The Myth of the Cave

3 Let's turn our attention to Plato's philosophy. Let's start with another generous dialogue. Next is the so-called cave myth that is a cave fable. This is a very famous section of book 7 of the Republic. People living in the underground cave have a way from one to the other, but imagine the exit is long. These men are there since they were children and their necks and legs are tied up so they stay on the spot and can only head straight ahead. Their bonds prevented them from turning their heads. Fire burns upward from far away, light falls down. Between the fire and the prisoners there is a way through the width of the cave in front of the lower wall like the front of the puppet theater, as if hiding the performers. Show them their dolls. - I understand. (514A to B)

There is an old and solemn omen in this unconscious behavioral ideology. Plato's cave myth. In the first part, people were imprisoned in the cave since childhood. Because these prisoners are tied up so that their feet and necks are fixed, we do not look around the cave, but look at their front walls in front of each other. They can see shadows cast on the walls of the caves in front of them, they listen to the sound from there. An important background metaphor is that it has not been imprisoned since childhood (education, television, video games, other critics may not agree). In the cave myth of Socrates, the prisoner was unaware that what he saw was the shadow of the object in front of the fire. Needless to say, these objects are inspired by genuine creatures outside the cave. And they can get a refund of the movie they saw.

The goal depicted by Socrates is to have knowledge and understanding of the world that people can understand; once again mythical cave explains what Socrates wants to convey. According to the cave myths, humans live in a visible world, so humans should see a world that they can understand. Therefore, Socrates wishes to guide the human race to an understandable world by teaching the truth. That is the goal of Socrates. Moses' goal is to lead people to the promised land. According to God, if people follow the rules of the Ten Commandments, they can go to the promised land, so Moses will teach the teachings of God. The purpose of Jesus is to lead people to the kingdom of heaven and teach the meaning of the Ten Commandments rationally. So he loved God, loved your neighbor, loved your enemies, and taught people to explain the Ten Commandments more clearly. There is a difference between Moses and Jesus. Even though Moses does not understand the meaning of the Ten Commandments, he teaches the Ten Commandments.