Anticlericalism – what is it? This word is foreign. To understand its interpretation, one should turn to etymology. It comes from the Latin prefix anti - "against" and the late Latin adjective clericalis, which means "church". The latter were formed from the Greek prefix ἀντί - "against" and the noun κληρικός - "clergy", "clergy". The word atheism is formed differently: from the ancient Greek fromἀ - "without" and θεός - "god", i.e. "denial of God, godlessness".
More details about what it is - anti-clericalism and atheism, will be discussed below. Let's also consider their difference from each other.
Clericalism
To understand what this is - anti-clericalism, it would be advisable to start with a definition of this concept. In a broad sense, clericalism isis such a political direction, whose representatives seek the leading role of the clergy and the church in politics, culture, and public life. The opposite of this term is "secularism".
The carriers of clericalism are the clergy and persons associated with the church. But clericalism is used not only by the apparatus of the church, but also by various organizations, political parties of the clerical wing. Also, the clergy often involve cultural, women's, youth, trade union and other organizations created with their participation in the implementation of their goals.
Clerical parties were created along with parliamentarism. But as for clericalism as a worldview and ideal, it is much older.
Anticlericalism
This is a social movement that is directed against the clergy, religious organizations and their power - political, economic, as well as in the field of culture, science, education. Some of his ideas were expressed by ancient philosophers. In Europe in the Middle Ages, anti-clericalism was a form of struggle against the idea preached by the church about the superiority of spiritual power over secular. Then the main direction of it was the condemnation of the feudal church. At the same time, the peasant movements oriented against the church primarily pursued economic goals.
In the Renaissance, the ideologists of anti-clericalism are representatives of the humanistic direction: philosophers and writers who expressed the ideas of the early bourgeoisie. Their work contributed to the beginning of the struggle for tolerance towardsvarious faiths, for the revival of the ancient view of man, lost in Catholicism. Such figures were, for example, Giordano Bruno, Lorenzo Valla, Poggio Bracciolini, Leonardo Bruni.
Atheism
It is necessary to distinguish the concept under consideration from atheism. The latter, translated from ancient Greek, means "godlessness", "denial of God." In a broad sense, it is understood as a denial of the belief that gods exist. In a narrower sense, it is a belief in what is said above.
But there is also the broadest interpretation, according to which atheism is a simple lack of belief in the existence of a higher power. In relation to religion, this is a worldview that denies everything supernatural.
From what has been said, we can conclude about the difference between the concepts of "anti-clericalism" and "atheism".
- The latter stands on the position of denying the existence of God and other supernatural phenomena, the existence of which is declared by religion.
- Anti-clericalism denies not the truth of religion in general, but only those claims that the church makes about its exclusivity in the life of society.
Thus, these two concepts, although related to each other, are inherently different. Next, the features of the manifestation of anti-clericalism and atheism in the Enlightenment will be considered.
Bourgeois thought and the "cult of Reason"
In the Age of Enlightenment, anti-clericalism was one of the important tasks of bourgeois ideologists. They associated it with the struggle for freedom of conscience, with challengingreligious concepts, with criticism of church policy. This primarily applies to Pierre Bayle, Toland, Voltaire.
At that time, bourgeois laws were adopted that provided for the alienation of church property, primarily land, and the separation of church and state.
During the French Revolution, the negative consequences of the struggle against the clerics appeared. They were expressed in the desire to eliminate the church as a social institution, in the destruction of church buildings, the seizure of the property of churches, and the forcing of priests to renounce their priesthood. As a result of forced de-Christianization, religion was replaced by the "cult of Reason", and later by the "cult of the Supreme Being" at the state level. The Thermidorian coup eventually took place.
At the end of the 18th century, the first atheistic thinkers began to appear and speak out. Such was, for example, Baron Holbach. During this period, the expression of unbelief becomes less dangerous. The most systematic of the representatives of enlightened thinking was David Hume. His ideas were based on empiricism, which undermined the metaphysical foundations of theology.
