Seth Benardete
Plato’s Laws
 
“Plato’s Laws is, in proportion to its size, the most neglected of his works. It is dauntingly massive and complex, but it must contain Plato’s final views on a large range of issues, political social, ethical, metaphysical, and especially religious. Benardete brought to the task the skills of a classicist, a synoptic vision of Plato’s goals and methodology, and a lifetime of writing challenging books on many of the other dialogues. Of the remarkably original ideas in his work, we may note at the start Benardete’s attention to the word “nomoi,” meaning both “laws” and “songs”; he shows that Plato plays with ambiguity, making music a pathway to the understanding of the legal structure of the state. Book ten of the <I>Laws<I> is often called ‘Plato’s Theology,’ and it deserves that title, but Benardete shows how all twelve books of the dialogue are permeated with Plato’s theological understanding of being and the state.”--<I>Religious Studies Review<I>

Religious Studies Review