The “affections” Socrates alludes to are attributes or qualities of piety, as opposed to “revealing its being,” which asks for the essence or abstract definition of piety. As an example, we can use these two methods to understand a more mundane concept like a triangle. To reveal the being of a triangle, we could say that it is a closed, simple polygon in 2D Euclidean space consisting of exactly three non-collinear points and the three line segments connecting them. Its affections, on the other hand, could include: having interior angles that sum to 180 degrees or can effectively distribute loads and resist deformation when used in truss structures. One provides a blueprint for the absolute essence of the object or idea, while the other enum ates it’s qualities.
Socrates’ pursuit in the Euthyphro is to find the “being” of piety, in line with his wider philosophical quest to reveal the essence of virtue. The Euthyphro presents a unique scenario where both Euthyphro and Socrates are about to participate in legal trials regarding piety—Euthyphro as prosecutor and Socrates as defendant. In this context, as opposed to some of Socrates other ‘what is x’ dialogues, the answer to the question of what is piety has significant consequences for both participants. Euthyphro is bold in his claim that he is acting piously by charging his father with the murder of a farmhand, but the case has many moral complications. Due to the peculiarity of Euthyphro’s case and the claim that his action in prosecuting this case is indeed pious, the dialogue turns to surround two questions:

1. Do we need to know what piety is in order to resolve hard questions about piety?
2. Does this knowledge require being able to reveal its essence/being?

Socrates believes that the answer to both of these questions is yes, and thus asks Euthyphro to reveal the essence of piety, both to satisfy his pursuit of knowledge and justify that his knowledge is sufficient to rule on this difficult case. Euthyphro makes four attempts to define the “being” of piety, or what piety is:

1. “Piety is what I am doing now, prosecuting a criminal either for murder or for sacrilegious theft” (5e).

   This is a clear example of what an “affection” as it merely reaffirms his belief that he is a pious in his action without any concrete model in which we can all understand piety.

2. “The pious is what all the gods love, and the opposite, what all the gods hate, is the impious.” (9e).

Socrates refutes this definition from 10a-11b as just another affection of piety. Socrates asks the questions at 10a, “Is the pious loved by the gods because it is pious, or is it pious because it is loved by the gods?“. If something is pious because the gods love it, this would mean that piety is arbitrary and dependent on the whims and myths of the gods. This is inadequate, as Greek mythology contains many moral contradictions, making it impossible to judge each case of piety independently. For example, the myth of Orestes demonstrates that Euthyphro’s act of prosecuting his father for a murder, impious. In fact, almost every act that Euthyphro claims to be pious could be refuted by a niche subsect of Greek mythology. Conversely, if the gods love something because it is pious, piety itself must be external to the gods love. This is because if the love of an act is determined not by the fact that the gods love it, but because the act is pious, thus the gods love it.

3. Piety is the part of the just concerned with tending to the gods (12e).

This proposal comes after Socrates and Euthyphro agree piety is a species of justice. Isolating that piety is the aspect of justice is satisfactory to Socrates, however the specific wording of ‘tending’ entails caring for something to its benefit, however the gods are perfect immortal beings and mortal humans thus can not benefit them in any way. This leads to the 4th definition.

4. “If a person knows how to do and say the things that are pleasing to the gods in prayer and sacrifice - those the ones who are pious. And actions like them preserve both the private welfare of households and the common welfare of the city, whereas those that are the opposite of pleasing are unholy, and they, of course, overturn and destroy everything (14b).”

This attempt expands piety to a wider sphere of not just actions loved by gods, but they promote the welfare of society. However, the words “pleasing” or “tending” are really just synonyms of “loved by”, meaning the initial logical flaws in the second definition are never remedied(15c). However, as the second sentence subjects, piety requires the knowledge of promoting the welfare of the city. While this is more just a plain definition of justice, it does propose piety as simply justice (knowledge of promoting the wellbeing of citizens/society) derived from a religious/mythological epistemology.

The Euthyphro dialogue is aporetic, meaning a definite conclusion of piety is never reached. Euthyphro still maintains complete confidence in his knowledge that his action is pious.

The argument that revealing the being of something is not necessary for judging the case of piety could follow this logic: just as children are able to recognise triangles without spelling out their mathematical definition, Euthyphro does not need a precise definition of piety in order to differentiate and rule on the pious from the impious. For simple cases such as blatant violent murder or theft (as with the first definition), this method may be sufficient. However, as Euthyphro himself is breaking several moral conventions in pursuing his case—those being: prosecuting a family member, prosecuting on behalf of a non-family member, prosecuting on behalf of a murderer, and stating that neglect is a form of murder—an extra degree of rigour may be needed.

Taking the definition of piety as justice as promoting the wellbeing of a society and it’s citizens (derived definition four), Euthyphro’s conviction could be disputed. Taking this utilitarian definition, it could be seen that the breaking of the moral conventions could set an unhealthy precedent for Athenian society that could lead to anarchy and disharmony. However, taking definition one we could also derive that piety is more so in line with strict moral laws (a la Kant’s categorical imperative), and thus would require a complete groundwork of metaphysics and critique of pure reason to justify his action’s piety. This is all to say that Socrates is justified in concluding that the being of piety is necessary to judge on hard cases such as Euthyphro, and thus is healthy base initialize the pursuit of the nature of virtue and morality.