Buff-aedo

(Spoiler alert!)

Plato portrays a touching death of Socrates, who spends his final hours assuring his students (or the fearful child within his students, as Cebes suggests) that death is not frightening. Once again, the scene is mirrored by Whedon in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, in the final episode of season 6.

Socrates' role, his identity, is that of "philosopher." As Plato characterizes him, this role pushes him not only to pursue the highest truth, but to push others to look beyond what is most obviously apparent in the world. We see this in his interactions with his students in Phaedo. He feels a responsibility to the knowledge he seeks, and this responsibility creates a bond between him and others. He is driven to pull others toward knowledge, just as he is driven toward knowledge himself.

Although Buffy has a very different role, that of the Slayer, she is subject to a similar responsibility. She is responsible to destiny, and her destiny is to be the people's protector. Like Socrates worked to defend the people from ignorance, Buffy worked to defend the people from vampires and other demons.

As Socrates explains, the lovers of knowledge are awarded the best position for their immortal souls after death. This is his role, and he has lived it well, so he approaches death without fear. As he drinks the hemlock and his body dies, he implies that he is being healed from the sickness of bodily imprisonment. He can now reside in pure knowledge.

Buffy expresses similar thoughts when she sacrifices her own life in the final episode of season 6, for her sister, Dawn's. "This is the work that I have to do," she tells Dawn. "I'm okay...You have to be strong. The hardest thing in this world is to live in it. Be brave. Live. For me."

As Socrates accepts his coming death as an escape from the temptations and fallacies of the body, Buffy accepts her death as the ideal act of duty and protection. She encourages Dawn to use her memory to be brave, and to not shy away from the world when living is difficult. Socrates asks his students to serve his memory by living lives "for their own selves," to not be swayed by the ideas or criticisms of the masses. Both, as guides and friends, encourage those they leave behind to face the challenge of the conflict between internal and external worlds.

Both died at peace, moving toward an ideal they had lived for.