Analyzing The Theory Of Human Nature In Kant's Religious Philosophy From The Perspective Of Freedom

Talking about the good and evil of human nature and the improvement of human morality from the perspective of freedom is the most prominent feature of Kant's theory on human nature.The reason that Kant is able to do this is that he retains the possibility for negative freedom in theoretical philosophy,and further demonstrats the practicality of freedom in practical philosophy.Based on this concept of freedom,Kant discusses in detail two issues in the first two articles of Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason,human nature and moral improvement.Kant believes that,other than man's natural nature,man's moral nature must be the result of man's free choice.Since the origin predisposition in human nature is good,in order to be able to attribute moral responsibility to humans,we must assume that man chooses a propensity to evil at the beginning of moral action,and this particular evil is innate in man's nature.Therefore,Kant suggested that human beings as a race are radical evil.As this innate evil is based on the free choice of man,the foundation of this particular evil does not exist either in the sensibility of human nature or in a corrupted of the morally legislative reason of man.For the same reason,this particular evil does not have either a temporal origin or a rational one.Concerning the issue of moral improvement,Kant proposes that converting evil to good and realizing moral redemption is the recovery of the purity of law,as the supreme ground of all maxims,which must be achieved through a revolution in the disposition of the human being,as he calls it,a change of heart.However,the reason why a fundamentally corrupted person can complete this revolution is that moral law commands us be good,so we are bound to be able to achieve it,and the practical faith in the morally perfect human prototype provides the power required.Nevertheless,Kant suggests that there are still three major difficulties of the moral redemption of man.First,the infinite distance between the level of morality that human beings can possibly reach and the holiness required by moral redemption.Second,as human beings cannot recognize the disposition which is deeply hidden in their hearts,they cannot determine whether they have completed the change of heart.Thus,how much confidence should one possess in maintaining his/her moral integrity?Finally,in order to display their own justice,how should God treat the sins committed by those who have completed the change of heart before the transformation?Kant answers these three questions one by one.Kant thus establishes a freedom-based theory of human nature,which undoubtedly has important implications:First,good and evil originate from the choice of our own,which makes it impossible for us to evade moral responsibility,whether accepting the consequences of evil or performing the duty of redemption.Secondly,"people are radically evil" which actually means the possibility of doing evil and it cannot be eradicated.This requires that we always remain vigilant and avoid doing evil ourselves.Last but not least,people,either through the gradual improvement of the way of life or religious conversion,are not able to achieve moral redemption simply on their own.Moral redemption requires the combination of both.However,Kant's theory on human nature has faced numerous criticisms since its birth.The classic criticism proposed by contemporary scholars generally includes five issues.First,how is the propensity to evil and the spontaneity of freedom compatible with each other?Second,how can the freedom of choice be compatible with the innate evil?Third,how are the freedom of choice and the universality of radical evil compatible?Fourth,how is divine grace and moral self-discipline compatible?Last but not least,how can moral redemption unite with personality identity?This article,based on reconstruction of Kant's theory on human nature,tries to answer the five questions mentioned above.First of all,I try to argue that the propensity to evil tends to be the result of people's free choice.However,this choice is innate in the nature of human beings and is therefore universal,because it is a transcendental condition that people can be evil,even the transcendental condition of the possibility people may choose freely.Second,for Kant,divine grace is only introduced as an object that can be hoped for,rather than one that we can explore within the scope of theory or practice.Finally,The change of heart does not break identity of personality,because it is itself a dynamic process of rejecting evil and turning toward good.Based on the arguments above,I believe that there is not the problem of inconsistency of the text in Kant's theory of human nature.However,unlike traditional human nature theory,which discusses human physical nature,Kant explores human moral nature.