Leo Strauss on Plato’s Euthyphro

Leo Strauss famously asserted that the fundamental, defining debate within Western civilization is that between Jerusalem and Athens, piety and philosophy, the Bible and Plato. And yet, surprisingly, Strauss never published any of his thoughts on Plato’s dialogue on piety, the Euthyphro.

This volume presents, for the first time, Strauss’s 1948 notebook on the dialogue, written in preparation for a class at the New School for Social Research. Featuring close analysis and line-by-line commentary, the notebook opens a window onto a philosophic mind in action, as Strauss asks questions of the classic text, jots down observations and formulations, and analyzes very specific terms and arguments but also steps back, reviews the overall movement of the dialogue, and reconsiders previous conclusions. Beyond the notebook, the volume also brings together all the known materials that lay out Strauss’s thoughts on the Euthyphro. This includes newly transcribed and edited public lectures, illuminating appendixes, critical essays by volume editors Hannes Kerber and Svetozar Y. Minkov and scholar Wayne Ambler, an account of Strauss’s public lecture, and a new English translation of Plato’s Euthyphro by Seth Benardete, a classicist and one of Strauss’s students.

Engaging and inspiring, Leo Strauss on Plato’s “Euthyphro” is a vital resource for scholars and students of political theory, readers interested in the intersection of philosophy and religion, and a must-have for anyone who studies Strauss.

“[This volume] brings to light many interesting juxtapositions and many more fascinating questions from an intellect to which I owe a great deal. . . .it will be a prize possession among followers of [Plato].”—Colin Redemer, Ad Fontes

“Kerber and Minkov have set the standard for publishing Strauss’s Nachlass.”—Steven H. Frankel, Interpretation: A Journal of Political Philosophy

“This volume is the result of philological work of the highest quality and has the merit of offering materials undoubtedly of interest for both historical and philosophical purposes. Especially from the latter point of view the volume offers new elements useful in the construction of the argument in favor of philosophy in the dispute between Athens and Jerusalem.”—Marco Menon, Filosofia morale / Moral Philosophy

“Characterised by meticulous scholarship of the highest order, this book is an important addition to our understanding of Plato’s Euthyphro, through the eyes of a preeminent philosopher.”—Cliff Cunningham, Sun News Austin

“For readers without prior familiarity with Strauss’s writings, the book offers, beyond its comprehensive and important interpretation of Plato’s dialogue, an excellent introduction to Strauss’s scholarship and philosophical concerns. For those with such familiarity, it offers a provocative and illuminating discussion of the problem of reason and revelation, and an unprecedented look ‘behind the scenes’ at Strauss’s process of interpreting a Platonic dialogue.”—Benjamin Lorch, Bryn Mawr Classical Review

“A welcome volume of Strauss’s scattered writings on a key Platonic dialogue.”—Glenn Ellmers, The New Criterion

“The present volume manages to be clear, focused, succinct, and approachable, while providing tremendous insight and remaining unabashedly complex.”—Colin David Pears, The Review of Metaphysics

“Leo Strauss on Plato’s ‘Euthyphro’ is a most valuable work of scholarship and it will prove to be of tremendous interest, and even indispensable, to scholars and students of political philosophy, religion, philosophy, and classics as a whole and of Leo Strauss and Plato in particular.”—Peter Ahrensdorf, author of Homer and the Tradition of Political Philosophy: Encounters with Plato, Machiavelli, and Nietzsche

“Strauss’s notes on the Euthyphro, which have never been published, offer important insights into his thinking, and will make a splash in the world of Strauss studies. The excellent interpretive essays in the volume should draw attention in their own right.”—Devin Stauffer, author of Hobbes's Kingdom of Light

Hannes Kerber is Academic Program Director at the Carl Friedrich von Siemens Foundation and Lecturer at the University of Munich. He is the author of Die Aufklärung der Aufklärung: Lessing und die Herausforderung des Christentums.

Svetozar Y. Minkov is Professor of Philosophy and directs the philosophy program at Roosevelt University. He is the author of Leo Strauss on Science: Thoughts on the Relation Between Natural Science and Political Philosophy and coeditor of Toward “Natural Right and History”: Lectures and Essays by Leo Strauss, 1937–46.

Acknowledgements

Introduction: The Significance of Strauss’s Notebook on Plato’s Euthyphro

Hannes Kerber and Svetozar Y. Minkov

PART I LEO STRAUSS ON PLATO’S EUTHYPHRO

1. Strauss’s Notebook on Plato’s Euthyphro and Crito

2. Strauss’s Lecture “On Plato’s Euthyphron”

Appendix 1: Selections from Strauss’s Notes on the Euthyphro

Appendix 2: Strauss’s Draft for His First Lecture on the Euthyphro

Appendix 3: Strauss’s Outlines for a Lecture on the Euthyphro

Appendix 4: Strauss’s Marginalia to the Greek Text of the Euthyphro

PART II INTERPRETIVE ESSAYS

1. Reading Strauss’s Notebook on Plato’s Euthyphro

Hannes Kerber

2. Comments on Strauss’s Notes on the Crito

Svetozar Y. Minkov

3. An Introduction to Strauss’s “On Plato’s Euthyphron”

Wayne Ambler

PART III TRANSLATION

Translation of Plato’s Euthyphro

Seth Benardete

Selected Bibliography

List of Contributors

Index of Greek Terms

Index of Names

Download a PDF sample chapter here: Introduction

Philosophy

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Political Science

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Religious Studies & Religion