Kant’s Model for Building the True Church: Transcending “Might Makes Right” and “Should Makes Good” through the Idea of a Non-Coercive Theocracy

• Authors: Palmquist Stephen
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

Kant’s Religion postulates the idea of an ethical community as a necessary requirement for humanity to become good. Few interpreters acknowledge Kant’s claims that realizing this idea requires building a “church” characterized by unity, integrity, freedom, and unchangeability, and that this new form of community is a non-coercive version of theocracy. Traditional (e.g., Jewish) theocracy replaces the political state of nature (“might makes right”) with an ethical state of nature (“should makes good”); non-coercive theocracy transcends this distinction, uniting humanity in a common vision of a divine legislator whose legislation is inward: the law of love binds church members together like families.

Keywords

EN

Immanuel Kant; church; theocracy; Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason; might makes right; ethical community

• Publisher: Instytut Filozofii - Uniwersytet Jagielloński
• Journal: Diametros
• Year: 2017
• Issue: 54
• Pages: 76-94

Dates

published

2017-12

Contributors

author

Palmquist Stephen

• Hong Kong Baptist University

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Identifiers

DOI

10.13153/diam.54.2017.1134