Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- A note on references
- Introduction
- 1 The standard philosophical interpretation
- 2 Hobbes's compositive reconstruction, phase one: identification of the principle of political obligation
- 3 Compositive reconstruction, phase two: religion and the redescription of transcendent interests
- 4 Hobbes's mechanism for the reproduction of social stability
- 5 Hobbes's resolutive analysis, phase two: part 4 of Leviathan
- 6 Theory in practice: Leviathan and Behemoth
- 7 Hobbes's resolutive analysis, phase one: design and detail
- 8 The treatment of transcendent interests
- 9 Hobbes's absolutism
- Notes
- Index
2 - Hobbes's compositive reconstruction, phase one: identification of the principle of political obligation
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 08 January 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- A note on references
- Introduction
- 1 The standard philosophical interpretation
- 2 Hobbes's compositive reconstruction, phase one: identification of the principle of political obligation
- 3 Compositive reconstruction, phase two: religion and the redescription of transcendent interests
- 4 Hobbes's mechanism for the reproduction of social stability
- 5 Hobbes's resolutive analysis, phase two: part 4 of Leviathan
- 6 Theory in practice: Leviathan and Behemoth
- 7 Hobbes's resolutive analysis, phase one: design and detail
- 8 The treatment of transcendent interests
- 9 Hobbes's absolutism
- Notes
- Index
Summary
It is not the bare words, but the scope of the writer that giveth the true light by which any writing is to bee interpreted; and they that insist upon single texts, without considering the main designe, can derive no thing from them cleerly.
–Hobbes (L 333)Although interpreters of Hobbes's political philosophy have all agreed that Hobbes took as his primary task providing an answer to the question of how domestic social order can be established and maintained perpetually, there remains among Hobbes interpreters serious disagreement over what might be called the strategy that Hobbes is thought to employ in executing this fundamental task. The specific characterizations of Hobbes's strategy put forward by the various interpreters – their views of how Hobbes was proceeding – differ in ways that have a profound effect on the resulting positions attributed to Hobbes – their views of what Hobbes actually argued. Nonstandard interpreters such as Warrender and Taylor have held that Hobbes sought to provide a basis for social order by demonstrating that people have a moral obligation to obey their sovereign, and have thus attributed to him views and arguments that differ dramatically from those alleged by standard philosophical interpreters, who see Hobbes as attempting to provide a basis for social order by demonstrating that people, who desire their selfpreservation above all else, would be irrational ever to disobey their sovereign.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Ideals as Interests in Hobbes's LeviathanThe Power of Mind over Matter, pp. 48 - 98Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1992