Heretics, Atheists and Infidels: Religious Tolerance and Intolerance in Grotius, Hobbes and Kant

Abstract

This paper examines the dynamic interplay between religious tolerance and intolerance in the work of Hugo Grotius, Thomas Hobbes, and Immanuel Kant. In each we discover how the ideological premises of the thinker allows him to construct the moral category of the religious Other and a basis for both tolerance and intolerance.

Keywords: Grotius; Hobbes; Kant; early enlightenment; religion; religious intolerance

JEL Classification: Z12