Rousseau on Civil Religion
- Date Submitted: 01/28/2010 06:29 AM
- Flesch-Kincaid Score: 53.2
- Words: 1990
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Religion is a component of almost every society.
Knowing this, one might look at the function it
serves. For Jean-Jacques Rousseau, religion,
specifically a civil religion established by the
Sovereign, is an instrument of politics that serves a
motivating function. In a new society people are
unable to understand the purpose of the law.
Therefore, civil religion motivates people to obey the
law because they fear some divine being. For a
developed society, civil religion motivates people to
maintain the habit of obedience because they grow to
understand and love the law. First of all, it is
necessary to clarify Rousseau’s ideas on religion. In
Chapter Eight of On the Social Contract, Rousseau
distinguishes four types of religion.
The first of these is the “religion of man.” According
to Rousseau, this type of religion is “without
temples, alters or rites.” It is “limited to the
purely internal cult of the supreme God and to the
eternal duties of morality--is the pure and simple
religion of the Gospel, the true theism, and what can
be called natural divine law” (SC, Bk IV, Ch. 8). In
addition, he describes the “religion of man” as
Christianity. However, it is different than the
Christianity of today in that it is focused on the
Gospels and “through this holy, sublime, true
religion, men, in being the children of the same God,
all acknowledge one another as brothers, and the
society that united them is not dissolved even in
death” (SC, Bk IV, Ch. 8). Rousseau finds fault in
this type of religion. True Christianity of this sort
would require every citizen to be an equally good
Christian for peace and harmony to be maintained. In
addition, Rousseau argues that it would be...
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