Antifontove političke ideje: jedna rekonstrukcija
ANTIPHON’S POLITICAL IDEAS: A RECONSTRUCTION

Summary/Abstract: This paper is an attempt at sketching some basic characteristics of Antiphon’s political thought, even though the primary sources are both lacking and fragmented. It is argued that Antiphon, although having a hedonistic account of human nature, views human condition as very difficult. People, guided by reason and led by their ability to distinguish between the pleasant and the unpleasant, need to find ways to cope with their unfortunate predicament and live least unhappy lives. Living in political communities complicates this situation further and reveals tensions between law and nature. Antiphon criticises laws, as their incompatibility with nature fuels the tendency to inflict pain on innocent people. This particularly applies to laws in democratic Athens which had supressed and replaced traditions that were a part of the polis’s aristocratic past. In contrast to (at least some) laws, old traditions saw reciprocity as inextricably linked to justice. An important reflection of this principle was the maxim that one should help friends and harm enemies. It is possible that Antiphon was one of the sophists who supported this particular definition of justice.

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