The similarity between Frank Herbert’s God Emperor and Plato’s philosopher king is striking. It might be because I’ve been reading both simultaneously, but I was amazed at how many parallels I kept stumbling upon. As I read, I tried to look for answers to a question that has always been important for me: Who is happy, the one living under illusions (ignorance is bliss) or the one who has discovered the truth (whatever that means)? There are also several other questions that stem from this core one, questions I’ve touched on in previous posts, but for which I have not yet found a satisfactory answer. Namely, in Plato’s allegory of the cave, after the philosopher has come outside and seen the truth, why would she go back to the cave to lead the others? Why would the others trust or accept her as their ruler? She is alien to them now, she speaks in riddles, and so much light from the outside has blinded her to the reality of everyday life inside the cave.
God Emperor of Dune has brought to life the cave allegory for me, providing possible answers to these questions, and I’m fascinated by it.
My Initial Impression of the Allegory of the Cave
On my very first post on The Republic, I wrote about how, in the pursuit of knowledge, the philosopher has relinquished something she didn’t know was essential and only realized the magnitude of what was lost once she saw the truth. Then, it was too late. What she lost is human connection, community, love. She has seen the truth of the universe, but she’s all alone. She now tries to go back to the cave to try to recover what she has lost, but she has been transformed and can no longer reclaim her place among her fellow humans. Has she lost her touch with her humanity?
The Question of Choice
Without me, there would have been by now no people anywhere, none whatsoever. And the path to that extinction was more hideous than your wildest imaginings.
— Leto II Atreides, God Emperor of Dune by Frank Herbert
My other question was whether the philosopher has a choice to go outside of the cave and then return.
In Herbert’s universe, Leto, the God Emperor, does have a choice whether to purse the so-called Golden Path (coming back inside the cave to rule the people). Through his prescient vision, he sees that it’s the only way for humanity to survive. However, the burden of that knowledge is forced on him. One could argue that ‘going outside the cave’ was not a choice for him, he was born outside. His father could’ve taken that role, sparing him from that fate, but he didn’t. Maybe his sister could’ve done it as well. What I find fascinating is that in order to ensure the Golden Path, he must literally give up his humanity. He becomes a tyrant out of selflessness, embodying Plato’s idea of the philosopher king. One who doesn’t rule for self gratification, but makes the ultimate sacrifice for humanity: to become the villain in their story so they may be saved.
He goes on to create a whole religion, or what Plato would describe as a system of noble lies, in order to keep order and peace in his empire.
This begs the question of whether those living under his illusions are content with their lives. It’s evident that they can’t understand the extent of the sacrifice that Leto has made. They haven’t seen what he has seen.
Both the citizens and the philosopher end up trapped in their roles, prisoners of the very system meant to save them. It’s a kind of stalemate. Perhaps the optimal move in a game-theory sense, but one that leaves everyone miserable in the end. People, after all, crave freedom to rather than freedom from. That is an interesting concept I learned reading Atwood’s ‘The Handmaid’s Tale.’ We crave the sense of agency, of choosing our own path, even if those choices ultimately lead us to ruin.
The Best for the Whole Might Not Be the Best for the Individual
When I set out to lead humankind along my Golden Path, I promised them a lesson their bones would remember. I know a profound pattern which humans deny with their words even while their actions affirm it. They say they seek security and quiet, the condition they call peace. Even as they speak, they create the seeds of turmoil and violence. If they find their quiet security, they squirm in it. How boring they find it.
— Leto II Atreides
If we were talking a bad evil tyrant, one who’s only looking out for himself, it’s a no-brainer. No one wants that. It’s easy to agree on something like that, and there’d be no need for reflection or further discussion in that case.
The question here is about placing people into roles which guarantees the best for city (or empire) as a whole, not for one particular individual. In this case, the ruler must sacrifice so much that we, as a third person observer, not as a citizen, recognize that they truly are acting out of (perceived) selflessness.
If we’re having this discussion, I’m not even sure what the real question is. Is it an ethical one? That’s a difficult place to start, because before we can even attempt an answer, we have to decide what ethical really means. Maybe instead we should ask: Would I do it? Would I surrender my own humanity in order to preserve humanity itself? Could I accept immortality if it meant being cut off from the very experiences that make life meaningful: love, vulnerability, connection, purpose? Could I give all that up so that others might live on, knowing that few, if any, would ever understand my sacrifice? Could I become the villain, the necessary monster, for the sake of their survival?
And what about the people living under such a ruler? Would you rather be a citizen in the realm of the God Emperor or under the guidance of Plato’s philosopher king: safe, peaceful, and prosperous, yet confined within the limits of their rule and their noble lie? You’d have security, yes, but also a cage. You might never even know what dangers they’ve saved you from, only the quiet pressure of the bars built “for your own good.”
The Question of Love
“Do you know,” he asked, “that since I have become thus, you are the first person to touch my cheeks?”
“But I know what you are and what you were,” she said.
“What I was . . . ahhh, Hwi. What I was has become only this face, and all the rest is lost in the shadows of memory . . . hidden . . . gone.”
“Not hidden from me, Love.” […]
“Then I will not mourn for what might have been,” he said. “Yes, my love, I will share my soul with you.”
One of the most touching parts of the Dune series, for me so far, is the relationship between Hwi and Leto. She manages to see beyond his façade of emperor, of worm, of tyrant, and to glimpse his soul. Hwi recognizes the humanity still within him. They grieve together what could’ve been.
Leto’s ancestral memories were awake within him from the inside womb. He was never allowed a true childhood, even while still human. He became a worm before he could grow up. He gave up experiencing human relationships and love. It is through Hwi that he comes to understand just how immense that sacrifice truly was, even though it’s far too late to undo it.
It is in his last moment with Hwi before his death that we, as the readers, get to witness his humanity, still alive inside him. Paradoxically, she became the temptation to stray away from the Golden Path as well as the ultimate reason to pursue it til the end. She embodied what he had set out to save in the first place. She was proof that humanity was not doomed.
Lessons From The God Emperor
Thus, I demonstrate the terrible danger of a gliding, passionless mediocrity, a movement without ambitions or aims. I show you that entire civilizations can do this thing. I give you eons of life which slips gently toward death without fuss or stirring, without even asking “Why?” I show you the false happiness and the shadow-catastrophe called Leto, the God Emperor. Now, will you learn the real happiness?
— Leto II Atreides
What mesmerized me the most was the realization that Leto intended for his reign to be a lesson for those to come. A lesson in what not to do, or what not to permit. I see this as part of Herbert’s legacy, his message to the world. I can’t help but wonder whether, in painting for us a picture of a supposedly ‘just city’ and revealing its inherent injustices, Plato was also in fact warning us against the pursuit of such an ideal.