Secularism and Religion in Nineteenth-Century Germany

The Rise of the Fourth Confession

AvTodd H. Weir

Inbunden, Engelska, 2014

1 350 kr

Beställningsvara. Skickas inom 7-10 vardagar. Fri frakt över 249 kr.

Fler format och utgåvor

Häftad

441 kr

Beskrivning

Negotiating the boundaries of the secular and of the religious is a core aspect of modern experience. In mid-nineteenth-century Germany, secularism emerged to oppose church establishment, conservative orthodoxy, and national division between Catholics, Protestants, and Jews. Yet, as historian Todd H. Weir argues in this provocative book, early secularism was not the opposite of religion. It developed in the rationalist dissent of Free Religion and, even as secularism took more atheistic forms in Freethought and Monism, it was subject to the forces of the confessional system it sought to dismantle. Similar to its religious competitors, it elaborated a clear worldview, sustained social milieus, and was integrated into the political system. Secularism was, in many ways, Germany's fourth confession. While challenging assumptions about the causes and course of the Kulturkampf and modern antisemitism, this study casts new light on the history of popular science, radical politics, and social reform.

Produktinformation

Utgivningsdatum:2014-04-21
Mått:158 x 235 x 22 mm
Vikt:570 g
Format:Inbunden
Språk:Engelska
Antal sidor:316
Förlag:Cambridge University Press
ISBN:9781107041561

Utforska kategorier

Mer om författaren

Todd H. Weir serves as a lecturer in Modern European History at Queen's University Belfast. After a formative experience as an exchange student in East Germany in 1988, Weir trained as a historian at the Humboldt University, Berlin and Columbia University, New York. He has previously taught at Humboldt University, Seattle University, and the University of Washington. Weir has been a resident scholar at the Berlin Program for Advanced German and European Studies, the Simpson Center for the Humanities of the University of Washington, and the Historisches Kolleg in Munich. He is the editor of Monism: Science, Philosophy, Religion, and the History of a Worldview (2012), and his articles have appeared in Central European History, Church History, German History, German Studies Review, and Deutschland Archiv. Weir's research has also been supported by grants from the British Academy, the Arts and Humanities Research Council, the German Academic Exchange Service, and the Leverhulme Trust.

Recensioner i media

'Secularism and Religion in Nineteenth-Century Germany is a highly original, deeply researched, elegantly argued, and very significant contribution to modern German history. Crossing virtually all of the topics of recent interest in the field, including secularization, anti-Semitism, the Kulturkampf, monism, the history of Berlin, and esoteric religious pursuits, Todd Weir blends recent research with older debates concerning Bismarck's policies, the Strange Death of German Liberalism, and the problem of Jewish assimilation. Readers will surely be impressed by the depth of Weir's research and the subtlety of his argumentation, and even subjects they thought they knew well will look different on viewing them from the perspective of 'the fourth confession'.' Suzanne L. Marchand, Louisiana State University

Innehållsförteckning

Introduction; 1. Dissidence and confession 1845 to 1847; 2. Free religious worldview: from Christian rationalism to naturalistic monism; 3. The sociology of dissent: free religion and popular science; 4. Politics and free religion in the 1860s and 1870s; 5. Secularism in the Berlin Kulturkampf 1869–80; 6. From worldview to ethics: secularism and the 'Jewish Question' 1878–92; 7. Secularism in Wilhelmine Germany; Epilogue: German secularism after 1914.