The Cave

In Plato’s the Allegory of the cave he explores the concept of education through the allegory of prisoners in the darkness. Most, people would agree that with out knowledge and education a person’s life could never be fully illuminated into the full enlightenment of the world. In the Allegory of the cave Plato uses symbolism to represent the nature of education to the people. In this paper we will explore the nature of education, the effects of change and returning to re-educate the people and a contemporary view of Plato’s ideas of education as well as concluding with his position as an essentialist.  

The allegory of the cave tells us what education is about.  In the cave, the citizens never see "reality" they only get to see the shadows on the wall that the Forms cast.  Because they have never seen anything else, they think the forms are reality.  They are chained so they cannot look behind them or gain any insight from the people around them who also think that the shadows are reality as well.  If one of them can break free into the light of day, that person “the philosopher” or a person seeking truth according to Plato may then be able to come back into the cave to enlighten the others by others the people or citizens about what reality is.  The purpose of education is the same.  Although there are many intermediate goals the ultimate goal of education is to move us out of the cave, or to enlighten us to the world you could say.

The meaning of the prisoner returning in the cave is very simple it represents the education of the people. He wants to tell the other prisoners what he has learned. In other words he wants to share the wisdom that he has acquired by seeing things for himself.   Although the ex-prisoner might want to stay in the sun, meditating on truth, he cannot. His duty is to return to the cave and let others know the truth. Plato talks about his return saying, “that when he enters the cave again, although, his eyes will not be able to see...