Men would say of him that up he went and down he came without his eyes; and that it was better not even to think of ascending; and if any one tried to loose another and lead him up to the light, let them only catch the offender, and they would put him to death,” so said Plato in The Republic. In his thought experiment, Plato's Cave, Plato spoke of a prisoner who gets enlightened, but nobody listens to this prisoner, and they even threaten to kill him if he decides to enlighten anyone else. To Plato, this prisoner was Socrates and he was put to death for doing the same: spreading his beliefs and trying to enlighten Athens. Plato was not the only who felt this way about Socrates, for over time, people around the world have also begun to feel this way. Socrates, a brilliant philosopher and creator of the Socratic irony and Socratic Method, was put to death for his views on morality, politics, and religion. What is surprising is the fact that he was sentenced to death by a democratic government governed by the people. Over time, people have begun to understand the lack of justice involved in the sentence and to provide sympathy for the plight of Socrates, sympathy he was denied during his time.
To understand the trial of Socrates, one also needs to understand the criminal procedures in Athens. In democratic Athens, there was no public prosecutor. Judicial hearings could be initiated by any citizen, as was in the case of Socrates. A citizen would deliver an oral summons to an accused. Then, the accused would appear before a legal magistrate to answer his charges. Once the legal magistrate determined, after having listened to both the accuser and the accused, that the lawsuit was permissible under Athenian law, a date was set for the preliminary hearing. The preliminary hearing began with the reading and answering of the charges. The magistrate would then question both the accuser and the accused and following that, they were allowed to question each other. The last part of the preliminary hearing consisted of the magistrate reading the formal charges and a date was set for the public trial.
The public trial took place in the people's court in front of a jury anywhere from 500 to 1501 volunteers. The Athenian thought was: Who could afford to bribe so many people? Members of the jury were required to take an oath where they swore by the gods of Zeus, Apollo, and Demeter. The trial itself began with the reading of the charges and then the prosecution presented its evidence, though there were little formal rules of evidence. After the prosecution's argument, the defendant had three hours to answer the argument in what was called an “apology.” Following the arguments, the jurors then had to make their decision. Considering the size of the jury, it would be very hard to obtain a unanimous decision. Instead, the jurors voted on the guilt or innocence of the defendant, with a majority vote being necessary for conviction. If the defendant is convicted, as was in the case of Socrates, then the phase of punishment commenced. The prosecution and the defendant each proposed a punishment and the jury chooses between the two punishments (This is still part of the apology). Thus, this was how a trial in Athens got carried through.
Socrates was a very well-known Athenian during his time, though not necessarily well-liked. His Socratic method was greatly resented by the key thinkers of his time, for he easily debunked their wisdom with his questioning. Furthermore, he was a critic of democracy, even having said that in no other government could a craftsman be elected. This drew suspicion from the Athenian democrats, especially since many of his associates were also critics of democracy. Finally, he had religious views that were considered inappropriate for his time. He made several references to a daimonion, which he claimed was his personal spirit. He said that it warned him against certain events and is generally understood today as intuition. However, the people of Athens believed that by affirming one's belief in a daimonion, one has rejected the state religion. Socrates further caused religious controversy when he claimed that the concept of goodness was not determined by the gods, but actually preceded it; Socrates was the one who actually proposed the Euthyphro dilemma. All of this eventually amounted to Socrates being charged with corrupting the youths of Athens and impiety.
Socrates' primary accuser was Meletus, a poet, and along with Alytus and Lycon, they formed the prosecution. Both Alytus and Lycon had personal reason for disliking Socrates; for the bisexual Socrates had relationships with their sons. After the preliminary hearing, the trial began with a 501 member jury. The prosecution presented its argument against Socrates, but no record of the argument survived. Socrates then had to answer the charges in his apology. Although there were many accounts of Socrates' apology, only two survived: the one by Plato and the other by Xenophon. Both Plato and Xenophon were students and admirers of Socrates, and for this reason, they probably wanted to portray their master in a very favorable light. In doing so, their accounts of Socrates' apology were probably biased and they very likely did not include the most damning evidence against Socrates. However, those are the only extant copies of Plato's apology.
