Religion During The Enlightenment

The Enlightenment Era was a period during the eighteenth century. Its philosophers, often called “the philosophs” attempted to refute the previously held religion-based system by creating arguments based solely on reason, and thus create a completely rational system of thought. But, the question of whether they were as reason-based in their thinking as they attempted to be, given the 11 documents, is unanswerable. While some of the documents are useful to judge this, they are by no means a complete and comprehensive overview of the period’s style of thinking, and some of the documents are entirely unhelpful.

Without using reason in our everyday lives, society will collapse and turn into nothing but chaos. During the Enlightenment, a time when reason was beginning to be applied to the people’s thoughts, there were many great thinkers, but there were three in particular that attempted to change society’s unreasonable thinking. Voltaire, John Locke, and Mary Wollstonecraft all believed in freedom of choice; however, they believed in different branches of freedom of choice such as religion, government, and women’s education.

The European politics, communication, science and philosophy were radically reoriented between 1685 and 1815, during a time that was referred to as the Age of Reason, or in other words, the Enlightenment Era. The European thinkers from Britain, France and throughout Europe started questioning the traditional authority and developed the idea that humanity could be made better through rational change. As a result of the Enlightenment, there was production of numerous essays, wars, books, scientific discovery and revolution. The Enlightenment Era directly influenced the French and the American revolutions which respectively led to the peak of its influence and its decline.

During the Great Awakening, "religious conflicts divided families, split churches, and fragmented communities, forever altering the religious landscape of colonial America" (Keene, 77). Ministers such as Gilbert Tennent and Jonathan Edwards were leaders of this movement. They believed the only way to reach salvation was by accepting the reality of a sin and opening your heart to grace. Rather than "ministers preaching an empty, dead form of religion" (Keene, 77). To convey this message to his parishioners, "Edwards compared their fate to that of a spider dangling above the pit of eternal damnation, with only God's mercy preventing them from falling in" (Keene, 78). Edward's revival in Massachusetts inspired George Whitefield, an English

Both The First Great Awakening and The Enlightenment generated an instant trend in the revival of religious influences. Started by Jonathan Edwards and George Whitefield, the Great Awakening was most commonly understood to have its greatest religious impact between the 1730s and 1740s. American colonists had begun to become more devoted to various religions, which resulted in the toleration of many of them. Another cause of this revival dated back to the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries when a German movement, called Pietism, emphasized closely distinct personal connections with God (Gullotta, 2016). This movement spread as a result British, German, Scottish, Scotch-Irish immigration that then influenced British and Dutch religion (Gullotta, 2016). As a consequence, American colonists had begun to become more devoted to various religions, which resulted in the toleration of many of them.

Religion is a perilous subject, regardless of who you choose to discuss it with; everyone has their stance about it. In the pamphlet ‘The Age of Reason’ by Thomas Paine, the author offers his perspective of religion in which he provides factual arguments as to why he despises it and refutes its ‘message’. Paine challenges the authenticity of the Bible while also addressing its contradictions, inconsistencies and false claims. From the moment it was published, Paine knew the pamphlet would cause controversy simply by the nature of which it is based upon. Paine openly and willfully ridicules the church, the mythology of the church, the word of God and the legitimacy of the authority of which the Bible has ascribed certain individuals to. The pamphlet itself is dichotomized as follows: section one and section two. Section one consists of Paine loosely planting the roots of his arguments and satirically dissecting the basis of religion. Section two provides a close examination of the New and Old Testament where Paine directly addresses the contradictions, logical inconsistencies and empirical falsehoods of the Bible and its many books and anecdotes that will be discussed in this essay. Although some may feel offended by the nature of the pamphlet and its contents, Paine does not set out to force a conversion or instill his philosophical state of mind upon others, he simply strives to ventilate his beliefs and disbeliefs.

Throughout the Enlightenment, philosophes have made discoveries as well as have ideas that have revolutionized society as we know it today. The Enlightenment took place during the 17th and 18th century in Europe. During this period, philospohes, or philosophers, would discuss different questions and brought new, intellecutal ideas that brought out the Age of Reason. There is many different points of view of what the philosophes main idea was during the enlightenment. The main idea of the philosophes was greater individual freedom. This idea was a key part of their thinking in three areas: government, religion and women's rights.

In the 17th Century, there was much controversy between religion and science. The church supported a single worldview that God’s creation was the center of the universe. The kings and rulers were set in their ways to set the people’s minds to believe this and to never question it. From these ideas, the Enlightenment was bred from the Scientific Revolution.

When one stops to ponder or reflect on the Catholic religion it is easy to see how strong their faith is. In my opinion they have to be the ones who truly know the meaning of blind faith. In life one goes through trials and tribulations, and it is up to the individual to cope with their problems how they see fit. However, throughout the eternities this community of believers has undergone many speculations; nevertheless their beliefs continue to reign.

The Enlightenment movement did not materialize until the 17th century. Because of this, the Enlightenment was obviously not the first conceited philosophical movement popularized by mankind. Preceding its entrance into the world, other similar religious movements came before it such as Epicureanism, Naturalism, and Stoicism. Each one of these spiritual movements encountered their day of aggrandizement, yet each failed to engender the same long-lasting traction as the Enlightenment due to their different reasons.

Religion was so central to political and military conflict in the early modern period because religion encompassed the era due to the strongly religious cultural society. The centre of conflict deriving from the Catholic and Protestant divide, which caused conflict within politics and the military, because the opposing sides fought over religious territory and popularity. The centre of the conflict within these sectors of religion was The Reformation and the wars which followed, which created a struggle for power as different religions gained new support and thus power, and others experienced reduced power as a result. The resulting political and military turmoil created the growth of secularism, which attempted to stabilize politics and the military by increasing control. Therefore religion was so central to political and military conflict in the early modern period because the period was so strongly religious that it had more of an impact on political and military conflict than any other factor, because it was held in a higher regard than politics and the military sustained individually.

Americans in the Enlightenment period strongly connected themselves with the classical age in terms of how they approached their art. The Enlightenment period lasted for about 150 years, from approximately 1700 -1850. Throughout this time period many artists took inspiration from the classical age which occurred in ancient Greece and Rome hundreds of years before. We can see examples of this in buildings like The White house and Monticello in America, and Kedleston Hall in England. These three buildings, though located in very different parts of the world, all have a number of aestheticly similar attributes.

During the 17th and 18th centuries, the Enlightenment emerged causing great change within philosophy, religion, and thought. Many Enlightenment thinkers question numerous well-known ideas accepted by society. One belief, Deism, emerged among the mix of innovative concepts. Deism is a type of religion in where the person believes in a God that does not have impact on the world. This belief concludes that human beings can understand the authenticity of theology by logical and sensible manners. Deists also reject the supernatural or revealed experiences that other religions firmly hold true. During the Enlightenment period, the concept of Deism brought about reason to religion and forever changed religious and political views.

Kant in his work argued that the government should free the mankind from immaturity and leave everyone free to use his own reason in all matters of conscience. Can we be sure that in this case, people will have enlightenment, given that whatever the time period, people need rules, laws, and regulations in order to secure their safety and for the country not to have chaos and confusions? Moreover, nowadays people have rights to be free and assert their rights before the law.

The Enlightenment was the root of many of the ideas of the American Revolution. It was a movement that focused mostly on freedom of speech, equality, freedom of press, and religious tolerance. The American Revolution was the time period where America tried to gain its independence from England. They got influenced very much from many philosophers. That will be discussed throughout the essay. The Enlightenment ideas were the main influences for American Colonies to become their own nation.