________________
188 Śramaņa, Vol 57, No. 3-4/July-December 2006
One, it presents his most careful and systematic analysis of the will and its degrees of Potency in volition; two, its Book One contains what Kant considered his clearest and simplest statement of the nature of moral incentives and of the way in which moral pleasures is to be distinguished from pathological pleasure.
In 1800 he wrote 'Preface' to Jachmanns Examination of the Kantian Philosophy of Religion with regard to its alleged Similarity to pure Mysticism. His class-room lectures, delivered before 1788 (during the reign of Frederick the Great), were edited after his death by Politz and published at Leipzig in 1817 (second edition, in 1830) under the title Vorlesungen uber die philosophische religionslehre (Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion). Here he expresses the positive and constructive aspects of philosophy of religion. It contains, in simple and direct statements, his central theological beliefs. It has two parts: (i) Transcendental Theology and (ii) Moral Theology. The first part summarizes the theological conclusions arrived at in his first and third critiques. The second one contains the central ethico-religious doctrines of the Critique of Practical Reason and Religion Within the Limits of Reason Alone (the fourth Critique!). After an introductory statement on the moral approach to the knowledge of God, Kant describes God's moral attributes - His holiness, goodness, and justice, and His relation to evil. Then comes a discussion on the certainty of this knowledge of God. This is followed by a consideration of God's relation to the world as its Cause, Creator, and ruler. The Lectures end with a brief examination of revelation and a very sketchy history of natural theology.
The strength of Kant's conception of religion is his efforts to separate the form of religion from its substance, the transitory from the abiding. For him the right course is not to go from grace to virtue but rather to progress from virtue to pardoning grace. His religion is anthropocentric and his Religion is a deistic classic. He was convinced in his heart that the world is in the hands of a divine
Jain Education International
7
For Private & Personal Use Only
www.jainelibrary.org
