Miscellanies 5.2.14

Summary: Plato's Socrates, in the Crito and Phaedrus, speaks of hope of another life after death and of the soul winged by love reaching the goal of hope and eternal life.

Greek text · Stählin 2:335

Περὶ μὲν οὖν πίστεως ἱκανὰ μαρτύρια τῶν παρʼ Ἕλλησι γραφῶν παρατεθείμεθα· ὡς δὲ μὴ ἐπὶ μήκιστον παρεξίωμεν καὶ περὶ τῆς ἐλπίδος καὶ τῆς ἀγάπης πλεῖστα φιλοτιμούμενοι συναγαγεῖν, ἀπόχρη μόνα ταῦτα εἰπεῖν, ὡς ἐν τῷ Κρίτωνι ὁ Σωκράτης, πρὸ τοῦ ζῆν τὸ εὖ ζῆν καὶ τεθνάναι τιθέμενος, ἐλπίδα τινὰ ἑτέρου βίου μετὰ τὴν τελευτὴν ἔχειν οἴεται. καὶ γὰρ καὶ ἐν τῷ Φαίδρῳ αὐτὴν καθʼ αὑτὴν γενομένην τὴν ψυχὴν λέγων μόνην δύνασθαι τῆς ἀληθινῆς σοφίας καὶ κρείττονος τῆς ἀνθρωπίνης δυνάμεως μεταλαβεῖν, ὅταν αὐτὴν ὁ ἐνθένδε ἔρως εἰς οὐρανὸν πτερώσῃ, διὰ τῆς φιλοσόφου ἀγάπης εἰς τὸ τῆς ἐλπίδος τέλος ἀφικομένην φησὶν ἄλλου βίου ἀιδίου ἀρχὴν λαμβάνειν.

English · Claude translation

About faith, then, we have set out sufficient testimonies from the writings of the Greeks; but so as not to go on too long by striving to collect a great deal about hope and love too, it is enough to say only this: that in the Crito Socrates, placing living well and dying well before living, thinks he has some hope of another life after death. And in the Phaedrus too, saying that the soul alone, when by itself, can share in true wisdom and in what is greater than human power, when love from here gives it wings to heaven, he says that, having arrived through philosophic love at the goal of hope, it takes the beginning of another, eternal life.

About this passage

Source

Stählin 2:335 · Otto Stählin, ed., Clemens Alexandrinus, vol. 2, Stromata Buch I–VI, GCS 15 (Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1906); vol. 3, Stromata Buch VII und VIII, GCS 17 (Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1909) · Greek text: Otto Stählin, Clemens Alexandrinus 2–3 (GCS 15, 17, 1906–1909), digitized by the Perseus Digital Library, CC BY-SA 4.0

Text

As printed in Stählin, GCS 15, 17. Manuscript variants and the editor's apparatus are not reproduced; no textual problem is noted in this passage.

Translation

Claude translation (claude-opus-5-5), 2026-09-27 · Translated by Claude from the Greek text of Stählin (1906–1909); made independently of existing English translations.

Compare

Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 2 (1885) (an older public-domain English translation, whole volume at CCEL; checked against ours only after ours was made) · Book 3 is left partly untranslated (in Latin) there.

Extrabiblical texts

Plato, Crito 48b; Phaedrus 249a–d (Plato (works)) · allusion, high confidence

Topics

Eschatology

Cite this passage

Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 5.2.14 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-stromata/5/2/14/).

Plain text

Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 5.2.14 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-stromata/5/2/14/).

Greek text · Stählin 2:335

English · Claude translation

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Notes

Translation notes

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