Question

Euthyphro's third attempt at a definition of piety occurs between 9d and 9e: "The pious is what all the gods love, and the opposite, what all the gods hate, is the impious." However, by line 10e, Socrates has concluded that "the god-loved is not the same as the pious." How did we get here? In other words, if the conclusion to the argument is "the god-loved is not the same as the pious," what are the premises? What are the steps by which we arrive at that conclusion? You will find all relevant premises, be they explicit or implicit, between lines 10a and 11b.

Answer 1

According to Socrates, Plato's Euthyphro contradicts itself.

Finally, Socrates concluded that " the god-loved is not the same as the pious " because:

In 10d, Euthyphro says that

The pious is loved by the gods only because it is pious, and for no other reason. Also, if the gods love something, it is not necessary that the thing is pious.

Contradicting the above statement, 10c mentions that:

The thing that god loves(god-loved), is only because they love it; and for no other reason.

Explanation: These are 2 contradicting statements.In the first statement, it says that gods love someone only if they are pious. But the latter statement says that if gods love someone(i.e god-loved), it is only because the gods love them(and for no other reason). This implies that the god-loved and pious are 2 different things.Since the pious have to be pious(religious) to be loved by gods; however the god-loved are loved without any reason.