Politics and Religion: Luther's Simplistic Imperative

Sheldon S. Wolin

American Political Science Review, 1956, vol. 50, issue 1, 24-42

Abstract: The encounter between the human mind and the outside world is the essence of speculation. The dramatic element in the encounter has been provided by man's assertion that mind is capable of comprehending and ordering the world about him. This same “epistemological presumptuousness,” which we associate instinctively with the spectacular successes of the natural sciences, has also been implicit in the enterprise of political theory. Here, too, the claim is that the human intellect can understand all of the complex interrelationships of a political order. In some ways this claim is even more assertive than that of the natural scientist. The theorist seeks not only to analyze and explain certain phenomena, but to prescribe more satisfactory patterns.Given the complexity of the subject matter of politics and the finite character of the human mind, it is not surprising that the ideas of political theorists lend themselves to diverse interpretations at the hands of later commentators. Disagreement in interpretation, however, can take one of two forms: it may turn on a question concerning a particular idea, meaning, or emphasis; or it may find the interpreters taking diametrically opposed positions concerning the basic tendency of a given set of political ideas.

Date: 1956
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