The Good, the Dead, the Actual

Perhaps the defining moment of Plato's oeuvre is in book VII, of the Republic, when the escapee from the cave returns.  This signifies that the function in Platonism of the world of Forms is Political, not Ontological, i. e. that its status as a 'better' world befits it as a source of influencing the actual world, rather than as a permanent residence.  Accordingly, even though in the Phaedo, Socrates seems to be asserting that humans are better off dead, those words may just as likely be designed to console his grieving followers.  Instead, the reason for his refusing the exile option may be the simplest one--that he is too old for such a change.  Likewise, comparisons between Socrates and Christ, e. g. Kierkegaard's, tend, in their zeal for afterworldliness, to overlook the mundane fact of the vast age difference at the time of their deaths.  Platonism is fundamentally Political Philosophy, not Theology.