In Politics III, 4.1277a15–16 Aristotle presents phronēsis as the characteristic excellence of the good ruler. Difficulties arise when we consider that, on his view, a good ruler should always be loyal to his constitution, even when its prescriptions are contrary to moral goodness. This paper investigates the condition of a wise ruler in imperfect communities by attempting to answer the following questions: Would a wise ruler be capable of retaining his practical wisdom in a (...) deviant community and stay loyal to the constitution? Can the quality of any deviant polis be improved by the ruler’s practical wisdom without losing its distinctive nature? It is argued that Aristotle believes in the possibility of improving a deviant constitution compatibly with its preservation, and that such a possibility does not undermine the ruler’s practical wisdom. The only one constitution that leaves this possibility open is the polity. (shrink)

The late antique and early medieval Mediterranean was characterized by wide-ranging cultural and linguistic diversity. Yet, under the influence of Christianity, communities in the Mediterranean world were bound together by common concepts of good rulership, which were also shaped by Greco-Roman, Persian, Caucasian, and other traditions. This collection of essays examines ideas of good Christian rulership and the debates surrounding them in diverse cultures and linguistic communities. It grants special attention to communities on the periphery, such as the (...) Caucasus and Nubia, and some essays examine non-Christian concepts of good rulership to offer a comparative perspective. As a whole, the studies in this volume reveal not only the entanglement and affinity of communities around the Mediterranean but also areas of conflict among Christians and between Christians and other cultural traditions. By gathering various specialized studies on the overarching question of good rulership, this volume highlights the possibilities of placing research on classical antiquity and early medieval Europe into conversation with the study of eastern Christianity. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Why does Thrasymachus Think that Justice is the Interest of the Rulers? Socrates' Refutations of Thrasymachus' Premises Is [the] Justice [of Thrasymachus] Good for Me? Thrasymachus Unconvinced, Socrates Dissatisfied. What Has Gone Wrong?

Many scholars have viewed the noble lie as fundamentally a device for educating the non-philosophers in the Kallipolis. On this reading, the elite and sophisticated philosopher rulers lie to the non-philosophers, who are unable to fully grasp the truth; such lies help motivate the non-philosophers towards virtuous activity and the promotion of the common good. Hence, according to many scholars, the falsehoods of the noble lie play no role in motivating fully accomplished adult philosophers towards virtue. The motivation for (...) this view is that it would seem strange that the wisest citizens, who have knowledge of the Forms, believe something as far-fetched as the myth of the metals. However, this paper challenges this tradition by arguing that the falsehoods of the noble lie are fundamental to the philosophers’ virtuous dispositions. More precisely, this paper argues that the non-reasoning part of the rulers believes the falsehoods of the noble lie and that these false beliefs have positive ethical value because the non-reasoning part of the soul is too unsophisticated to grasp the complete truth. Thus, the non-reasoning part of a philosopher’s soul requires false beliefs in the same way that non-philosophers require false beliefs. (shrink)

Plato’s Politicus argues for a striking normative claim about the law: the ideal expert ruler will not only change the laws of the city when he thinks it best, but will also contravene them. The Eleatic Stranger’s argument for this conclusion reveals important features of Plato’s views on expertise in general, and political expertise in particular. Laws should not be inviolable for an expert ruler because no craft lays down inviolable rules for its practitioners. There are no inviolable (...) rules of action for experts because crafts are teleological: expert action aims only to produce some good. The expert ruler’s political action recognizes no constraints besides the aim of best promoting the good condition of the whole city. Plato believes that the statesman will do markedly better at promoting this end when unconstrained by even the best laws, and there is evidence that he will harm individual citizens in order to do so. (shrink)

The political upheavals of China's Warring States period proved to be intellectually fertile, giving rise to one of history's greatest flowerings of political philosophy. The most eminent thinkers of the day sought to articulate models for good government amidst the ruins of the Zhou dynasty. Zhuangzi, on the other hand, appears to many readers to eschew these political questions. In this article, however, I contend that the Zhuangzi has a more practical political teaching than has often been appreciated. It (...) is intended to help others to navigate the treacherous political waters in which they might well find themselves, particularly in an era of profound instability, by teaching them how to understand their own... (shrink)

This article expands a traditional pedagogic interpretation of Plato’s reasons for urging trainee rulers to study astronomy. It argues, primarily, that they need to become familiar with astronomy because it teaches them about cosmic harmony. This harmony indeed models a “personal harmony,” which will prevent them from becoming tyrants, and informs them about the analogous social harmony— which it will be their special duty to create and maintain. In Plato’s view, indeed, astronomy shows that social harmony requires obedience on the (...) part of the lower orders and that social goods are best distributed in accordance with a special antidemocratic principle of equality. (shrink)

Plato's Sun-Like Good is a revolutionary discussion of the Republic's philosopher-rulers, their dialectic, and their relation to the form of the good. With detailed arguments Sarah Broadie explains how, if we think of the form of the good as 'interrogative', we can re-conceive those central reference-points of Platonism in down-to-earth terms without loss to our sense of Plato's philosophical greatness. The book's main aims are: first, to show how for Plato the form of the good is (...) of practical value in a way that we can understand; secondly, to make sense of the connection he draws between dialectic and the form of the good; and thirdly, to make sense of the relationship between the form of the good and other forms while respecting the contours of the sun-good analogy and remaining faithful to the text of the Republic itself. (shrink)

I argue for a view that departs radically from the long-held assumption that "to know the good is to do the good". On the view I shall defend, the role of the Form of the Good in the 'Republic' is greatly demoted; I argue that Plato thinks that knowledge of the Form of the Good is in fact 'insufficient' for the philosopher-king to rule. Instead, I argue that Plato thinks that knowledge of the Forms must be (...) complemented with a type of "practical wisdom". I define "practical wisdom" as the ability to discern information about a 'particular' circumstance and the capacity to choose the best 'actions' that will bring about ideal ends for that circumstance. (shrink)

This article responds to the theory of Common Good Constitutionalism as posited by Adrian Vermeule. He argues that a powerful centralized government composed of wise rulers must use law to direct the public towards a proper political and substantive morality to achieve the ends of the common good. This article then explores the broader concept of Integralism, in which Common Good Constitutionalism is rooted, similar in its belief that politics must be concerned with the human good (...) through the centralization of sovereign power. Natural law adherents created Common Good Constitutionalism and Integralism to combat the legitimate societal threat of modern liberal individualism and reintroduce the spiritual common good into our political and legal discourse. Though these arguments have some appeal, both theories are misguided in their understanding of the nature of politics, law, and the United States as a constitutional republic. This article instead suggests a more authentically Catholic salve for the societal wounds inflicted by acidic individualism; a true natural law understanding of the common good which respects the decentralized history and tradition of our country, the limits of political authority, the social priority of local communities above the state, and most importantly, the reality that man’s ultimate end is God’s gift of salvation. (shrink)

Before Plato there are ample cases in which Greek poets, philosophers, and politicians recognize the possibility that individual and social good can conflict. Nor does Plato think that a full understanding of the notion of one's good must demonstrate that it cannot conflict with standards of justice. On the contrary, Plato holds that such conflicts can occur even in the case of the rulers of his ideal city‐state. This idea is not contradicted by evidence of other works, such (...) as the Meno, the Symposium, and the Philebus. Nevertheless, although Plato's view admits what is normally thought to be a characteristically Kantian conflict of ethical standards with one's good, it still possesses some distinctly eudaimonistic elements that are at variance with the Kantian view. (shrink)

Thoughts and theoretical reflections about “governance” in Islamic society, whether theorizing about the desired structure of government or describing the characteristics of an ideal ruler, is one of the most important topics studied in the field of political thought and philosophy in Islam, to which great names such as Farabi, etc. are connected. In this context, this research, through a comparative approach, seeks to examine and analyze the views of Farabi and Sohrawardi about the ideal ruler from the (...) perspective of a judicial approach. Based on such an approach, a philosopher like Farabi considers the different ways of connecting to the active intellect as the separation of the theoretical intellect from matter and the connection to the active intellect, and a divine sage like Sohrawardi also speaks of the separation of the theoretical intellect and the separation of the power of imagination, which is manifested in a prophet. In the eyes of both thinkers, human reason has the ability to overcome material existence. This type of excellence is a condition for achieving complete metaphysical knowledge and theoretical perfection. The ultimate happiness is the achievement of the active intellect. “The Absolute First Leader” and “Quṭb (Imam or pole)” have both achieved this position. Introduction The ideal government and ruler, in the system of Islamic philosophy, are based on the approach of philosophers to wisdom and their opinions and ruling foundations. The philosophers’ approach to wisdom and intellect in the system of Islamic philosophy has changed and developed from Farabi to Sohrawardi and later. Based on this change in the method and approach to wisdom of the sages, philosophical issues and topics including the issue of government and the ideal ruler, have also undergone changes and transformations. Despite the significant evolution of Islamic philosophy in the two Peripatetic and Illuminative systems, it seems that the ideal ruler in Sohrawardi’s philosophy, which he refers to as “the pole/Imam (quṭb),” is compatible with the first leader of al-Farabi’s utopia. The problem of this research is to investigate the characteristic features of “Qutb” and “First Leader/Philosopher” in the Peripatetic and Illuminative systems of philosophy based on Sohrawardi and Farabi’s approach to wisdom and its types. “Qutb” in Sohrawardi’s thought In the wisdom of enlightenment, the perfect human being and the “Qutb” to whom the position of caliph belongs, is perfect in intuitive and argumentative wisdom, and in other words, he is both adept in reflection and adept in discussion. In Sohrawardi’s thought, the rulers must know wisdom as well be practical wayfarers, that is, they must possess a combination of theoretical and practical wisdom. On the one hand, Sohrawardi’s theory is influenced and consistent with Plato’s theory, both of which emphasize the “ruling sage,” and on the other hand, it is influenced by the Iranian tradition and the benefit of the ideal kings from wisdom and intellect, and “Khurra-yi Kiani”1 and the approval of God, which is in the interpretation Religious and close to Sufism and Shiism, it is interpreted as Qutb and divine sage. A Qutb or an Imam is one who is connected with the active intellect, receives grace from the higher realm, and spreads goodness, prosperity, knowledge, justice, and virtue among religions with a divine plan. “The First Leader” in Farabi’s thought The First Leader is someone who does not need the guidance of another human being; rather, all sciences and knowledge are obtained by him in esse and he is able to infer appropriate actions and behavior from general reasoning. He can also best guide others to perform these meritorious deeds; the same actions and actions that bring a person to happiness. These abilities are realized in people of great and outstanding nature by connecting to the active intellect. Such a person, in fact, in the eyes of the ancients, is a king and ruler and worthy of revelation. The rule of such a person is the first rule and his leadership is the first leadership, and the rule of others that is through his rule will be the subordinate rule, and people under the rule of this leader and leader are virtuous people, the chosen ones, and the fortunate ones. Conclusion In examining and comparing the two viewpoints, it should be said that a philosopher like Farabi considers the different ways of connecting to the active intellect to be the separation of the theoretical intellect from matter and the connection to the active intellect, and a Godly sage like Sohrawardi also speaks of the separation of the theoretical intellect and the power of imagination, which manifests itself in a prophet, where we witness detachment from matter and the ability to remove the soul from the body. In the eyes of both thinkers, human reason has the ability to overcome material existence. This type of excellence is a condition for achieving complete metaphysical knowledge and theoretical perfection. The ultimate happiness is the achievement of the active intellect.”First Leader”and “Qutb” have both achieved this position. Based on this, the complete transcendence of material existence is possible for certain people. (shrink)

This article offers an interpretation of Vladimir Nabokov’s unique contribution to political theory as seen primarily through the lens of his novel Invitation to a Beheading. Although most frequently interpreted as an indictment of totalitarianism, the novel depicts a form of cruelty practiced not only by totalitarians, but also by the rulers and citizens of milder political orders, including liberalism. The novel suggests that such cruelty is more insidious than that familiar to readers of dystopian novels precisely because of its (...) universality. This article demonstrates that Nabokov’s contribution to liberalism may be found in the surprising coherence between his aesthetic principles and his art, both of which critique the imposition of “general ideas” on either persons or books. What emerges is a picture of aesthetic liberalism in which Nabokov’s model for the ideal liberal citizen is neither the sensitive artist nor the apolitical aesthete, but rather the careful reader. (shrink)

Does the Longer Way, described but not taken in Plato's Republic, provide understanding that justice and other virtues are good? Sarah Broadie argues that it does not, on the grounds that Socrates and the brothers learn about justice's goodness without taking the Longer Way. I argue that Socrates’ arguments for justice's goodness are not so complete as to make it impossible for philosopher-rulers to gain from the Longer Way greater understanding of the same point. My main textual evidence is (...) a passage of Book IX (589b–c), a summary that has been widely underappreciated. (shrink)

At the end of Book III, chapter 4 of Aristotle’s Politics, Aristotle identifies the virtue peculiar to the excellent ruler as prudence. The ruled’s complementary virtue is true opinion. All the other virtues are held in common, albeit in different forms. Why these habits? The answer to this question lies in Aristotle’s discussion of the good man and the serious citizen in III.4, and of the rule of law in III.16.

While the notion of the common good figures frequently in both rhetoric and the inquiries of academic political theory, it is often neither closely examined nor precisely defined. This article examines Aristotle’s use of the idea, focusing primarily on two sets of key texts: first, Politics 1.1–2 and Nicomachean Ethics 1.2; and second, Nic. Ethics 8.9 and Politics 3.7. The first set of texts emphasizes the common good as flourishing and the city as its necessary condition; the second (...) emphasizes the common good as the good of all citizens as distinct from that of the rulers alone and leads to Aristotle’s notion of the generic political regime with its focus on the middle class and the rule of law. The conclusion notes both continuities and discontinuities with and challenges to contemporary politics posed by Aristotle’s view, which is neither as readily supportive of modern political programs nor as opposed to modern practices as is sometimes thought. (shrink)

While the notion of the common good figures frequently in both rhetoric and the inquiries of academic political theory, it is often neither closely examined nor precisely defined. This article examines Aristotle’s use of the idea, focusing primarily on two sets of key texts: first, Politics 1.1–2 and Nicomachean Ethics 1.2; and second, Nic. Ethics 8.9 and Politics 3.7. The first set of texts emphasizes the common good as flourishing and the city as its necessary condition; the second (...) emphasizes the common good as the good of all citizens as distinct from that of the rulers alone and leads to Aristotle’s notion of the generic political regime with its focus on the middle class and the rule of law. The conclusion notes both continuities and discontinuities with and challenges to contemporary politics posed by Aristotle’s view, which is neither as readily supportive of modern political programs nor as opposed to modern practices as is sometimes thought. (shrink)

Let me begin with some of the background worries that motivate the paper. First, for years I have been working on the relation of the Timaeus to the Republic guided by this triple analogy: as the demiurge is to the cosmos, so the philosopher-ruler is to the polis, so reason is to the soul or individual. The key claim is Tim. 29e: the demiurge is good and so wants to make everything it makes like it itself is, i.e., (...) good, as good as possible. I take the demiurge to be reason idealized, so I infer reason wants to make everything it makes as good as possible. This sets the stage: how is reason related to the good? (shrink)

Anyone who has read Plato’s Republic knows it has a lot to say about mathematics. But why? I shall not be satisfied with the answer that the future rulers of the ideal city are to be educated in mathematics, so Plato is bound to give some space to the subject. I want to know why the rulers are to be educated in mathematics. More pointedly, why are they required to study so much mathematics, for so long?

Arnold Geulincx Arnold Geulincx was an early-modern Flemish philosopher who initially taught at Leuven University, but fled the Catholic Low Countries when he was fired there in 1658. He settled at Leiden, in the Protestant North, where he worked under the patronage of the Cartesian Calvinist theologian Abraham Heidanus, and … Continue reading Geulincx, Arnold →.

In the Second Treatise of Government, Locke clearly intends to construct a political order that limits the harm a tyrannical ruler can do, but his account of prerogative also effectively limits the good a ruler can do. If political and paternal power are distinct, then the standard for legitimate rule is not the public good but the good as the public understands it. The significance of this distinction becomes clear when we recognize Locke’s pessimism about (...) our ability to adequately judge the public good. Locke’s reliance on the public’s judgment as the final authority, despite his expectation that we will judge badly, can be explained in practical or pedagogical terms. He further suggests that the limits to a ruler’s power follow from inherent limits on what human beings can know about the good. (shrink)

In the Second Treatise of Government, Locke clearly intends to construct a political order that limits the harm a tyrannical ruler can do, but his account of prerogative also effectively limits the good a ruler can do. If political and paternal power are distinct, then the standard for legitimate rule is not the public good but the good as the public understands it. The significance of this distinction becomes clear when we recognize Locke’s pessimism about (...) our ability to adequately judge the public good. Locke’s reliance on the public’s judgment as the final authority, despite his expectation that we will judge badly, can be explained in practical or pedagogical terms. He further suggests that the limits to a ruler’s power follow from inherent limits on what human beings can know about the good. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Ideas 61.3 (2000) 381-395 [Access article in PDF] Minds, Forms, and Spirits: The Nature of Cartesian Disenchantment Han van Ruler What is Descartes's contribution to Enlightenment? Undoubtedly, Cartesian philosophy added to the conflict between philosophical and theological views which divided intellectual life in the Dutch Republic towards the end of its "Golden Age." 1 Although not everyone was as explicit as Lodewijk Meyer, (...) who said that his theological doubts were inspired by Descartes's philosophical method, Cartesianism along with Copernicanism, Socinianism, and Cocceianism played an important part in the growing skepticism towards the authority of Scripture. 2 Apart from Descartes's general method, however, specific Cartesian ideas encouraged a new view towards nature and towards God's role in governing it. In physics and physiology the new philosophy replaced the image of mind working on matter with the image of a self sufficient mechanism. This new causal metaphor led to a typically Cartesian form of "disenchantment." In this article I argue that on account of their approval of a Cartesian theory of causality, even authors with sincere religious motives came close to accepting radical and nearly Spinozistic ideas. I start with disenchantment in a very literal sense: Balthasar Bekker's denial of the activities of devils, angels, and other spirits. A comparison of Bekker's arguments with those of another Cartesian, Arnold Geulincx will, I hope, bring out the nature and importance of what I shall present as [End Page 381] Descartes's "mechanical reduction" in physics. Finally, I argue that the Cartesian separation of mind and body gave rise to a form of disenchantment that reached far beyond contemporary debates. Devils, Ghosts, and God's Omnipotence Balthasar Bekker's classic book The World Bewitched (1691-93) does not so much deal with the practice of sorcery as with its theory. Bekker offers a wide range of theological and philosophical arguments in order to combat the idea that ghosts, devils, and angels influence natural or historical events. In particular Bekker draws some important conclusions from the philosophy of Descartes. Yet it is immediately clear to the reader that the motives for his critique are religious rather than philosophical. 3 The World Bewitched is not written as a scientific assault on superstition. Bekker, at the time serving as a Calvinist minister in Amsterdam, presents his work as a new and perhaps final phase in the perfection of Christianity. For two centuries it had been a goal of the Protestant Reformation to accentuate God's majesty and to establish the idea of His absolute power over creation. Bekker's World again expresses this idea. His denial that ghosts and devils are active in the world is a logical consequence of the belief that there is no room for demigods in nature. Bekker thus adds a final touch to the project of the Reformation. The World Bewitched will testify to the fact "that I return as much of the honor of His Power and Wisdom to the Almighty, as they took from Him who gave it to the Devil. I ban [the Devil] from the World and I bind him in Hell." 4 Removing devils and spirits from nature, Bekker aims to distinguish superstition from true faith. The battle against superstitious beliefs had formed a characteristic element of Protestant tactics. Dutch Calvinists, for instance, took offense at the continuing practices of blessings and incantations. 5 Bekker wanted to go even further. The Protestantization of Christian dogma could only be completed by making everything in nature's course depend on God's unique power and providence. 6 "Science" in our sense of the word was a subsidiary matter. 7 Still, Bekker saw the new scientific theories of his day as useful allies. In particular it was the new philosophy of Descartes that attracted him. Following Descartes, Bekker reasons "that I think, that I will, [End Page 382] [and] that I understand something," without any part of my body being involved in this type of consciousness. Mind and body in fact have nothing in common: My... (shrink)

This study on the reception of Cartesianism is the result of a four-year fellowship as assistant-in-training at the Faculty of Philosophy of the University of Groningen. Zie: Preface.

This article discusses Descartes’s preferred focus on morally and theologically neutral subjects and points out the impact of this focus on the scientific status of theology. It does so by linking Descartes’s method to his transformation of the notion of substance. Descartes’s _Meditations_ centred around epistemological questions rather than non-human intelligences or the life of the mind beyond this world. Likewise, in his early works, Descartes consistently avoided referring to causal operators. Finally, having first redefined the notion of substance in (...) the _Principia,_ Descartes would completely abandon making use of this notion in his later years. Indeed, in contrast to many authors before and after him, Descartes never showed any interest in the long-established metaphysical interpretation of substances as being causal factors of natural change. With God, nature, and mind commonly serving as instances of substantial causality, Descartes’s philosophy had a huge impact on the place of God in science and discreetl. (shrink)

Although Descartes’ characterization of the mind has sometimes been seen as too ‘moral’ and too ‘intellectualist’ to serve as a modern notion of consciousness, this article re-establishes the idea that Descartes’ way of doing metaphysics contributed to a novel delineation of the sphere of the mental. Earlier traditions in moral philosophy and religion certainly emphasized both a dualism of mind and body and a contrast between free intellectual activities and forcibly induced passions. Recent scholastic and neo-Stoic philosophical traditions, moreover, drew (...) attention to the disparity between the material and the immaterial, as well as to the possibility of a retreat into the personal realm of one’s own mind. Yet none of these moral and religious assessments of the relation between mind and body were motivated by the purely epistemological interest that we find in Descartes in setting apart a world of consciousness from the world of physics. The present article explains how Descartes made use of specific theological and moral philosophical theories in his own analysis of mental faculties; how he changed the orientation of metaphysics itself in the direction of a phenomenology of the mental; how he never returned to the naive idea of offering a dualist foundation for ethics; and how his mechanicism may have motivated his epistemological transformation of the science of metaphysics. In all these various ways, Descartes inaugurated an understanding of human mental life on the basis of physiological rather than metaphysical considerations, a view of psychology that is related to the experience of human individuals, and a naturalistic characterization of the mind in terms of a domain of consciousness rather than of moral conscience. (shrink)

Arnold Geulincx Arnold Geulincx was an early-modern Flemish philosopher who initially taught at Leuven University, but fled the Catholic Low Countries when he was fired there in 1658. He settled at Leiden, in the Protestant North, where he worked under the patronage of the Cartesian Calvinist theologian Abraham Heidanus, and … Continue reading Geulincx, Arnold →.

Descartes's dualism did not result from Cartesian doubts, Christian beliefs, from a bias against animal nature, or from a conflict of reason and emotion. In fact, Descartes's dualism was the very fruitful product of the mechanistic conception of causality with which the French philosopher sought to replace the souls, qualities and intelligences contemporaries put forward as alternatives for the outdated Aristotelian principles of matter, form and privation. Descartes's naturalistic turn in physiology and physics not only formed the basis for his (...) dualistic metaphysics; it still bears fruit in the work of scientists such as Antonio R. Damasio today. Descartes gave scientists the paradoxical instruction to describe nature without reference to human experience. (shrink)

Two types of dualism characterize Spinoza′s mature philosophy. The first is the Cartesian dualism of attributes. Although Spinoza′s radicalized version of this dualism officially rules out any interaction between matter and mind, his Ethics nevertheless retains a theory of causal precedence between the mental and the physical. In the production of ideas, it is sometimes the mind, sometimes the physical environment that has causal priority. A second, non-Cartesian, type of dualism is to be found in Spinoza′s metaphysics of substance. Spinoza′s (...) concept of substance resumes the Platonico-Aristotelian idea that agency-causation is limited to what has real being and must be distinguished from the modifications that are its effects.The first, “horizontal”, dualism of Cartesian attributes eliminates from Spinoza′s psychology any account of behavioral change, and forces him to fall back on the classic idea that we are agents only in so far as we direct our thoughts. The second, “vertical”, dualism concerning the ontology of causation, enables Spinoza to introduce a non-arbitrary notion of God, who has a causal role to play that may be distinguished from the workings of the universal clockwork itself. In both cases, rather than expressions of a modern-type naturalism, Spinoza′s dualistic positions are motivated by a concern to meet the demands of a Renaissance philosophy of morals, according to which the liberation of the mind and the love of God are crucial elements in the quest for beatitude. (shrink)

Although Thomas More’s description of the Utopians’ ‘Epicurean’ position in philosophy nominally coincides with Erasmus’s defence of the Philosophia Christi, More shows no concern for the arguments Erasmus gave in support of this view. Taking its starting point from Erasmus’s depreciations of the body and More’s intellectual as well as physical preoccupations with the bodily sphere, this article presents the theme of the human body and its moral and religious significance as a test case for comparing Erasmus and More. The (...) treatises both men wrote on Christ’s suffering in the Garden of Gethsemane confirm that both authors dealt with the notion of the body in contrasting ways: Erasmus shows a tendency to address the moral-psychological question of mentally conquering the worldly self, whilst More highlights the way in which ordinary facts and physical things may carry spiritual and religious meaning. Paradoxically, Erasmus consistently applied his spiritualized ideal of man to this-worldly moral and social concerns, whereas More focused on the physical domain out of a religious interest in transcendent truths. In line with Giulia Sissa’s thesis, our hypothesis is that More ostensibly appropriated an Erasmian type of idealism in Utopia, but, contrary to Erasmus himself, focused on the exterior form of a virtuous society, rather than on its moral and spiritual preconditions. While Erasmus advocated a mental transformation towards reason, More’s Utopia envisioned what might come of this. (shrink)