Is Death the Way to the Truth?

I thoroughly enjoyed the last bit of reading we had on Plato's Phaedo. I really liked what Socrates had to say about death and how it isn't something to be feared or avoided. Socrates asks about death, "Is it anything than the separation of the soul from the body?" (12). With the answer being "no" Socrates goes on to explain that the body hinders the soul with it's physical needs and plain mortality in general. As a philosopher with no interest in the physical world or bodily pleasures, Socrates dismisses the idea that one cannot live without his body.

Socrates asserts that "The body confuses the soul and does not allow it to acquire truth and wisdom whenever it is associated with it" (14). His belief is that "if we are ever to have pure knowledge, we must escape from the body" (15). I find this extremely interesting to find that Socrates has distanced himself so far from the human world that he does not believe such physical pleasures worth his while. He is too far on his quest for the ultimate truth that he sees no other way to live.

The fact that Socrates is more concerned with wisdom than life connects back to his trial and his defense in saying he was not "teaching" the youth his beliefs. Of course. Why would he bother his mortal self, why distract himself, with such a physical privilege when he could be discovering the truth of the universe? Instead he argues that those willing to learn, listened to him. They sought him out.