The legal philosophy of Grotius is complex, complicated, and (above all) eclectic: It fuses strands which might (independently) constitute a jurisprudentia. Since Grotius was an “Arminian” Calvinist who was horrified by the hyper-Calvinist notion that God simply makes justice by an “absolute decree,” he was an antivoluntarist in both law and theology; and that is why he Platonizingly says that “even if we were to say [etiamsi daremus] that there is no God,” there would still be uncreated natural justice (which is as natural as the truth of A = A or 2 + 2 = 4) (Grotius 1964, Prolegomena, pars 11; see Grotius 1925).
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Similar content being viewed by others
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2009 Springer Science+Business Media B.V.
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Riley, P. (2009). The Legal Philosophy of Hugo Grotius. In: Pattaro, E., Canale, D., Grossi, P., Hofmann, H., Riley, P. (eds) A Treatise of Legal Philosophy and General Jurisprudence. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-2964-5_10
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-2964-5_10
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-90-481-2963-8
Online ISBN: 978-90-481-2964-5
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and LawPhilosophy and Religion (R0)