Socrates is a man of great controversy. He has been portrayed as many different personalities such as a sophist to a great philosopher to just a vocal old man. The true nature of Socrates is to be questioned. He spoke his thoughts on life and what his philosophy on life was. A couple arguments that he spoke about really stood out about lying. These arguments had brute force and were made very clear through his dialogue. According to his dialogue, he felt that there were two different types of lies.
The first type called the true lie, in Socrates mind feels, as this type is impossible. The true lie consists of one simply not telling the truth, as they know it. Socrates says:
When a man in speech makes a bad representation of what
gods and heroes are like, just as a painter paints something
that doesn't resemble the things whose likeness he wished
As can clearly be seen in this sentence, Socrates is pointing out a painter that knows that truth about what he is painting but is making it look different than he knows it as. The painter is doing this to portray something other than the truth to other people because the truth may either hurt him or hurt others. It is more of a protection type, to protect himself or to protect others from coming into harm.
One of Socrates examples of a true lie is shown in the following dialogue that talks about god.
Do you suppose the god is a wizard, able treacherously to
reveal himself at different times in different ideas, at one
time actually himself changing and passing from his own
form and to many shapes, at another time deceiving us and
making us think such things about him? (380e)
This idea is showing that God is playing with human kind, or appearing as a human form, which he may really not be. This also shows how some feel that God changes with out us knowing and deceives us to make us feel different from what he should be d
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