Socrates as Teacher and Practitioner of Rhetoric in The Clouds

In The Clouds, Aristophanes’ nuanced presentation of Socrates as both a teacher and practitioner of rhetoric characterizes him as morally ambiguous, seemingly existing outside of cultural norms regarding religion, scientific understanding, and even social interaction. Aristophanes’ Socrates is an enigmatic and often contradictory figure: although his school is somewhat secretive, Socrates himself is very open about his unorthodox religious beliefs and intensive focus on the natural sciences. This inconsistency may serve to distance Socrates from the sophists in the mind of the audience, suggesting that he has nothing to hide. However, when Strepsiades openly declares he wants to learn how to speak unjustly, Socrates is not noticeably alarmed, instead seemingly reassuring him that his request can be granted. Interestingly, Socrates removes himself from the debate that later takes place between Just Speech and Unjust Speech, and it is implied that his students choose for themselves which path they will take, rather than being convinced by him one way or another. Socrates’ own practice of rhetoric is more opaque. His ultimate aim seems to be more closely tied with relaying knowledge than convincing his students, but although seems more concerned with teaching than mere persuasion, he nevertheless employs rhetorical strategies in conversation with Strepsiades. For the most part, Socrates chooses to convince Strepsiades of certain realities through logic and observable facts than through rhetorical strategy. Interestingly, when the Clouds first appear, they praise Socrates not for his skills in rhetoric or manipulation, but for his brazenness and investigation into heavenly matters (lines 362-363). Socrates’ story as a teacher and practitioner of rhetoric unfolds with ever-increasing layers of complexity, which is only intensified by his intriguing relationship with the Clouds.

Clearly, a certain reputation follows Socrates as a teacher of rhetoric. Seeking a means by which he may avoid paying his debts, Strepsiades is drawn to Socrates’ ability to make the weaker speech the stronger—in fact, he is explicitly interested in learning the unjust speech from Socrates and nothing else (lines 655-58). From his nonchalant attitude as a teacher and apparent willingness to teach Strepsiades, it may seem that Socrates is indifferent to matters of justice. However, from the moment he first appears, the audience understands Socrates is an unusual teacher, defying distillation into too black-and-white terms. Separated from the rest of society, Socrates and his students philosophize in “a thinkery of wise souls” (line 94). But unlike the other sophists, Socrates lives in poverty and does not accept payment for his services (a point that continually escapes Strepsiades). Addressing Strepsiades as “ephemeral one” (line 223) from his lofty basket, it is clear that Socrates’ mind is somewhere else. Still, he immediately accepts Strepsiades as a student. Following a sort of initiation process in which a crown is placed on Strepsiades’ head and he is sprinkled with flour (lines 255-62), echoing divine rites, Socrates invokes the Clouds in prayer and introduces them as the true deities. He explicitly states that Zeus does not exist (line 368), teaching that phenomena traditionally attributed to Zeus, such as thunder and lightning, are actually natural occurrences. However, he later drops reference to the divine entirely and relies exclusively on naturalistic explanations for observable events. 

Although we understand that Socrates teaches rhetoric, his method of teaching does not actually seem to rely on what we might understand rhetoric to be; that is, merely convincing an audience that something is the case without necessarily supporting that claim with evidence. Instead, he relies on logic and deductive reasoning to convey knowledge to his students. What we observe of Socrates’ teaching is not limited to speaking skills: students study, among other things, astronomy, geometry, and cartography (lines 200-15). Interestingly, most rhetorical instruction occurs off-stage. This makes it difficult to assess Socrates’ teaching of rhetoric: while we see the results of Socrates’ instruction, we do not necessarily understand how he carries this out. This is especially evident in the case of Pheidippides, whom we clearly understand to have learned the art of rhetoric but whose instruction we are not privy to. One clue as to what occurs behind closed doors is the conversation that takes place between Strepsiades and Socrates in lines 747-83, where Strepsiades suggests various crafty ways to avoid paying his debts.This conversation seems to be a test of Strepsiades’ learning of rhetoric: Socrates is pleased by some of Strepsiades’ plans, such as preventing the month from turning by capturing the moon and melting the wax tablet detailing his suit using a reflective lens, but much less so by his suggestion that he hang himself before his creditors can accuse him. Socrates’ reactions seem to suggest that his instruction in rhetoric centers around identifying seemingly simple situations in everyday life that may actually feature glaring illogicalities. This may be a reflection of Socrates’ own understanding of rhetoric as a process of questioning the most basic things, gradually eroding what the opposing speaker thought he knew to be true about the world until he is forced to concede.

Socrates’ own practice of rhetoric is perhaps more opaque than his straightforward teaching methods. His experiences as a practitioner of rhetoric may inform his concern for language and its specificity: it seems likely that the special attention paid to the naming of things in lines 658-91 may serve as part of Socrates’ rhetorical instruction by pointing to the importance of knowing exactly what one is speaking about. Explicitness is certainly a quality associated with Aristophanes’ Socrates. Throughout the play, a pattern emerges whereby serious contentions regarding traditional religion and natural science are obscured by humor—fart jokes abound—but Socrates himself is very blunt about his beliefs, many of which carry grave implications. Besides his ambiguous religious beliefs and heavily-implied atheism, the question of Just and Unjust speech is one that appears consistently throughout the course of Socrates’ rhetorical teaching and practice. The practice of rhetoric as understood by Aristophanes and the play’s characters is not a particularly honest one, seemingly referring directly to making the weaker speech the stronger: Strepsiades brands himself a “cheat” for wanting to learn this skill (line 487), surely reflecting poorly on those who already possess it. However, we do not ever see Socrates himself using rhetoric in an explicitly unjust manner. Further, Socrates does not introduce Just Speech and Unjust Speech. They apparently appear of their own volition as independent characters who speak for themselves, each attempting to convince listeners which to pursue (889-1104). This seems to indicate that Socrates is not necessarily teaching injustice when students like Strepsiades and Pheidippides come to him with explicitly unjust motivations, but rather that his students are choosing to apply rhetoric unjustly. However, that Socrates permits the conversation between Just and Unjust Speech to take place at all suggests a certain comfort with justice versus injustice being an open question, which may itself point to his entertaining a level of injustice.

In Socrates’ absence, the battle between Just Speech and Unjust Speech that takes place in lines 889-1104 also serves to inform the audience of how each operates. Although the contest consists largely of name-calling and other childish antagonisms, we are able to pinpoint the main draw of each character. Both appeal to the necessity of education, but go about it in very different ways: broadly, Just Speech represents the old ways of thinking, affirming worship of the gods, traditional ways of living, and a general sense of decency and moderation (lines 961-83), as well as the promise of a classically beautiful physique as a result of discipline (lines 1003-19). Unjust Speech, on the other hand, represents a newer perspective on what it means to live a successful life. Rejecting tradition in favor of personal gratification and freedom from restraint, Unjust Speech appeals to Pheidippides’ vanity by warning him of the pleasures he must sacrifice under the guidance of Just Speech (lines 1071-82). It is unclear where Socrates stands with regard to these two outlooks. Some of his teachings and practices seem to align more clearly with the claims of Unjust Speech—for example, his preference for natural explanations over religious ones—while others, such as his personal moderation, align more clearly with Just Speech. Throughout the course of the debate, we also learn how the weaker speech is made the stronger. Notably, there seems to be no question that the weaker speech is the weaker speech; that is, there is clearly a right and wrong side to the arguments that involve a weaker and a stronger speech. However, the strategic genius of the weaker speech is in putting the stronger speech to the test and making it defend in the course of the argument why it is the stronger speech. When the conversation gets to a point where the stronger speech is unable to do this, the weaker speech seems to be the stronger simply because the truly stronger speech cannot say why this should not be the case. This is the strategy that eventually defeats Just Speech in lines 1087-104, and we see this later in the altercation that takes place between Strepsiades and Pheidippides in lines 1324-1437: Strepsiades is unable to provide a rigorous defense for his belief that sons should not beat their fathers and is forced to agree with Pheidippides. Although both probably know Strepsiades is morally right, he is unable to prove it. From the debate, it seems that Socrates himself does not teach this strategy, but that Unjust Speech is something that exists of itself, perhaps something to be communicated with or channeled rather than a method taught. Socrates himself seems to be caught somewhere within the tension between the way things have always been done and more radical ideas about the way society should function.

The results of Socrates teaching rhetoric with a view to Unjust Speech are nothing if not disastrous. The education of Pheidippides seems at first to have fulfilled its purpose: Socrates confirms that Pheidippides has learned the unjust speech (line 1149), and Strepsiades is seemingly delighted that his son has acquired “a negating and contradicting look” perfectly suited to “doing injustice and working evil” (lines 1170-75). Pheidippides easily confounds his father’s creditors when they come knocking with blatantly fallacious arguments as well as threats of physical violence (lines 1213-1300), but it quickly becomes clear that he is not merely playing a part and that this own sense of justice has been destroyed in the course of his education with Socrates. During a celebratory feast, Pheidippides beats his father—a serious crime—and Strepsiades is horrified when he recognizes the full extent of Pheidippides’ corruption. In the course of his self-justification, Pheidippides’ language echoes that of Unjust Speech during the earlier debate with Just Speech, welcoming his father’s accusations with lines like “Sprinkle me with many roses!” (1330). Pheidippides boldly claims he can use the rhetorical strategies he learned from Socrates to show that he was in the right for beating his father (lines 1332-33) and actually succeeds in doing so, calling upon traditional family dynamics, law, and the natural world in his defense. It seems that Strepsiades is able to come to terms with the changes in Pheidippides, such as his preference for new, edgy poetry involving themes like incest—albeit grudgingly—and he is even prepared to accept that Pheidippides was right to beat him, but it is Pheidippides’ suggestion that he beat his mother in line 1442 that pushes Strepsiades over the edge. This immediate threat to filial loyalty (and presumably his wife’s safety) seems to be what leads Strepsiades to a dramatic turnaround, where he rejects everything he has learned from Socrates and reverts to his previous beliefs.

Accusing the Clouds of his son’s corruption, the Clouds reveal to Strepsiades that all that has transpired was a form of divine judgement, proclaiming, “We do this on each occasion  to whomever we recognize as being a lover of villainous affairs, until we throw him into evil so that he may know dread of the gods” (lines 1458-61). Evidently, the Clouds force a kind of self-recognition on those who seek to do evil unto others, showing them how evil falls upon them also. It is possible that the Clouds intentionally used Socrates for this purpose because of his skills as a teacher and practitioner of rhetoric. This is an especially interesting possibility considering that Socrates does not believe in the traditional Athenian gods, perhaps suggesting that as a result of Socrates’ investigation into heavenly matters—for which the Clouds praised him—he recognizes there is a right and wrong way to live, even with no religious basis. On the one hand, Socrates did indeed corrupt an impressionable youth, potentially damaging his relationship with his father beyond repair. However, the Clouds affirm that Socrates did not (at least in this case) wantonly lead a student astray: there was some divine purpose behind it all. As a teacher whose instruction may steer students directly into the clutches of Unjust Speech, but as a practitioner who seemingly never uses his skills to unjust ends, Socrates’ relationship with rhetoric occupies an ambiguous position, perhaps suggesting that rhetoric is a tool few can be trusted to handle carefully.