Ethical Rationalism and Secularisation in the British Enlightenment

Ethical Rationalism and Secularisation in the British Enlightenment
Author: Dafydd Mills Daniel
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 351
Release: 2020-10-22
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 3030522032

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This book reassesses the ethics of reason in the Age of the Reason, making use of the neglected category of conscience. Arguing that conscience was a central feature of British Enlightenment ethical rationalism, the book explores the links between Enlightenment philosophy and modern secularisation, while responding to longstanding criticisms of rational intuitionism and the analogy between mathematics and morals, derived from David Hume and Immanuel Kant. Questioning in what sense British Enlightenment ethical rationalism can be associated with a secularising ‘Enlightenment project’, Daniel investigates the extent to which contemporary, and secular liberal, invocations of reason and conscience rely on the early modern Christian metaphysics they have otherwise disregarded. The chapters cover a rich collection of subjects, ranging from the Enlightenment’s secular legacy, reason and conscience in the history of ethics, and controversies in the Scottish Enlightenment, to the role of British moralists such as John Locke, Joseph Butler and Adam Smith in the secularisation of reason and conscience. Each chapter expertly refines Enlightenment ethical rationalism by reinterpreting its most influential proponents in eighteenth-century Britain – the followers of ‘Isaac Newton’s bulldog’ Samuel Clarke – including Richard Price (Edmund Burke’s opponent over the French Revolution) and John Witherspoon (the only clergyman to sign the US declaration of Independence).

The Sources of Secularism

The Sources of Secularism
Author: Anna Tomaszewska
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 320
Release: 2017-10-05
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 3319653946

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This book examines the importance of the Enlightenment for understanding the secular outlook of contemporary Western societies. It shows the new ways of thinking about religion that emerged during the 17th and 18th centuries and have had a great impact on how we address problems related to religion in the public sphere today. Based on the assumption that political concepts are rooted in historical realities, this collection combines the perspective of political philosophy with the perspective of the history of ideas. Does secularism imply that individuals are not free to manifest their beliefs in public? Is secularization the same as rejecting faith in the absolute? Can there be a universal rational core in every religion? Does freedom of expression always go hand in hand with freedom of conscience? Is secularism an invention of the predominantly Christian West, which cannot be applied in other contexts, specifically that of Muslim cultures? Answers to these and related questions are sought not only in current theories and debates in political philosophy, but also in the writings of Immanuel Kant, Benedict Spinoza, Thomas Hobbes, Anthony Collins, Adriaan Koerbagh, Abbé Claude Yvon, Giovanni Paolo Marana, and others.

Between Secularization and Reform

Between Secularization and Reform
Author: Anna Tomaszewska
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 372
Release: 2022-08-22
Genre: History
ISBN: 9004523375

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The authors revisit the idea that Enlightenment spearheaded secularization. This book invites all to look at the Enlightenment religiosity as founded on a merger of religious criticism and heterodoxy.

Enlightenment and Religion

Enlightenment and Religion
Author: Knud Haakonssen
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 370
Release: 1996-05-30
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 0521560608

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This book makes a comprehensive reassessment of the relationship between Enlightenment and religion in England. The debate about an 'English' Enlightenment has centred on the role of religion, especially the relationship between the established Anglican Church and the dissenting confessions. It has long been accepted that liberal, rational dissenters developed an Enlightenment agenda, but most literature on this topic is quite out of date. These interdisciplinary essays provide a fresh analysis of rational dissent within English Enlightenment culture. Equally, they contribute to the debate over eighteenth-century religion and its social, political and intellectual meaning, focusing on the Irish and Scottish contributions to English dissent. Its wide perspective and research make Enlightenment and Religion an important and original contribution to eighteenth-century studies.

Enlightenment Prelate

Enlightenment Prelate
Author: William Gibson
Publisher: James Clarke & Company
Total Pages: 537
Release: 2022-03-31
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0227906543

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A reappraisal of the legacy of Benjamin Hoadly, the 18th Century bishop whose liberal and rationalist views had a considerable influence on the English Enlightenment and the American Revolution.

The Quest to Save the Old Testament

The Quest to Save the Old Testament
Author: David Ney
Publisher: Lexham Academic
Total Pages: 362
Release: 2022-07-27
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1683596277

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Enlightenment attempts to save the Old Testament Pastors and scholars today lament the Old Testament's neglect in the West. But this is nothing new. In the eighteenth century, natural philosopher John Hutchinson witnessed the Old Testament becoming devalued as Scripture. And in his mind, the blame lay with Isaac Newton. In The Quest to Save the Old Testament, David Ney traces the battle over Scripture during the Enlightenment period. For Hutchinson, critical scholarship's enchantment with the naturalism of Newton undermined the study of the Old Testament. As cultural forces reshaped biblical interpretation, Hutchinson spawned a movement that sought, above all, to reclaim the Old Testament as Christian Scripture. Hutchinson's followers sought to be shaped by Scripture, not culture. Rejecting the Newtonian degradation of history, they offered a compelling figural defense of the Old Testament's doctrinal and moral significance. The Old Testament is the voice of Providence. It is the means of discerning God's hand at work both in nature and in history. The Quest to Save the Old Testament is a timely retelling of fateful and faithful attempts to "save" the Old Testament.

Nature and Culture

Nature and Culture
Author: Lester G. Crocker
Publisher: Baltimore, Hopkins P
Total Pages: 578
Release: 1963
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN:

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Modern Moral Philosophy

Modern Moral Philosophy
Author: Stephen Darwall
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 399
Release: 2023-05-31
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 1009380613

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In this magisterial study, one of our leading moral philosophers refutes the charge (originally made by Elizabeth Anscombe) that modern ethics is incoherent because it essentially depends on theological and religious assumptions that it cannot acknowledge. Stephen Darwall's panoramic picture starts with the seventeenth-century thinker Grotius and tells the story continuously down to the time of Kant, exploring what was in fact a completely new way of doing ethics based on secular ideas of human psychology and universal accountability. He shows that thinkers from Grotius to Kant are profoundly united by this modern approach, and that it helped them to create a theory of natural human rights that remains of great political relevance today. He further shows that this new way of thinking provides conceptual resources that are far from exhausted, and that moral philosophy in this idiom still has a vibrant future.

The Religious Innatism Debate in Early Modern Britain

The Religious Innatism Debate in Early Modern Britain
Author: R.J.W. Mills
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 137
Release: 2021-09-20
Genre: History
ISBN: 3030843238

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This book demonstrates that the common belief that humanity is naturally disposed to religion did not disappear with the emergence of the Enlightenment. Going beyond a narrow focus on John Locke’s empiricism, this vivid analysis reconstructs the vociferous, multivocal debate over the natural origins of religious belief in England and Scotland between c. 1650 and c. 1750. It enriches our understanding through examining hundreds of discussions of the relationship between human nature and religion, from a variety of genres and contexts. It shows that belief in religious innatism was a ubiquitous and enduring claim about human nature across the continuum of Christian thought in early modern Britain, and one deployed for a variety of reasons. While the doctrine of innate religious ideas did fall out of use, the belief that human nature was framed for religion continued in new forms into the eighteenth century.