Leibniz: Philosophy of Religion

In his rich and engaging essay, Professor Garber asks most centrally, “…what was the relation between Leibniz’s metaphysical project as set out in the so-called ‘Monadologie’ and the more theological project in the Essais de Théodicée?” His answer is, in short, that there isn’t much of a relationship between these two great works. Furthermore, he takes this result to be evidence of Leibniz’s not being a systematic philosopher in the spirit of Descartes or Spinoza. In these brief comments, I revisit (...) Garber’s two central questions in turn and offer some moderating resistance to both of his conclusions. (shrink)

Pointing to the origination of the concept of "simplicity", conveying concepts such as "infinity" and "universality" in Islamic philosophy as well as Western philosophy in the 17 . Century , the author goes to elucidate the similarity between the meanings of "the simple existence", "the absolute existence" and "infinite existence" in the doctrines of Mulla Sadra, Spinoza, and Leibniz. He believes that from the rule of "the simplest reality..." of Mulla Sadra to the Spinoza's absolute existence, which are incorporated in (...) Leibniz's philosophy, the same intellectual movement can be seen! While describing the doctrines of these philosophers on the rule of "the simplest reality..." he mentions the monad 's "singularity in kind" and "plurality in reference" in Leibniz's doctrine and then adds: this discrepancy between the doctrines of Mulla Sadra and Leibniz on "pure simple" or as Leibniz puts it "existence", that according to him has no impossible predicates and attributes, has paved the way for plurals in Leibniz's philosophy, leading finally to what Mulla Sadra calls" primacy of quiddity". (shrink)

From among the arguments adduced for God's Existence, the ontological argument is of prime importance. Since long ago, prominent western philosophers have written important papers and books for or against this argument. Leibniz, who is one of the supporters of the ontological argument, claims that through removing the defect of the ontological argument posed by Anselm and Descartes, it can be transformed into an argument comparable to mathematical ones in terms of certainty and conclusiveness.In this paper, in addition to the (...) history of the ontological argument, we will explain Leibniz's view concerning its defect and inquire into his solutions in this regard. (shrink)

This contribution discusses Leibniz’s conception of the Christian church, his life-long ecumenical efforts, and his stance toward religious toleration. Leibniz’s regarded the main Christian denominations as particular churches constituting the only one truly catholic or universal church, whose authority went back to apostolic times, and whose theology was to be traced back to the entire ecclesiastical tradition. This is the ecclesiology which underpins his ecumenism. The main phases and features of his work toward reunification of Protestants and Roman Catholics, and (...) unification of Protestant churches are briefly explored, before turning to the issue of religious toleration. It is argued that a remarkably inclusive conception of toleration can be gleaned from a broad sample of Leibniz’s writings and correspondence. It is thanks to the philosophical and theological grounds of this conception that toleration can in principle be extended, for Leibniz, to all men and women of good will, including non-Christians, pagans, and atheists. (shrink)

This contribution discusses Leibniz’s conception of faith and its relation to reason. It shows that, for Leibniz, faith embraces both cognitive and non-cognitive dimensions: although it must be grounded in reason, it is not merely reasonable belief. Moreover, for Leibniz, a truth of faith (like any truth) can never be contrary to reason but can be above the limits of comprehension of human reason. The latter is the epistemic status of the Christian mysteries. This view raises the problem of how (...) it can be determined whether a doctrine above the full grasp of human reason does or does not imply contradiction. The notion of ‘presumption’ and the ‘strategy of defence’ are presented and discussed as Leibniz’s way to tackle this issue. Finally, the article explores the ‘motives of credibility’ which, according to Leibniz, can and should be produced to uphold the credibility of a putative divine revelation, including his account of miracles. (shrink)

This contribution discusses Leibniz’s views on key Christian doctrines which were surrounded, in the early modern period, by particularly lively debates. The first section delves into his defence of the Trinity and the Incarnation against the charge of contradiction, and his exploration of metaphysical models capacious enough to accommodate these mysteries. The second section focuses on the resurrection and the Eucharist with special regard to their connections with Leibniz’s metaphysics of bodies. The third section investigates Leibniz’s position on predestination, grace, (...) salvation, and damnation. It comes to the conclusion that salvation, for Leibniz, does not ultimately depend on believing a set of true doctrines, but on a practical attitude: the love of God above all things. Leibniz’s theology is thus fundamentally a theology of love which is ultimately practical, and tries to be both universalist and Christian. (shrink)

This paper re-assesses the place of theology in Leibniz’s thought focusing on the relationship between theory and praxis. It takes as its point of departure a general conclusion established in previous work, namely that Leibniz’s key formulations of his overarching plan for the reform and advancement of all the sciences, are devoted to a set of objectives which is both shaped by broadly theological concerns and ultimately practical. Against this backdrop, the discussion will then turn to an exploration of how (...) Leibniz thought of theology as such. I argue that Leibniz was committed to the elaboration of a robust Christian dogmatic which was rationally defensible, and that this commitment resulted in a genuine engagement with Christian theology which took very seriously its theoretical content. The key additional thesis argued for in this paper is that this theoretical engagement was in the service of a science which he conceived as ultimately practical. For Leibniz, the ultimate aim of theology was to lead to the love of God above all things and, in so doing, to salvation and eternal happiness. It is in the light of this practical end that his theological pragmatism should be evaluated. When this is done, it becomes apparent that, beneath Leibniz’s efforts at theological reconciliation in the context of his Kirchenpolitik, there lies a deeper, fundamental and properly theological emphasis on praxis, grounded in Leibniz’s epistemology and driven by his conception of salvation as ultimately dependent on a practical attitude – the love of God above all things. Leibniz’s theological pragmatism was remarkably -- perhaps even surprisingly -- close to the family of prudential approaches to religious belief proposed by Pascal and later authors such as William James. The paper concludes that Leibniz’s conception of theology as ultimately practical is very much in line with the whole thrust of Leibniz’s intellectual programme as expressed in the over-arching plans discussed in the first section. These plans too were driven by a practical end: the promotion of the common good and of human happiness as the celebration of the glory of God in his creation. At the same time, the end of happiness – whether worldly or eternal -- should not be regarded as competing with Leibniz’s theoretical endeavours – whether in the sciences or in theology -- but as directly supported by them. (shrink)

In his 1785 book Morning hours, Moses Mendelssohn presents a proof for the existence of God from the grounding of possibility. Although Mendelssohn claims that this proof is original, it has not received much attention in the secondary literature. In this paper, I will analyze this proof and present its historical context. I will show that although it resembles Leibniz’s proof from eternal truths and Kant’s pre-critical possibility proof, it has unique characteristics which can be regarded as responses to deficiencies (...) Mendelssohn identified in these earlier proofs. I argue that by analyzing the semantics of judgments about dispositions, Mendelssohn provides a novel explanation for the basic premise shared by these proofs, namely that possibility is grounded in actuality. Additionally, this analysis simplifies the inference to a unique infinite mind grounding all possibility. Thus, the proof is worth studying both for historical reasons and for its original account of modal concepts. (shrink)

That Leibniz finds the philosophy of Spinoza horrifyingly wrong is obvious to anyone who reads Leibniz’s work; that Leibniz finds Spinozism so seductive that his own system is in danger of collapsing into it is less obvious but, I believe, equally true. The difference here is not so much between an exoteric and an esoteric philosophy suggested by Russell2 but between a thorough-going rationalism on the part of Spinoza and Leibniz’s “mitigated rationalism” – mitigated by the exigencies of his orthodox (...) Christianity. In other words, it is Leibniz’s traditional view of the nature of God and his creatures that leads him to abhor Spinoza’s vision, while his own commitment to a number of principles and ideas pushes him to rationalism. And if Kant is right that the mind naturally desires a system, then Leibniz ought to see the Spinozistic consequences of many of his philosophical principles. Of course, there is nothing new in saying that the God of Spinoza and the God of Leibniz are fundamentally different, but I believe that if we focus on Leibniz’s critique of Spinoza’s account of the nature of God and a constellation of related concepts, we can come to a deeper understanding of the thought of both philosophers. (shrink)

Why would God create a world at all? Further, why would God create a world like this one? The Neoplatonic framework of classical philosophical theology answers that God’s willing is an affirmation of God’s own goodness, and God creates to show forth God’s glory. Mark Johnston has recently argued that, in addition to explaining why God would create at all, this framework gives extremely wide scope to divine freedom. Timothy O’Connor objects that divine freedom, on this view, cannot be so (...) wide as Johnston supposes: the creation of a fundamentally unjust world, for instance, could not be a way of affirming the divine goodness. I argue that O’Connor does not go far enough. While the Neoplatonic framework helps to explain why God would create at all, it does nothing to secure God’s freedom to create less than the best. (shrink)

In this paper I claim that in Leibniz’s metaphysics we can use the term ‘world’ in a twofold sense. On the one hand to refer to highly complex divine thoughts, i.e. the ideal realm, and on the other hand to refer to a network of living substances with their perceptions and appetitions, i.e. the substantial realm. First of all, I will clarify the ideal realm in Leibniz's metaphysics, which consists of three combinatorial levels about the fundamental entities, namely the simple (...) ideas in God's mind: complex ideas, complete individual notions and possible worlds. The second part is about the individual substances, i.e. the monads. In the third section, fnally, I will discuss different ways to think about the connection between both worlds—how the best possible world is linked to the actual monadic world. (shrink)

In the Theodicy, Leibniz argues against two impious conceptions of God—a God who makes arbitrary choices and a God who doesn’t make choices at all. Many interpret Leibniz as navigating these dangers by positing a kind of non-Spinozistic necessitarianism. I examine passages from the Theodicy which reject not only blind necessitarianism but necessitarianism altogether. Leibniz thinks blind necessitarianism is dangerous due to the conception of God it entails and the implications for morality. Non-Spinozistic necessitarianism avoids many of these criticisms. Leibniz (...) finds that even necessary actions should receive certain rewards and punishments as long as they necessarily lead to a change in future behavior. But Leibniz rejects even non-Spinozistic necessitarianism on the grounds that it is inconsistent with punitive justice. Whether Leibniz successfully avoids necessitarianism, it ought to be clear that he sees his own position as significantly distinct from necessitarianism and not just Spinozism. (shrink)

Leibniz and Kant were heirs of a biblical theistic tradition which viewed miraculous activity in the world as both possible and actual. But both were also deep explanatory rationalists about the natural world: more committed than your average philosophical theologian to its thoroughgoing intelligibility. These dual sympathies—supernaturalist religion and empirical rationalism—generate a powerful tension across both philosophers’ systems, one that is most palpable in their accounts of empirical miracles—that is, events in nature that violate one or more of the natural (...) laws. The primary goal of this chapter is to exhibit their respective efforts to resolve this tension, and to show how Kant’s noumenal ignorance doctrine allows him to set aside some key difficulties that Leibniz’s model leaves unresolved. The chapter concludes with the unorthodox suggestion that both systems leave conceptual space for the idea that finite free beings, rather than just God, can produce empirical miracles. (shrink)

This paper addresses some issues of Leibniz’s metaphysics to show the relationship between religion, God, and the conception of eternal truths, and with that to reveal that Leibniz’s philosophy is a coherent and intertwined whole. His idea of religion is set out briefly, then his metaphysics is analyzed, in particular creation and what are the eternal truths. The paper ends with a commentary on some quotations from the New essays that make evident that these truths require the existence of God. (...) // Se abordan algunas cuestiones de la metafísica leibniziana para mostrar el vínculo entre la religión, Dios y la concepción de las verdades eternas, y con ello poner de manifiesto que la filosofía de Leibniz es un todo engarzado y coherente. Se expone sucintamente su idea de religión, se analiza su metafísica, en particular la creación y lo que son las verdades eternas, y finalmente se comentan algunas citas de los Nuevos ensayos que evidencian que dichas verdades exigen la existencia de Dios. (shrink)

Se aborda la polémica entre Leibniz y Malebranche en torno a la relación entre las sustancias. Se plantean cuatro hipótesis para explicar esta interacción: la influencia física, la asistencia divina inmediata, la identidad y la armonía previa. Se explica la posición crítica de Leibniz respecto a las otras tres. En relación con la primera hipótesis Leibniz y Malebranche están de acuerdo en que no es viable. Se explican la crítica de Leibniz al ocasionalismo de Malebranche y al monismo sustancialista de (...) Spinoza. Y finalmente se analiza, desde la hipótesis de la armonía previa, el modo en que Leibniz aprovecha la disputa con el ocasionalismo, tanto en la versión de Malebranche como en la de Pierre Bayle, para reivindicar la autonomía de la razón en el ámbito de las causas segundas. En ello juegan un papel fundamental la noción de naturaleza de las cosas, el principio de diversidad y el principio de razón suficiente. (shrink)

Leibniz considered the Cartesian version of the ontological argument not as an inconsistent proof but only as an incomplete one: it requires a preliminary proof of possibility to show that the concept of ‘the most perfect being’ involves no contradiction. Leibniz raised this objection to Descartes’s proof already in 1676, then repeated it throughout his entire life. Before 1676, however, he suggested a more substantial objection to the Cartesian argument. I take into account a text written around 1671-72, in which (...) Leibniz considers the Cartesian proof as a paralogism and a petition of principle. I argue that this criticism is modelled on Gassendi’s objections to the Cartesian proof, and that Leibniz’s early rejection of the ontological argument has to be understood in the general context of his early philosophy, which was inspired by nominalist authors, such as Hobbes and Gassendi. Then, I take into account the reconsideration of the ontological argument in a series of texts of 1678, showing how Leibniz implicitly replies to the kind of criticism to the argument he himself shared in his earlier works. (shrink)

According to the most prominent principle of early modern rationalists, the Principle of Sufficient Reason [PSR], there are no brute facts, hence, there are no facts without any explanation. Contrary to the PSR, some philosophers have argued that divine ideas are brute facts within Leibniz’s metaphysics. In this paper, I argue against brute-fact-theories of divine ideas, especially represented by Samuel Newlands in Leibniz and the Ground of Possibility, and elaborate an alternative Leibnizian theory of divine ideas.

This paper considers two objections which can be levelled against Leibniz’s account of divine love. The first is that he cannot allow that divine love is gracious because he is committed to the view that love is properly proportioned to the perfection perceived in the beloved; the second is that God is cruel to those who are damned and so cannot be said to love all. I argue that Leibniz has the resources to rebut—or at least blunt—each of these objections.

An examination of the history of the development of the philosophical issues in the West indicates that since the Demiurge of Plato in_ the Timaeus_ created the sensible world in imitation of the intelligible archetypes, failing at the same time, to overcome some necessities, until the beginning of the seventeenth century and the emergence of the Cartesian anthropocentric conception of reality, the common question most often raised by modern philosophers, in their discussions about the nature of God, man and universes (...) in this: What is Justice? Is God just? Was man created in the best form? Is the existing world, the best among all the possible worlds? The answer to these questions among the Christian thinkers before Leibniz was mostly based on the principles of dogmatic theology. Even in the fifteenth century the question as to how God's providence and foreknowledge could be reconciled with the human free choice was the pivot and axis of most philosophical and theological problems. In addition, the progress of natural sciences and the emergence of necessary causal laws in the domain of the various sciences impaired the human freedom of choice.Spinoza and Leibniz, each in his own peculiar way, endeavored to prove that the human free choice is compatible with the causal determinism required. By science. In Leibniz, God wills the most harmonious and compossible worlds. In the present article, prior to Leibniz's rational justifications of the principle of "the best possible World", his conception of the world as based on the principle of the pre-established harmony, along with some other related issues are analyzed. (shrink)

To explain why God is not the author of sin, despite grounding all features of the world, the early Leibniz marginalized the divine will and defined existence as harmony. These moves support each other. It is easier to nearly eliminate the divine will from creation if existence itself is something wholly intelligible, and easier to identify existence with an internal feature of the possibles if the divine will is not responsible for creation. Both moves, however, commit Leibniz to a necessitarianism (...) that is stronger than what prominent interpreters such as Robert Sleigh and Mogens Lærke have found in the early Leibniz, and stronger than the necessitarianism that threatens his later philosophy. I defend this reading of Leibniz and propose that some features of Leibniz’s later metaphysics, including his “striving possibles” doctrine, are an artifact of the effort to rescue the early theodicy from its unwelcome implications. (shrink)

Résumé: Cet article vise à analyser la réception de la théorie cartésienne des vérités éternelles dans les œuvres de Leibniz et Malebranche. Les deux auteurs ont critiqué et refusé ses prémisses pour éviter les conséquences dont ils pensaient qu’elles découlaient de la doctrine de Descartes. L’objectif est celui de démontrer qu’on ne peut pas comprendre pleinement leurs réflexions sans les interpréter à la lumière de la théorie cartésienne, dans la mesure où elle représente la condition critique de possibilité de leur (...) approche philosophique. Mots-clés: Théodicée Moderne. Vérités Éternelles. Descartes. Leibniz. Malebranche. Descartes and the genealogy of modern theodicy in Leibniz and Malebranche: This article aims to analyze the reception of the Cartesian theory of the eternal truths in the works of Leibniz and Malebranche. Both authors criticized and refused the premises of Descartes’ doctrine in order to avoid the consequences they believed derived from it. The main goal is to demonstrate that we cannot fully understand their reflections without interpreting them in the light of the Cartesian theory, as it represents the critical condition of possibility of their philosophical approach. Key-words: Modern Theodicy. Eternal Truths. Descartes. Leibniz. Malebranche. Descartes e a genealogia da teodiceia moderna em Leibniz e Malebranche Resumo: Este artigo propõe-se a analisar a recepção da teoria de Descartes das verdades eternas nas obras de Leibniz e Malebranche. Os dois autores criticaram e recusaram as premissas cartesianas para evitar as consequências que eles pensavam dependentes da doutrina. O objetivo é demonstrar que não podemos compreender plenamente as reflexões de Leibniz e Malebranche sem interpretá-las à luz da teoria cartesiana, como se essa doutrina representasse a condição crítica de possibilidade da sua abordagem filosófica. Palavras-chave: Teodiceia Moderna. Verdades Eternas. Descartes. Leibniz. Malebranche. (shrink)

Leibniz’s correspondence with Antoine Arnauld is one of the clearest and most comprehensive expressions of Leibniz’s philosophy in the so-called middle period. This chapter will explore the philosophical content of this correspondence. It will concentrate on four of the most central topics: (a) complete concepts and contingency, (b) substance and body, (c) causation, and (d) the special status of rational souls in God’s plan.

Monads, Composition, and Force: Ariadnean Threads through Leibniz’s Labyrinth, by ArthurRichard. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018. Pp. ix + 329.

This volume presents introductory chapters from internationally-renowned experts on eleven of Leibniz's key philosophical writings. Offering accessible accounts of the ideas and arguments of his work, along with information on their composition and context, this book is an invaluable companion to the study of Leibniz.

Tolkien uses the terms “primary creation” and “secondary creation” in his works with reference to divine and human creation respectively. In the first part of this paper, I argue that one criterion to distinguish the former from the latter is their completeness or incompleteness. The primary creation is complete because it is thought of and created by God. The secondary creations like human fictions are incomplete since the human intellect is finite and does not have the capacity to grasp the (...) entire structure of its own creation. In the second part, I will examine this distinction in relation to Tolkien’s Christian background, and reformulate and systematise it in the metaphysical framework of G.W. Leibniz. Finally, I offer a definition of a human fiction as a part of a divine fiction, i.e. as a part of a possible world in a Leibnizian sense. (shrink)

The Heythrop Journal, Volume 63, Issue 1, Page 57-63, January 2022.

In this paper, I am interested in the conception of toleration that can be gleaned from the political and theological texts of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz. I argue that Leibniz did not defend a notion of toleration comparable to a standard modern conception. The modern conception is very often traced back to a constellation of writers contemporary with Leibniz including Locke, Bayle, and Spinoza. It involves an inclusive embrace of diversity, religious and otherwise, and an affirmation of toleration as a fundamental (...) value in and by itself, intrinsically linked to an equally fundamental imperative of freedom of expression allowing such diversity to flourish publicly. Leibniz, however, understood toleration as a political tool to be employed in order to facilitate the reunion of the Christian churches; he did not consider it a constitutive value, or a value in and by itself, but rather saw it as a means to an end; he did not establish any intrinsic link between toleration and freedom of expression but promoted moderate forms of censorship. Most importantly, however, while clearly seeing it as something positive, he also detected deep ambiguities in the concept from which we have much to learn in our own assessment of modern toleration. (shrink)

O artigo procura apresentar as modificações do clássico argumento da existência de Deus feitas por Leibniz nos textos _Novos ensaios sobre o entendimento humano _e _Meditações sobre o Conhecimento, a Verdade e as Ideias_. Defende-se que já há em Leibniz uma leitura "ontologizante" de Anselmo, cuja razão bem pode ser a apropriação cartesiana do argumento. O plano de fundo dessa discussão é a maneira como os filósofos, quando leem outros, na medida em que possuem suas próprias agendas filosóficas, cometem, intencionalmente (...) ou não, o que se chama, neste artigo, "deslize filosófico". (shrink)

Leibniz di fferenziert zwischen den Ideen des göttlichen Intellekts und den Ideen im menschlichen Geist, bestimmt ihr Verhältnis aber als Ähnlichkeit. Der Grund dafür, dass es sich bei der Beziehung zwischen Ideen des göttlichen Geistes und den Ideen der mens nicht um Identität oder Teilhabe, sondern um Ähnlichkeit handelt, liegt unter anderem in der Schulphilosophie des 17. Jahrhunderts geläufi gen theologischen Imago-Dei-Lehre begründet. Der menschliche Geist ist demnach dem göttlichen Intellekt wegen der biblisch begründeten Gottebenbildlichkeit, trotz des Sündenfalls und der (...) daraus resultierenden erbsündlich bedingten Korrumpiertheit des menschlichen Verstandesvermögens, ähnlich. Zwar ist nach Leibniz die mens in der Lage, unendlich viele Ideen in sich zu tragen, jedoch sind ihr diese Ideen nicht simultan präsent und zudem häufi g konfus und verworren; ihre Klarheit und Distinktheit hängt vom Situs der Geistmonade ab, von dem sie die regio idearum zu erfassen vermag. Zwischen den Ideen innerhalb des göttlichen Geistes und den eingeborenen Ideen der mens besteht eine Ähnlichkeit und damit ein irgendwie geregeltes Verhältnis. Für Leibniz treten Ideen "einmal als Urbilder individueller Substanzen im göttlichen Denken auf, darüber hinaus aber als Abbilder in den Substanzen selbst, die als Monaden das Universum "spiegeln": Aus dieser Doppelheit wird verständlich, wieso Ideen Objekte des Denkens sein können; nämlich im menschlichen Denken und darüber hinaus in Gott geschaut werden, nämlich in der Erkenntnis ihrer Gegründetheit in der regio idearum des gottlichen Denkens" (Poser, Hans: Leibniz' Philosophie. Uber die Einheit von Metaphysik und Wissenschaft, Hamburg 2016, S. 109). -/- Dieser Beitrag möchte das Verhältnis zwischen den Ideen im göttlichen Verstand und denjenigen des menschlichen Geistes in der Metaphysik Leibnizens unter der Berücksichtigung der zentrale Stellung der Lehre von der Gottebenbildlichkeit in der Philospohie Leibniz' untersuchen. (shrink)

Loving God is our highest perfection for Leibniz. It secures our belief and trust in the Creator, which is integral to the sciences as well as faith. Those who love God have justification for reasoning, that is, they can rationally expect to arrive at truth. This is because love is a receptivity to the perfection all of things; loving God, then, is a disposition and tendency toward the most perfect being, the ens perfectissimum. Individuals who perceive the divine nature “do (...) not merely fear the power of the supreme and all-seeing monarch,” Leibniz writes, “but are assured of his beneficence, and lastly—and what brings everything together—burn with a love of God above all else.”1 In my dissertation, I argue that Leibniz’s qualification should be taken seriously: love of God “brings everything together.” The subject of my dissertation can be stated schematically. It consists of two pairs of claims, one pair philosophical, the other theological: A moral quality is required to secure our reason. From a most perfect unity, a moral quality follows. Love of God is our highest perfection. Love of God secures our reasoning. Both concern the security of reason, by which I mean the rational motivation for reasoning itself. They are reasons we ought to expect reasoning to lead to truth. Yet they do not form a tight demonstration: while an inference is clearly at work in the first pair, there are no inferences in the second. Also, there is a distinction between a moral quality and love for God. Unless they are identified, Leibniz’s philosophy and theology secure reasoning apart from one another. In 1686, Leibniz wrote his well-known “Discourse on Metaphysics.” A few months after, he composed a theological treatise, Examination of the Christian Religion. These texts, I argue, should be read side by side, and the first chapter compares how divine perfection secures our reasoning in both texts. Some Moderns’ notion of perfection—namely, Descartes’, Spinoza’s, and Malebranche’s—fail to secure our reasoning because their views entail arbitrariness in the world and the divine nature. But a proper sense of perfection, one that includes a moral quality, secures our reasoning by ensuring that everything is amenable to reason. Descartes also sought to secure our reasoning, and for the second and third chapters I compare his account with Leibniz’s own, then draw out the latter’s criticisms. For Descartes, the deity’s moral quality is characterized by an indifferent will, which is eminently and formally revealed throughout creation. Although recognizing the infinite source of all things directs our attention appropriate in the Cartesian system, Leibniz criticizes Descartes’ detached and indifferent God. When our disposition toward God is not characterized by love, we are less rational than otherwise. Leibniz finds intolerable moral implications in the Cartesian system, and I work out these implications in chapter three. Descartes’ criteria of true and false ideas does not settle dispute, but relies on “interior testimony.” Proper reasoning, then, does not tend toward unity among persons, and this is especially problematic in religious debate. Descartes’ method is Stoic, which also leads to trouble when it comes to church unity: one remains in the church by a sheer act of will, which can violate reason. Leibniz views such a detachment of faith and reasoning as dangerous, besides impoverishing the concept of reason altogether. Leibniz’s notions of God and perfection secure our reason by engendering love for God. “Discourse” and Examen begin with a moral disposition and tendency. In the last chapter, I argue that this is the case by considering two criteria Leibniz adopts—his test for perfection and the kinds of knowledge—as well as the foundation of his logic at the time. Leibniz can tolerate provisional beginnings, hypothetical truths, and original sin because of his robust conception of love. He distinguishes two ways we love God: spes, or hope, is a disposition or tendency to natural perfection, and caritas, or esteem, affection, or love, regards divine perfection. These states orient us according to the divine plan. Miracles are within the world as an effect of the deity’s moral quality: they are a means God personally relates to rational beings. Miracles reveal the moral effects of our perception of phenomena generally, included the regularity observed and classified by science. So, to conclude, I compare Leibniz’s discussion of revelation in Examen with his discussion of miracles in “Discourse” to draw out the significance of miracles for him. Besides much debate on the implications of miracles for his conception of substance, I argue that there is a moral motivation for retaining miracles, even those of the second rank. (shrink)

The oft-told story of Leibniz’s doctrine of the best world, or optimism, is that it enjoyed a great deal of popularity in the eighteenth century until the massive earthquake that struck Lisbon on 1 November 1755 destroyed its support. Despite its long history, this story is nothing more than a commentators’ fiction that has become accepted wisdom not through sheer weight of evidence but through sheer frequency of repetition. In this paper we shall examine the reception of Leibniz’s doctrine of (...) the best world in the eighteenth century in order to get a clearer understanding of what its fate really was. As we shall see, while Leibniz’s doctrine did win a good number of adherents in the 1720s and 1730s, especially in Germany, support for it had largely dried up by the mid-1740s; moreover, while opponents of Leibniz’s doctrine were few and far between in the 1710s and 1720s, they became increasing vocal in the 1730s and afterwards, between them producing an array of objections that served to make Leibnizian optimism both philosophically and theologically toxic years before the Lisbon earthquake struck. (shrink)

This volume tells the story of the legacy and impact of the great German polymath Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716). Leibniz made significant contributions to many areas, including philosophy, mathematics, political and social theory, theology, and various sciences. The essays in this volume explores the effects of Leibniz’s profound insights on subsequent generations of thinkers by tracing the ways in which his ideas have been defended and developed in the three centuries since his death. Each of the 11 essays is concerned (...) with Leibniz’s legacy and impact in a particular area, and between them they show not just the depth of Leibniz’s talents but also the extent to which he shaped the various domains to which he contributed, and in some cases continues to shape them today. With essays written by experts such as Nicholas Jolley, Pauline Phemister, and Philip Beeley, this volume is essential reading not just for students of Leibniz but also for those who wish to understand the game-changing impact made by one of history’s true universal geniuses. (shrink)

The book discusses the structure, content, and evaluation of cosmological arguments. The introductory chapter investigates features essential to cosmological arguments. Traditionally, cosmological arguments are distinguished by their appeal to change, causation, contingency or objective becoming in the world. But none of these is in fact essential to the formulation of cosmological arguments. Chapters 1-3 present a critical discussion of traditional Thomistic, Kalam, and Leibnizian cosmological arguments, noting various advantages and disadvantages of these approaches. Chapter 4 offers an entirely new approach (...) to the cosmological argument - the approach of theistic modal realism. The proper explananda of cosmological arguments on this approach is not change, causation, contingency or objective becoming in the world. The proper explananda is the totality of metaphysical reality - all actualia and all possibilia. The result is the most compelling and least objectionable version of the cosmological argument. (shrink)

Leibniz is commonly labeled a foe of Molinism. His rejection of robust libertarian freedom coupled with some explicit passages in which he distances himself from the doctrine of middle knowledge seem to justify this classification. In this paper, I argue that this standard view is not quite correct. I identify the two substantive tenets of Molinism. First, the connection between the conditions for free actions and these free actions is a contingent one: free actions follow contingently from their sufficient conditions. (...) Second, God knows what creatures would freely do in different possible circumstances prevolitionally—that is, prior to God willing anything. I argue that Leibniz himself endorses a version of both tenets and utilizes them for theoretical purposes similar to those of Molinists. I conclude that Leibniz is much closer to Molinism than is typically acknowledged. Leibniz is best characterized as a friend—rather than a foe—of Molinism. (shrink)

Leibniz argues that God doesn't create everything possible because not all possible things are compossible, that is, compatible with each other. Much recent debate has focused on Leibniz's conception of compossibility. One important aspect of this debate, which has not been examined directly, is the distinction between possible worlds and possible creations: the notion of possible world is more robust than simply whatever God can create. Many commentators have relied on this distinction without a clear formulation of it. I develop (...) the distinction between possible worlds and possible creations by looking at how Leibniz characterizes what God is capable of creating. I argue that possible creations must be both logically consistent and determinate. Possible creations differ from possible worlds insofar as possible creations fail to be either maximal or harmonious. I conclude, therefore, that focusing on the notion of determinateness offers a new approach to answering the question why doesn't God create everything possible? (shrink)

this paper has a double objective. On the one hand, it aims to examine Leibniz's approach to church-state relations, a central question in early modern political philosophy that has rarely been discussed in the context of the philosopher of Hanover despite the fact that his political texts contain much to be appreciated on the topic. On the other hand, it aims at providing a prominent example of how Leibniz's political philosophy, contrary to what is often held, was not exclusively grounded (...) in the metaphysical principles of 'universal jurisprudence,' that is, the eternal and immutable principles of justice common to God and men. I argue that Leibniz realized that applying those principles in human jurisprudence... (shrink)

It is sometimes argued that Leibniz’s metaphysical commitments lead to Spinozist Necessitarianism, i.e., the view, in Spinoza’s words, that “Things could not have been produced by God in any way or in any order other than that in which they have been produced”. Leibniz comments on this passage as follows: “This proposition may be true or false, depending on how it is explained”. I suggest in this paper that what Leibniz means by this comment can be fleshed out by making (...) a distinction between what could have been actual and what is possible. I also address some potential objections to this distinction and attempt to elaborate it by means of comparing Leibniz’s and Alvin Plantinga’s approaches to modality. (shrink)

Welche Relevanz hat Leibniz für aktuelle Debatten? Untersucht wird Leibniz’ Konzeption der Individualität sowie seine These: „Der Ort des Anderen ist der wahre Standpunkt sowohl in der Politik als auch in der Moral.“ Ferner, wie weit Kants Theorie des Subjekts als Explikation Leibnizscher Einsichten zu lesen ist und wie die Monadenlehre Einspruch gegen den Szientismus erhebt. Die Aktualität der Leibnizschen Systematik wird auch im Blick auf Religion dargestellt: hinsichtlich der europäischen Rezeption buddhistischer Traditionen wie auch der Problematik der inter-religiösen Relationen. (...) Untersucht werden ferner Leibniz-Lektüren im nachmetaphysischen Denken, von Ch. S. Peirce über G. Deleuze bis J. Rawls. Einen weiteren Fokus bildet die Grundidee von Akademien: das Prinzip ‚theoria cum praxi‘ und die Forderung, dass die Wissenschaften dem Gemeinwohl verpflichtet sein sollen. Die Implementierung dieser Konzeption wird durch die Geschichte der Philosophie an der Russischen Akademie sowie die österreichischen Entwicklungen nach dem letzten Aufenthalt von Leibniz in Wien illustriert. (shrink)

La expresión “mundo posible” se emplea para expresar argumentos moda-les. En este trabajo encontramos las huellas implícitas anteriores de la idea de mundos posi-bles en las obras de Antonio Rubio que tuvo una gran influencia en la discusión posterior. Primero reconstruimos la crítica lleva a cabo por Suárez contra Aristóteles que postulaba que sólo había un mundo. Seguidamente, se desarrolla dicha propuesta en la que se asentó el planteamiento acerca de los mundos posibles desarrollada por Gottfried Leibniz. Se presenta el (...) argumento de la Teodicea que se refirió a los mundos posibles como procedimientos de la mente de Dios y utilizó la noción para argumentar que nuestro mundo creado realmente debe ser “el mejor de todos los mundos posibles”. Dicho argumento se asienta tanto en el campo de la lógica modal como en los procedimientos seguidos por el cálculo funcional. (shrink)

Proofs of God in Early Modern Europe offers a fascinating window into early modern efforts to prove God’s existence. Assembled here are twenty-two key texts, many translated into English for the first time, which illustrate the variety of arguments that philosophers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries offered for God. These selections feature traditional proofs—such as various ontological, cosmological, and design arguments—but also introduce more exotic proofs, such as the argument from eternal truths, the argument from universal aseity, and the (...) argument ex consensu gentium. Drawn from the work of eighteen philosophers, this book includes both canonical figures (such as Descartes, Spinoza, Newton, Leibniz, Locke, and Berkeley) and noncanonical thinkers (such as Norris, Fontenelle, Voltaire, Wolff, Du Châtelet, and Maupertuis). -/- Lloyd Strickland provides fresh translations of all selections not originally written in English and updates the spelling and grammar of those that were. Each selection is prefaced by a lengthy headnote, giving a biographical account of its author, an analysis of the main argument(s), and important details about the historical context. Strickland’s introductory essay provides further context, focusing on the various reasons that led so many thinkers of early modernity to develop proofs of God’s existence. -/- Proofs of God is perfect for both students and scholars of early modern philosophy and philosophy of religion. (shrink)