Plato believes that at the end of life the soul is set free from the body, and that that our true self, or ‘jiva’ is actually imprisoned in our bodies, and that we can only fully access it by dividing the soul from the body, he says to be a true philosopher, we should aim to gather our mind into itself where it is not disturbed by any pleasures nor pains, he believes that once the soul has as little as possible to do with the body, and has no bodily sense of feeling that is when a person can attain true truths, not misconstrued truths from inaccurate witnesses.
Plato also added the argument of the opposites, he believed that the physical world consists of opposites such a big and small, light and dark, he suggested that the opposite of living must be death, but for death to be something rather than nothing there must be a purpose for it, Plato argues that the opposite of life cannot be death as being the end will render it meaningless and a nonentity, for that reason, this argument supports the idea of reincarnation, that our next life depends on our state of the soul and our conduct in the previous life.
Many people over time, have given criticism of Plato’s views, Peter Geach questions what it can mean for the disembodied soul to see the forms, given that seeing is a process that is linked to the body and experience through one’s senses, however Hindus and Plato would say that it is possible to see the world of the forms with the Third Eye, the third eye belief stems from Hindu beliefs that we each have a inner eye in between our brows, for Hindus this is of a great importance and is included in the concept of the chakra, the third eye allows us to perceive extra sensory perception, this allows us to gain knowledge without physical senses, I believe the belief of the third eye makes Geach’s criticism void, as this would imply that blind people would not be able to access the world of the Forms through their soul and it is known that blind people can still dream and can obtain the power see the world through their third eye.
In conclusion, I believe that the body and soul distinction is not a myth derived from philosopher as the belief what we must distinct our souls from the body exists substantially in Hinduism, Hindus emphasize the importance of spirituality in their teachings, they include extra sensory perception in their attributes of accessing the third eye chakra, and I believe this is similar to the belief that if we run away with our mind away from the body, we can achieve true knowledge of our selves.