Aristotle Justice And Friendship Essay

Moreover, Aristotle’s use of division actually allows the reader to see the similarities between the two ideas, justice and friendship. Both are defined by smaller, more refined categories, which are organized hierarchically themselves, many of these individual categories mirroring one another. This mirroring is particularly evident in the transactional and reciprocal nature of friendship: “[i]n all friendships between dissimilars it is, as we have said, proportion that equalizes the parties and preserves the friendship” (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1163b). Aristotle is concerned with balance in the nature of friendship, suggesting that the amount given and received in a friendship must be exchanged both proportionally and reciprocally. He suggests that friendships last “when the love is in proportion to the merit of the parties”, meaning that in a relationship of people who are unequal, the person who is most worthy should be loved the most (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1158b). This sort of balance which governs friendship—as all friendships are based on a system of exchange, whether it be utility, pleasure or love—is not unlike the different types of justice. Reciprocal justice, for example, closely mirrors the exchange of love in unequal friendships: “justice does hold men together—reciprocity in …show more content…
While Aristotle writes “justice is often thought to be the greatest of virtues, and ‘neither the evening nor morning star’”, this sentiment is once again shrouded in ambiguities, as “often thought” is only used to describe how justice can be understood, not how it should be understood (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics,1129b). Further, because justice by itself is not enough to ensure happiness and self-sufficiency, it is important to view justice as a quality not superior or inferior to friendship, but one which works in cooperation with friendship to achieve the ultimate aim of