Enlightenment Definition and Meaning: We explain what the Enlightenment was, what its characteristics were and in what historical context it arose. In addition, its main ideas and representatives.
What was the Enlightenment?
The Enlightenment was a cultural and intellectual movement that emerged in Europe in the 17th and 18th centuries. The Enlightenment movement held that the use of reason should be the basis of thought and that reality could be known “in a clear manner” through observation. These ideas inspired great changes in the culture, politics, economy and society of the time.
Enlightenment thought questioned all aspects of reality; especially those that were presented as absolute truths, religious dogmas and the principles that organized society and nature. The Enlightenment believed that, through study and observation, the reality of things could be known. You must read about Slavery once!
The intellectuals of the Enlightenment used the terms “light” (linked to rational thought) and “darkness” (linked to religious thought) to define different ways of understanding the world. For this reason, the 18th century, which was the heyday of this intellectual movement, is known as the “Age of Enlightenment.”
The Enlightenment movement spread throughout Europe, especially among the bourgeoisie and part of the aristocracy, through print media and social gatherings. It was also spread by intellectuals and popularizers who wrote about science, philosophy, politics and literature.
KEY POINTS
- The Enlightenment was a cultural movement that emerged in Europe in the 17th and 18th centuries. It was based on the primacy of reason to understand reality, which generated great changes in politics, economics and society.
- Its main characteristics were the questioning of established truths and the promotion of change and progress as fundamental values.
- Its historical context was marked by the rise of absolutist monarchies in Europe, with a class society divided between nobles, clergy and commoners.
- Its main representatives were René Descartes, Francis Bacon, Immanuel Kant, John Locke, Voltaire, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, David Hume and Montesquieu.
- His political ideas focused on popular sovereignty and contractualism. In economics, there was a debate about the origin of wealth, which gave impetus to currents such as physiocracy and economic liberalism.
- Its main consequences were the emergence of enlightened despotism in some European monarchies, the French Revolution, the growth of science and the transformation of the popular mentality through the dissemination of enlightened works in various social spheres.
Characteristics of the Enlightenment
The Enlightenment was characterized by being an intellectual movement that promoted the use of reason to know and understand reality, the questioning of the truths established by political and religious authority, the defense of the ideas of change and progress, and the development of natural sciences and social sciences. Maybe you should definitely read about Modern Age once!
Among the main characteristics of the Enlightenment are:
- Use of reason: Enlightenment thinkers considered that, through research, reality could be known. Through observation, study, experimentation and rational thought, new notions that defined the world and societies could be developed.
- Reformism: As a principle, Enlightenment thought discarded all absolute and indisputable truth, and encouraged critical analysis of ideas inherited from the past.
- Secularism: Enlightenment thought established the separation between the natural and the supernatural. As an inheritance of humanist thought, the enlightened maintained that God ruled the sphere of the supernatural and that religious dogmas should affect spiritual practices. Instead, nature, man and society were under the sphere of the natural, which could be known through the use of reason.
- Change and progress: Enlightenment thinkers considered that society, politics and culture were creations of man (and not of God) and that they were crossed by history. They sought to explain both the changes that occurred within a society and the differences between different societies. Thus, change began to be identified as something positive and was linked to the notion of progress. From their point of view, through moral and material progress, society could reach an ideal of plenitude and happiness.
- Development of science: Enlightenment thinkers sought to understand and reform political and social structures, promoting ideas such as popular sovereignty and the separation of powers. In the natural sciences, they developed the scientific method as a fundamental tool for the study of nature.
Historical context of the Enlightenment
The historical context of the Enlightenment was marked by the rise of absolute monarchies in Europe during the 17th and 18th centuries. Absolutism was a political form in which the king concentrated power in an absolute manner. It was held that the source of power was God and that the king exercised sovereignty by divine mandate.
Consequently, the king’s decisions were indisputable and covered all state functions. On the other hand, kings had institutions and officials under their power to exercise the different functions of government.
European society was a class society divided between nobles, clergy and commoners. Nobles and clergy enjoyed different privileges, such as not paying taxes and rents. They could also hold political positions within the monarchical bureaucracy and be received in the royal courts.
For its part, the class of commoners was made up of peasants, urban workers and bourgeoisie. These made up the vast majority of the population and were obliged to pay royal taxes. In addition, peasants had to pay rents on the lands of the nobility.
Main ideas of the Enlightenment
The main political ideas of the enlightened developed around the origin of government and authority.
In relation to politics, enlightened thought held that the source of power resided in the people (this is called “popular sovereignty”), and that the people, through a contract, delegated it to an authority that enforced the laws. This current of political enlightenment is known as “contractualism”.
In relation to the economy, enlightened thought questioned what the origin of wealth was. Some thinkers considered that wealth was based on the exploitation of natural resources, especially through agriculture. This position is known as “physiocracy”.
Other thinkers of the time argued that the economy had a natural order governed by the principles of supply and demand, and that governments should refrain from interfering in it. These ideas were the origin of economic liberalism.
Origin of the term “Enlightenment”
At the end of the 17th century, various European authors and philosophers promoted the idea that thought should be based on the use of reason. They believed that through observation, research and rational thought, it was possible to know reality “clearly”. In this context, the terms “light” and “darkness” began to be used to refer to different conceptions of the world.
This notion led to the rationalist intellectual movement in different European countries receiving names that referred to the idea of “illuminating” or “giving light”. Illustration in France, Enlightenment in England, Iluminismo or Ilustración in Spain and Aufklärung in Germany.
In contrast, systems of thought that were based on religious ideas or on the notion of a single, immutable truth were linked to the notion of “darkness” or “obscurantism”. From this tradition was born the idea that the European Middle Ages, governed by the Christian values of the Church, was a “dark age.”
Representatives of the Enlightenment
Among the main representatives of Enlightenment thought, the following stand out:
René Descartes (1596-1650)
He was a French philosopher, physicist and mathematician, considered the father of modern philosophy, and one of the founding thinkers of rationalism. His role in the Scientific Revolution was central and his works were a great inspiration for the following generations of philosophers and scientists.
Francis Bacon (1561-1626)
He was an English philosopher, politician, lawyer and writer, considered the founding father of philosophical and scientific empiricism. He was the author of the rules of the experimental scientific method.
Immanuel Kant (1724-1804)
He was one of the most important philosophers of the Western tradition, founder of criticism and precursor of German idealism. His work Critique of Pure Reason forever changed the history of Western philosophical thought.
John Locke (1632-1704)
English physician and philosopher, he was the founder of classical liberalism and one of the most influential philosophers of the British empiricist school. He was known for his contribution to the contractualist theory and influenced the thinking of Voltaire and Rousseau.
Voltaire (1694-1778)
Full name François-Marie Arouet, he was a French writer, philosopher, historian and lawyer. He was one of the most representative authors of the French Enlightenment. He was a member of the French Academy, and developed literature and philosophy from a hypercritical and humorous point of view.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778)
Of Swiss origin, this writer, philosopher, lawyer, musician, botanist and naturalist was one of the greatest exponents of the Enlightenment. The Social Contract (1762) was one of his most famous works.
David Hume (1711-1776)
A philosopher, economist and historian of Scottish origin, he is considered one of the most important thinkers in Western philosophy. His work laid the foundations for logical positivism and the philosophy of science.
Montesquieu (1689-1755)
Charles Louis de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu, was a philosopher and jurist of French origin. His most famous work was The Spirit of the Laws, in which he worked on the political ideas of liberty and separation of the powers of the State.
The Enlightenment and the Encyclopedia
The most characteristic work of the Enlightenment was the Encyclopedia or Reasoned Dictionary of the Sciences, Arts and Trades, popularly known as the Encyclopedia. This work was edited and directed by Denis Diderot and Jean Le Rond D’Alembert. It was published in 17 volumes, between 1751 and 1772. In total, it contained more than 72,000 articles.
The Encyclopedia was a monumental work that aimed to bring together all the knowledge available at the time. To do so, thousands of authors collaborated, writing articles on different branches of practical and theoretical knowledge, such as architecture, astronomy, agriculture, economics, philosophy, physics, history and mathematics.
This work served to organize the branches of knowledge. Diderot and D’Alembert created a scheme that distributed understanding into three human faculties: Memory, Reason and Imagination. In turn, each of these corresponded to a subject that included more specialized topics. For example, within the faculty of Memory, there was the subject History, which in turn included specialized topics such as Sacred History (religion) or Civil History (the study of society).
The different authors wrote articles on these specialized topics. In doing so, they connected their knowledge with the body of scientific knowledge.
Consequences of the Enlightenment
The intellectual movement of the Enlightenment had as consequences the diffusion of the use of reason in different sciences of knowledge and the questioning of the established forms of social, economic and political organization.
During the 18th century, the enlightened ideals generated important political changes, such as the appearance of “enlightened despotism” in the European monarchies. Towards the end of the century, these ideas inspired even deeper changes that led to the outbreak of the French Revolution (1789).
Meanwhile, in the 19th century, there was a wave of liberal revolutions in Europe and independence in America influenced by the principles of the Enlightenment.
In summary, among the main consequences of the Enlightenment are:
Enlightened despotism
During the Age of Enlightenment, different kings took some of the enlightened ideas and introduced reforms in the administration of their kingdoms. These reforms invoked rational criteria and the ideas of progress and well-being of the people. However, they did not change the concentration of power in the monarchs. For that reason, this political movement is known as “enlightened despotism.”
French Revolution
In 1789, French society began a revolutionary process inspired by the ideas of the Enlightenment and overthrew the absolutist monarchy.
In turn, this revolution had a series of broader consequences. It created the necessary conditions in Europe for the American colonies to begin their own processes of independence, also inspired by the ideas of the Enlightenment. In the same way, it inspired the wave of liberal revolutions that swept through Europe in the 19th century.
Growth of the sciences
With the Enlightenment, the different sciences and areas of study were connected to each other as branches of knowledge of reality. With the use of the scientific method, the systematization of study spread and the academic community grew.
Transformation of the popular mentality
Illustrated works were read in royal courts, in literary salons, in cafes and in private libraries. Collective readings and debate meant that the ideas of the Enlightenment reached all social sectors (nobles, bourgeoisie, artisans and even peasants who could read).
