I regret to remember how long it's been since I read about the death of Socrates, but I did stumble over this wonderful web site containing his (so-called) apology.

Am I misinformed, however, when I understand that the background of the religious charges were simply that Socrates had taught men like Alciabiades, who had betrayed the Athenian state, and there was a certain "teacher-pupil" blame game going on? I further understood that the whole point was that there was something inherently evil in a man who could argue both sides of any question so effectively - as if he didn't HAVE any personal beliefs. Socrates himself described it as

Well, what do the slanderers say? They shall be my prosecution and I will sum up their words in an affidavit: 'Socrates is an evil-doer, and a curious person, who searches into things under the earth and in heaven, and he makes the worse appear the better cause; and he teaches the aforesaid doctrines to others.'

The Apology of Socrates