airly evident that many of PlatoÆs and SocratesÆ contemporaries did think that SocratesÆ ôphilosophicalö acceptance of his sentence amounted to a form of suicide. Otherwise, why would Plato have dealt with this question at such length in both the Crito and the Phaedo? This is a question that continues to be debated by theologians, classicists, ethicists, and many others. It too is not a question that can be resolved in a paper of this small scope.
It has sometimes been argued or assumed that SocratesÆ death was a ônoble suicide,ö a martyrdom intended to defend freedom of thought and inquiry against the tyranny of the majority, or some such rot. In this sort of argument, Socrates is often compared to Jesus, and it is alleged that both voluntarily sacrificed themselves for the good of mankind. All of this raises issues that likewise cannot be gone into here, but they are raised for the sake of emphasizing that no such assumption is being made here.
Even if one does not know what the alternatives might have been, one can still see that a Father who to an
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