The Social Contract: Rousseau's Code Of Law

According to Rousseau in The Social Contract, laws are an abstract expression of the general will, deal with the people collectively and help to ensure that all people remain loyal to the sovereign. Rousseau points out that, because people will always chose to promote their individuals interests, one man must serve as a lawgiver who has no command over the people and has no place in the constitution. Although Rousseau recognizes the importance of a lawgiver, he fails to offer a practical solution to the problem that, no man with civil authority can also embody the divine characteristics necessary to be a perfect and unbiased lawgiver. Throughout the text, Rousseau demonstrates the importance of the general will, but suggests that the general

Throughout the text, Rousseau uses historical references to support is claims. For example, Rousseau argues that, “Any man can carve tablets of stone, or bribe an oracle”(87) and uses the Hebrews as evidence, “The Law of the Hebrews, which still lives, and that of the child of Ishmael which has ruled half the world for ten centuries”(88). Interestingly, the Hebrews’ main code of law is the Ten Commandments, which are carved tablets of stone. Furthermore, Rousseau goes on to state that, “Worthless tricks may set up transitory bonds, but only wisdom makes lasting ones”(87). Why would Rousseau use the example of carving stone tablets, if not to allude to the Ten Commandments? Rousseau implies that the tablets are a trick, but he also argues that “worthless tricks” cannot build lasting nations; however, Rousseau clearly states that the Hebrew nation “still lives.” Because Rousseau believes himself to be a true statesmen, he must see Moses as a “great and powerful genius”(88) and the Hebrews as “a company of fools”(87). In addition the aforementioned contradictions, Rousseau insists that civil society is better than man’s original natural state. One of the main benefits is that man gains civil freedom and from civil freedom man develops reason and a sense of morals and becomes an overall more enlightened intellectual being. It is illogical to have a people, like the Hebrews, be considered fools. If their society is lasting and strong and based on laws from a wise lawgiver, then the citizens should be enlightened and intellectual enough to have a strong sense of morals and a high capacity for reason; in other words, not fools. Rousseau clings to his argument that lawgivers, like Moses, wrote strong and longlasting constitutions because they were wise, but he also points out that Moses most likely