L' Erotikos: un éloge du Dieu Éros? Une relecture du dialogue de Plutarque

Abstract

This article reconsiders the unity and coherence of Plutarch’s Erotikos, a highly debated theme, in order to bring a light over the philosophical dimension of the dialogue. A thorough examination of the composition shows at first how logoi and praxis (the affair of Ismenodora and Bacchon) are skilfully interweaved and how they bind the themes of love and marriage. Then the logoi themselves can be divided into three different parts ; in each of them Plutarch deals with the same themes and similes, borrowed especially from Plato’s Phaedrus, and brings out the divinity, the power and the benevolence of the God Eros —these three qualities are topoi of eulogy and remind the reader even more of Plato’s Symposion. Hence, I finally suggest that the whole work could be read as a huge eulogy, in which Plutarch celebrates the essential part Eros plays in religious tradition as well as in philosophy, in human life as well as after death.