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Enlightenment
Enlightenment term applied to the mainstream of thought of 18th-century Europe and America.
Background and Basic Tenets
The scientific and intellectual developments of the 17th cent.—the discoveries of Isaac Newton , the rationalism of Réné Descartes , the skepticism...
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deists
deists , term commonly applied to those thinkers in the 17th and 18th cent. who held that the course of nature sufficiently demonstrates the existence of God. For them formal religion was superfluous, and they scorned as spurious claims of supernatural revelation. Their tenets stemmed from the ratio...
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bodhisattva
bodhisattva [Sanskrit,=enlightenment-being], in early Buddhism the term used to refer to the Buddha before he attained supreme enlightenment; more generally, any being destined for enlightenment or intent on enlightenment. The spiritual path of the bodhisattva is the central teaching of Mahayana ...
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Jean-Antoine Houdon
Jean-Antoine Houdon , 1741-1828, French neoclassical sculptor. He studied with Michel Ange Slodtz, Lemoyne , and Pigalle , took the Prix de Rome at the age of 20, and spent four years in Italy. Many of his later works reveal his study of classical form, e.g., the marble Diana (St. Petersburg) an...
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Rosa Bonheur
Rosa Bonheur , 1822-99, French painter of animals. She was a pupil of her father, Raymond Bonheur. Her paintings were regularly exhibited in the Salon from 1841. Bonheur's informed and sympathetic pictures of animal life were remarkably enlightened in approach. They gained her wide popularity, parti...
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Nachman Krochmal
Nachman Krochmal , 1785-1840, Jewish secular historian and writer, b. Galicia. He was a leader in the movement of the Jewish enlightenment and a pioneer of modern Jewish scholarship. He applied his synthesis of religion and philosophy to the writing and teaching of Jewish history. His most important...
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Theodor Wiesengrund Adorno
Theodor Wiesengrund Adorno , 1903-69, German philosopher, born as Theodor Adorno Wiesengrund. Forced into exile by the Nazis (1933), he spent 16 years in England and the United States before returning to Germany to take up a chair in philosophy at Frankfurt. A leading member of the Frankfurt School...
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despotism
despotism government by an absolute ruler unchecked by effective constitutional limits to his power. In Greek usage, a despot was ruler of a household and master of its slaves. The title was applied to gods and, by derivation, to the quasi-divine rulers of the Middle East. In the Byzantine Empire, ...
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Dōgen
Dōgen , 1200-1253, Zen master (see Zen Buddhism ) and founder of the Sōtō Zen school in Japan. After studying in China, he received the seal of enlightenment and succession to the Ts'ao-tung (Sōtō) school. In 1236 he established the first independent Zen temple in Japan. S&...
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Ludvig Holberg, Baron
Ludvig Holberg, Baron , 1684-1754, Danish dramatist, essayist, poet, and historian, apostle of the Enlightenment in Scandinavia. Born in Norway, he studied theology in Bergen and in Copenhagen. After 1708 he made Denmark his home, residing there between European travels. Professor of metaphysics and...
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