Suchergebnisse

Far from being only an insincere homage to the spirit of his time, Hobbes's concern for theology is a consequence of his political individualism. Irrespective of God's real existence, in order to answer the 'Foole' and to assure legitimation and obedience to Leviathan, calculating reason is not enough, as individual faith in God and in the binding force of His law of nature is required. In Leviathan II, chapter XXXI, the correspondence between the earthly king, i.e. the mortal god, and the immortal God proves to be the starting point for a new political theology, conceived as a practical science for the needed order of peace in this unique, material world. The divine image of sovereignty, embodied by Almighty God, is the beginning and the end of an immanent, sacred history of salvation that resembles a utopian tale, not in an attempt to oppose or overturn the present political order, but to solve the problems of modern political rationality by means of theological imagination.

Going beyond the belief-unbelief controversy in the scholarly debate about Hobbes's theological ideas, the essays in this issue look at the philosopher's theology as a practical science for attaining particular ends, irrespective of his religious feelings. This approach is both to reassert the seriousness of Hobbes's discourse on theology and to show how deeply political issues are involved in the development of his theological science. From this perspective his theses on heresy turn out to be the necessary corollary of his attempt to de-legitimate clerical control over politics; while in order to answer to the Foole and solve the legitimacy enigma, Almighty God appears to be the divine icon of earthly kings rather than the Lord of a transcendent world. Likewise this issue looks at the correspondence between political theology and materialism by investigating both the new meaning of 'Potentia Dei' in Hobbes's theological thought and the radical outcomes he draws with his criticism of the Cartesian argument of the Deus deceptor. On the whole, all the essays converge in highlighting the strong connection between new ideas on nature and knowledge, theological nonconformity and political science in Hobbes's thought.