How Political Is the Kantian Church?

Stephen Palmquist

doi:10.33392/diam.1639

Abstract

Commentators who lament that Kant offers no concrete guidelines for how to set up an ethical community typically neglect Kant’s claim in Religion that the ethical state of nature can transform into an ethical community only by becoming a people of God—i.e., a religious community, or “church.” Kant’s argument culminates by positing four categorial precepts for church organization. The book’s next four sections can be read as elaborating further on each precept, respectively. Kant repeatedly warns against using religious norms to control people. Accordingly, he explicitly forbids the true church from adopting any standard form of political governance; it must aim to be radically non-political. Nevertheless, churches organized according to Kant’s non-coercive theocratic model contribute something essential to the ultimate political goal of achieving perpetual peace and an end to war: by approaching the ultimate ethical goal (the highest good), the true church offers an antidote to normative fragmentation.

Highlights

Commentators who lament that Kant offers no concrete guidelines for how to set up an ethical community typically neglect Kant’s claim in Religion that the ethical state of nature can transform into an ethical community only by becoming a people of God—i.e., a religious community, or “church.” Kant’s argument culminates by positing four categorial precepts for church organization
Churches organized according to Kant’s non-coercive theocratic model contribute something essential to the ultimate political goal of achieving perpetual peace and an end to war: by approaching the ultimate ethical goal, the true church offers an antidote to normative fragmentation
A related insight regarding Kant’s view of thepolitical nature of the true church’s organization can be gained by examining his use of the term Gewalt—one of the five terms Kant uses that are often translated as “power.” To distinguish between these terms, I translate each with a different English word; for Gewalt I use “control.”24 Early in the first Preface of Religion (RGV 6:5) Kant notes that one of the key problems with human morality is that we cannot control the results of our actions—a theme that crops up several times throughout the First Piece

Summary

Does Kant give concrete guidelines for organizing a church?

Commentators on Kant’s much-discussed theory of the “ethical community” express frustration that he seems to offer precious little advice as to how we are to establish and maintain real, empirical examples of his grand vision. Just as the first Critique’s Grundsätze are put aside in the second Critique, because the standpoint changes from theoretical to practical reason, so the Grundsätze in RGV are applicable only to those who aim to construct an ethical community as a people of God (i.e., a church) They are necessary conditions for the possibility of any empirical religion that is to present itself as a representative of what Kant calls the “true church” or “true religion.”. When the people are freed from any such political controls, Kant argues toward the end of this section, can “the kingdom of God” become real on earth

Unchangeableness

How Does the Church Contribute to Humanity’s Political Predetermination?