Plato gives a description, of a cave in which prisoners are chained so that they are obliged to face the wall. The chained prisoners symbolises ordinary, ignorant people in the ignorant world. Such people are content with the idea of living with the illusion of truth and don’t want to think for themselves.
Behind the prisoners there is a ‘fire’ and a ‘road’. The fire represents an illusion of truth and light or goodness perhaps. It is an initiation of the form of Good. The road is an illusion of a path that we must choose to take which will lead us to the real world and deter us from the photocopy world which presumably Plato believes is false.
In this cave there are shadows casted by objects held by those on the road which causes the shadows on the wall in front of the prisoners. These shadows are mistakenly viewed by the prisoners as reality. In the same way for example: the media presents stereotypes of different groups in society and some people in society take the representations as the only truth and do not question its authenticity.
The prisoners believe that these shadows are authentic things and are forced to believe the shadows alone are reality as they have no other truth. The shadows are in fact a representative of objects in the physical world and they are also the source of truth. The analogy of the sun is used to represent that the sun enlightens people to the real world and in effect is the source of all other forms.
Plato believes that the shadows are just an imitation of the appearing world and that the real world can be accessed with sufficient spiritual knowledge. In some ways the shadows foreshadow the option of freedom being open but being ignored by the chained prisoners as they may fear the revelation of the Truth and not the ‘truth’ they are used to.
When noises are heard within the cave the prisoners automatically assume that the shadows are in fact talking. Through, this description Plato aims to represent our condition as human beings; our senses chain us and cause for us to accept the world around us, which is symbolised by the cave. He argues we are false to believe that our world is the sum total of reality. The walls are described as being ‘raised’ which could be symbolic for our limited way of pondering.
Further on in the analogy, one of the prisoners is released. He is described to being ‘dazed’ and ‘confused’. The dazzling of the prisoners eyes for the first time symbolises the difficulty human kind may face when the actual Truth is put before their very eyes.
‘It is a hard journey getting out of the cave. Eventually when his eyes adjust to the light, he is able to look at real objects in the world outside the cave’. Here, Plato is representing the philosopher who learns not to trust their senses. The journey to the knowledge is not easy and we have to go against our supposed common sense views. If we do so, Plato thinks that, just like the escaped prisoner, we will have the means to see the Forms. The most important form is the form of the Good.
The escaped prisoner returns with excitement to the cave to inform the others of the truth. They do not believe him and even threaten to shoot the messenger if he continues to talk nonsense about the supposed ‘real world’. The reaction of the current prisoners to the escaped prisoners is unpleasant in which suggests they fear being challenged, fear change and fear truth. The thought of everything they’ve ever known being claimed to be false may make them rebel in order to protect their beliefs and emotions.
The fact that the prisoner returns to the cave suggests that once you’ve discovered reality of the truth you cannot go back to your previous ignorant state because it is difficult to go back and pretend that everything is rosy and normal. Once the truth is revealed everything in effect changes.
The escaped man is actually a symbol of philosophers. He suggests they represent philosophical enlightenment and the eventual realisation that the forms are the way to the truth. He believes philosophers see the real world and therefore have the means to true knowledge. If so then this could lead to the conclusion that the cave is actually the unreal world. The escaped man also suggests that we will all eventually overcome false appearance and be connected with reality which awaits us somewhere.
by
bibimasala (student)
