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The Leviathan In The Book Of Job

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Before Thomas Hobbes, the Leviathan is a biblical reference to a monstrous sea serpent that was a divine creation made to rule the lands and seas mentioned in the Book of Job. To Hobbes, however, the Leviathan is a human creation used to solve political problems. According to Hobbes, humans mimic nature to create manmade machines to do their work (Hobbes 7). By this principle, Hobbes introduces “the great Leviathan called a Commonwealth, or State (in Latin, Civitas), which is but an artificial man, though of greater stature and strength than the natural” (Hobbes 7). Hobbes, therefore, depicts the Commonwealth as an "artificial person" made from “pacts and covenants” that protects and defends its members (Hobbes 7). He reasons that what brought the Leviathan into being can be compared to God’s proclamation of “Let us make man” (Hobbes 7). In the Leviathan, each member of the community has their own …show more content…

To start, “the sovereignty”, a supreme and independent power of the state, “is an artificial soul, as giving life and motion to the whole body” (Hobbes 7). Secondly, the magistrates and other community officers act as the artificial joints that allow the community to move. The nerves of the body are found in rewards and punishments. These consequences are attached to the soul so that “every joint and member is moved to perform his duty (Hobbes 7). Hobbes finds the strength of the body politic in the wealth and riches of all the particular members of the society (Hobbes 7). As previously stated, the body’s main occupation is promoting and protecting the safety of its people. To complete this, it receives advice from the Counselors, which become its memory while justice and law become the body’s reason and will. When the Leviathan is healthy and functional, it is at peace. Illness and death, however, come from sedition and becomes civil

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