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Hobbes and biblical philology in the service of the state

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Notes

  1. See A. Pacchi, ‘Una ‘biblioteca ideale’ di Thomas Hobbes: il MS E2 dell'Archivio di Chatsworth’,Acme, Annali della Facoltà di Lettere a Filosofia dell'Università di Milano, XXI(1968), pp. 20–21.

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  2. Hobbes,Leviathan, ed. by C. B. Macpherson, Harmondsworth, Penguin Books, 1968 (in the present essay I shall constantly refer to this edition), 35, p. 444.

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  3. For Masius theory aboutPentateuch, see: Andreas Masius,Josuae imperatoris historia illustrata atque explicata, Antuerpiae, Platinus, 1574, esp. pp. 2, 301; for Jacques Bonfrère S. J., seePentateuchus Mosis commentario illustratus, Antuerpiae, Moretus & Meursius, 1625, esp. pp. 93–4 and 1062.

  4. Leviathan, 32, p. 411.

  5. Ibid.

  6. Lev., 32, pp. 413–14.

  7. Lev., 37, pp. 470–71.

  8. See Spinoza'sTractatus theologico-politicus, VI (inOpera, Im Auftrag der Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften, herausgegeben von Carl Gebhart, Heidelberg, Winters, 1924, vol. III, p. 83).

  9. Lev., 37, p. 473.

  10. Lev., 33, pp. 426–27; 43, pp. 613–14.

  11. Lev., 7, p. 133.

  12. Lev., 32, p. 409.

  13. Lev., 32, p. 411.

  14. Lev., 47, pp. 711–12.

  15. Lev., 12, p. 179.

  16. J. G. A. Pocock, ‘Time history and eschatology in the thought of Thomas Hobbes’, inPolitics, Language and Time. Essays on Political Thought, London, Methuen, 1972, pp. 148–201.

  17. De homine, I. 1.

  18. Lucretius,De rerum natura, V, 958–61.

  19. See Richard H. Popkin,Isaac La Peyrère (1596–1676) — His Life, Work and Influence, Leiden, Brill, 1987, p. 45.

  20. Ibid.

  21. In the Latin version supplied by La Peyrère, verses sound as follows: “XII. Sicut per unum hominem peccatum intravit in mundum, per peccatum mors: ita etiam in omnes homines mors pervasit, in quo omnes peccaverunt. XIII. Nam usque ad legem peccatum erat in mundo: peccatum vero non imputabatur non existente lege. Regnavit autem mors ab Adamo usque ad Mosem: in eos etiam qui non peccaverant ad similitudinem transgressionis Adami” (Prae-Adamitae, Sive exercitatio super versibus duodecimo, decimotertio, et decimoquarto, capitis quinti Epistolae D. Pauli ad Romanos ..., Anno Salutis MDCLV, pp. 25–6.

  22. Lev., 33, esp. pp. 417–18.

  23. See La Peyrère anonymous workSystema theologicum, ex Prae-Adamitarum hypothesi. Pars prima, Anno salutis MDCLV, pp. 204–5 (this work is the logical sequel toPrae-Adamitae, it is bound in the same volume and has continuous pagination with it).

  24. Lev., 34 and 35.

  25. Lev., 34, p. 440.

  26. See theAppendix to the Latin version ofLeviathan (1668): ‘Affirmat quidem Deum esse corpus’ (Hobbes is here speaking of himself), inOpera philosophica quae latine scripsit omnia, ed. by W. Molesworth, London, 1839–45, reprint Scientia, Aalen, 1961, vol. III, p. 561. The same assumption is also openly held inConcerning Heresy (The English Works, ed. by W. Molesworth, London, 1839–45, reprint Scientia, Aalen, 1962, vol. IV, p. 393) and inAn Answer to a Book Published by Dr. Bramhall ... Called the ‘Catching of the Leviathan’ (English Works, IV, pp. 306 and 313), which were nevertheless published only after Hobbes's death.

  27. Lev., 38, pp. 479–80.

  28. Lev., 38, pp. 480–81. For God's civil sovereignty, 35, pp. 442–43.

  29. Lev., 38, pp. 489–90; 44, pp. 636–37, 647–49.

  30. Lev., 38, pp. 481–84; 44, pp. 644–47.

  31. Lev., 38, pp. 478–79.

  32. See Richard Overton'sMans Mortallitie, only published with the author's initials and a false placename (Amsterdam) in 1643. This pamphlet had further editions up to 1675. As for Thomas Browne, seeThe Religio Medici and Other Writings, Everyman's Library 92, London and New York, Dent and Dutton, 1962, p. 8. For Milton seeDe doctrina christiana, I, xiii (inThe Works of John Milton, New York, Columbia U. P., vol. XV, 1933, pp. 218–51). For a general view of the problem, see: N. T. Burns,Christian Mortalism From Tyndale to Milton, Cambridge Mass., Harvard University Press. 1972.

  33. Origen, for instance, thought that the damned would be finally reunited with God, and not that they would die definitively.

  34. Lev., 44, p. 648.

  35. Klaus-Michael Kodalle,Thomas Hobbes — Logik der Herrschaft und Vernunft des Friedens, München, Beck, 1972.

  36. See Spinoza'sTractatus, cit., XVII, inOpera, cit., III, pp. 205–6. Spinoza also makes use of Samuel's episode (see below, n. 37), ibi, inOpera, III, p. 219.

  37. Lev., 40, p. 508 (see ISam. 8.5–8).

  38. Lev., 41, p. 514. The assumption about Christ can be found already fully expounded inDe Cive, 17.

  39. The whole outline of this argument is deployed in chs. 40–42 ofLeviathan; a draft of the same had already been supplied in chs. 16–17 ofDe Cive.

  40. De Cive, 16. ix. Later on, Hobbes seems to lose interest in the distinction: seeLev., 40, pp. 500–1.

  41. Lev., 43, p. 659; 46, p. 687.

  42. “Non est potestas super Terram quae comparetur ei” (Job, 41.24, following Hobbes's quotation, 41.33 in King James's Bible).

  43. Lev., 31, p. 398 (seeJob, 38.4).

  44. Lev., 17, p. 227.

  45. Answer, cit.,English Works, cit., IV, p. 295.

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Pacchi, A. Hobbes and biblical philology in the service of the state. Topoi 7, 231–239 (1988). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02028423

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