Leader and General
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Aristophanes — θεούς, ἵνα τὰ μὲν ἐκφύγωμεν, τῶν δὲ τύχωμεν, ὡς ὁ Ἔρως ἡμῖν ἡγεμὼν καὶ στρατηγός. ᾧ μηδεὶς ἐναντία πραττέτω— πράττει δʼ ἐναντία ὅστις θεοῖς ἀπεχθάνεται— φίλοι γὰρ γενόμενοι καὶ διαλλαγέντες τῷ θεῷ ἐξευρήσομέν τε καὶ ἐντευξόμεθα τοῖς παιδικοῖς τοῖς ἡμετέροις αὐτῶν, ὃ τῶν νῦν ὀλίγοι ποιοῦσι. καὶ μή μοι ὑπολάβῃ Ἐρυξίμαχος, κωμῳδῶν τὸν λόγον, ὡς Παυσανίαν καὶ Ἀγάθωνα λέγω— ἴσως μὲν
...the gods, so that we may escape some things, and attain others, since Eros is our leader and general. Against him, let no one act in opposition— whoever is hateful to the gods acts in opposition— for, having become friends and reconciled with the god, we shall find and meet the beloveds who are our very own, which few people nowadays manage. And let Eryximachus not take me up, making a comedy of my speech, as if I mean Pausanias and Agathon— though perhaps indeed—
Continuing directly from 193a's exhortation, the purpose clause completes: piety toward the gods lets us escape one fate and attain another, since Eros is our leader and general. Aristophanes turns the exhortation into something closer to a military order — let no one act against Eros, since to do so is to be hateful to the gods — and promises that reconciliation with the god lets each of us find and meet the beloved who is truly our own, a rare thing now. He then heads off a joke before Eryximachus can make it, insisting he does not mean only Pausanias and Agathon — though the sentence runs on unfinished into 193c.
ἡγεμὼν καὶ στρατηγός is ordinary Athenian civic vocabulary, not decoration: a hēgemōn leads an expedition or a chorus, and a stratēgos is one of the ten generals citizens actually elected each year — men like Pericles, or, within a few years of this dinner party's dramatic date, Alcibiades himself, reclining a few couches away. Aristophanes borrows the language of command from the assembly and the army to describe submission to Eros, and the sentence that follows keeps the metaphor literal rather than ornamental: enantia prattein, 'to act in opposition,' is the standard phrase for a soldier or subordinate defying orders. No one mutinies against this general; whoever does has already picked a fight with the gods.
The word Aristophanes reaches for to describe what he fears Eryximachus will do — kōmōidein, 'to make a comedy of' — is his own trade name for himself. It comes from kōmōidia, comedy, the genre he has spent his career writing, the same genre that had already put Socrates on stage as a fraud in the Clouds a decade before this dinner. A comic poet is, professionally, the one Athenian licensed to turn any citizen into material for laughter, and here he asks not to have that done to his own speech. Plato does not comment on the irony; he lets Aristophanes use the verb and move on. Whether the request is sincere or itself a bit of stagecraft — a comedian's mock-solemn plea to be taken seriously — is left for the reader to judge, and the myth he has just finished telling, sawn noses and all, has not exactly played it straight either.
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