Filozofska istraživanja, Vol. 36 No. 2, 2016.
Review article
https://doi.org/10.21464/fi36208
Jean Meslier’s Radical Atheism
Marko Škorić
orcid.org/0000-0002-4019-2807
; Univerzitet u Novom Sadu, Filozofski fakultet, Dr Zorana Đinđića 2, RS–21000 Novi Sad
Abstract
During the end of the 17th century, more and more “radical thinkers” began to speak about how common understanding of god was being incoherent, childish, and anthropomorphic. Because of that, their contemporaries saw them as atheists, although today probably nobody would characterize them as such. One thing is for certain – the definition of atheist had different meanings in different times. We know that many authors published their works anonymously or after their death, and one of those writers was Jean Meslier. He was a priest who wrote a book titled Testament, in which he developed a thorough materialistic and atheistic worldview. Besides that, he attacked the Church, Christianity, Jesus, God, aristocracy, monarchy, “ancient regime” etc. The paper analyses historical context in which Meslier lived, his biography, and his thoughts on politics, Church, ethics, materialism, and atheism.
Keywords
Jean Meslier; atheism; materialism; Enlightenment; clandestine literature
Hrčak ID:
173357
URI
Publication date:
27.9.2016.
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