The pursuit of moral order : the religious foundation of Rousseau's thought

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dc.contributor.advisorViroli, Maurizio
dc.contributor.committeeMemberWilliams, David L
dc.contributor.committeeMemberBonevac, Daniel A
dc.contributor.committeeMemberTulis, Jeffrey K
dc.contributor.committeeMemberLuskin, Robert C
dc.creatorO'Connor, James Joel
dc.creator.orcid0000-0002-1560-163X
dc.date.accessioned2022-10-04T00:54:55Z
dc.date.available2022-10-04T00:54:55Z
dc.date.created2022-05
dc.date.issued2022-04-20
dc.date.submittedMay 2022
dc.date.updated2022-10-04T00:54:56Z
dc.description.abstractRousseau's religious system is essential to understanding his educational, moral, and political systems. Order is the central hub connecting them. Divine order—the order of nature—creates a standard to judge human life. Consequently, Rousseau's entire philosophy is dedicated to reestablishing the natural order created by God and abandoned by humanity. Of course, it is impossible to entirely return to the natural order. Instead, the natural order is a model for all of Rousseau's projects. Nothing that Rousseau proposes is perfectly natural, even if he calls it such. Instead, he artificially produces new orders that approximate nature while never imitating it perfectly. His politics is dedicated to reestablishing the non-contradictory desires naturally present between people despite the new, artificial addition of society; his education is dedicated to making people who live as much as possible without contradictory desires despite being both natural and social creatures. God made us non-contradictory, but our artificial social creations have put us in contradiction with ourselves: the key to good living is to reconcile artifice with nature and to resolve the contradictions we have made for ourselves. Once Rousseau is placed in his appropriate Genevan religious context, the idea that religious order integrates his entire philosophy becomes plain.
dc.description.departmentGovernment
dc.format.mimetypeapplication/pdf
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/2152/116095
dc.identifier.urihttp://dx.doi.org/10.26153/tsw/42991
dc.language.isoen
dc.subjectRousseau
dc.subjectOrder
dc.subjectEducation
dc.subjectEmile
dc.subjectReligion
dc.titleThe pursuit of moral order : the religious foundation of Rousseau's thought
dc.typeThesis
dc.type.materialtext
thesis.degree.departmentGovernment
thesis.degree.disciplineGovernment
thesis.degree.grantorThe University of Texas at Austin
thesis.degree.levelDoctoral
thesis.degree.nameDoctor of Philosophy

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