The human condition as a disease condition. An interpretation of Cebes’ objection and Socrates’ response in Phaedo La condición humana como condición de enfermedad. Una interpretación de la objeción de Cebes y la respuesta de Sócrates en El Fedón

Abstract

In ancient Greece, the concepts of “health” and
“illness” had very different meanings than those
we assign to them today. There are several texts
that show the particularities and diversity of
meanings that the Greeks gave to these terms,
among these texts, Plato’s famous dialogue entitled
“Phaedo” stands out. In this dialogue,
whose central theme is the story of the death
of Socrates, Plato presents a discussion between
Socrates and Cebes, which revolves around the
problem of the nature of the soul and, more
precisely, the nature of the soul in the human
condition. There, Socrates and Cebes discuss
the problem of whether the soul is imperishable
and the effects that incarnating the body in the
human figure brings to it. In this article, I address
this discussion, my objective is to defend
the following thesis: both Cebes and Socrates
consider that the soul, when it forms unity with
the body in the human figure, is in a condition
of illness. To do this, I will carry out a hermeneutical
analysis of Cebes’s objection and Socrates’
response to this objection.