Most of those who think about these things agree that the two pillars of Western culture are Socrates (427–347 B.C.E) and Jesus of Nazareth (c. 5 BC/BCE – c. 30 AD/CE) the former thus predating Jesus by around 427 years.

Jesus was crucified because he was seen as a threat to the powers-that-be. His brand of non-violent resistance, his manner of stirring the people and empowering the poor, were correctly judged to be challenging the political power structures of his day.

Socrates was charged with impiety (i.e for being unreligious) and with corrupting the youth of Athens. He lived during the time of the transition from the height of the Athenian Empire to its decline after its defeat by Sparta.  At a time when Athens was seeking to stabilize and recover from its humiliating defeat, the Athenian public may have been entertaining doubts about democracy as an efficient form of government. Socrates appears to have been a critic of democracy, and his trial is interpreted by some scholars to be an expression of political infighting. He was found guilty as charged by a jury of 500 of his fellow Athenians (by a vote of 280 to 220), and sentenced to death by drinking a silver goblet of hemlock. Socrates turned down the pleas of his disciples to escape from prison - since they had drugged the guards and planned a safe way out - drank the hemlock and died in the company of his friends. According to the Phaedo, Socrates had a calm death, enduring his sentence with fortitude. He was his own executioner. His last words were “Crito, we owe a cock to Asclepius. Do pay it. Don't forget.”

Socrates asks questions. Jesus offers answers. Socrates was the son of Sophroniscus, an Athenian stone mason and sculptor. Jesus was the son of God and was a carpenter. Socrates symbolises the voice of reason, Jesus symbolises belief. So why do Christians smirk when I tell them I am a philosopher by choice and not a Christian by birth?

Jacques-Louis David: The Death of Socrates

"At the height of his youthful popularity and enthusiasm, part of a close circle of friends (including Chernier, Lafayette and Lavoisier) who were purshing for radical political reform, David painted this unusual historical picture in 1787. Commissioned by the Trudaine de Montigny brothers, leaders in the call for a free market system and more public discussion, this picture depicts the closing moments of the life of Socrates. Condemned to death or exile by the Athenian government for his teaching methods which aroused scepticism and impiety in his students, Socrates heroicly rejected exile and accepted death from hemlock."

"For months, David and his friends debated and discussed the importance of this picture. It was to be another father figure (like the Horatii and Brutus), unjustly condemned but who sacrifices himself for an abstract principle. By contrasting the movements of the energetic but firmly controlled Socrates, and his swooning disciples, through the distribution of light and dark accents, David transforms what might have been only a fashionable picture of martyrdom to a clarion call for nobility and self-control even in the face of death."

"Here the philosopher continues to speak even while reaching for the cup, demonstrating his indifference to death and his unyielding commitment to his ideals. Most of his disciplines and slaves swirl around him in grief, betraying the weakness of emotionalism. His wife is seen only in the distance leaving the prison. Only Plato, at the foot of the bed and Crito grasping his master's leg, seem in control of themselves."

"For contemporaries the scene could only call up memories of the recently abandoned attempt at reform, the dissolution of the Assembly of Notables in 1787, and the large number of political prisoners in the king's jails or in exile. David certainly intended this scene as a rebuke to cringing souls. On the eve of the Revolution, this picture served as a trumpet call to duty, and resistance to unjust authority. Thomas Jefferson was present at its unveiling, and admired it immensly. Sir Joshua Reynolds compared the Socrates with Michelangelo's Sistine Ceiling and Raphael's Stanze, and after ten visits to the Salon described it as `in every sense perfect'."