The Study Of John Locke's Sport Thoughts

In17th century of European society, the concepts of body and sport were changing from the medieval "asceticism" to the modern "humanism". On one hand, people wanted to release their passion through physical activities; On the other hand, the desire was suppressed by the old idea of "the body is a prison of the soul", so sports was staggering forward in the way of conflict between old and new ideas. John Locke, the British politician, educator and philosopher, formed his unique sport philosophy based on his thoughts system of politics, philosophy and education combining the condition of European sport and new talents demand in the United Kingdom.Locke deduced from the natural law and made the assertion that "the rights of body, health and life" are natural rights. Body represents life and health stands for the quality of life. So promoting physical health through sport is the respect to the right of life. Thus, Locke planted sport into the ecosystem of "rights", which not only broke the heavy chains on sport from the mind dualism, and dismissed all the scruples about participating in sport, but also opened a new way to legislate in sport.To fight against the obscurantism advocated by the Christian theology, Locke inspired people to use their rational capacities to pursue happiness. He regarded people's rational capacity as the highest standard to guide the developing of sport, which avoided a repetition of the ancient Greece civilization of Olympic Games dying from the desire of fortune, and kept sport away from keeling down under the altar of theology to be condemned to the hell.Locke inherited the "physical and mental harmony theory" from Aristotle, placed sport in the first place of education system, hoping to cultivate the talents in physical, moral and intellectual through sport. Locke ushered in a new era for sport which aimed at "man's all-round development" as its ultimate goal. Locke not only reconstructed the concept of sport, also filtered and organized the sport activities from all strata to build a full and systematic knowledge system. Basing on cultivating the qualities carrying by bourgeois gentleman, he put forwarded with the tasks, principles, contents and means of physical education, which laid the foundation for sport courses, moreover made sport complete integration into education area, and ultimately led sports to the way towards transformation into modern sports.Although some of Locke's sport thoughts have become the focus of academic debate due to some defects, it cannot cancel the broadness and insights of his sport philosophy. As the enlightener of European modern sport, Locke well deserves it.