<i>The Filial Is Political: The Fifth Commandment in Seventeenth-Century English Political Thought</i>

Abstract This paper adds some overlooked context to the polemics between John Locke (1632–1704) and Robert Filmer (1588–1653) by examining the wider historical milieu for their interpretations of the fifth commandment to ‘honour your father and mother’. In a largely overlooked passage from the first of his Two Treatises, Locke refutes Filmer’s assertion that the biblical commandment to ‘honour your father and mother’ provides a basis for submission to divinely ordained political authority. Filmer’s assertion and Locke’s refutation need to be set in a wider religious and theological context to understand the significance of the claims made by both parties. The article will examine the role the fifth commandment played in seventeenth-century English political thought by surveying texts which deploy the commandment as a theoretical justification for political obligation. The originating perspective of these sources is that of Christian theology, not jurisprudence or political theory. Taking account of these sources affects our reading of Locke, showing that his de-theologising of political obligation is more radical than previously thought.