I met a sentence: Δυνάμεθα ἄρα τοῖς φύλαξι παραβάλλειν τοὺς κύνας·. I think it means that “So we can compare guards to dogs”, but why “guards”(τοῖς φύλαξι) in dative and “dogs”(τοὺς κύνας) in accusative?
It’s one of the ways you can use παραβάλλω to compare things - you compare one thing (accusative) to another (dative). Alternatively, you can compare one thing (accusative) πρὸς (to) another (also accusative). You can use παρὰ instead of πρὸς if you like.
You can find information like this by looking up the verb in a lexicon - I’ve got the Liddell and Scott one on my phone.
I know that, but here I wonder why “guards”(τοῖς φύλαξι) in dative. Don’t we want to compare “guards” to “dogs”? In my opinion “guards” should be in accusative and “dogs” in dative
I don’t think it makes any difference… if you’re comparing two things with παραβάλλω you put one in accusative and one in dative.
Well I am entangled with this. Are “compare guards to dogs” and “compare dogs to guards” the same? Here I think they are using dogs as vehicles of metaphor.(“they” refers to Σωκράτης and Γλαύκων)
OK, maybe this will help. παραβάλλω is like put something (accusative) alongside something else (dative). So here we already have the guards, and we put the dogs alongside them to make a comparison.
I have no idea if this reflects how the verb is used consistently, though.
It seems to have a point.
Anyway, I won’t think about this question.