The "Philosophical Bible" and the Secular State
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 3970335 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Montserrat Herrero (0000-0001-8949-3742, Universidad de Navarra, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2017 |
| Volume | 22 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 31-48 |
| Publication date | 2017-01-02 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | The European Legacy (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1084-8770 • E-ISSN: 1470-1316 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/10848770.2016.1239453 |
| OpenAlex | W2534731111 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 3 |
| References cited | 40 |
Almost all scholars of the Enlightenment consider Hobbes, Spinoza, and Locke as the founding theorists of the “secular modern state.” In contrast to the widely held view of the modern state, I argue that far from being “secular” it was the product of the sacralization of politics, which resulted from the way these philosophers interpreted the Scriptures as part of their philosophical inquiries. The analysis of the “linguistic turn” in their biblical interpretations reveals how they tried to undermine the power of the Church to claim greater freedoms for the state. Their philosophical inquiries initiated the secularization of the Christian religion and the sacralization of politics as two correlative developments, rather than the secularization of the state per se, as is usually supposed. The philosophical arguments proposed by Hobbes, Spinoza, and Locke helped to resolve the religious battles of Europe’s many confessions in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, but are still pertinent to our current very different historical context
Enlightenment · Epistemology · Political science · Politics · Secular state · Secularization · American Constitutional Law and Politics · History · Law · Philosophy · Political Theory and Influence · Religious studies · Seventeenth-Century Political and Philosophical Thought
Spinoza's Critique of Religion
The Clarendon Edition of the Works of John Locke
The Clarendon Edition of the Works of John Locke: The Reasonableness of Christianity: As delivered in the Scriptures
The Books of Nature and Scripture
Locke, Language and Early-Modern Philosophy
Political Discourse of Carl Schmitt
Persecution and the Art of Writing
Reason and Rhetoric in the Philosophy of Hobbes
The Political Thought of John Locke
The Dignity of Legislation
Hobbes and Republican Liberty
The Bible and Reason
God, Locke, and Equality
The Wars of Truth
Christianity, Antiquity, and Enlightenment
Radical Enlightenment
Jus Circa Sacra
Spinoza and Language
The Political Thought of John Locke
John Locke and the Theological Foundation of Liberal Toleration
The Civil Theology of Liberal Democracy
I. Philosophy and Prophecy
Spinoza's Political Theology
The Secularization of Language in the Seventeenth Century
Hobbes on Religion and the Church between "The Elements of Law" and "Leviathan
Part III
The Elements of Law
| Unique citing works | 3 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,38 |
| Citation span | 2018 - 2025 (8) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 3 |