When Socrates is told by Chaerephon that Pythia of Delphi has proclaimed him, not just wise but the wisest of all men, Socrates is confused—believing that he is not wise, he cannot understand how he can at the same time be the wisest. All he can do, he thinks, is doubt the word of the oracle. The ‘empirical’ Socrates sets off to investigate—he seeks an engagement with another. He goes to a man who considers himself wise but is not. Socrates tells him as much and concludes that:
I am certainly wiser than this man. It is only too likely that neither of us has any knowledge to boast of, but he thinks that he knows something which he does not know, whereas I am quite conscious of my ignorance. At any rate it seems that I am wiser than he is to this small extent, that I do not think that I know what I do not know (Plato, Apology, 21d).
The ironic nature of this intrigues Socrates and, checking it out further, he decides that those who think they know something are more foolish and those who think they know nothing are wiser. He realises the ‘process of wisdom’ as more important than any objectivised view of what it is to be wise. Socrates’ ‘midwifery’ may well concern trying to show whether ‘the offspring of a young man’s thought is a false phantom or instinct with life and truth’ (Plato, Theatetus, 150c)—a mere image or a legitimate truth—but his ‘wise effort’ is found in his endeavour to reveal truth to others, and in particular, one with whom he relates in the asymmetrical relationship of teacher and student.
This relationship is found in N-U Philosophical Counselling, although it is more noticeably interchangeable (predominantly because it is less likely that we sincerely believe Socrates knows nothing). This imbalance is important in that wiseness may be with one while clarity and un-wiseness may be with the other. Socrates, says of himself, ‘I have no sort of wisdom, nor has any discovery ever been born to me as the child of my soul’ (Ibid. 150d)—not only does he know nothing, he says, he has not even had an original thought. It is not Socrates’ wisdom which leads him to philosophical triumphs, but it is because of his unknowing clarity that he can ‘deliver’ the wise thoughts of others who become capable, in his company, of having them. And it is this clarity which has the capacity to reveal wisdom in others. By doing this, Socrates is ‘Exchanging the Word’[1]—sharing his clarity, and allowing it to return having ‘enwisened’ the other. And importantly, he does not wait until he knows before he ‘exchanges’. He shares what he knows of clear thinking but the results are received by the other. And what comes back from his ‘exchange’ is movement within the process of wisdom itself. There is an inherent inexactitude in progressing along this path—‘Exchanging the Word’ is risk taking and necessarily defiant of complete description. But it is not the word itself, or its close meaning which is the conveyor of the intention, it is the use of it, what it conveys, how it is part of what is formed in the act of transmission. Camus says, ‘A symbol is always in general and, however precise its translation, an artist can restore to it only its movement: there is no word for word rendering’ (Camus, 1975, p.112).
In his pursuit of ‘wisdom creation’ by ‘Exchanging the Word’, Socrates lets nothing stand in his way—no person or position daunts or distracts him, he acts with complete freedom of thought. His gift is a courageous capacity for releasing the creative power in others, even though, and at the same time that he gives them the benefit of his aid, he never craves for himself the consequent self-improvement brought about by its liberation. Socrates shows us that the questioning and explanatory form which invokes creative wisdom in the other is the greatest philosophical gift, the offering of which, if our search for wisdom, should be our primary philosophical aim. Socrates finds stable reality not in self-deception or desire for personal wisdom, but in the clarity of mind and the freedom found in the personal gift of uncompromisingly offering himself fully to the needs of the other. For Socrates, the progress towards ‘un-wisdom’ is complete when measured against the wisdom it solicits from the other with whom he is engaged.
[1] I am led to use this term by Wittgenstein who says, ‘It is impossible for words to occur in two different ways, alone and in the proposition’ (Wittgenstein, 1922, 2.0122).
