A Question That Changes Everything

In the Meno, the Thessalian nobleman Meno poses a seemingly simple question to Socrates: can virtue be taught? Socrates responds with a counter-question that drives the entire dialogue: how can we teach something if we don’t even know what it is? This question isn’t meant to frustrate. It opens the door to deeper understanding.

For the Freemason, this dynamic is deeply familiar. With every degree advancement, you encounter symbols and rituals whose meaning is never directly explained. You must search for yourself, ask questions, and discover that the question is often more important than the answer. Plato called this the method of elenchus — the systematic examination of what you think you know, until you discover what you truly know.

Knowledge Already Within You

One of the most celebrated passages in the Meno is the exchange between Socrates and a young enslaved boy. By asking questions alone — never giving answers — Socrates guides the boy to the solution of a geometric problem. The boy has never studied mathematics, yet he arrives at the correct answer. Plato uses this scene to illustrate that knowledge doesn’t come from the outside; it is remembered from within.

Virtue is not taught — it is discovered. The Freemason finds it by learning to ask the right questions of himself.

This principle resonates powerfully with Freemasonry. The lodge is not a classroom where you sit passively listening to a teacher. It is a space where you actively seek light. The symbols — the rough ashlar, the compasses and square — provide no answers. They invite reflection. Just as Socrates didn’t feed the boy answers but helped him find them on his own, so too does the ritual help the brother unlock the wisdom already within him.

Virtue as Practice, Not Theory

Meno wants a neat definition of virtue that he can memorize and apply like a formula. Socrates refuses to provide one. Why? Because virtue is not a recipe you follow — it is a disposition you develop through practice. You learn to be just by acting justly, not by reading a book about justice.

Freemasonry embodies this same principle. The rough ashlar doesn’t become smooth through philosophizing about it — it requires daily work. Every interaction with a fellow brother, every decision in your daily life, is an opportunity to practice virtue. The lodge offers a safe environment for that practice, but the real work happens outside its walls.

Practical Steps for the Seeking Brother

How can you apply the insights from the Meno concretely on your own Masonic path? Here are some actions you can take starting today:

Ask yourself one fundamental question each week. Not “how was my week?” but rather “when did I act against my own values this week, and why?”

Listen for the questions, not just the answers. In lodge, pay attention to the questions your brothers ask. Which questions do you yourself tend to avoid?

Choose one virtue per month to practice consciously. Not to achieve perfection, but to discover what that virtue truly means to you in practice.

Challenge your certainties. When you think you know something for sure, ask yourself: how do I know this? What might I be missing?

The Paradox of Seeking

Meno raises a famous paradox: how can you search for something if you don’t know what it is? And if you already know it, why would you search at all? Socrates resolves this with the idea that the soul is immortal and already possesses all knowledge — it simply needs to be remembered. Whether you take this literally or as a metaphor, the practical lesson remains: the search itself is valuable, even when you cannot describe the destination.

Every Freemason knows this experience. You enter the lodge without knowing precisely what you’re looking for. Yet something drives you forward. That inner urge toward self-improvement, toward connection, toward something greater than yourself — that is the seeking Plato describes. The answer is not a formula you find, but a person you become.

Connection Through Shared Inquiry

The Meno also reveals that wisdom grows through dialogue. Socrates does not philosophize in solitude. He needs Meno to sharpen his own thinking, and Meno needs him to move beyond superficial assumptions. This is precisely what brotherhood in the lodge makes possible — not a hierarchy of knowledge, but a community of seekers helping one another dig deeper.

In an age when answers are cheap and available everywhere, the art of asking questions is more precious than ever. The Freemason who reads Plato’s Meno recognizes an ancient truth: the path to virtue begins with the courage to admit what you do not know, and the willingness to search together.

Plato’s dialogue ends without a definitive answer to whether virtue can be taught. That is not a failure — it is an invitation. The Freemason who walks into lodge tonight can accept that invitation. Not by waiting for instructions, but by asking the questions that carry him forward. In that questioning, in that shared search, lies the very heart of both philosophy and brotherhood.

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Texts are based on the ideas and content of the author of devrijmetselaar.nl, reviewed, corrected, and supplemented with the assistance of OpenAI. Images are created based on the ideas of the author of devrijmetselaar.nl using OpenAI/DALL-E.

The message Plato’s Meno and Freemasonry: Discovering Virtue by Asking first published on De Vrijmetselaar.