On The Concept Of "fear"

Tomas Hobbes is the pioneering of modern legal philosophy with the first put forward the natural right theory which is based on the naturalism understanding of human nature. It is said scholarly that Hobbes regarded the self-preserving as the nature of human being which is free from the medieval idea concerning human nature; more precisely Hobbes justified the sense and passion in the daily life which have no position in the medieval ideas. Accordingly the satisfaction of sense and passion is the only task of the political and legal life.After the Strauss's understanding, this article confirms that this naturalism understanding of Hobbes theory is not enough. It is points to the true meaning of "fear" which is the keystone of the whole structure of the Hobbes legal philosophy and the medium of the natural state and the political state. The story on fear reflects the main idea of Hobbes's thought about human nature. It is a useful interest to exploit a correct meaning of fear for understanding of Hobbes's legal philosophy. The structure and the nature of fear decide the basic style of Hobbes's philosophy and relates to the new way of proving the possibility of legal order.The article divided five parts:The introduction briefly describes the historical background of Hobbes who wants to justify the legal order on the new basis for answer the basic question of his time. In the introduction of the leviathan, Hobbes claimed to found a general passion which is the basic method of his theoretical construction. In the end, he found the passion of fear is the general passion which is basis of his legal philosophy. It is this particular passion which aroused much kind of misunderstandings about the basic nature of Hobbes's thought. People accustomed to understand it from the points of naturalism. But Leo Strauss understands it from Hobbes's attitude of life on his founding of the mixture of the natural element and the transcendental element in the Hobbes's thought. His explanation runs far away from the field of Hobbes's texture and gives away for the interest of the history of political thought. The author want give a more proper explanation about this mixture from Hobbes's story of fear.The first section wants to give a main idea of first six chapters of leviathan talking about passion and imagination which is the necessary beginnings of the discussion of fear. Passion is not an animal reflection concerning the outer world but is the mental action of the humankinds. It is the results of the controlling of imagination to the object world. The article differentiates two acts of the imagination: one is the desire and the other is the knowledge. The discussion of passion attributes to the studying about the nature of desire. this section the author also give a short discussion about Hobbes's attitude about reason and prove that Hobbes's putting forward his theory on the passion other than the reason.The second section is the key section of this article which is the logical derivation of the first section .In this section, the structure and the nature of the fear is carefully determined. The acting of passion eventually leads to the conflicting state (the natural state) which is filled with the reality and possibility of war. The fear of death filled in the heart of the people day after night. So the fear is the essence of the natural state and is the basic passion of all passions. It is the fundamental structure of the spirits and the self-conscious of the people in the natural state. It is importantly noticed that the fear entering to the inner world of humankind which free from the bound of this living state. Haven accepted the illumination coming from Kant's argument, the article points out that the fear is an aesthetical one which mixed the natural and the transcendental element. It is on this discovery the author recognizes the foundation of Hobbes's legal philosophy has its own an aesthetical nature rather than the natural.The third section discusses the variation of fear which is taking place during the process from nature right to leviathan. The author finds the principle of the construction of Hobbes's legal philosophy: On the one hand, the transcendental element which means the homogeneity and identity constitutes the idea basis for the possibility of the right order. On the other hand, the leviathan is replaced the natural state and build the ordering state. The argument about sovereign demonstrated that leviathan has an overwhelming feature leading to the dangerous state which is never taking seriously of the individual freedom but highlighting the state's power. The divine power thesis is frequently refused after Hobbes even in his period. But Hobbes haven his own method, the divine sovereign thesis is backed on the civil religion which is related his discussion about fear, and in this proceeding, the fear under the natural state is transformed the honor for God .leviathan is subjecting to the god. The earth politics is coordinated with the theological politics. Leviathan is the representative of the God on the earth.The conclusion of this article points to the parallel between Hobbes's demonstration of the fear and the modern philosophy. The story about fear corresponds to the directions of modern philosophy. Hobbes answered the question of his time through his successful arguments about the possibility of legal order on the foundation of aesthetical understanding of human nature.