Liberation from the cave

In the cave allegory, Plato says that humans have been living in deep denial of integrative meaning and all the truths associated with it, with the result that they can only see a highly distorted representation of the world. The question then is, how were humans to free themselves from this awful world, how were they going to escape their life of bondage in the ‘cave’? The next part of Plato’s allegory deals with that question. It was summarised in the Encarta entry thus: ‘Breaking free, one of the individuals escapes from the cave into the light of day. With the aid of the sun, that person sees for the first time the real world and returns to the cave with the message that the only things they have seen heretofore are shadows and appearances and that the real world awaits them if they are willing to struggle free of their bonds. The shadowy environment of the cave symbolizes for Plato the physical world of appearances. Escape into the sun-filled setting outside the cave symbolizes the transition to the real world, the world of full and perfect being, the world of Forms, which is the proper object of knowledge.’

Plato is saying that someone has to be free of the cave existence of denial—has to be living in the illuminating light of the ‘sun’, that is, acknowledging the fundamental truth of integrative meaning and Page 97 of
Print Edition therefore thinking truthfully—to be able to find understanding of the human condition and by so doing see through the denial and illusion of the cave existence.

While Plato’s cave allegory is a simplified account of how humanity is liberated from the human condition, how it ‘escapes from the cave’, it nevertheless contains all the elements involved in the process of becoming free. An analysis of these elements will confirm just how incredibly insightful Plato was.

There are three aspects to consider:

Firstly, in ASPECT A, we will examine the possibility of someone being sufficiently free of denial, that is sufficiently sound and secure in self, to be able to confront and think truthfully and effectively about the issue of the human condition—how it is possible for someone to ‘escape from the cave into the light of day.’

Secondly, in ASPECT B, we will examine the knowledge that a person would need to assemble the liberating understanding of the human condition, and by so doing end humanity’s need to live in denial—how it is possible for someone to ‘see for the first time the real world’.

Thirdly, in ASPECT C, we need to look at the difficulty of introducing those who are living in denial of the human condition to the liberating understanding of the human condition. In Plato’s metaphor we need to look at what happens when the person who has assembled the liberating understanding of the human condition ‘returns to the cave [prisoners] with the message that the only things they have seen heretofore are shadows and appearances and that the real world awaits them’.

These areas of examination have been divided into Aspects ‘A’, ‘B’ and ‘C’ to assist the reader with their comprehension of the information.