S.M.Y Kayseri's Reviews > Leviathan

This book's scope, like its title suggested is massive. It is one of those book which started from the minutest detail of the microcosmos, that is Man, to the apex of Man's reaches; in this book, the Common-Wealth.

Hobbes' main project in this book is to provide an all-reaching argument supporting obedience to authority according to human reasoning. As he grounded his argument in human reasoning, it is necessary and wise for him to start with the single unit-Man- and define Man's passion and his natural rights. This is what Hobbes' embarked on the Part I of this book, titled Of Man.

The second part, after he elaborated on human passion, he worked on to justify the formation of Sovereignty from the data he amassed in the former part. He argued that the natural right for Man is to protect or to preserve his life, and in Man's natural condition, the limits for self-preservation is almost close to none. So, Man in his primordial anarchic state, can enforce his basic rights with whatsoever means and impunity and thus, a perpetual Warring state. Only by the formation of an Authority can guarantee both Man's natural rights for Self-preservation and Peace. By assenting to the formation of an Authority, a Common-Wealth is created, a Leviathan, a macro-image of the microcosmos, which every of its subject's natural rights are guaranteed.

The third part elaborates on the formation of a Christian Common-Wealth. The fourth part was essentially an attack on what Hobbes' called as "Vain Philosophy" and the "darkness" it wrought. Being a Renaissance man himself, it is understandable why Hobbes and his peers developed degrees of ambivalence (to put it nicely) towards the Scholastic metaphysics.

I would categorise this book as a World-building book for the reasons I mentioned above. I can only recall few books that can rival Leviathan's scope, the closest one being the Muqaddimah of Ibnu Khaldun. Of course, certain ideas in their works are severely outdated and disproved, but they still bear witness on Man's journey in discovering and exploring new frontiers.