How did the English Civil War and Glorious Revolution influence Locke's and Hobbes' philosophies?

In 1649, the execution of King Charles I ended the English Civil War. The war was centered around whether the dominant form of authority in England would be the Parliament or King Charles I. After the king’s execution, Thomas Hobbes defended the absolute power of kings in his book entitled The Leviathan. Hobbes compared a leviathan, a mythological sea monster, to the government because it represented his views of how a government should be able to have absolute power over the people. He wanted the king to be the supreme form of power in England.

As a Protestant, John Locke supported the Protestant Parliament against the Catholic King James II in the Glorious Revolution of 1685. The revolution resulted in the Parliament becoming the principal authority in England and weakened the king’s power. Locke did not want the king to have absolute power, and instead preferred the Parliament. According to Locke, the executive and courts would be under the control of the law-making legislature of England, which was the Parliament.

Do I agree or disagree with Locke's and Hobbes' claims?

I agree with the claim on Hobbes’ views that states that other strong men in the commonwealth will seek to forcefully remove the sovereign. In the country, there may be other influential individuals who might have enough power and they can desire to seek the highest form of authority and replace the king. Additionally, I agree that there is a possibility that a king is likely to turn into a tyrant. According to Hobbes’ view of human nature, humans have animalistic qualities, and instead of acting on reason, they act instinctively. If a sovereign does not govern by reason, and instead is instinctively violent and selfish, this may lead to them becoming a tyrant.

     I agree with the claim on Locke’s views that America is becoming a less Christian nation, but I disagree that that is turning the country into a more corrupt and selfish nation. It doesn’t matter if a government is closely associated with a specific religion or is completely secular, because corruption is happening all over the world in multiple types of governments. It is not related to religious or non-religious laws in a country. There are multiple examples of corruption in different settings, including religious based governments versus non-religious. During the Middle Ages in the Vatican, Popes paid to be elected, and this this proves that a high level of corruption can exist in a Christian country. In a completely secular government, such as in the former Soviet Union, corruption was also present and evident when political decisions were influenced by money.

How did John Locke's and Thomas Hobbes' religious views influence their thoughts on government and society?

As an atheist, Thomas Hobbes’ believed that the church should be under the government. According to him, the church would become too powerful, and a civil war concerning religion could emerge if the church would not be under the close supervision of the king. Hobbes wrote that if a dispute occurred between religious and royal law, the people were to comply with the king. Thus, if an individual would not take the king’s side, they were to be executed. Hobbes was pointing out the necessity to obey the king as opposed to following religious rules.

John Locke was a Protestant, and he was against King James II, who was a Catholic. Locke was a supporter of the Protestant Parliament in the Glorious Revolution of 1685. The Revolution resulted in the Parliament becoming the dominant authority of the English government. According to Locke, the law-making legislature, such as the Protestant Parliament, should be the sovereign government of England, with the prime minister and other officials being under the authority of the parliament. In his book, The Two Treatises of Government, Locke argued that all men are free and equal and he was against the idea of God wanting the people to obey a king. Additionally, he supported the idea of people revolting against a king.