The Role of the Sublime in Kant’s Religion: Moral Motivation and Empirical Possibility
- DOI
- 10.5922/0207-6918-2020-1-2
- Pages
- 31-57
Abstract
I show that Kant’s depiction of the christic figure in Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason is not contingent but explains how this figure functions in two essential ways: as a representation of a maximum of morality that can ground our moral disposition and in so doing acts as a standard for morality. More precisely, the following argument is made: 1) the sublime nature of the image of Christ — as an image of universal respect for the law — awakens the moral feeling of subjects in the sense of the possibility of overcoming one’s perverted nature; 2) as moral perfection it provides immediate transparency to the end goal of morality; 3) just as in the case of associative construction of empirical concepts, the sublime provides the prototype for association through which empirical acts are determined as moral ones; 4) the image of Christ also acts as motivator by encompassing said transparency and standard in the idea of moral perfection. These four points show that the image of Christ functions in a dual manner. Points 1) to 3) address Christ as a prototype/archetype (Urbild) — awakening and making possible a moral redefinition of the subject — while point 4) addresses Christ as an example (Vorbild) — sustaining and entertaining the moral redefinition as a motivating model.
Reference
Allison, H., 2001. Kant’s Theory of Taste: A Reading of the Critique of Aesthetic Judgment. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Engstrom, S., 2009. The Form of Practical Knowledge: A Study of the Categorical Imperative. Harvard: Harvard University Press.
Firestone, C. L., Jacobs, N. A., 2008. In Defense of Kant’s Religion. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Foessel, M., 2008. Analytik des Erhabenen. In: O. Höffe, ed. 2008. Immanuel Kant: Kritik der Urteilskraft. Berlin and Boston: De Gruyter, pp. 99-119.
Forschner, M., 2005. Immanuel Kant über Vernunftglaube und Handlungsmotivation. Zeitschrift für Philosophische Forschung, 59(3), pp. 327-344.
Hare, J., 1996. The Moral Gap: Kantian Ethics, Human Limits, and God’s Assistance. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Hughes, F., 2007. Kant’s Aesthetic Epistemology: Form and World. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Kant, I., 1992. The Jäsche Logic. In: I. Kant, 1992. Lectures on Logic. Translated and edited by J. Young. Cambrige: Cambridge University Press, pp. 521-641.
Kant, I., 1996a. Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason. In: I. Kant, 1996. Religion and Rational Theology. Translated and edited by A. W. Wood and G. di Giovanni. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 39-216.
Kant, I., 1996b. The Conflict of the Faculties. In: I. Kant, 1996. Religion and Rational Theology. Translated and edited by A. W. Wood and G. di Giovanni. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 233-328.
Kant, I., 1996c. Critique of Practical Reason. In: I. Kant, 1996. Practical Philosophy. Translated and edited M. J. Gregor. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 133-271.
Kant, I., 1996d. Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals. In: I. Kant, 1996. Practical Philosophy. Translated and edited M. J. Gregor. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 37-108.
Kant, I., 1997. Lectures on Ethics. Translated and edited by P. Heath and J. Schneewind. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Kant, I., 1998. Critique of Pure Reason. Translated and edited by P. Guyer and A. W. Wood. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Kant, I., 2000. Critique of the Power of Judgement. Translated and edited by P. Guyer. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Kant, I., 2007. Anthropology from a pragmatic Point of View. In: I. Kant, 2007. Anthropology, History, and Education. The Cambdrige Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant. Translated and edited by R. B. Louden, G. Zöller. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 227-429.
Käfer, A., 2006. Die wahre Ausübung der Kunst ist religiös. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck.
Kuehn, M., 2014. Kant’s Jesus. In: G. E. Michaelson, ed. 2014. Kant’s Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason — A Critical Guide. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 156-174.
Longuenesse, B., 1998. Kant and the Capacity to Judge: Sensibility and Discursivity in the Transcendental Analytic of the Critique of Pure Reason. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Louden, R. B., 2000. Kant’s Impure Ethics: From Rational Beings to Human Beings. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Palmquist, S., 1992. Does Kant Reduce Religion to Morality? Kant-Studien, 83(2), pp. 129-148.
Palmquist, S., 2015. Comprehensive Commentary on Kant’s Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell.
Pasternack, L., 2017. The ‘Two Experiments’ of Kant’s Religion: Dismantling the Conundrum. Kantian Review, 22(1), pp. 107-131.
Reardon, B. M. G., 1988. Kant as Philosophical Theologian. New York: Palgrave.
Ryan, S., 2015. In Defense of Moral Evidentialism. Logos and Episteme, 6(4), pp. 405-427.
Sirovátka, J., 2018. Religion als “notwendige Ergänzung” der Moral bei Immanuel Kant. Theologie und Philosophie, 93(3), pp. 366-375.
Taylor, R. S., 2010. Kant’s Political Religion: The Transparency of Perpetual Peace and the Highest Good. Review of Politics, 72(1), pp. 1-24.
Van Fraasen, B., 1984. Belief and the Will. Journal of Philosophy, 81(5), pp. 235-256.
Van Inwagen, P., 1996. It is Wrong, Everywhere, Always, and for Anyone, to Believe Anything upon Insufficient Evidence. In: J. Jordan and D. L. Howard-Snyder, eds. 1996. Faith, Freedom and Rationality. Lanham and London: Rowman & Littlefield, pp. 137-153.
Ward, K., 1972. The Development of Kant’s View of Ethics. New York: Blackwell.
Wimmer, R., 2011. Kants kritische Religionsphilosophie. Edited by G. Funke and R. Malter. Berlin and Boston: De Gruyter.
Wood, A., 2002. Unsettling Obligations: Essays on Reason, Reality, and the Ethics of Belief. Stanford: CSLI Publications.
Zuckert, R., 2007. Kant on Beauty and Biology: An Interpretation of the Critique of Judgment. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511487323.