Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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69 of 76 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Hobbes is a lot smarter than I am, July 5, 2004
I finished reading Leviathan a couple months ago, but cringed every time I thought about writing a review. The book is large at over 700 pages and covers so much ground, a review would have to be a book in itself to do it justice. Due to Leviathan's philosophical content and somewhat antiquated language, it's very slow going. Each page needs time to digest.So I'm not going to bother writing a real review. I will just say that Leviathan is a 5-star classic and worth your time, if you can deal with reading political philosophy. Hobbes divides the work into four major sections: Of Man, in which he discusses human nature and why civilized people prefer peace to war. Here Hobbes establishes the primary reason that people form a government to rule over them: to safeguard them from enemies, both external and internal. Of Common-wealth, in which Hobbes first talks about the several forms of government and the pros and cons of each. He then explains the rights that a government has over its people; according to Hobbes, the government can do pretty much anything it wants to. Finally he goes into the things that tend to weaken or dissolve a government. Of a Christian Common-wealth, the longest section, in which Hobbes accepts the Bible as the word of God and quotes from it numerous time to bolster his position in support of a powerful government. Of the Kingdome of Darknesse, the shortest and strangest section, in which Hobbes veers away from the topic of government and instead focuses on religious practices and beliefs of the day that he deems improper and inconsistent with the Bible. It took me months to read this, but I came away with great respect for Hobbes and a better understanding of politics. I can't say that I agree with everything I read, but I think the majority of his arguments are sound and convincing. Five stars, no doubt in my mind. But it's a dive into the deep end, so you'll probably only finish it if you really appreciate and enjoy philosophical discussion!
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80 of 96 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Machiavel in reverse, June 23, 2003
Leviathan is one of the first books written after philosophy begun to detach itself from the Catholic inspired medieval thinking, also marking the beginning of the influence philosophy received from the scientific thinking, a point not suficiently y explored by Thomas Hobbes but which one we can get with the benefit of hindsight.Leviathan is an old Fenician word for a mythical crocodile, quoted in some verses of the biblical Book of Job, an taken by Thomas Hobbes as meaning the representation of a powerfull governor totally devoted to do his most to the benefit of the Commonwealth. In Hobbes mind the most efficient form of government was monarchy, but he takes a lot of time to analyse also Democracy and Aristocracy. One has to keep in mind that the time the book was written was one of internal revolt, a civil intestine strife in England, and the objective of Hobbes was to lay the foundations for human actions conducive to an equilibrium within the state, ending war. His book can be also be taken as one where many important aspects of Right and Laws are aprehended, from the perspective of a deeply religious anglican man, that tried his best to separate, in his words, the Kingdoms of men (where civil laws are imperative) from the Kingdom of God (Naturall Right). He does extensive analysis of God's Laws and its importance to the balance in the relationship between men. The edition is a very good one, with a good introduction and is a copy of the text as written in the 17th century, exhibiting an archaic English sometimes difficult to understand. Also, some quotations in Greek and in Latin are not translated, despite all the effort the author makes to turn them inteligible to the reader. The book could be understood as antipodal to Machiavellian's The Prince, because power is not taken here as something good in itself, but only as a means of carrying the security and hapinnes the kingdom subjects deserve.
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38 of 44 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
A good work, but a poor copy., September 7, 2005
While I enjoyed the text itself very much, I cannot recommend this particular copy of it. I read parts of it for a class, and wanted to read more on my own, but I simply could not make it through 736 small pages of miniscule print without getting frustrated (as well as getting a headache). Further, the margins are practically nonexistent, making it a poor copy to buy for anyone who likes to take notes in the book. Additionally, the binding is quite weak.
I would encourage any interested parties to continue pursuing the 'Leviathan,' as it is a very rich text indeed, but I would recommend finding a different copy.
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