Alfarabi lived in a city whose Christian inhabitants often still knew Greek.2 This fact alone should mean that the question of Alfarabi’s knowledge of Greek is far from settled. His project of recovering the genuine thought of Plato and Aristotle, which he believed to have been blurred over time (AH 47.4–9, Ar. 97.65), would have given him every incentive to learn at least some Greek. If he had studied Greek with certain heterodox Christian friends and associates, especially in the enemy kingdom of Byzantium,3 he might have wished to conceal the company he kept, and therefore his linguistic knowledge, from his predominantly Muslim audience. Errors in the interpretation of Greek words, well attested in modern scholarship (Rudolph, 372–73), might indeed have been due to ignorance, but an alternative explanation would be that they were meant to hide his knowledge. On one occasion, however, Alfarabi appears to let down his guard. A frequently overlooked passage in the Great Book of Music reads as follows: “It is possible to learn about the circumstances [of Greece and Byzantium] because they are neighbors, and because of the abundance of immigrants from the lands of Greece and Byzantium to the lands of the kingdom of the Arabs, who bring us reports about them, as well as from the books that the ancient Greeks wrote on the subject of musical theory” (BM 110). To be sure, musical theory cannot be equated with language, but this statement should demonstrate beyond all reasonable doubt that Alfarabi attempted to learn as much as he could from ancient Greek works and Byzantine migrants on a wide variety of subjects. Unfortunately, just how much he was able to learn from them may always remain in doubt.
The simple fact is that as long as we have not discovered any tenth-century Arabic translations of Plato, or proof of Alfarabi’s knowledge of Greek, we will never be able to determine with any exactitude what texts of Plato Alfarabi actually read. Due caution is therefore required. And yet I find myself strongly inclined to the view that Alfarabi must have had access to something closely resembling the original texts of the Republic, and probably several other Platonic dialogues. Alfarabi’s summary of the Republic in the Philosophy of Plato, although extremely terse, contains most of the essential elements of the dialogue: the investigation of justice, the foundation of the city, the rule of the philosophers, and the description of other kinds of city (PP 19.14–20.14). But the strongest evidence in favor of this supposition is simply Alfarabi’s own claim: why would he pretend to know Plato’s Republic, as well as the thirty-odd other dialogues summarized in the Philosophy of Plato, if he in fact had no access to them? The same question applies to Averroes and his knowledge of the Republic, on which he wrote a full-blown commentary. But some might reply that these philosophers either lied or were deceived about their access to the original Plato. Let me examine each of these possibilities in turn.
Alfarabi and Averroes might have considered lying on certain occasions, but they would need to have a plausible reason for doing so. Feigning knowledge of Plato while writing purported commentaries on him would simply have exposed them to the ridicule of future generations, and risked discrediting their own philosophic project of reviving certain aspects of Plato’s thought. If they really had so little access to Plato, and were fully aware of this fact, then why couldn’t they simply have relied more heavily on Aristotle? Now Alfarabi and Averroes, like everyone else, were also capable of error. Yet there is plenty of evidence, especially in the Book of Letters,4 that Alfarabi was sensitive to problems of translation, which makes it highly implausible that he would have reproduced, or even relied on, any Arabic translations or summaries without due reflection. Such reflection would presumably have cautioned him against mistaking the summaries of Galen the doctor and rhetorician for the dialogues of the philosopher Plato. Indeed, Alfarabi and Averroes would not have regarded Plato as a philosopher equal to Aristotle unless they themselves had read a version of Plato’s writings that was complete enough to convey a convincingly philosophic teaching. It is hard to identify any Hellenistic or Roman commentator who could have produced such a work. In the absence of any reason for thinking that these philosophers lied or were deceived about their knowledge of Plato, we ought to take them at their word. The texts that they possessed may not have been identical to our texts, but they must have been adequate enough to convince them that Plato was a philosopher of the highest rank on whose works they could compose reliable commentaries.
I hope to strengthen my supposition by showing that the comments on Plato contained in Alfarabi’s own writings display profound insight into him, especially with regard to the theme of this book. Proving that Alfarabi understood what Plato had to say about the nation does not establish that Alfarabi had access to every word that Plato wrote, but it does suggest, as we will soon see, that he must have had a considerable portion of the Republic at his disposal.
Is the City of the Republic Greek?
The most famous Platonic dialogue focuses on the founding of a new city, as Alfarabi clearly recognizes (PP 19.13–20.14, 21.1–2).5 But Plato says nothing in the Republic about the founding of a new nation. This does not mean that he avoids the nation entirely. Plato needs to consider whether the new city will assume any existing ethnic identity, and if not, he must explain how it will define itself vis-à-vis the nations of the earth.
Any attempt to understand the significance of the nation for Plato must take into account the fact that Greek lacks a single, definite term that can be translated as “nation.” Plato uses the terms ethnos and genos in a surprising variety of contexts.6 In the absence of any distinct term for “nation,” the issues surrounding ethnic identity are often raised in the more concrete form of the Greek-barbarian distinction, which occurs frequently enough in the Republic to serve as the starting point of our investigation. An obvious question emerges: is the city founded in the dialogue Greek, barbarian, both, or neither? I wish to analyze the Republic with this question in mind.
The ethnic character of the city in Republic appears at first glance to be established in Book V, where the city is declared Greek (470e4–6). But upon closer examination this declaration belongs entirely to Glaucon. Socrates does no more than ask the question, “Won’t the city that you are founding be Greek?” (470e4–6), while it is Glaucon who replies in the affirmative. One may wonder why Socrates needs to raise this question at all. Isn’t the Greek identity of the city self-evident from the start? Who could imagine Glaucon, Adeimantus, or even Socrates founding a city that wasn’t Greek? The very fact that Socrates poses the question implies that something unusual may be afoot. Let us review the earlier portions of the dialogue for evidence that the city is indeed Greek.
The opening discussions about justice in the first book contain no reference to any particular people: a satisfactory definition of justice as such must be universal. But one would expect Socrates to address the question of ethnic identity when he undertakes the founding of a city, which must come into being in some particular place and among some particular people if it is to exist at all. Although Socrates may encourage his interlocutors to think that the city is Greek, several aspects of his presentation seem to evade the question. Most notably, Socrates never calls the city Greek. The scene in which the city first comes into being describes the general human needs that give rise to cities, but says little about the circumstances surrounding this particular city’s founding. Socrates gives the impression that the first inhabitants are aboriginals who form a settlement of their own accord for the sake of mutual help (369c1–4). But are they Greek aboriginals? Socrates acknowledges that the city will be founded “in a place of some sort” (toiouton topon; 370e5–7), but since the qualities of this place remain completely indefinite, so does the stock of its first inhabitants. The vagueness with which the location of the city is described in the Republic stands in contrast to the precision with which it is described in the Laws (704c ff.).
The material description of the luxurious city, which includes couches, rhapsodes, actors, and choruses (Republic 372e ff.), is indeed evocative of Greece. Given the cultural background of the interlocutors in the dialogue, it would make no sense for Socrates to fill the city with unknown Persian delicacies. Thus the question remains: in assuming that the city is Greek, does Socrates speak with a view to his still-inexperienced interlocutors, or to his own understanding of the character of the city?
The same uncertainty prevails in the account of the guardians’ education. It is based on the reform of Greek music and poetry (376d ff.), but