Plato's views are called idealism by professionals. — frank

There are different schools of thought. There are also many scholars who avoid the use of anachronistic terminology. The idea is, to the extent it is possible, to understand an author on his own terms using his own terminology.

I'm trying to understand why that's significant to you. — frank

As a general interpretive principle I think it best to minimize the use of anachronistic terminology.

So, what do you mean when you say Socrates 'demystifies' these virtues etc? — Wayfarer

... moderation and justice and courage and thoughtfulness itself are nothing but a kind of purifier.

It is this kind of purification that is needed for those who arrive in Hades.

I think it’s better described as objective idealism. That is, Ideas or Forms are real, in that they’re not dependent on your or my mind, but they’re only graspable by a rational intelligence. — Wayfarer

Why call it idealism at all? Is everything that is grasped by a rational intelligence a form of idealism? Is mathematics a form of idealism?

In the Idealism article. — frank

The article continues:

"Although we have just referred to Plato, the term “idealism” became the name for a whole family of positions in philosophy only in the course of the eighteenth century."

Yes, it's ontological idealism. — frank

Neither term existed then.

I don't agree that his intent is to demystify. — Wayfarer

Here are the quoted terms from 69c-d in context and bolded, starting with what I quoted above with a break in the paragraph. It is one paragraph though without a break.

… maybe this alone is the right coin for virtue, the coin for which all things must be exchanged - thoughtfulness. Maybe this is the genuine coin for which and with which all things must be bought and sold; and maybe courage and moderation and justice and true virtue as a whole are only when accompanied by thoughtfulness, regardless of whether pleasures and terrors and all other such things are added or subtracted … and maybe moderation and justice and courage and thoughtfulness itself are nothing but a kind of purifier.

And it looks as if these people who initiated our mythic rites weren't a bunch of bunglers but spoke with a genuine hidden meaning when they said long ago that whoever arrives in Hades ignorant of the mysteries and uninitiated will lie in Muck, but he who arrives there purified and initiated will dwell with gods.

The purification is as he identifies it, moderation and justice and courage and thoughtfulness.

78c-79a, 80b)

In due time.

Demystify that! — Wayfarer

Socrates has done it for me, but I do not want to get ahead of myself.

Plato was neither a realist nor idealist. The terms were not used and do not fit. What we take to be the real world was said to be an image of the Forms. The Forms are independent of the human mind.

Idealism vs realism, yes. — frank

I think this is anachronistic.

In fact, I think there's a kind of 'anti-Christian' bias that is often at play - the wish to deny the religious or metaphysical dimension in the dialogues so as to project the kind of Plato that is more harmonious with this secular age. — Wayfarer

The following from my last posted reading:

… maybe this alone is the right coin for virtue, the coin for which all things must be exchanged - thoughtfulness. Maybe this is the genuine coin for which and with which all things must be bought and sold; and maybe courage and moderation and justice and true virtue as a whole are only when accompanied by thoughtfulness, regardless of whether pleasures and terrors and all other such things are added or subtracted … and maybe moderation and justice and courage and thoughtfulness itself are nothing but a kind of purifier. (69 b-c)

Socrates demystifies “mystic rites”, “genuine hidden meaning”, “mysteries”, and “purification”. (69c-d) The practice of dying and being dead turns out to be the practice of a life of moderation and justice and courage. — Fooloso4

For Plato, and others, there is a something more... a reification fo the use of "equal" — Banno

In my opinion, which is certainly not original, the Forms are themselves images rather than, as he says, what things are images of. But that is a discussion for another time.

I find it odd that Cebes seems convinced by the argument at (72 b-d). — Banno

I will be addressing his eagerness to agree in my next section. As I see it, it has little or nothing to do with the strength of the argument.

Gotta love a cliffhanger... — Banno

I would throw in some sex but Socrates already said the philosopher has not interest. Although, as I mentioned, at seventy years old he had a young son.

Wayfarer already answered that. It isn't my fault that you don't read other people's posts. — Apollodorus

Actually I read it. And I responded. It is your fault for not reading other people's posts.

The Republic 509D-513E — Apollodorus

This does not support your claim of a Cosmic Mind

I am not surprised to see this in Apollodorus, having observed a habit of first forming a conclusion and then looking for the arguments that might support it. — Banno

The same occurred to me but decided not to give him something else to turn into an extended rant about Marxism and liberals.

I think part of the attraction to Plato is the lack of interpretative consensus. Each year, after all this time, hundreds of books and articles are published on Plato. One would think that if a consensus existed none of that would be necessary.

Thank you.

Many Platonists today look to Plato for religious and quasi-religious answers,often of the Christian variety.

Plato naturally preferred to convey his teachings orally — Apollodorus

We know nothing of his oral teachings. I asked you to provide authentication of any oral teaching. You could not.

You seem to deny both the scholarly consensus and the Platonic tradition itself. — Apollodorus

I deny that there is a scholarly consensus. The fact that you think there is shows that you really do not know what is going on today.

There has been an important reappraisal in the way the dialogues are read. Influential figures are Jacob Klein and Leo Strauss, and his students including Alan Bloom, Stanley Rosen, Thomas Pangle, and Seth Benardete, and their students, including Charles Griswold, Rhonna Burger, David Roochnik, Laurence Lampert , and many others.

then you can read into the dialogues anything you like and you don't need a discussion. — Apollodorus

It is evident that you have not been reading what I have written and have not checked it against the text. You have not made even one specific textual comment on anything I have said. Show me where what I have said cannot be confirmed by the text. I asked you to provide textual evidence for your claim but you have not been able to. Instead of point to Plato's texts you cast about elsewhere.

Socrates wraps up his defense by saying:

… maybe this alone is the right coin for virtue, the coin for which all things must be exchanged - thoughtfulness. Maybe this is the genuine coin for which and with which all things must be bought and sold; and maybe courage and moderation and justice and true virtue as a whole are only when accompanied by thoughtfulness, regardless of whether pleasures and terrors and all other such things are added or subtracted … and maybe moderation and justice and courage and thoughtfulness itself are nothing but a kind of purifier. (69 b-c)

Socrates demystifies “mystic rites”, “genuine hidden meaning”, “mysteries”, and “purification”. (69c-d) The practice of dying and being dead turns out to be the practice of a life of moderation and justice and courage.

Cebes breaks in:

Socrates, the rest seems to me to be beautifully put, but what you say about the soul induces a lot of distrust in human beings. They fear that the soul, once she is free of the body, is no longer anywhere, and is destroyed and perishes on that very day when a human being dies; and that as soon as she’s free of the body and departs, then, scattered like breath or smoke, she goes fluttering off and is no longer anywhere. Of course, if she could be somewhere, herself by herself, collected together and freed from those evils you went through just now, there'd be a great hope - a beautiful hope - that what you say, Socrates, is true. But this point that the soil is when the human being dies and holds onto both some power and thoughtfulness - probably stands in need of more than a little persuasive talk and assurance.(70a)

Cebes hopefulness amounts to saying that if what Socrates says, that the soul is somewhere herself by herself, is true then is true. Cebes states it in such a way that the latter follows as a conclusion from the former, but both state the same thing.

Socrates responds:

What you say is true, Cebes, but now what should we do? Or do you want us to tell a more thorough story about these things to see whether what we’re saying is likely or not?” (70a-b)

Socrates proposes telling a more thorough story in order to see if the stories he has told are likely or not. He shifts from Cebes ‘true’ to ‘likely’. He proposes to “investigate it in some such was as this”. (70c)

… do the souls of men exist in Hades when they have died, or do they not? Now there's an
ancient doctrine, which we've recalled, that they do exist in that world, entering it from this one, and that they re-enter this world and are born again from the dead; yet if this is so, if living people are born again from those who have died, surely our souls would have to exist in that world? Because they could hardly be born again, if they didn't exist; so it would be sufficient evidence for the truth of these claims, if it really became plain that living people are born from the dead and from nowhere else; but if that isn't so, some other argument would be needed.' (70c-d)

But, of course, some other argument is needed. The living come from the living. The argument that life comes from death requires a soul that does not come to be or die. Now perhaps a soul separate from the senses, a priori, might think that the living come from the dead, but our experience informs us that we are born of living parents.

Socrates now shifts from living things to beauty and ugly, just and unjust, larger and smaller. It should be noted that he mentions justice and beauty but not the good. According to the argument, doing good would result in doing bad. (70e)

In the Republic Socrates says that the Good: "provides the truth to the things known and gives the power to the one who knows". It is "the cause of the knowledge and truth". Further, "existence and being" are the result of the Good. (508e - 509b)

The argument from opposites concludes with the claim that this movement must be circular:

And similarly, my dear Cebes, if all things that partake in life were to die, but when they'd died, the dead remained in that form, and didn't come back to life, wouldn't it be quite inevitable that everything would ultimately be dead, and nothing would live? Because if the living things came to be from the other things, but the living things were to die, what could possibly prevent everything from being completely spent in being dead?' (72 b-d)

Perhaps Cebes is persuaded by this, but it assumes what is still to be proven, the continuation of the soul in death, and ignores the obvious fact of generation of life from the living.

'Yes, and besides, Socrates,' Cebes replied, 'there's also that argument you're always putting forward, that our learning is actually nothing but recollection; according to that too, if it's true, what we are now reminded of we must have learned at some former time. But that would be impossible, unless our souls existed somewhere before being born in this human form; so in this way too, it appears that the soul is something deathless.' (72e-73a)

Two points to be noted here. Socrates just went through this long argument from opposites, how life comes from death, but if the soul is deathless then it could not come to be or become again from its opposite.

Second, note the qualification: “if it is true”. Simmias does not share Cebes enthusiasm. He does not place his hope in the possibility that it might be true. He wants to be reminded of the demonstrations that it is true. There is a play here between recollection and remembering.

'One beautiful argument,' said Cebes, 'is that when people are questioned, and if the questions are well put, they state the truth about everything for themselves-and yet unless knowledge and a correct account were present within them, they'd be unable to do this; thus, if one takes them to diagrams or anything else of that sort, one has there the plainest evidence that this is so.' (73b)

He is referring to the demonstration in the Meno where a slave without any education is able to solve a complex geometric problem. Cebes mentions but seems to fail to recognize the importance of Socrates’ “well put” questions. Without them the slave would have never “recollected” the solution. The irony here should not go unnoticed. An overarching question of the dialogue is about teaching and learning. Socrates teaches him how to solve the problem and yet claims it was recollection. This is not the place to get into it, but the difference between Meno’s problem, teaching virtue to someone like Meno who is lacking in virtue and teaching someone geometry is very different. There is a sense in which virtue must already be in the soul if one is ever to be virtuous, but it is not evident that the same holds for mathematical knowledge.

Socrates breaks in:

'But if that doesn't convince you, Simmias, then see whether maybe you agree if you look at it this way. Apparently you doubt whether what is called "learning" is recollection?'

'I don't doubt it,' said Simmias; 'but I do need to undergo just what the argument is about, to be "reminded". Actually, from the way Cebes set about stating it, I do almost recall it and am nearly
convinced; but I'd like, none the less, to hear now how you set about stating it yourself.'

'I'll put it this way. We agree, I take it, that if anyone is to be reminded of a thing, he must have known that thing at some time previously.'

'Certainly.'

'Then do we also agree on this point: that whenever knowledge comes to be present in this sort of way, it is recollection?

He goes on to give an example of recollection:

'Well now, you know what happens to lovers, whenever they see a lyre or cloak or anything else their loves are accustomed to use: they recognize the lyre, and they get in their mind, don't they, the form of the boy whose lyre it is? And that is recollection. Likewise, someone seeing Simmias is often reminded of Cebes, and there'd surely be countless other such cases.'(73b-d)

There seems to be no distinction here between recollection and being reminded of something. In the example given recollection is independent of stories of death. Socrates now shifts from things perceived to “the equal itself”. (74a).

'But still, it is from those equals, different as they are from that equal, that you have thought of and got the knowledge of it?' (74c)

It is through the combination of sense and thought that we perceive that things are equal. That this is either based on or leads to recollection of “the equal itself” is questionable.

'Then we must previously have known the equal, before that time when we first, on seeing the equals, thought that all of them were striving to be like the equal but fell short of it. (75a)

All that is necessary to see how implausible this is is to consider how we learned what it means for things to be equal. But Socrates’ concern is not simply with the equal:

Because our present argument concerns the beautiful itself, and the good itself, and just and holy, no less than the equal; in fact, as I say, it concerns everything on which we set this seal, "what it is", in the questions we ask and in the answers we give. (75d)

Can the earlier argument for opposites be reconciled with “the beautiful itself”, “the good itself”, and “the just itself”? What each is itself does not allow for its opposite.

As Socrates wraps up this argument we should not overlook a difficulty that is introduced but only developed later:

Just as sure as these beings are, so also our soul is (76e)

The problem is that “the beautiful itself”, “the good itself”, and “the just itself” are each one and distinct from things we call beautiful, good, and just. If the soul is in the same way they are then “the soul itself” exists, and my soul and your soul are like the things that are beautiful, good, and just, things that admit of their opposite. Things that come to be and pass away.

In the Seventh Letter Plato says:

There is no treatise (suggramma) by me on these subjects, nor will there ever be. (341c)
— Fooloso4

That's precisely why I pointed out that in the Greek philosophical tradition, teachings were transmitted orally. — Apollodorus

Oh. really. You said:

It is clear from Plato’s writings ... — Apollodorus

It cannot clear from his writings if he did not write what he actually thought about such things.

Has an oral tradition ever been authenticated?

Even if there is no "treatise" by Plato, certain core teachings must be acknowledged ... — Apollodorus

The core teaching of Plato is not in the form of a doctrine. He teaches those who are thoughtful and perspicacious enough how to philosophize. To the careful reader he does not provide answers, although there are plenty of things he says that can be latched onto as answers. This dynamic plays out in the dialogue, as we shall see.

... if you do want to have a discussion of Plato ... — Apollodorus

I am not going to allow you to dictate how I will proceed in this thread. I will follow Plato's lead, attending to what is said and done in the the dialogue in the order it occurs. It is only once we have seen the whole that we can see how everything fits together, with each part serving its purpose.

I find that every time I read the dialogues I find something new and different.
— Fooloso4

That makes the whole discussion kind of pointless, doesn't it? What happens if following the closure of the discussion you decide to find "new and different things" in the texts? — Apollodorus

It does not make it pointless. It simply means that there is more there then I have seen. It is not a matter of "deciding" to find something new and different things. If they are there to be found I consider myself fortunate to have found them and revise my interpretation accordingly.

Plato and his disciples didn’t call themselves “Platonists” or their system “Platonism” so the designation is irrelevant. — Apollodorus

And yet that was the designation you used.

What matters is that this was a living tradition that was transmitted orally from master to disciple for centuries after Plato. — Apollodorus

That may be what matters to you. What matters to me is the dialogues themselves. I have no interest a Platonist cult.

Its representatives didn’t think they were just “influenced” by Plato, they believed and had reasons to believe that they followed Plato in all his main teachings. — Apollodorus

Well, if what you claimed is an example of following his main teachings then they thought wrong.

It is clear from Plato’s writings ... — Apollodorus

In the Seventh Letter Plato says:

There is no treatise (suggramma) by me on these subjects, nor will there ever be. (341c)

Did I misunderstand you when you said you "need to cut out".

@frank

I would like for you to stick around. This tread was started in part because of things you said about Plato and the soul.

Images from Phaedo have gone deep into my thoughts since I first read it. — frank

That, it seems to me, would be a good reason to read it again. I find that every time I read the dialogues I find something new and different. Certainly I do not the Phaedo now the same way I did when I first read it.

There will be seat-sales, when Armageddon strikes. — god must be atheist

As I understand it, they have all been reserved by the elect. Not even standing room for the likes of me.

Not necessarily. What kind of things might that be? Wouldn't an anti-Platonic approach also lead to misattributions or and perhaps even more so? — Apollodorus

You are confusing terminology. Platonism and Platonic are not the same. "Anti-Platonic" would presumably mean against Plato. The result may well be misattributions or misinterpretations.

Philosophical systems do evolve over time. — Apollodorus

The dialogues are not a philosophical system and do not evolve. How the dialogues are read and interpreted change over time. The reliability of any of those interpretations can only be evaluated in light of the dialogues themselves.

Platonism is generally consistent with Plato's writings, that's why it's called Platonism — Apollodorus

This is simply wrong. It is called Platonism because it was influenced by Plato. It is not consistent with his writings. Nowhere in Plato do we find your assertion about the individual mind being illumined by the cosmic or divine Mind and the rest.

Plato is best interpreted in the Platonic tradition of Plotinus and others. — Apollodorus

Platonism is an impediment to understanding Plato. You end up attributing things to Plato that are nowhere to be found in the dialogues.

If you choose a different standpoint then it might help to let us know what it is. — Apollodorus

It is not a matter of a standpoint but of letting the dialogues stand on their own. In the Phaedrus Socrates says about a written composition:

Every part must be put together like a living creature, with a body of its own; it must be neither without head nor without legs; and it must have a middle and extremities that are fitting both to one another and to the whole work. (264c)

The dialogue should be read as a whole, with each part having a function within that whole.

If you want to read Plotinus you would do well to read Plato, but not the other way around.

At death, desire is lost. — Amity

The irony is that on the one hand the desire will be fulfilled, one will be able to see the truth unencumbered by the body. On the other, if philosophy is the desire for wisdom rather than its possession there would be no philosophizing in Hades.

So, Plato in giving us an understanding of who Socrates was, gives several versions of what he actually thinks ? Talk about getting to the 'truth'... — Amity

In the Second Letter Plato says that the Socrates of the dialogues is made "young and beautiful", which can also be translated as "new and noble".

Ideas of the soul - of afterlife - of life and death - all 'images' or 'imagination' or mere speculation as in a story...? — Amity

Reading and thinking along we become involved in speculation, but Plato provides the images and stories.

Does he actually believe what he is saying, or is it simply a matter of consolation... — Amity

Before deciding whether we think he believes what he is saying, we have to figure out what it is he is saying. There may be more to it than at first appears.

If Socrates wants to inspire and for philosophy to continue, then he must offer hope in the very act of practising philosophy. — Amity

Yes! He will have much more to say about this.

Bearing in mind the later arguments about the fate of the soul and of philosophers and ‘good men’, — Wayfarer

Yes, we will have to look a those arguments and whether they succeed or fail. This is why I ended my last reading this way:

And if these things are not true then rather than great hope there is a danger of a loss of hope. Knowledge of the just, the beautiful, and the good hang on the fate of the soul. — Fooloso4

As a matter of expression in Greek, the use of "δια" to nous and logos are not far away from the nouns and verbs by themselves. — Valentinus

Right. The prefix "δια" here means by or through, thus dianoia (διανοία)/i] through thought and dialectic through speech.

So to say that ‘the real can only be discerned by thought’ doesn’t convey what depth of the ‘idea of the good’, — Wayfarer

Once again, according to the dialogue knowledge of the good can only be attained in death if at all.

'So isn't it in reasoning, if anywhere at all, that any of the things that are become manifest to it?' (65b)

Noesis is not reasoning. It is direct apprehension.

...the presumption is still that things are guided by intelligence, not by merely material causes. — Wayfarer

Right, but that is very different from what Apollodorus is claiming. I will have more to say about this section when I get there.

Typically wealthy people and organizations generally work together and coordinate with government agencies. At the very least they do not regard all government as the enemy as you seem to. No private entity has the ability to organize and implement on the massive scale of countries like the US.

The individual nous is in turn illumined by the Cosmic Nous or Divine Mind. So, there is a continuum extending from Ultimate Reality all the way down to the lowest levels of experience or existence. — Apollodorus

In which of the dialogues does Plato say this?

True, and explicated in detail in the Republic, Analogy of the Divided Line, more so than the Phaedo. However the general point of nous as 'the faculty which sees what truly is', is certainly relevant across all the dialogues. — Wayfarer

The Phaedo tells a different story than the Republic.It is certainly useful to compare the dialogues, but what is said in one cannot be substituted for what is said in another. Each must be read on its own as a whole. It is not explicated in the Phaedo because it is not there. As Socrates said, quoted above:

… if we can know nothing purely in the body's company, then one of two things must be true: either knowledge is nowhere to be gained, or else it is for the dead. (66e)

It appears that the world is to be 'seen' by thought alone.
— Amity

I think the key word is 'nous' - — Wayfarer

Amity is right. The passage under discussion is not about noesis but rather dianoia, thought or reason.

The questions of duality. Is it even possible to be a 'genuine' philosopher if it means turning away from body to soul ( or mind ) ... I think not. — Amity

I agree.

However, I am not sure that that is what Socrates is saying. — Amity

Some readers are all too quick to reject. We need 'as far as possible' to figure out what he means. This often requires going beyond isolated statements. I think it is a good practice when you come across something questionable to note it, postpone judgment, keep in mind the circumstances, and see how things develop. With the dialogues it is always important to look not only at what is said but at what is done.

He qualifies everything with 'as far as possible'. — Amity

Socrates' many qualifications are important. How far is it possible to turn away from the body? The qualification 'it seems' and its variations are frequent.

Nevertheless, there is a focus on abstract concepts such as 'Beauty' compared to the experience of seeing things that are beautiful — Amity

The Forms differ from the things of experience but they are not abstract concepts or objects of the mind. They are said to be "things themselves by themselves". This formulation is used with regard to the soul. What this means will be discussed.

What is the 'soul' ? — Amity

Good question.Socrates gets Simmias to agree before they even raise the question.

I think, if there is such a thing, it would involve the bodily senses — Amity

In that case the soul would not endure separate from the body.

What are 'the things that are' or 'that which is' - things that exist ? — Amity

The Forms.

Concepts such as 'Beauty' don't exist by themselves, do they ? — Amity

Concepts do not exist by themselves. They require thought or mind. But Beauty is not a concept. It's existence is independent of the mind. Things are beautiful to the extent they are images of Beauty itself.

Philosophy can be just as much an impure distraction as anything else... — Amity

In the Symposium Socrates says that the love of wisdom is eros, desire. Philosophy then cannot be freedom from desire if it is motivated by desire.

In the Apology Socrates suggests two possibilities of what happens in death:

to be dead is one of two things: either the dead person is nothing and has no perception of anything, or [death] happens to be, as it is said, a change and a relocation or the soul from this place here to another place (40c).

In the Phaedo Socrates is silent about the first possibility. He wishes to leave his friends with a message of hope, but if death is nothingness then despite the attempt to portray the end of his life as a comedy it is a tragedy. The practice of dying and being dead cannot be the practice of nothingness. That practice must take into account both possibilities. If there are rewards and punishments, one must live a just life and be rewarded rather than punished. And if there is nothing after life then one should live life for its own rewards rather than live in expectation of what may never be. Here too it is the practice of justice, for the just soul according to the Republic is the healthy soul, in proper harmony with itself.

If we heed the words of Parmenides that “out of nothing comes nothing”, then if a dead person is nothing and out of nothing comes nothing, there can be no rebirth.

But a problem that must be faced in the Phaedo is fear of death. One has it within their power to live in such a way as to avoid fear of punishment for wrongdoing in death. What about the fear of nothingness? Here the practice may involve meditation along the lines of Epictetus:

Why should I fear death? If I am, then death is not. If Death is, then I am not.

Simmias laughs at Socrates claim that philosophy is the practice of dying and being dead:

'Goodness, Socrates, you've made me laugh, even though I wasn't much inclined to laugh just now. l imagine that most people, on hearing that, would think it very well said of philosophers-and our own countrymen would quite agree-that they are, indeed, verging on death, and that they, at any rate, are well aware that this is what philosophers deserve to undergo.' (64b)

The only good philosopher is a dead philosopher.

Socrates defines death:

'And that it is nothing but the separation of the soul from the body? And that being dead is this: the body's having come to be apart, separated from the soul, alone by Itself, and the soul's being apart, alone by itself, separated from the body? Death can't be anything else but that, can it?' (64c)

Simmias agrees with Socrates’ claim, but we should not be so quick to agree. The question of the soul is the very thing that will be the focus of the discussion. Death may simply be, as Socrates said in the Apology, annihilation. The idea of the soul itself by itself will be questioned.

Socrates then proceeds to make an argument for asceticism:

And certainly Simmias, most human beings are of the opinion that the man for whom none of these things is pleasant and who doesn’t have a share of them doesn’t deserve to live. In fact, the man who thinks nothing of the pleasures that come through the body is pretty much headed for death. (65a)

It is not Socrates who thinks this, it is the opinion of most human beings. So what is the opinion of Socrates who is quite literally headed for death? We are provided with a piece of evidence near the beginning: Xantippe is there with his little boy (60a). A seventy year old man with a young son is hardly a man who eschews the pleasure of sex.

Socrates asks:

So when does the soul get in touch with truth?

Isn’t it in her act of reasoning, if anywhere, that something of the things that are becomes very clear to her? (65b-c)

Socrates now introduces his “Socratic Trinity”, the Just, the Beautiful, and the Good. (65d) But he says nothing of them, and for very good reason:

… if we can know nothing purely in the body's company, then one of two things must be true: either knowledge is nowhere to be gained, or else it is for the dead. (66e)

This is at odds with the Republic and the story of knowledge of the Forms. But of course those philosophers who had knowledge of "the Forms themselves by themselves" only existed in a city made in speech. A city that is the soul writ large. An image of the soul found in an image of the city. A fine example of Plato’s poesis.

Now if the soul is reborn this is not a problem. In fact, it is an essential part of the myth of anamnesis, that is, knowledge through recollection. But if death is the end then knowledge of such things is not possible.

“Then”, said Socrates, “if these things are true, my comrade, there’s great hope that when I arrive at the end of my journey, there - if anywhere - I shall sufficiently attain what our constant business in our bygone life has been for. (67b)

And if these things are not true then rather than great hope there is a danger of a loss of hope. Knowledge of the just, the beautiful, and the good hang on the fate of the soul.

That they're examples of the Ur-religion of the Ancient Greeks, — Wayfarer

Socrates does make use of mythologies as a means of persuasion, both stories of old and new ones he makes up, but this does not mean that he is persuaded by these stories. Regarding knowledge he demands logos not muthos, that is, not simply stories but the ability to give an account of what is said that can be defended against elenchus.

Philosophy is 'preparing for death' by letting go of the passions and attachments, as Socrates demonstrates by his calm demeanour. — Wayfarer

Yes, I think that this is part of it.

I don't know but it reminded me of something else - perhaps the Stoics. — Amity

I will have something to say about this in the next section. Part of the Stoic practice of philosophy involved meditations on death.

I think he is just trying to encourage his anxious young men that because they are philosophical they will be ready to die when the time comes. Not to fear it or to grieve his passing. He is setting an example of how to approach death with the right attitude. — Amity

I agree. His arguments are rhetorical, intended to persuade, give them courage, and alleviate their fears.

If this play is to be a comedy then crying and weeping are to be dispatched.
— Fooloso4

No. It's a tragicomedy. — Amity

A tragedy is about the protagonist's downfall. But instead of the end of his life being a downfall
Socrates makes it seem as if it is a journey of hope. A happy ending and new beginning.

But I think you are right. No life is either one or the other, but a mixture.