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Writer of Fancy: The Playful Piety of Jane Austen
1 & 2 Kings
Brazos Theological Commentary
The Promise Of His Appearing: An Exposition Of Second Peter
A Great Mystery: Fourteen Wedding Sermons
Deep Comedy: Trinity, Tragedy, And Hope In Western Literature
Miniatures & Morals: The Christian Novels of Jane Austen
The Priesthood of the Plebs: A Theology of Baptism
A Son To Me: An Exposition of 1 & 2 Samuel
From Silence to Song: The Davidic Liturgical Revolution
Ascent to Love: A Guide to Dante's Divine Comedy
Blessed Are the Hungry: Meditations on the Lord's Supper
A House For My Name: A Survey of the Old Testament
Heroes of the City of Man: A Christian Guide to Select Ancient Literature
Brightest Heaven of Invention: A Christian Guide To Six Shakespeare Plays
Wise Words: Family Stories That Bring the Proverbs to Life
The Kingdom and the Power: Rediscovering the Centrality of the Church
In his essay “What is Enlightenment?” Kant described humanity’s coming-of-age. Enlightenment makes man’s deliverance from the tutelage of external authorities and the achievement of mature autonomy.
Earlier, Descartes had constructed an entire philosophy on the foundation of “clear and distinct ideas.” The Enlightenment billed itself as the end of blindness and the beginning of effortless, undistorted vision.
In these and other ways, the Enlightenment implicitly claimed to have reached the eschaton. Its epistemology was, Knight says, a “beatific vision of the object.” And its claim to maturity was a claim to have arrived at full human development, to have achieved the status of the Last Man.
What is Enlightenment? It’s a false eschatology, the heavenly city of the philosophers.
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Thursday, June 26, 2008 at 2:12 pm
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