This difference between εἴδωλον and ἰδέα, or εἶδος, plays an important
role in the philosophy of Plato. εἶδος (ἰδέα) means the look of
something itself, what, for example, makes a house what it is. εἴδωλον is an image, a likeness; it too is a kind of look. For example, a photograph also gives us a look, but it does not give us the house itself. εἶδος is applied to the things themselves. The essence of the house is τὸ κοινόν [the common], what pertains to each individual house. Individual houses, tables, and the like are likenesses, εἴδωλα, to the extent that each looks like the essence. εἴδωλον is the name for the individual being. This chair is a quite specific image of chairs in general.
—Τί δήτα, ὦ ξένε, εἴδωλον ἂν φαῖμεν εἶναι πλήν γε τὸ πρὸς τἀληθινὸν
ἀφωμοιωμένον ἕτερον τοιοῦτον;
—Ἓτερον δὲ λέγεις τοιοῦτον ἀληθινόν, ἢ ἐπὶ τίνι τὸ τοιοῦτον εἶπες;
—Οὐδαμῶς ἀληθινόν γε, ἀλλ᾽ ἐοικὸς μέν.
—Ἆρα τὸ ἀληθινόν ὄντως ὂν λέγων;
—Οὕτως.
—What should we understand by εἴδωλον? What should we under
stand by likeness or copy other than that which is likened to the genuinely unconcealed and consequently is secondary and heterogeneous? {Here, an image of something is given, an image that in a certain sense is likened to the thing itself. In this sense, it is a second thing just like the prototype. This is correct in a certain sense, but it is also a distortion.}
—Another thing like this, that is, another genuinely unconcealed thing,
do you mean? {If the copy is designated as a second thing just like what it copies, then it too is an ἀληθινόν.}
—No, I mean that the image is like the being itself. {The copy is indeed
like the genuine object in a certain sense, but as the copy it is never the authentic object itself (ἀληθινόν).}
—So do you understand by ἀληθινόν the ὄντως ὄν, the unconcealed
in the genuine sense, what is in the genuine sense {the idea}?
—Yes, that’s it.
In Plato, then, the idea is what is in the genuine sense. The third stage, which treats the unconcealed in the sense of the idea, also treats what is unconcealed in the highest sense and therefore what is in the highest sense.
c) The ideas as what is seen in a
pre-figuring (projective) viewing
How can the ideas be called what is unconcealed in the first rank? They are, so to speak, the vanguard for the genuinely true, they prepare the way for experiencing and pre-figuring a specific idea, a form;