無中生有的創世論和社會契約論

Creation ex nihilo and the Social Contract Theory

林國基(LIN Guoji)

《道風：基督教文化評論》 15期 (2001/07) Pp. 13-41+218-219

並列摘要

As a philosophical hypothesis, where does the idea of ＂the state of nature＂ presupposed in the social contract theory find its ultimate root? Why does the social contract theory as such come into being with a voluntaristic and constructive spirit in its depth? Why is the idea of freedom upheld as the most supreme value in the social contract theory? Put in general, what is the essential question to which the social contract theory attempts to respond? Against a basic context formulated by the above questions, this article tries to develop from a theologico-philosophical perspective through a comparison between Greek cosmology and Judeo-Christian Creation ex nihilo an interpretative paradigm to decipher the transcendent cause of the genesis of the social contract theory. My conclusion is that: I) it is the cosmological, axiological and existential contingency, triggered by Judeo-Christian God's absolute and omnipotent creative will, that is the essential question to which the social contract theory attempts to respond; 2) henceforth, it is via the hypothesis of the state of nature that Judeo-Christian God's creative will is politically incarnated this-worldly in the modern: 3) just in this sense, the modern state represented by the social contract theory is actually a modern version of creation ex nihilo (the hypothesis of the state of nature) by human beings.