POLITICAL COMMENTARY. INTERPRETATION OF THE TRADITION OF POLITICAL THEORY AS A MODE OF POLITICAL INQUIRY: AN EXAMINATION OF LEO STRAUSS'S HOBBES COMMENTARIES

The subject of this inquiry is commentary on the tradition of political theory. The work presents an argument regarding the nature of commentary in this field, and applies the argument to Leo Strauss's commentaries on the political thought of Thomas Hobbes.;The present study argues that commentary on political theory is a distinctive enterprise; that it ought not to be assimilated to other branches of interpretation; and that its distinction consists in its political subject-matter. The study argues the view that commentary on political theory ought to be conceived and treated as a mode of political discourse. A major problem is to conceive appropriate criteria for evaluation of commentaries in the field, given this political definition of their nature. In place of orientation towards establishing textual meaning that governs theories of interpretation, the study proposes that commentaries on political theory be evaluated in the same way as political arguments are customarily evaluated: for their political position, and the sincerity, or straightforwardness, of the argument supporting the position.;This view is applied to Leo Strauss's commentaries on Hobbes's political philosophy. Strauss wrote six works on Hobbes, the best-known of which is The Political Philosophy of Hobbes: Its Basis and Its Genesis (1936). In the early thirties, he had published three short pieces on Hobbes, and in the early fifties he would publish two additional articles on Hobbes's thought. All the commentaries are presented as straightforward exegeses of the meaning of Hobbes's philosophy. The central claim of The Political Philosophy of Hobbes, the claim for which Strauss is noted, is that the philosophy has a moral basis. This moral basis consists in the polarity of vanity and fear of violent death, the latter being the psychological source of constraint on the passions. The interpretation reveals a "real" Hobbes; a Hobbes who, despite the superficial appearance of his theory, is neither a utilitarian nor a nascent political scientist.;As is customary in commentary, the argument is presented and defended in textual terms, as an interpretation of Hobbes's meaning. However, Strauss's other commentaries on Hobbes present somewhat different textual interpretations. Most notably, the article included in Natural Right and History (1953) replaces emphasis on the moral basis of Hobbes's philosophy with treatment of Hobbes as a natural-right theorist. Although Strauss does not draw attention to it, the interpretations are inconsistent. Their inconsistencies provide a clue that something more is going on in the commentaries than simple exegesis of the meaning of Hobbes's philosophy.;The activity of commenting on political theory has itself become a matter of concern in recent years, largely under the impact of questions raised by historians. Uncertainty now surrounds the methodology that ought to govern commentary in this field, and the grounds that ought to be the basis for evaluation of commentaries. The temptation exists to resolve these uncertainties by turning for guidance to theories of interpretation: the idea is to treat commentary on political theory as a branch of interpretive studies.;On the basis of examination of the development of Strauss's Hobbes interpretation, the present work reveals a political project underlying the textual exegeses. The project is a conservative defense of liberalism: a defense that esteems liberalism for its requirement of individual self-constraint and its re-direction of human energies from politics to economic life. The revelation of this hidden project shows Leo Strauss's Hobbes commentaries, which are among the earliest of his writings, to be especially significant works for understanding his enterprise in commenting on the tradition of political theory.