Leviathan

Leviathan Plot Summary

Introduction

Political authority remains one of the most fundamental questions confronting human societies. What makes some people entitled to rule over others? How can a government claim legitimate power over its citizens? These questions become particularly urgent during times of civil unrest when the very fabric of society threatens to unravel. The seventeenth century witnessed precisely such turmoil, as religious wars and civil conflicts tore through Europe, challenging traditional sources of authority and creating a crisis of political legitimacy. Against this backdrop emerges a revolutionary approach to understanding political authority—one that rejects appeals to divine right, ancient tradition, or natural hierarchy. Instead, it grounds political obligation in rational self-interest and mutual advantage. By examining human nature with unflinching realism and applying geometric precision to political reasoning, a new vision of sovereignty takes shape: the commonwealth as an artificial creation designed to rescue humanity from its own worst tendencies. This rational reconstruction of political authority not only provided a powerful response to the chaos of its time but continues to shape modern conceptions of state legitimacy, individual rights, and the proper relationship between citizens and their government.

Chapter 1: The State of Nature and Human Vulnerability

Human beings exist in a precarious condition. Without some form of common authority to restrain them, individuals find themselves trapped in a situation of perpetual insecurity. This vulnerability stems not from any inherent evil in human nature, but from three fundamental facts about the human condition. First, humans possess a rough equality of physical and mental capabilities—while some may be stronger or cleverer than others, these advantages are never so great that they cannot be overcome through cunning or collective action. Second, humans share similar desires for scarce resources, creating inevitable competition. Third, all humans seek to preserve their lives and well-being, leading them to anticipate threats and strike preemptively against potential enemies. These three factors combine to create a situation in which rational individuals, each pursuing their own security, paradoxically produce conditions of universal insecurity. Without a common power to keep everyone in awe, people exist in what can only be described as a "state of war"—not necessarily constant fighting, but a constant readiness to fight. In such conditions, industry, agriculture, navigation, building, arts, letters, and society itself become impossible. Life becomes "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short." Crucially, this bleak assessment does not depend on assuming excessive selfishness or malice in human nature. Even moderately self-interested individuals with normal human passions will find themselves driven to conflict in the absence of common authority. The problem is fundamentally structural rather than moral. Without security, even naturally sociable humans cannot develop the trust necessary for cooperation. This vulnerability creates a powerful incentive for rational individuals to seek a solution. If the natural condition of humanity leads to universal insecurity, then reason dictates finding a way out of this condition. The solution must address the root cause of conflict—the absence of a common judge with sufficient power to enforce its decisions. Without such authority, each person remains judge in their own case, leading to endless disputes and violence. The state of nature thus serves as both diagnosis and motivation. By understanding the precarious condition that results from political anarchy, we can appreciate why rational individuals would consent to establish sovereign authority, even when that authority places significant constraints on individual freedom. The escape from natural vulnerability requires nothing less than the creation of an artificial person—the sovereign—who can represent the will of all and transform a multitude of competing individuals into a unified commonwealth.

Chapter 2: Sovereignty as Rational Response to Insecurity

The solution to humanity's natural vulnerability lies in the creation of sovereign power. This sovereignty emerges through a social contract in which individuals mutually agree to transfer their natural right of self-governance to a common authority. The logic of this transfer is compelling: since the unrestricted exercise of individual rights leads to universal insecurity, rational individuals benefit by collectively limiting those rights and establishing a power capable of enforcing peace. This social contract differs fundamentally from ordinary agreements. In the state of nature, contracts lack force because there is no power to compel their fulfillment. The social contract, however, creates the very power needed to enforce all contracts, including itself. It represents a unique form of collective action that transforms the conditions that would otherwise make cooperation impossible. Through this agreement, the multitude becomes a unified commonwealth, capable of acting with one will through its sovereign representative. The sovereign thus created must possess absolute authority. Any limitation on sovereign power would require some judge to determine when those limits had been exceeded. But who would judge the judge? The logic of sovereignty cannot admit divided or limited authority without falling into an infinite regress of competing jurisdictions. For this reason, sovereignty must be understood as indivisible, unlimited, and inalienable. The sovereign alone determines what laws are necessary for peace, what doctrines may be taught, how property is distributed, and how disputes are resolved. This absolute authority does not mean the sovereign's power is arbitrary or without purpose. The very reason for establishing sovereignty is to secure peace and enable commodious living. A sovereign who fails to provide these benefits undermines the rational basis for obedience. While subjects cannot legitimately resist the sovereign (except in immediate defense of their lives), a sovereign who consistently fails to provide security effectively dissolves the commonwealth and returns subjects to their natural liberty. The rationality of sovereignty explains why individuals would consent to such extensive authority. In the state of nature, each person has unlimited right but limited power, resulting in universal insecurity. Under sovereignty, each has limited right but benefits from the concentrated power of all, resulting in greater security for each. This exchange represents not a surrender of freedom but its transformation into a more effective form—the liberty to pursue one's interests within the framework of civil law rather than the self-defeating liberty of universal conflict.

Chapter 3: Natural Law as Framework for Civil Authority

The transition from natural vulnerability to civil society depends upon certain fundamental principles that can be discovered through reason. These principles constitute the laws of nature—not physical laws that describe how things happen, but moral laws that prescribe how people ought to act to achieve peace and self-preservation. These laws are eternal and immutable, binding in conscience even in the state of nature, though they can only be effectively implemented within a commonwealth. The first and fundamental law of nature directs individuals to seek peace when possible and to defend themselves when peace cannot be secured. From this primary law flow numerous secondary precepts: to lay down one's right to all things when others are willing to do likewise; to keep covenants made; to show gratitude for benefits received; to accommodate oneself to others; to pardon those who repent; to look to future rather than past benefit in punishment; to avoid contempt of others; to acknowledge natural equality; to allow equal use of common resources; to use impartial arbitration for disputes; and several others concerning mediation, representation, and judgment. These natural laws provide the constitutional framework for civil authority. They are not merely prudential maxims but genuine moral obligations that reason discovers as necessary for human flourishing. While they bind only in conscience outside the commonwealth, within civil society they acquire the force of civil law through the sovereign's authority. The sovereign, by incorporating these principles into civil law, transforms what would otherwise be mere counsel into enforceable command. The relationship between natural law and civil law is complex but complementary. Natural law provides the rational foundation for civil law, while civil law provides the enforcement mechanism that natural law lacks. The sovereign does not create moral obligation through civil law but rather gives practical effect to obligations that reason already recognizes. This explains why civil laws that contradict natural law—such as commands to harm oneself or to refuse self-defense—cannot create genuine obligation. This constitutional framework establishes important constraints on sovereignty without requiring external enforcement. The sovereign remains bound by natural law not because subjects can enforce these constraints, but because the sovereign's authority derives from its role as the instrument through which peace is secured. A sovereign who systematically violates natural law undermines the very purpose for which sovereignty was established and thereby weakens the commonwealth. The natural laws thus serve as a standard against which civil laws can be evaluated, not by subjects (who lack authority to judge the sovereign), but by the sovereign itself in fulfilling its proper function. They constitute an internal standard of legitimacy that guides the exercise of sovereign power toward its proper end—the security and well-being of the commonwealth.

Chapter 4: The Social Contract and Transfer of Rights

The concept of representation provides the essential mechanism through which sovereign authority operates. The sovereign represents the commonwealth not merely in the sense of acting on its behalf, but in the more fundamental sense of giving it existence as a unified entity. Without representation, there is no commonwealth—only a multitude of disconnected individuals. Through authorization, the multitude becomes one person whose words and actions are owned by all. This theory of representation has profound implications for understanding political authority. It means that when the sovereign acts, those actions are attributed not just to the natural person who holds sovereign office, but to the artificial person of the commonwealth that includes all subjects. The sovereign's commands become the commands of the commonwealth itself, which each subject has authorized. This explains how subjects can be obligated to obey laws they might personally disagree with—they have authorized the sovereign to determine what laws are necessary for peace. The social contract represents a rational solution to the collective action problem posed by the state of nature. By mutually agreeing to transfer their natural rights to a sovereign power, individuals escape the state of nature and secure the conditions for peaceful coexistence. This agreement is not historical but hypothetical—it represents what rational individuals would consent to if they properly understood their situation. The rationality of this consent is crucial; political obligation is not based on tradition, divine right, or natural superiority, but on the rational self-interest of those who submit to authority. What makes this account distinctive is the insistence that this rational agreement must create absolute, undivided sovereignty. Any limitations on sovereign power would undermine its ability to maintain peace, as disputes about the boundaries of authority would lead back to conflict. Therefore, rational individuals must authorize a sovereign with unlimited power to determine and enforce the rules of social cooperation. As the text states, "Covenants without the sword are but words, and of no strength to secure a man at all." This rationality extends to the obligation to obey the sovereign even when its commands seem contrary to immediate self-interest. Since the purpose of the social contract is to secure peace, and peace requires general compliance with established rules, it is rational to obey even burdensome laws as long as they contribute to overall security. The "inconveniences" of subjection to sovereign power are always less severe than the "miseries and horrible calamities that accompany a civil war."

Chapter 5: Religious Authority and the Commonwealth

One of the most revolutionary aspects of this political theory is its radical reconfiguration of the relationship between religious and political authority. Writing in an era when religious conflicts had torn Europe apart for over a century, the theory seeks to neutralize religious claims to political authority by subordinating ecclesiastical power to the sovereign state. The approach to religion begins with epistemological skepticism about divine revelation. While we can know God exists through reason, we cannot have certain knowledge of His will or commands except through the sovereign's interpretation. This epistemological move is crucial: by denying that individuals can have direct, authoritative knowledge of God's will, the theory undermines claims to religious authority independent of the state. The problem with competing religious authorities is that they create divided loyalty among subjects. When ecclesiastical powers claim the right to determine what is necessary for salvation independently of the sovereign, they effectively establish a competing source of obligation. This is equivalent to serving "two masters"—a situation that inevitably leads to conflict and undermines the peace that sovereignty is designed to secure. The solution is to unite religious and political authority in the person of the sovereign. The sovereign alone has the right to interpret Scripture, determine the forms of public worship, and decide religious controversies. This does not mean that the sovereign dictates private belief—there is a distinction between internal faith, which cannot be commanded, and external religious practice, which falls under sovereign control. Faith is internal and invisible, but the profession of it is external and visible, and therefore subject to regulation. This subordination of religious to political authority is justified through reinterpretation of Scripture and church history. The Kingdom of God, as described in Scripture, is not a present ecclesiastical authority but a future reality that will be established at Christ's return. In the meantime, Christians are obliged to obey their earthly sovereigns in all matters of external action. This treatment of religious authority has profound implications for religious tolerance. While it does not advocate complete freedom of religion in the modern sense, the insistence that internal belief cannot be commanded creates space for private religious conviction. Moreover, by making religious practice a matter of civil rather than spiritual authority, it transforms religious differences from cosmic battles between good and evil into manageable political disagreements.

Chapter 6: Liberty and Obedience Under Sovereign Power

The apparent tension between liberty and obedience forms one of the most nuanced aspects of this political theory. Unlike many political philosophers who view liberty and authority as fundamentally opposed, it develops a sophisticated account of their compatibility within a properly constituted commonwealth. Liberty means the absence of external impediments to motion. Applied to human action, this means freedom from physical restraints that prevent one from acting according to one's will. This materialist definition allows a distinction between liberty and the popular understanding of "free will." Liberty concerns not the will itself but the absence of obstacles to acting on one's will. This definition enables the striking claim that liberty and necessity are compatible—actions can be both free and determined. Within a commonwealth, subjects retain significant liberty despite their obligation of obedience. The sovereign's laws do not eliminate liberty but rather create the conditions for its meaningful exercise. There are three domains of liberty under sovereignty: first, subjects retain the right to defend their lives even against the sovereign; second, subjects are free in matters about which the law is silent; third, subjects enjoy whatever liberties the sovereign explicitly grants them. The obligation to obey the sovereign derives from the social contract and lasts only as long as the sovereign can provide protection. If the sovereign can no longer protect subjects—whether through conquest by foreign powers or internal collapse—the obligation of obedience ceases. This conditional nature of political obligation reveals that absolutism is ultimately grounded in the practical necessity of security rather than in any mystical or divine right. There is an important distinction between true and false conceptions of liberty. The liberty celebrated in classical republican thought—the freedom of the commonwealth from foreign domination—is not the liberty of individual subjects but of the sovereign. Similarly, when subjects mistake the liberty of nature for civil liberty, they misunderstand their own interests. True liberty under law is preferable to the dangerous "liberty" of the state of nature, where everyone has the right to everything but the security to enjoy nothing. The relationship between liberty and obedience reveals the fundamental purpose of this political theory: to establish conditions under which human beings can pursue their diverse ends without destroying one another. The sovereign's absolute authority, paradoxically, creates the space for subjects to exercise meaningful liberty. By establishing clear boundaries through law and providing security through enforcement, the sovereign enables subjects to plan their lives with reasonable confidence—a condition impossible in the state of nature.

Chapter 7: The Limits of Sovereign Authority

Despite advocating for absolute sovereignty, this political theory contains a sophisticated account of natural law that places meaningful constraints on sovereignty. These constraints are not external limitations imposed by other institutions but internal to the very purpose and logic of sovereign authority itself. Natural laws are not divine commandments but rational precepts discoverable by reason. They are "dictates of reason" that instruct individuals on how to preserve themselves and achieve peace. The fundamental law of nature is to "seek peace and follow it," from which numerous additional laws are derived concerning keeping covenants, gratitude, accommodation to others, and the equitable use of things that cannot be divided. These laws of nature constitute a comprehensive moral framework that applies to all rational beings, including the sovereign. The relationship between natural law and sovereign power is complex. While the sovereign's commands become civil law, these commands are legitimate only insofar as they serve the end for which sovereignty was established: the security and well-being of subjects. When the sovereign issues commands that fundamentally undermine this purpose, they cease to be proper exercises of authority. This creates an internal standard by which sovereign actions can be evaluated—not as violations of external rights, but as failures to fulfill the sovereign's essential function. This interpretation challenges the conventional view of legal positivism where justice is simply whatever the sovereign commands. Instead, natural law and civil law "contain each other and are of equal extent." The sovereign's authority to make civil law derives from the natural law obligation to seek peace, and civil laws are legitimate only when they serve this purpose. The limits of sovereign power become particularly clear in the discussion of punishment and self-defense. No subject can be obliged to harm himself or abstain from self-preservation. Even when lawfully condemned to death, a subject retains the right to resist. This is not a political right of rebellion but a natural right that cannot be transferred in the original covenant. Similarly, the sovereign's obligation to protect subjects is reciprocal with their obligation to obey: "The obligation of subjects to the sovereign is understood to last as long, and no longer, than the power lasteth by which he is able to protect them." The account of natural law also provides a standard for evaluating the sovereign's performance. While subjects cannot legitimately rebel against a sovereign who violates natural law, such violations undermine the stability of the commonwealth. A sovereign who consistently acts against the interests of subjects, imposing unnecessary hardships or failing to provide security, weakens the foundations of his own authority. In this sense, natural law functions as a prudential constraint on sovereign power.

Summary

The rational design of sovereignty presented in this analysis offers a powerful response to the problem of political disorder. By examining human nature without illusions and applying rigorous reasoning to the challenge of establishing stable political authority, it develops a framework that grounds legitimacy in consent while providing for effective governance. The central insight—that rational individuals would authorize absolute sovereignty to escape the insecurity of their natural condition—provides a compelling account of why people accept constraints on their natural liberty. This framework's enduring significance lies in its transformation of how we understand political legitimacy. By rejecting appeals to tradition, divine right, or natural hierarchy in favor of rational consent, it established the fundamental principle that legitimate authority must serve the interests of those subject to it. While later thinkers would modify many specific elements—particularly the need for absolute sovereignty—they would build upon this essential foundation. Modern democratic theory, with its emphasis on consent, representation, and government limited by individual rights, develops these core insights while rejecting the conclusion that effective authority must be absolute. In this way, the rational design of sovereignty continues to shape our understanding of the proper relationship between citizens and the state, even as we struggle with new challenges to political authority in our own time.

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Thomas Hobbes

Thomas Hobbes was a British philosopher and a seminal thinker of modern political philosophy. His ideas were marked by a mechanistic materialist foundation, a characterization of human nature based on greed and fear of death, and support for an absolute monarchical form of government. His 1651 book Leviathan established the foundation for most of Western political philosophy from the perspective of social contract theory.He was also a scholar of classical Greek history and literature, and produced English translation of Illiad, Odyssey and History of Peloponnesian War.

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