{"product_id":"let-there-be-enlightenment-9781421426013","title":"Let There Be Enlightenment","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eChallenging the triumphalist narrative of Enlightenment secularism.   According to most scholars, the Enlightenment was a rational awakening, a radical break from a past dominated by religion and superstition. But in Let There Be Enlightenment, Anton M. Matytsin, Dan Edelstein, and the contributors they have assembled deftly undermine this simplistic narrative. Emphasizing the ways in which religious beliefs and motivations shaped philosophical perspectives, essays in this book highlight figures and topics often overlooked in standard genealogies of the Enlightenment. The volume underscores the prominent role that religious discourses continued to play in major aspects of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century thought. The essays probe a wide range of subjects, from reformer Jan Amos Comenius's quest for universal enlightenment to the changing meanings of the light metaphor, Quaker influences on Baruch Spinoza's theology, and the unexpected persistence of Aristotle in the Enlightenment. E\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTrade Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThis book has many merits. All of its chapters are very original and even groundbreaking in several respects. By employing interdisciplinary approaches that pay due attention to both texts and contexts, the contributors to this volume rediscover and revalue several intellectual currents and figures traditionally neglected by historiography . . . [\u003ci\u003eLet There Be Enlightenment\u003c\/i\u003e] provides excellent food for thought for both specialists in the field and educated lay readers willing to acquire a deeper insight into this fascinating and complex period of human history.\u003cbr\u003e—Diego Lucci, American University in Bulgaria, \u003ci\u003eJournal of Jesuit Studies\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI am delighted to have this collection in my library . . . [\u003ci\u003eLet There Be Enlightenment\u003c\/i\u003e] asserts stronger and more complex continuities between medieval thought and the Enlightenment, making it worth noting for not only specialists in early modern history, but more broadly scholars of religion and ideas in pre-nineteenth-century Europe.\u003cbr\u003e—Chad Denton, \u003ci\u003eH-France Review\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTable of Contents\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003eAcknowledgments \u003cbr\u003eIntroduction \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePart I. Lux\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eChapter 1. Via Lucis in tenebras: Comenius as Prophet of the Age of Light \u003cbr\u003eChapter 2. Whose Light Is It Anyway? The Struggle for Light in the French Enlightenment\u003cbr\u003eChapter 3. The \"Lights\" before the Enlightenment: The Tribunal of Reason and Public Opinion\u003cbr\u003eChapter 4. Writing the History of Illumination in the Siècle des Lumières: Enlightenment Narratives of Light\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePart II. Veritas\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eChapter 5. Another Dialogue in the Tractatus: Spinoza on \"Christ's Disciples\" and the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) \u003cbr\u003eChapter 6. A Backward Glance: Light and Darkness in the Medieval Theology of Power\u003cbr\u003eChapter 7. Lumen unitivum: The Light of Reason and the Aristotelian Sect in Early-Modern Scholasticism\u003cbr\u003eChapter 8. The Aristotelian Enlightenment\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePart III: Tenebrae\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eChapter 9. Secular Sacerdotalism in the Anglican Enlightenment, 1660–1740\u003cbr\u003eChapter 10. Refracting the Century of Lights: Alternate Genealogies of Enlightenment in Eighteenth-Century Culture\u003cbr\u003eChapter 11. Enlightenment in the Shadows: Mysticism, Materialism, and the Dream State in Eighteenth-Century France\u003cbr\u003eChapter 12. Light, Truth, and the Counter-Enlightenment's Enlightenment\u003cbr\u003eContributors\u003cbr\u003eIndex\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Johns Hopkins University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49529535725911,"sku":"9781421426013","price":47.5,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1739\/5799\/files\/9781421426013.jpg?v=1731876002","url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/let-there-be-enlightenment-9781421426013","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}