Apology

Socrates was a master of rhetoric and he goes to marketplace and talks to everyone. He talks to everyone and makes them feel stupid and therefore everyone was really irritated by him and finds him totally annoying. People wanted to teach him a lesson and decided to press charges against him.

A friend had gone to the Oracle of Apollo, the God of truth and knowledge, at Delphi in search of the wisest man and got his answer: Socrates. His friend returned and told Socrates about it. 

Socrates: That’s bullshit. I am stupid. I don’t know anything. He then scoots off to find wiser men around.

Socrates was charged by Meletus for 3 charges.
Corrupting Youths
Not believing in the God of State
Practicing a false religion

Socrates poor defense
Meletus dealt frivolously with serious matters
Meletus irresponsibly brought him to court
Meletus professed concern about things he doesn’t care about

Socrates: I am a bad influence on the youth? Who is good?
Meletus: Everyone else except you.

Socates: Lets take a horse and trainer analogy. So everyone is a good horse trainer? 

He manages to show that Meletus professed concern about things he doesn’t care about. However, when innuendo is used here, it could go completely undetected by some jury members who was not familiar with the hidden meaning, and would find nothing odd about the sentence. However, some of the jury members would have gotten it that he was trying to say they were stupid and the jury has time to talk to each other after that. Not a very good idea is it?

Socrates believed that even if he was corrupting the youth, he wasn’t doing it willingly and therefore Meletus should have just pulled him aside and told him not to do it again. He thus feels that Meletus irresponsibly brought him to court.

He felt Meletus dealt frivolously with serious matters as how can someone that does not believe in the God of State, an atheist, practice a false religion? Contradictory isn’t it? Socrates then rests his defense being totally not apologetic and being his usual annoying self.

Jury returns with guilty verdict. The accusers and Socrates gets to decide the punishment and the Jury will vote on it again.

The accusers suggest a death sentence as they want it to be too harsh so Socrates can get off easy with the punishment that he suggests. No one wanted Socrates to die and they barely wanted to teach him a lesson. However Socrates suggested his punishment, “How do you punish a person that rescue the Greek Society? Reward me then.” He felt that he was helping the youth and being a role model of an examined life. As Athens was degraded by Sophist that believed that truth was relative. He also felt that he was not going to stop philosophizing as God commanded him to do so and no laws against it will make it strong enough for him to stop.

“The unexamined life is not worth living”

A friend of Socrates walked up to him and told him that it was a bad idea and told him to suggest a fine and that they will pay the fine for him. Socrates told the jury, “my friend has suggested a fine and that he was going to pay it for me.” Jury returns with death sentence. Socrates was then placed in prison as there was a ship on religious pilgrimage and no one is supposed to be executed then. People had arranged for Socrates escape and the prison, a hole in a cliff, had no strict guards or locks that prevented him from doing so. He chose the death penalty and drank the hemlock.