Expanding on the Topic of Justice in Plato’s Republic

Throughout the book The Republic Plato, Socrates, and the rest of their peers constantly discuss what justice is. Spanning over the course of several chapters, they compare what an ideal city would be like and how the ordering of the city is the same as the ordering of the soul while trying to find what justice truly is and how to tell.

One of the main points that Plato brings up about justice is that no one lives a just life voluntarily. In a world with no consequences, one would choose to do whatever makes them happy rather than whatever is “just”. Socrates tells his students about the myth of the ring of Gyges, where say two men find magic rings that can turn you invisible, they would do whatever they wanted because they would choose their desires. To find out if a man is truly just, there would have to be no consequences for their actions, from taking away punishments for crime, taking away the reputation of the just man, and even taking away the consequences for where a man would go after death as a result for finding the ring and whatever he would do with it, justice could then be seen by the men’s actions.

By taking away everything, “despite doing nothing wrong, he must have the worst possible reputation for injustice. Then if unaffected by disgrace and its consequences, the purity of his justice will have been tested in the fire” (41). By taking away all labels, the worries about a self-fulfilling prophecy about if a man in just or unjust disappears. The main point is that justice is not something you do with other people, justice is a matter of you reconstructing your own soul. Rightly ordering your internal self, so when you go through the world and leave the world, because you have been internally ordered, you will have lived a just life. This is the moral of the story for not only the ring of Gyges but for the whole book and its views of justice. To be simply putThey say that it is the origin and essential nature of justice that is a compromise between the best case, which is doing wrong and getting away with it, and the worst case, which is being wronged and being unable to retaliate. Justice, being half-way between these two extremes, is not a prized good; it finds its value merely in people’s want of power to do wrong (39). Through his definition of justice, Plato’s thoughts about injustice become that injustice is preferred when it helps people get what they want.

Through the divisions of the human soul there was reason, spirit, and appetite. With reason came wisdom, with spirit came courage with a lesser amount of wisdom, and then finally appetite, which comes with temperance. These three aspects of the human soul reflect the city, with the three classes of virtuous rulers, virtuous warriors, and temperate producers. Justice reigns when people stay in their lanes and acknowledge the lane system of the divisions of people. This is why the myth of the metals would be created. This is an important lie that would take a few generations to settle in with one of the main roles being to give everyone in society a role. In it the people will be told they are made of certain metals, either gold, silver, orbronze and iron and whichever medal you are made from would determine your future. This takes away the aspect of competition to a point because when people believe that it is their destiny to be a farmer, or a blacksmith, or a warrior, than that gives you a sense of pride to be fulfilling your destiny. Through schooling the children are sorted out and the gold children are taken away for higher training. Gold children are born to gold parents, silver children to silver parents, and so on, but there can be exceptions where two bronze parents can havea gold child, in that case the child would be taken away for special training for their inevitable path as a leader. In each person there are the three qualities mentioned earlier, but whichever quality is the most dominant is who you are. The importance of the myth of metals in the city is that it reinforces the wisdom and reason directed towards the gods. Through the myth of the metals the new leaders and warriors are chosen but there are bound to be mistakes which is where the different types of government types. In describing the ideal city they all start off with a very small society with everyone having their own jobs and positions in society but slowly growing bigger.

The main three parts of the city are the leaders, the warriors, and the producers. This goes along with the needs of the soul because each group in the city is ruled by a personal desire. The leaders are ruled by reason and have more wisdom than the rest, which makes them fit to lead. The warriors are also virtuous but their courage is their most dominant trait. The producers have courage, and have wisdom, but their most dominate trait is their appetite. Where justice comes into place is how justice ad fairness is upheld. When the rulers have the best interest of their subjects at hand, all is right within the city, and in return everyone else in society does their jobs and follows the rulers command. This is what makes tyranny one of the hardest forms of government to uphold, as he is in constant danger of his subjects rising up against him”(296) a true tyrant is a true slave”, a slave to fear.