Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Introduction: The starry heavens and the moral law
- 1 “A Priori”
- 2 Kant on the perception of space (and time)
- 3 Kant’s philosophy of mathematics
- 4 Kant on a priori concepts: The metaphysical deduction of the categories
- 5 Kant’s philosophy of the cognitive mind
- 6 Kant’s proofs of substance and causation
- 7 Kant and transcendental arguments
- 8 The critique of metaphysics: The structure and fate of Kant’s dialectic
- 9 Philosophy of natural science
- 10 The supreme principle of morality
- 11 Kant on freedom of the will
- 12 Mine and thine? The Kantian state
- 13 Kant on sex and marriage right
- 14 Kant’s theory of peace
- 15 Kant’s conception of virtue
- 16 Kant’s ambitions in the third Critique
- 17 Moral faith and the highest good
- 18 Kant’s critical philosophy and its reception - the first five years (1781-1786)
- Bibliography
- Index
13 - Kant on sex and marriage right
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 March 2007
- Frontmatter
- Introduction: The starry heavens and the moral law
- 1 “A Priori”
- 2 Kant on the perception of space (and time)
- 3 Kant’s philosophy of mathematics
- 4 Kant on a priori concepts: The metaphysical deduction of the categories
- 5 Kant’s philosophy of the cognitive mind
- 6 Kant’s proofs of substance and causation
- 7 Kant and transcendental arguments
- 8 The critique of metaphysics: The structure and fate of Kant’s dialectic
- 9 Philosophy of natural science
- 10 The supreme principle of morality
- 11 Kant on freedom of the will
- 12 Mine and thine? The Kantian state
- 13 Kant on sex and marriage right
- 14 Kant’s theory of peace
- 15 Kant’s conception of virtue
- 16 Kant’s ambitions in the third Critique
- 17 Moral faith and the highest good
- 18 Kant’s critical philosophy and its reception - the first five years (1781-1786)
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Den Pakt zu wechselseitigem Gebrauch Von den Vermögen und Geschlechtsorganen Den der die Ehe nennt, nun einzumahnen Ercheint mir dringend und berechtigt auch.
Ich höre, einige Partner sind da säumig. Sie haben - und ich halt's nicht für gelogen - Geschlectsorgane kürzlich hinterzogen: Das Netz hat Maschen und sie sind geräumig.
Da bleibt nur: die Gerichte anzugehn Und die Organe in Beschlag zu nehmen. Vielleicht wird sich der Partner dann bequemen
Sich den Kontrakt genauer anzusehn. / Wenn er sich nicht bequemt - ich fürcht es sehr - / MuB eben der Gerichtsvollzieher her.
(“On Kant's Definition of Marriage in the Metaphysics of Morals” by Bertolt Brecht)Brecht's sonnet satirizes Kant's view of marriage as a legal contract between two persons for the legitimation of sex, and at the same time indicts bourgeois values according to which nothing is so sacred that it cannot be commodified. Indeed, Kant's most important single statement on marriage, sex, and family is located squarely within his discussion of property rights in the “Doctrine of Right” in the Metaphysics of Morals.
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- Chapter
- Information
- The Cambridge Companion to Kant and Modern Philosophy , pp. 447 - 476Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2006
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