It might perhaps be held that, on the Crito view, suicide would be wrong, if expressly forbidden by law. This is just how it is treated by Aristotle (Nicomachean Ethics 1138a9-13): it is illegal and therefore an offence against the state. However, no such argument is advanced here, nor would it show why suicide is 'forbidden' in the relevant sense. For this phrase (61cl0, d4, e5) strongly suggests a religious prohibition (cf. 'not holy', 62a6). To condemn suicide merely on account of its illegality would simply be to disregard the religious and moral questions it raises. For if suicide is sinful or morally wrong, presumably it is so whether it is legal or not.
The alternative translation at 62b4, 'garrison', would place suicide in a different light. It would then be viewed as desertion of a military post, and might be thought culpable as dereliction of duty or as cowardice. The latter notion appears in the Laws (873c7), in Aristotle (op.cit. 1116al2—14), and often in later literature. Clearly, however, many acts of self-destruction are not liable to the charge of cowardice. It is plainly inapplicable to altruistic self-sacrifice, to self-destruction on behalf of a worthy cause, and to the taking of one's own life to avoid morally worse alternatives. Even if 'suicide' were defined so as to exclude these cases, it would often remain debatable whether a charge of 'cowardice' was deserved. The word is itself a term of moral reproach. To apply it to conduct of any given kind is not to show why that conduct is morally wrong, but only to claim in a more specific way that it is so. Cebes' question why suicide is impermissible would not be answered, therefore, by branding it as 'cowardice', but would only be reopened in a more specific form.
(2) The reasoning at 62b6—c8 prefigures the Christian orthodoxy that life is given, and may therefore be taken away, only by God. Cf.67a6—'until God himself shall release us'. The doctrine raises radical difficulties for the relation between human action and the divine will. If all things are arranged by a cosmic Intelligence, as Socrates will later suggest (97c—d), then human actions, including suicides, would seem no more capable of counteracting its designs than anything else. If all men die in God's good time, how can suicide be condemned as a usurpation of His prerogative? On this view of the divine will, as Hume says: 'When I fall upon my own sword ... I receive my death equally from the hands of the Deity as if it had proceeded from a lion, a precipice, or a fever' (Essay on Suicide). On the other hand, if acts of suicide are conceived as successful contraventions of the divine will, how are they to be distinguished from other voluntary actions affecting the natural order of events, including those aimed at preserving human life? 'If I turn aside a stone which is falling upon my head, I disturb the course of nature, and I invade the peculiar province of the Almighty by lengthening out my life beyond the period which by the general laws of matter and motion he had assigned it' (Hume, ibid.). Since virtually any action might in this way be regarded as contravening the divine will, there would still be need to determine which kinds of action were impermissible, and whether suicide should be counted among them.
Socrates is not maintaining an absolute veto upon suicide. On the contrary, with the words 'until God sends some necessity, such as the one now before us' (c7—8), he implies that his own death will be self- inflicted. In his case, at least, self-destruction would be not merely permissible, but a religious duty. That such acts, when required by the state, were viewed by Plato as exceptions to the general rule is clear from the provisions for treatment of suicides in the Laws (873c—d). Indeed, a still broader range of exceptions is there envisaged, since a suicide is subject to punitive burial only if 'no state has required it of him, no stress of cruel and inevitable calamity driven him to the act, and he has been involved in no desperate and intolerable disgrace'. This is a far cry from the 'condemnation of suicide in every circumstance and form' for which Geddes (201) admires the present passage, but which is not to be found in it. Socrates is not denouncing suicide at large; he is trying to explain why the philosopher's desire for death would not justify him in procuring it for himself. See previous note.
'Kill' at 62c2 and 62c7 could possibly be interpreted, with Loriaux (69), to mean 'try to kill', on the ground that punishment proper could be inflicted only upon something still living. However, the words 'if you had any punishment at hand' (c3—4) are perhaps meant to concede that for a successful suicide no punishment would be practicable. Moreover, posthumous 'punishments', such as dishonouring the corpse, were sometimes imposed. No distinctive penalties in the afterlife are specified in the closing myth, although culpable acts of suicide would no doubt have been included among 'wrongful acts of killing' (113e, cf. Republic 615c), and punished accordingly.
On the whole subject see J. M. Rist, Stoic Philosophy (Cambridge, 1969), Ch.13, and, for a broader study, A. Alvarez, The Savage God (London, 1971).
2.2 Socrates' Defence (63e8—69e5)
This section contains a passionate apologia for the philosophic life. It resolves the contradiction with which Socrates had been faced. The philosopher's whole life is a preparation for death. He should therefore welcome death when it comes.
64c2—9. The translation 'death is something' (c2) preserves the Greek idiom. Less literally: 'there is such a thing as death'. Socrates means, non-technically, that 'death occurs' or 'there is death'. A 'Form' of Death will be needed later (105d9) but Socrates can hardly be referring to it here.
In defining death at 64c4—5 as 'the separation of the soul from the body', he seems to be treating it as the 'event' in which their separation is effected—cf.67d4, d9—10, and Gorgias 524b. At 64c5— 8, however, it is treated no longer as an 'event', but as the 'state' of 'being dead', the separated condition of soul and body. Cf.66e6— 67a2. See also note 4 and on 71d5-e3. It is to that 'state' that Socrates seems to refer when he asks at 64c8: 'Death can't be anything else but that, can it?'
Several difficulties arise here. (1) In what sense 'is there' such a thing as death? People die. But do they exist when dead? Or are 'the dead' simply those who no longer exist at all? Socrates avoids these questions by assuming that a living being is a body conjoined with a soul, and by defining death as the separation of one from the other. For a person to be dead is for his soul to be separated from his body and vice versa. This leaves it unclear what is the proper subject of the predicate 'dead'. Is it only the man who is to be called 'dead' when soul and body are parted, or may 'dead' be predicated of soul and body separately? See on 105el0-107al (p.221). Socrates will generally avoid speaking of 'dead souls'—although the soul is twice said to 'die' (77d4, 84b2)-perhaps because this would produce a conflict with the conclusion of the dialogue, that the soul is 'deathless': 'it won't admit death, nor will it be dead' (106b3-4). He will speak, rather, of 'the souls of the dead' (72a7, 72d9). But the question now arises whether 'the souls of the dead' exist.
(2) By defining death as he does, Socrates seems to prejudge this question in favour of the soul's survival. Hackforth (44, n.l) tries to defend him against this objection: 'all that Socrates here wants is an admission that we can properly think and speak of soul "apart" from body; whether soul continues to exist when thus apart is the question at issue.' However, 'being dead' is taken to include 'the soul's being apart, alone by itself, separated from the body'. From this definition, conjoined with the admission that there is such a thing as death (c2), it follows that the soul does exist apart from the body. If it did not, there would be no such thing as death, in the sense given to the word at 64c5—8. It therefore seems hard to acquit Socrates of prejudging the issue at this point. See also on 70c4—8 (p.106), 71al2—b5.