Links to the text: Project Gutenberg version; Oregon State University digital version;
Chapters to read for class: Part 1: The Introduction; Chs. 1, 6, 10, 11, 13, 14, 15; and Part 1 - Chs. 17, 18, 21, and 29
Thomas Hobbes (1588-167) was born in the midst of the Spanish Armada’s appearance off the coast of Southern England. This legend was indicative of Hobbes’ nationalism and his fealty to sovereign power and to the state became a key feature of his philosophical writing. A royalist who had to go into hiding and exile during the Cromwellian period, he wrote and published in 1651 his major study of state power, Leviathan, while living in Holland in exile.
Chapters to read for class: Part 1: The Introduction; Chs. 1, 6, 10, 11, 13, 14, 15; and Part 1 - Chs. 17, 18, 21, and 29
Thomas Hobbes (1588-167) was born in the midst of the Spanish Armada’s appearance off the coast of Southern England. This legend was indicative of Hobbes’ nationalism and his fealty to sovereign power and to the state became a key feature of his philosophical writing. A royalist who had to go into hiding and exile during the Cromwellian period, he wrote and published in 1651 his major study of state power, Leviathan, while living in Holland in exile.
As a
royalist, Hobbes was skeptical about the outcome of the English Civil War and thought
his country was falling apart and declining back into a primitive state of
nature (Jonathan Wolff, 2006, p. 7). To
counter this he opens his work with a substantial discussion of the state of
nature and man’s relation to nature. Hobbes
argues that without a state, we are returned to live in a dangerous and an
absolute state of nature, without any protection of government or implied laws
of civil society. After carefully
delineating the natural skills and ability of human traits and abilities,
Hobbes argues that through human society physical differences and superiority
of individual abilities are mitigated. In
order to restore society in the wake of the English Civil War, Hobbes’ Leviathan
offers a rationale for the power of the sovereign. Although he was empathetic to monarchy, in the
text Hobbes left his preference for monarchy or a republic ambiguous. His
emphasis on the duties and role of the Commonwealth allows him to bridge the
possibility of either a monarchy or a republic, while stressing the
responsibilities of the state, regardless of form, to provide for the
commonwealth.
Suggested questions for consideration in your essay:
- Does Hobbes' theory of a state of nature and a law of nature deny the capacity or choice of moral judgment and actions by human beings?
- Do Hobbes' Laws of Nature lack a basis for establishing their realization? In other words how do we establish and discuss any laws of nature?
- Should we distinguish between individual and collective rationality?
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