Anti-Climacus

THOMAS HOBBES, CHRISTIANIST?

A post by Andrew Sullivan got me wondering. Of course, 'Christianist' is a relatively useless neologism*, but in this particular instance, Mr. Sullivan suggests that it means:

"...the submission of reason to ecclesiastical, Biblical or political authority."

Tie this in with my recent (and at the moment very ill-advised-seeming) romp through all of Hobbes' Leviathan, and the question appears to me to be open. Hobbes leaves space to the individual conscience in private, that it might hold whatever beliefs about religion it wants--so it'd be unfair to say he rejects the role of reason altogether**. Then again, this is the same Hobbes who thinks there ought to be but one church in an entire country, where the King thereof is the final arbiter of decisions on questions of religion. Now, whether Hobbes himself was a Christian is a question open for debate (at the moment, I am inclined to say that he would think of himself as a Christian, though he might be in the minority on that question), which brings to mind yet one further query: do you have to be a Christian to be a Christianist?


*known uses: standing in for 'fascist' as a blanket term of opprobrium; making fun of Andrew Sullivan.

**Hobbes also adopts a faintly ridiculous materialist stance towards Christianity, which leaves plenty of work for reason to explain away the 'paradoxes' presented by the human soul, the Holy Spirit, the Word of God, angels, Saul and the Witch of Endor, prophecy and inspiration. It does take a mighty use of reason to resolutely avoid what a text obviously wants you to take away from it (insert Andrew Sullivan joke here).