Deism

Belief in a God based on rational thought

For other uses, see Deism (disambiguation). Not to be confused with Theism.

Deism

Origins

* Deus (Deus otiosus)
* Logos § Ancient Greek philosophy
* Neoplatonism § The One
* Chinese theology § Confucian theology
* Averroism
* Socinianism
* Unmoved mover
* Watchmaker God

Movements

* 18th-century England and France
* Christian Deism
* Pandeism (in Asia) (and Christianity) (criticism)
* Spinozism
* Cult of the Supreme Being
* Theophilanthropy
* Deistic evolution
* Natural theology
* Congregationalism in the
US § Disinterested benevolence
* Polydeism

Notable figures

* Edward Herbert, 1st Baron Herbert of Cherbury
* Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke
* Matthew Tindal
* Voltaire
* Charles Blount
* Thomas Chubb
* Thomas Jefferson
* Thomas Paine
* Guido von List
* Cayetano Ripoll

False equivalencies

* Ceremonial deism
* Moralistic therapeutic deism

Opposition

* Catholic Church
* John Leland
* Edward Stillingfleet § Philosophical controversy
* Anthony Bliss
* John Jackson
* Johann Georg Hamann
* Charles Jennens
* Religious thought of Edmund Burke
* Richard Blackmore § Non-epic writing
* James McGready
* Valentin Ernst Löscher
* Continental prophecies § Themes
* Friedrich Julius Stahl

* v
* t
* e

Part of a series on

Theism

Types of faith

* Agnosticism
* Apatheism
* Atheism
* Classical theism
* Deism
* Henotheism
* Ietsism
* Ignosticism
* Monotheism
* Monism
* Dualism
* Monolatry
* Kathenotheism
* Omnism
* Pandeism
* Panentheism
* Pantheism
* Polytheism
* Transtheism

Specific conceptions

* Brahman
* Creator
* Demiurge
* Deus
* Father
* Form of the Good
* God
* Great Architect
* Monad
* Mother
* Summum bonum
* Supreme
* The Lord
* Trinity
* Tawhid
* Ditheism
* Monism
* Personal
* Unitarianism

In particular religions

|  Abrahamic

* Judaism
* Christianity
* Islam
* Baháʼí Faith
* Mormonism
* Mandaeism
* Samaritanism

Indo-Iranian

* Hinduism
* Buddhism
* Jainism
* Sikhism
* Yungdrung Bon
* Zoroastrianism

Chinese

* Tian
* Shangdi
* Hongjun Laozu

Attributes

* Eternalness
* Existence
* Gender
* Names ("God")
* Omnibenevolence
* Omnipotence
* Omnipresence
* Omniscience
* Aseity
* Transcendence

* Experiences
* Practices

* Belief
* Esotericism
* Faith
* Fideism
* Gnosis
* Hermeticism
* Metaphysics
* Mysticism
* Prayer
* Revelation
* Worship

Related topics

* Euthyphro dilemma
* God complex
* God gene
* Theology
* Ontology
* Problem of evil (theodicy)
* Religion
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* texts
* Portrayals of God in popular media
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Deism (/ˈdiːɪzəm/ DEE-iz-əm [1][2] or /ˈdeɪ.ɪzəm/ DAY-iz-əm; derived from the Latin term deus, meaning "god")[3][4] is the philosophical position and rationalistic theology[5] that generally rejects revelation as a source of divine knowledge and asserts that empirical reason and observation of the natural world are exclusively logical, reliable, and sufficient to determine the existence of a Supreme Being as the creator of the universe.[11] More simply stated, Deism is the belief in the existence of God—often, but not necessarily, an impersonal and incomprehensible God who does not intervene in the universe after creating it,[8][12] solely based on rational thought without any reliance on revealed religions or religious authority.[13] Deism emphasizes the concept of natural theology—that is, God's existence is revealed through nature.[14]

Since the 17th century and during the Age of Enlightenment, especially in 18th-century England, France, and North America,[15] various Western philosophers and theologians formulated a critical rejection of the several religious texts belonging to the many organized religions, and began to appeal only to truths that they felt could be established by reason as the exclusive source of divine knowledge.[17] Such philosophers and theologians were called "Deists", and the philosophical/theological position they advocated is called "Deism".[18]

Deism as a distinct philosophical and intellectual movement declined toward the end of the 18th century[5] but had a revival in the early 19th century.[19] Some of its tenets continued as part of other intellectual and spiritual movements, like Unitarianism,[4] and Deism continues to have advocates today,[3] including with modern variants such as Christian deism and pandeism.

## Early developments

[edit]

### Ancient history

[edit]

Main article: History of philosophy

Deistical thinking has existed since ancient times; the roots of Deism can be traced back to the philosophical tradition of Ancient Greece.[20] The 3rd-century Christian theologian and philosopher Clement of Alexandria explicitly mentioned persons who believed that God was not involved in human affairs, and therefore led what he considered a licentious life.[21] However, Deism did not develop as a religio-philosophical movement until after the Scientific Revolution, which began in the mid-16th century in early modern Europe.[22]

### Divinity schools in Islamic theology

[edit]

Main articles: Aqidah and God in Islam

In the history of Islam, one of the earliest systematic schools of Islamic theology to develop was the Muʿtazila in the mid-8th century CE.[23][24] Muʿtazilite theologians emphasized the use of reason and rational thought, positing that the injunctions of God are accessible through rational thought and inquiry, and affirmed that the Quran was created (makhlūq) rather than co-eternal with God, an affirmation that would develop into one of the most contentious questions in the history of Islamic theology.[23][24]

In the 9th–10th century CE, the Ashʿarī school developed as a response to the Muʿtazila, founded by the 10th-century Muslim scholar and theologian Abū al-Ḥasan al-Ashʿarī.[25] Ashʿarītes still taught the use of reason in understanding the Quran, but denied the possibility to deduce moral truths by reasoning.[25] This position was opposed by the Māturīdī school;[26] according to its founder, the 10th-century Muslim scholar and theologian Abū Manṣūr al-Māturīdī, human reason is supposed to acknowledge the existence of a creator deity (bāriʾ) solely based on rational thought and independently from divine revelation.[26] He shared this conviction with his teacher and predecessor Abū Ḥanīfa al-Nuʿmān (8th century CE), whereas al-Ashʿarī never held such a view.[26]

According to the Afghan-American philosopher Sayed Hassan Hussaini, the early schools of Islamic theology and theological beliefs among classical Muslim philosophers are characterized by "a rich color of Deism with a slight disposition toward theism".[27]

### Origins of Deism

[edit]

The terms deism and theism are both derived from words meaning "god": the Latin term deus and the Ancient Greek term theós (θεός), respectively.[3] The word déiste first appeared in French in 1563 in a theological treatise written by the Swiss Calvinist theologian named Pierre Viret,[9] but Deism was generally unknown in the Kingdom of France until the 1690s when Pierre Bayle published his famous Dictionnaire Historique et Critique, which contained an article on Viret.[28]

In English, the words deist and theist were originally synonymous, but by the 17th century the terms started to diverge in meaning.[29] The term deist with its current meaning first appears in English in Robert Burton's The Anatomy of Melancholy (1621).

### Herbert of Cherbury and early English Deism

[edit]

Lord Herbert of Cherbury, portrayed by Isaac Oliver, c. 1603–05

The first major statement of Deism in English literature is Lord Herbert of Cherbury's book De Veritate (1624).[30] Lord Herbert, like his contemporary Descartes, searched for the foundations of knowledge. The first two-thirds of his book De Veritate (On Truth, as It Is Distinguished from Revelation, the Probable, the Possible, and the False) are devoted to an exposition of Herbert's theory of knowledge. Herbert distinguished truths from experience and distinguished reasoning about experience from innate and revealed truths. Innate truths are imprinted on our minds, as evidenced by their universal acceptance. Herbert referred to universally accepted truths as notitiae communes--Common Notions. Herbert believed there were five Common Notions that unify all religious beliefs.

1. There is one Supreme God.
2. God ought to be worshipped.
3. Virtue and piety are the main parts of divine worship.
4. We ought to be remorseful for our sins and repent.
5. Divine goodness dispenses rewards and punishments, both in this life and after it.

Herbert himself had relatively few followers, and it was not until the 1680s that Herbert found a true successor in Charles Blount (1654 – 1693).[31]

### The peak of Deism (1696–1801)

[edit]

See also: Deism in England and France in the 18th century

The appearance of John Locke's Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690) marks an important turning-point and new phase in the history of English Deism. Lord Herbert's epistemology was based on the idea of "common notions" (or innate ideas). Locke's Essay was an attack on the foundation of innate ideas. After Locke, deists could no longer appeal to innate ideas as Herbert had done. Instead, deists were forced to turn to arguments based on experience and nature. Under the influence of Newton, they turned to the argument from design as the principal argument for the existence of God.[32]

Peter Gay identifies John Toland's Christianity Not Mysterious (1696), and the "vehement response" it provoked, as the beginning of post-Lockian Deism. Among the notable figures, Gay describes Toland and Matthew Tindal as the best known; however, Gay considered them to be talented publicists rather than philosophers or scholars. He regards Conyers Middleton and Anthony Collins as contributing more to the substance of debate, in contrast with fringe writers such as Thomas Chubb and Thomas Woolston.[33]

Other English Deists prominent during the period include William Wollaston, Charles Blount, Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke,[7] and, in the latter part, Peter Annet, Thomas Chubb, and Thomas Morgan. Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 3rd Earl of Shaftesbury was also influential; though not presenting himself as a Deist, he shared many of the deists' key attitudes and is now usually regarded as a Deist.[34]

Especially noteworthy is Matthew Tindal's Christianity as Old as the Creation (1730), which became, very soon after its publication, the focal center of the Deist controversy. Because almost every argument, quotation, and issue raised for decades can be found here, the work is often termed "the Deist's Bible".[35] Following Locke's successful attack on innate ideas, Tindal's "Bible" redefined the foundation of Deist epistemology as knowledge based on experience or human reason. This effectively widened the gap between traditional Christians and what he called "Christian Deists", since this new foundation required that "revealed" truth be validated through human reason.

## Enlightenment Deism

[edit]

### Aspects of Deism in Enlightenment philosophy

[edit]

Enlightenment Deism consisted of two philosophical assertions: (1) reason, along with features of the natural world, is a valid source of religious knowledge, and (2) revelation is not a valid source of religious knowledge. Different Deist philosophers expanded on these two assertions to create what Leslie Stephen later termed the "constructive" and "critical" aspects of Deism.[36][37] "Constructive" assertions--assertions that deist writers felt were justified by appeals to reason and features of the natural world (or perhaps were intuitively obvious or common notions)--included:[38][39]

* God exists and created the universe.
* God gave humans the ability to reason.

"Critical" assertions--assertions that followed from the denial of revelation as a valid source of religious knowledge--were much more numerous, and included:

* Rejection of all books (including the Quran and the Bible) that claimed to contain divine revelation.[40]
* Rejection of the incomprehensible notion of the Trinity and other religious "mysteries".
* Rejection of reports of miracles, prophecies, etc.

#### The origins of religion

[edit]

A central premise of Deism was that the organized religions of their day were corruptions of an original religion that was pure, natural, simple, and rational. Humanity lost this original religion when it was subsequently corrupted by priests who manipulated it for personal gain and for the class interests of the priesthood,[41] and encrusted it with superstitions and "mysteries"--irrational theological doctrines. Deists referred to this manipulation of religious doctrine as "priestcraft", a derogatory term.[42] For Deists, this corruption of natural religion was designed to keep laypeople baffled by "mysteries" and dependent on the priesthood for information about the requirements for salvation. This gave the priesthood a great deal of power, which the Deists believed the priesthood worked to maintain and increase. Deists saw it as their mission to strip away "priestcraft" and "mysteries". Matthew Tindal, perhaps the most prominent Deist writer in early modern Europe, claimed that this was the proper, original role of the Christian Church.[43]

One implication of this premise was that current-day primitive societies, or societies that existed in the distant past, should have religious beliefs less infused with superstitions and closer to those of natural theology. This position became less and less plausible as Enlightenment philosophers such as David Hume began studying the natural history of religion and suggested that the origin of religion was not in reason but in emotions, such as the fear of the unknown.

#### Immortality of the soul

[edit]

Different Deists had different beliefs about the immortality of the soul, about the existence of Hell and damnation to punish the wicked, and the existence of Heaven to reward the virtuous. Anthony Collins,[44] Bolingbroke, Thomas Chubb, and Peter Annet were materialists and either denied or doubted the immortality of the soul.[45] Benjamin Franklin believed in reincarnation or resurrection. Lord Herbert of Cherbury and William Wollaston[46] held that souls exist, survive death, and in the afterlife are rewarded or punished by God for their behavior in life. Thomas Paine believed in the "probability" of the immortality of the soul.[47]

#### Miracles and divine providence

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The most natural position for Deists was to reject all forms of supernaturalism, including the miracle stories in the Bible. The problem was that the rejection of miracles also seemed to entail the rejection of divine providence (that is, God taking a hand in human affairs), something that many Deists were inclined to accept.[48] Those who believed in a watch-maker God rejected the possibility of miracles and divine providence. They believed that God, after establishing natural laws and setting the cosmos in motion, stepped away. He did not need to keep tinkering with his creation, and the suggestion that he did was insulting.[49] Others, however, firmly believed in divine providence, and so, were reluctantly forced to accept at least the possibility of miracles. God was, after all, all-powerful and could do whatever he wanted including temporarily suspending his own natural laws.

#### Freedom and necessity

[edit]

Enlightenment philosophers under the influence of Newtonian science tended to view the universe as a vast machine, created and set in motion by a creator being, that continues to operate according to natural law without any divine intervention. This view naturally led to what was then called "necessitarianism"[50] (the modern term is "determinism"): the view that everything in the universe--including human behavior--is completely, causally determined by antecedent circumstances and natural law. (See, for example, La Mettrie's L'Homme machine.) As a consequence, debates about freedom versus "necessity" were a regular feature of Enlightenment religious and philosophical discussions. Reflecting the intellectual climate of the time, there were differences among Deists about freedom and determinism. Some, such as Anthony Collins, were actually necessitarians.[51]

### David Hume

[edit]

David Hume

Views differ on whether David Hume was a Deist, an atheist, or something else.[52] Like the Deists, Hume rejected revelation, and his famous essay On Miracles provided a powerful argument against belief in miracles. On the other hand, he did not believe that an appeal to Reason could provide any justification for religion. In the essay Natural History of Religion (1757), he contended that polytheism, not monotheism, was "the first and most ancient religion of mankind" and that the psychological basis of religion is not reason, but fear of the unknown.[53] In Waring's words:

> The clear reasonableness of natural religion disappeared before a semi-historical look at what can be known about uncivilized man— "a barbarous, necessitous animal," as Hume termed him. Natural religion, if by that term one means the actual religious beliefs and practices of uncivilized peoples, was seen to be a fabric of superstitions. Primitive man was no unspoiled philosopher, clearly seeing the truth of one God. And the history of religion was not, as the deists had implied, retrograde; the widespread phenomenon of superstition was caused less by priestly malice than by man's unreason as he confronted his experience.[54]

### Deism in the United States

[edit]

Thomas Paine

The Thirteen Colonies of North America - which became the United States of America after the American Revolution in 1776 - were part of the British Empire, and Americans, as British subjects, were influenced by and participated in the intellectual life of the Kingdom of Great Britain. English Deism was an important influence on the thinking of Thomas Jefferson and the principles of religious freedom asserted in the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. Other Founding Fathers who were influenced to various degrees by Deism were Ethan Allen,[55] Benjamin Franklin, Cornelius Harnett, Gouverneur Morris, Hugh Williamson, James Madison, and possibly Alexander Hamilton.

In the United States, there is a great deal of controversy over whether the Founding Fathers were Christians, Deists, or something in between.[56][57] Particularly heated is the debate over the beliefs of Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and George Washington.[58][59][60]

In his Autobiography, Franklin wrote that as a young man "Some books against Deism fell into my hands; they were said to be the substance of sermons preached at Boyle's lectures. It happened that they wrought an effect on me quite contrary to what was intended by them; for the arguments of the Deists, which were quoted to be refuted, appeared to me much stronger than the refutations; in short, I soon became a thorough Deist."[61][62] Like some other Deists, Franklin believed that, "The Deity sometimes interferes by his particular Providence, and sets aside the Events which would otherwise have been produc'd in the Course of Nature, or by the Free Agency of Man,"[63] and at the Constitutional Convention stated that "the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth--that God governs in the affairs of men."[64]

Thomas Jefferson is perhaps the Founding Father who most clearly exhibits Deistic tendencies, although he generally referred to himself as a Unitarian rather than a Deist. His excerpts of the canonical gospels (now commonly known as the Jefferson Bible) strip all supernatural and dogmatic references from the narrative on Jesus' life. Like Franklin, Jefferson believed in God's continuing activity in human affairs.[65]

Thomas Paine is especially noteworthy both for his contributions to the cause of the American Revolution and for his writings in defense of Deism, alongside the criticism of Abrahamic religions.[19][66][67][68] In The Age of Reason (1793–1794) and other writings, he advocated Deism, promoted reason and freethought, and argued against institutionalized religions in general and the Christian doctrine in particular.[19][66][67][68] The Age of Reason was short, readable, and probably the only Deistic treatise that continues to be read and influential today.[69] Historian Mitch Horowitz noted that, "Colonials, at least those of means, had the capacity to participate in a fraternal order that enshrined and protected the individual spiritual search—and believed that the search belonged to no single congregation, doctrine, or dogma."[70]

The last contributor to American Deism was Elihu Palmer (1764–1806), who wrote the "Bible of American Deism", Principles of Nature, in 1801. Palmer is noteworthy for attempting to bring some organization to Deism by founding the "Deistical Society of New York" and other Deistic societies from Maine to Georgia.[71]

### Deism in France and continental Europe

[edit]

Portrait of Voltaire in the Palace of Versailles, 1724-1725

France had its own tradition of religious skepticism and natural theology in the works of Montaigne, Pierre Bayle, and Montesquieu. The most famous of the French Deists was Voltaire, who was exposed to Newtonian science and English Deism during his two-year period of exile in England (1726–1728). When he returned to France, he brought both back with him, and exposed the French reading public (i.e., the aristocracy) to them, in a number of books.

French Deists also included Maximilien Robespierre and Rousseau. During the French Revolution (1789–1799), the Deistic Cult of the Supreme Being--a direct expression of Robespierre's theological views--was established briefly (just under three months) as the new state religion of France, replacing the deposed Catholic Church and the rival atheistic Cult of Reason.

There were over five hundred French Revolutionaries who were deists. These deists do not fit the stereotype of deists because they believed in miracles and often prayed to God. In fact, over seventy of them thought that God miraculously helped the French Revolution win victories over their enemies. Furthermore, over a hundred French Revolutionary deists also wrote prayers and hymns to God. Citizen Devillere was one of the many French Revolutionary deists who believed God did miracles. Devillere said, "God, who conducts our destiny, deigned to concern himself with our dangers. He commanded the spirit of victory to direct the hand of the faithful French, and in a few hours the aristocrats received the attack which we prepared, the wicked ones were destroyed and liberty was avenged."[72]

Deism in Germany is not well documented. We know from correspondence with Voltaire that Frederick the Great was a Deist. Immanuel Kant's identification with Deism is controversial.[73]

### Decline of Enlightenment Deism

[edit]

Peter Gay describes Enlightenment Deism as entering slow decline as a recognizable movement in the 1730s.[74] A number of reasons have been suggested for this decline, including:[75]

* The increasing influence of naturalism and materialism.
* The writings of David Hume and Immanuel Kant raising questions about the ability of reason to address metaphysical questions.
* The violence of the French Revolution.
* Christian revivalist movements, such as Pietism and Methodism (which emphasized a personal relationship with God), along with the rise of anti-rationalist and counter-Enlightenment philosophies such as that of Johann Georg Hamann.[75]

Although Deism has declined in popularity over time, scholars believe that these ideas still have a lingering influence on modern society.[76] One of the major activities of the Deists, biblical criticism, evolved into its own highly technical discipline. Deist rejection of revealed religion evolved into, and contributed to, 19th-century liberal British theology and the rise of Unitarianism.[75]

## Contemporary Deism

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Contemporary Deism attempts to integrate classical Deism with modern philosophy and the current state of scientific knowledge. This attempt has produced a wide variety of personal beliefs under the broad classification of belief of "deism."

There are a number of subcategories of modern Deism, including monodeism (the default, standard concept of deism), pandeism, panendeism, spiritual deism, process deism, Christian deism, polydeism, scientific deism, and humanistic deism.[77][78][79] Some deists see design in nature and purpose in the universe and in their lives. Others see God and the universe in a co-creative process. Some deists view God in classical terms as observing humanity but not directly intervening in our lives, while others see God as a subtle and persuasive spirit who created the world, and then stepped back to observe.

### Recent philosophical discussions of Deism

[edit]

In the 1960s, theologian Charles Hartshorne scrupulously examined and rejected both deism and pandeism (as well as pantheism) in favor of a conception of God whose characteristics included "absolute perfection in some respects, relative perfection in all others" or "AR," writing that this theory "is able consistently to embrace all that is positive in either deism or pandeism," concluding that "panentheistic doctrine contains all of deism and pandeism except their arbitrary negations."[80]

Charles Taylor, in his 2007 book A Secular Age, showed the historical role of Deism, leading to what he calls an "exclusive humanism". This humanism invokes a moral order whose ontic commitment is wholly intra-human with no reference to transcendence.[81] One of the special achievements of such deism-based humanism is that it discloses new, anthropocentric moral sources by which human beings are motivated and empowered to accomplish acts of mutual benefit.[82] This is the province of a buffered, disengaged self, which is the locus of dignity, freedom, and discipline, and is endowed with a sense of human capability.[83] According to Taylor, by the early 19th century this Deism-mediated exclusive humanism developed as an alternative to Christian faith in a personal God and an order of miracles and mystery. Some critics of Deism have accused adherents of facilitating the rise of nihilism.[84]

### Deism in Nazi Germany

[edit]

Main articles: Gottgläubig, Ideology of the Nazi Party, and Religion in Nazi Germany

Further information: Kirchenkampf, Reichskonkordat, and Religious aspects of Nazism

On positive German God-belief (1939)

In Nazi Germany, Gottgläubig (literally: "believing in God")[85][86] was a Nazi religious term for a form of non-denominationalism practised by those German citizens who had officially left Christian churches but professed faith in some higher power or divine creator.[85] Such people were called Gottgläubige ("believers in God"), and the term for the overall movement was Gottgläubigkeit ("belief in God"); the term denotes someone who still believes in a God, although without having any institutional religious affiliation.[85] These National Socialists were not favourable towards religious institutions of their time, nor did they tolerate atheism of any type within their ranks.[86][87] The 1943 Philosophical Dictionary defined Gottgläubig as: "official designation for those who profess a specific kind of piety and morality, without being bound to a church denomination, whilst however also rejecting irreligion and godlessness."[88] The Gottgläubigkeit is considered a form of deism, and was "predominantly based on creationist and deistic views".[89]

In the 1920 National Socialist Programme of the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP), Adolf Hitler first mentioned the phrase "Positive Christianity". The Nazi Party did not wish to tie itself to a particular Christian denomination, but with Christianity in general, and sought freedom of religion for all denominations "so long as they do not endanger its existence or oppose the moral senses of the Germanic race" (point 24). When Hitler and the NSDAP got into power in 1933, they sought to assert state control over the churches, on the one hand through the Reichskonkordat with the Roman Catholic Church, and the forced merger of the German Evangelical Church Confederation into the Protestant Reich Church on the other. This policy seems to have gone relatively well until late 1936, when a "gradual worsening of relations" between the Nazi Party and the churches saw the rise of Kirchenaustritt ("leaving the Church").[85] Although there was no top-down official directive to revoke church membership, some Nazi Party members started doing so voluntarily and put other members under pressure to follow their example.[85] Those who left the churches were designated as Gottgläubige ("believers in God"), a term officially recognised by the Interior Minister Wilhelm Frick on 26 November 1936. He stressed that the term signified political disassociation from the churches, not an act of religious apostasy.[85] The term "dissident", which some church leavers had used up until then, was associated with being "without belief" (glaubenslos), whilst most of them emphasized that they still believed in a God, and thus required a different word.[85]

A census in May 1939, six years into the Nazi era,[90] and after the annexation of the mostly Catholic Federal State of Austria and mostly Catholic German-occupied Czechoslovakia[91] into German-occupied Europe, indicates[92] that 54% of the population considered itself Protestant, 41% considered itself Catholic, 3.5% self-identified as Gottgläubig,[93][94] and 1.5% as "atheist".[93]

### Deism in Turkey

[edit]

Main article: Irreligion in Turkey

Further information: Secularism in Turkey

Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the founding father of the Republic of Turkey, serving as its first president from 1923 until his death in 1938. He undertook sweeping progressive reforms, which modernized Turkey into a secular, industrializing nation.[95][96][97]

An early April 2018 report of the Turkish Ministry of Education, titled The Youth is Sliding towards Deism, observed that an increasing number of pupils in İmam Hatip schools was repudiating Islam in favour of Deism (irreligious belief in a creator God).[105] The report's publication generated large-scale controversy in the Turkish press and society at large, as well as amongst conservative Islamic sects, Muslim clerics, and Islamist parties in Turkey.[106]

The progressive Muslim theologian Mustafa Öztürk noted the Deistic trend among Turkish people a year earlier, arguing that the "very archaic, dogmatic notion of religion" held by the majority of those claiming to represent Islam was causing "the new generations [to become] indifferent, even distant, to the Islamic worldview." Despite a lack of reliable statistical data, numerous anecdotes and independent surveys appear to point in this direction.[107] Although some commentators claim that the secularization of Turkey is merely a result of Western influence or even an alleged "conspiracy", other commentators, even some pro-government ones, have come to the conclusion that "the real reason for the loss of faith in Islam is not the West but Turkey itself".[108]

### Deism in the United States

[edit]

Main article: Irreligion in the United States

Though Deism subsided in the United States post-Enlightenment, it never died out entirely. Thomas Edison, for example, was heavily influenced by Thomas Paine's The Age of Reason.[109] Edison defended Paine's "scientific deism", saying, "He has been called an atheist, but atheist he was not. Paine believed in a supreme intelligence, as representing the idea which other men often express by the name of deity."[109] In 1878, Edison joined the Theosophical Society in New Jersey,[110] but according to its founder, Helena Blavatsky, he was not a very active member.[111] In an October 2, 1910, interview in the New York Times Magazine, Edison stated:

> Nature is what we know. We do not know the gods of religions. And nature is not kind, or merciful, or loving. If God made me—the fabled God of the three qualities of which I spoke: mercy, kindness, love—He also made the fish I catch and eat. And where do His mercy, kindness, and love for that fish come in? No; nature made us—nature did it all—not the gods of the religions.[112]

Edison was labeled an atheist for those remarks, and although he did not allow himself to be drawn into the controversy publicly, he clarified himself in a private letter:

> You have misunderstood the whole article, because you jumped to the conclusion that it denies the existence of God. There is no such denial, what you call God I call Nature, the Supreme intelligence that rules matter. All the article states is that it is doubtful in my opinion if our intelligence or soul or whatever one may call it lives hereafter as an entity or disperses back again from whence it came, scattered amongst the cells of which we are made.[109]

He also stated, "I do not believe in the God of the theologians; but that there is a Supreme Intelligence I do not doubt."[113]

The 2001 American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) report estimated that between 1990 and 2001 the number of self-identifying Deists grew from 6,000 to 49,000, representing about 0.02% of the U.S. population at the time.[114] The 2008 ARIS survey found, based on their stated beliefs rather than their religious identification, that 70% of Americans believe in a personal God:[i] roughly 12% are atheists or agnostics, and 12% believe in "a deist or paganistic concept of the Divine as a higher power" rather than a personal God.[115]

The term "ceremonial deism" was coined in 1962 and has been used since 1984 by the Supreme Court of the United States to assess exemptions from the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, thought to be expressions of cultural tradition and not earnest invocations of a deity. It has been noted that the term does not describe any school of thought within Deism itself.[116]

## See also

[edit]

* Literature portal
* Philosophy portal
* Religion portal

* American Enlightenment
* Atheism during the Age of Enlightenment
* Creator in Buddhism
* Deism in England and France in the 18th century
* Deistic evolution
* God-fearer
* Great Architect of the Universe
* Ietsism
* Infinitism
* List of deists
* Moralistic therapeutic deism
* Nicodemite
* Non-physical entity
* Nontheism
* Philosophical theism
* Religious affiliations of presidents of the United States
* Religious interpretations of the Big Bang theory
* Spiritual but not religious
* Theistic rationalism
* Transcendentalism
* Unitarian Universalism

## References

[edit]

### Notes

[edit]

1. ^ The American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) report notes that while "[n]o definition was offered of the terms, [they] are usually associated with a 'personal relationship' with Jesus Christ together with a certain view of salvation, scripture, and missionary work" (p. 11).

### Citations

[edit]

1. ^ R. E. Allen, ed. (1990). The Concise Oxford Dictionary. Oxford University Press.
2. ^ "Deist – Definition and More from the Free Merriam-Webster Dictionary". Merriam-webster.com. 2012. Archived from the original on 12 January 2012. Retrieved 10 October 2012.
3. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Leland Royce (2020). "Attributes of a Deistic God". Multiverse Deism: Shifting Perspectives of God and the World. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield. pp. 47–68\. ISBN 978-1-7936-1475-9. LCCN 2020935396.
4. ^ a b Peters, Ted (2013). "Models of God: Deism". In Diller, Jeanine; Kasher, Asa (eds.). Models of God and Alternative Ultimate Realities. Dordrecht and Heidelberg: Springer Verlag. pp. 51–52\. doi:10.1007/978-94-007-5219-1_5. ISBN 978-94-007-5219-1. LCCN 2012954282.
5. ^ a b c d e f g Smith, Merril D., ed. (2015). "Deism". The World of the American Revolution: A Daily Life Encyclopedia. Vol. 1\. Santa Barbara, California: Greenwood Publishing Group, imprint of ABC-Clio. pp. 661–664\. ISBN 978-1-4408-3027-3. LCCN 2015009496.
6. ^ a b c d e Bristow, William (Fall 2017). "Religion and the Enlightenment: Deism". In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. The Metaphysics Research Lab, Center for the Study of Language and Information, Stanford University. ISSN 1095-5054. OCLC 643092515. Archived from the original on 11 December 2017. Retrieved 3 August 2021. "Deism is the form of religion most associated with the Enlightenment. According to deism, we can know by the natural light of reason that the universe is created and governed by a supreme intelligence; however, although this supreme being has a plan for creation from the beginning, the being does not interfere with creation; the deist typically rejects miracles and reliance on special revelation as a source of religious doctrine and belief, in favor of the natural light of reason. Thus, a deist typically rejects the divinity of Christ, as repugnant to reason; the deist typically demotes the figure of Jesus from agent of miraculous redemption to extraordinary moral teacher. Deism is the form of religion fitted to the new discoveries in natural science, according to which the cosmos displays an intricate machine-like order; the deists suppose that the supposition of a God is necessary as the source or author of this order. Though not a deist himself, Isaac Newton provides fuel for deism with his argument in his Opticks (1704) that we must infer from the order and beauty in the world to the existence of an intelligent supreme being as the cause of this order and beauty. Samuel Clarke, perhaps the most important proponent and popularizer of Newtonian philosophy in the early eighteenth century, supplies some of the more developed arguments for the position that the correct exercise of unaided human reason leads inevitably to the well-grounded belief in a God. He argues that the Newtonian physical system implies the existence of a transcendent cause, the creator a God. In his first set of Boyle lectures, A Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God (1705), Clarke presents the metaphysical or "argument a priori" for God's existence. This argument concludes from the rationalist principle that whatever exists must have a sufficient reason or cause of its existence to the existence of a transcendent, necessary being who stands as the cause of the chain of natural causes and effects."
7. ^ a b c d e f Manuel, Frank Edward; Pailin, David A.; Mapson, K.; Stefon, Matt (13 March 2020) [26 July 1999]. "Deism". Encyclopædia Britannica. Edinburgh: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. Archived from the original on 9 June 2021. Retrieved 3 August 2021. "Deism, an unorthodox religious attitude that found expression among a group of English writers beginning with Edward Herbert (later 1st Baron Herbert of Cherbury) in the first half of the 17th century and ending with Henry St. John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke, in the middle of the 18th century. These writers subsequently inspired a similar religious attitude in Europe during the second half of the 18th century and in the colonial United States of America in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. In general, Deism refers to what can be called natural religion, the acceptance of a certain body of religious knowledge that is inborn in every person or that can be acquired by the use of reason and the rejection of religious knowledge when it is acquired through either revelation or the teaching of any church."
8. ^ a b c Gomes, Alan W. (2012) [2011]. "Deism". The Encyclopedia of Christian Civilization. Chichester, West Sussex: Wiley-Blackwell. doi:10.1002/9780470670606.wbecc0408. ISBN 9781405157629. "Deism is a rationalistic, critical approach to theism with an emphasis on natural theology. The deists attempted to reduce religion to what they regarded as its most foundational, rationally justifiable elements. Deism is not, strictly speaking, the teaching that God wound up the world like a watch and let it run on its own, though that teaching was embraced by some within the movement."
9. ^ a b c d e Pitassi, Maria-Cristina (22 August 2005). "Déisme". Historical Dictionary of Switzerland (in French). Geneva: Swiss Academy of Humanities and Social Sciences. Archived from the original on 29 March 2023. Retrieved 30 May 2023. "Si le terme de déisme se trouve déjà chez Pierre Viret en 1563, ce n'est qu'aux XVIIe et XVIIIe s. que le mouvement connut son véritable essor. Il fut actif surtout en Angleterre où Herbert of Cherbury d'abord, Matthew Tindal, John Toland, et Anthony Collins ensuite lui donnèrent ses bases intellectuelles. [...] Malgré des sensibilités assez différentes à l'intérieur du mouvement, le déisme se caractérise par une attaque virulente de la révélation biblique et des institutions ecclésiastiques au nom d'une religion naturelle que l'être humain peut découvrir en utilisant exclusivement sa raison. [...] Assimilés par les apologistes chrétiens à des athées, les déistes ne niaient pas l'existence de Dieu mais dénonçaient sans indulgence les prétendues incohérences, voire les immoralités de l'Ecriture; celle-ci, considérée dans le meilleur des cas comme un amas de contradictions et dans le pire comme une supercherie habilement exploitée par les autorités ecclésiastiques, était ainsi dépouillée de tout caractère sacré. Pourtant, en dépit de son côté radical et polémique, la réflexion déiste sur l'Ancien et le Nouveau Testament a contribué au développement du criticisme biblique, en particulier en ce qui concerne l'élucidation des origines juives et chrétiennes, l'histoire du canon ou l'interprétation des prophéties."
10. ^ a b c d Kohler, Kaufmann; Hirsch, Emil G. (1906). "Deism". Jewish Encyclopedia. Kopelman Foundation. Archived from the original on 15 January 2013. Retrieved 3 August 2021. "A system of belief which posits a God's existence as the cause of all things, and admits His perfection, but rejects Divine revelation and government, proclaiming the all-sufficiency of natural laws. The Socinians, as opposed to the doctrine of the Trinity, were designated as deists [...]. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries deism became synonymous with "natural religion," and deist with "freethinker." England and France have been successively the strongholds of deism. Lord Herbert of Cherbury, the "father of deism" in England, assumes certain "innate ideas," which establish five religious truths: (1) that God is; (2) that it is man's duty to worship Him; (3) that worship consists in virtue and piety; (4) that man must repent of sin and abandon his evil ways; (5) that divine retribution either in this or in the next life is certain. He holds that all positive religions are either allegorical and poetic interpretations of nature or deliberately organized impositions of priests."
11. ^ [3][5][6][7][8][9][10]
12. ^ Doniger, Wendy; Eliade, Mircea, eds. (1999). "DEUS OTIOSUS". Merriam-Webster's Encyclopedia of World Religions. Springfield, Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster. p. 288\. ISBN 9780877790440. OCLC 1150050382. Archived from the original on 13 March 2023. Retrieved 15 March 2023. "DEUS OTIOSUS (Latin: "inactive god") in the history of religions and philosophy, a High God who has withdrawn from the immediate details of the government of the world. [...] In Western philosophy, the deus otiosus concept has been attributed to Deism, a 17th–18th century Western rationalistic religio-philosophical movement, in its view of a non-intervening creator of the universe. Although this stark interpretation was accepted by very few Deists, many of their antagonists attempted to force them into the position of stating that after the original act of creation God virtually withdrew and refrained from interfering in the processes of nature and human affairs."
13. ^ [3][5][6][7][9][10]
14. ^ [3][5][6][7][8][9]
15. ^ Rowe, William L. (2022) [2017]. "Deism". In Craig, Edward (ed.). Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy. London and New York: Routledge. doi:10.4324/9780415249126-K013-1. ISBN 9780415250696. "In the popular sense, a deist is someone who believes that God created the world but thereafter has exercised no providential control over what goes on in it. In the proper sense, a deist is someone who affirms a divine creator but denies any divine revelation, holding that human reason alone can give us everything we need to know to live a correct moral and religious life. In this sense of 'deism' some deists held that God exercises providential control over the world and provides for a future state of rewards and punishments, while other deists denied this. However, they all agreed that human reason alone was the basis on which religious questions had to be settled, rejecting the orthodox claim to a special divine revelation of truths that go beyond human reason. Deism flourished in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, principally in England, France, and America."
16. ^ a b Herrick, James A. (1997). "Characteristics of British Deism". The Radical Rhetoric of the English Deists: The Discourse of Skepticism, 1680–1750. Studies in Rhetoric/Communication. Columbia, South Carolina: University of South Carolina Press. pp. 23–49\. ISBN 978-1-57003-166-3.
17. ^ [5][6][7][9][10][16]
18. ^ [5][6][7][10][16]
19. ^ a b c Claeys, Gregory (1989). "Revolution in heaven: The Age of Reason (1794-95)". Thomas Paine: Social and Political Thought (1st ed.). New York and London: Routledge. pp. 177–195\. ISBN 9780044450900.
20. ^ Piland 2011, p. 4.
21. ^ Stromata, book 7, ch. 3. Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson (eds.), Ante-Nicene Christian Library: Translations of the Writings of the Fathers down to AD 325, vol. 12, p. 416
22. ^ Piland 2011, p. 5.
23. ^ a b • Treiger, Alexander (2016) [2014]. "Part I: Islamic Theologies during the Formative and the Early Middle period – Origins of Kalām". In Schmidtke, Sabine (ed.). The Oxford Handbook of Islamic Theology. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 27–43\. doi:10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199696703.013.001. ISBN 9780199696703. LCCN 2016935488. Archived from the original on 18 November 2022. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
• Abrahamov, Binyamin (2016) [2014]. "Part I: Islamic Theologies during the Formative and the Early Middle period – Scripturalist and Traditionalist Theology". In Schmidtke, Sabine (ed.). The Oxford Handbook of Islamic Theology. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 264–279\. doi:10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199696703.013.025. ISBN 9780199696703. LCCN 2016935488. Archived from the original on 18 November 2022. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
24. ^ a b Peters, J. R. T. M. (1980). "La théologie musulmane et l'étude du langage". Histoire. Épistémologie. Langage (in French). 2 (1: Éléments d'Histoire de la tradition linguistique arabe). Paris: Société d'histoire et d'Épistémologie des Sciences du Langage: 9–19\. doi:10.3406/hel.1980.1049. ISSN 1638-1580. Archived from the original on 30 November 2021. Retrieved 30 November 2021.
25. ^ a b Thiele, Jan (2016) [2014]. "Part I: Islamic Theologies during the Formative and the Early Middle period – Between Cordoba and Nīsābūr: The Emergence and Consolidation of Ashʿarism (Fourth–Fifth/Tenth–Eleventh Century)". In Schmidtke, Sabine (ed.). The Oxford Handbook of Islamic Theology. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 225–241\. doi:10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199696703.013.45. ISBN 978-0-19-969670-3. LCCN 2016935488.
26. ^ a b c Rudolph, Ulrich (2016) [2014]. "Part I: Islamic Theologies during the Formative and the Early Middle period – Ḥanafī Theological Tradition and Māturīdism". In Schmidtke, Sabine (ed.). The Oxford Handbook of Islamic Theology. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 285–290\. doi:10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199696703.013.023. ISBN 9780199696703. LCCN 2016935488. Archived from the original on 1 January 2023. Retrieved 2 June 2023.
27. ^ Hussaini, Sayed Hassan (2016). "Islamic Philosophy between Theism and Deism". Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia. 72 (1: Teísmos: Aportações Filosóficas do Leste e Oeste / Theisms: Philosophical Contributions from the East to the West). Braga: Aletheia - Associação Científica e Cultural: 65–83\. doi:10.17990/RPF/2016_72_1_0065. ISSN 0870-5283. JSTOR 43816275.
28. ^ Bayle, Pierre (1820). "Viret". Dictionnaire historique et critique (in French). Vol. 14 (Nouvelle ed.). Paris: Desoer. Retrieved 23 November 2017. (1697/1820) Bayle quotes Viret (see below) as follows: “J'ai entendu qu'il y en a de ceste bande, qui s'appellent déistes, d'un mot tout nouveau, lequel ils veulent opposer à l'athéiste,” remarking on the term as a neologism (un mot tout nouveau). (p.418)
29. ^ Orr, John (1934). English Deism: Its Roots and Its Fruits. Eerdmans. The words deism and theism are both derived words meaning "god" - "THE": Latin ZEUS-deus /"deist" and Greek theos/ "theist" (θεός). The word deus/déiste first appears in French in 1564 in a work by a Swiss Calvinist named Pierre Viret, but was generally unknown in France until the 1690s when Pierre Bayle published his famous Dictionary, which contained an article on Viret.“Prior to the 17th Century the terms ["deism" and "deist"] were used interchangeably with the terms "theism" and "theist", respectively. .. Theologians and philosophers of the 17th Century began to give a different signification to the words. .. Both [theists and deists] asserted belief in one supreme God, the Creator. .. But the theist taught that God remained actively interested in and operative in the world which he had made, whereas the Deist maintained that God endowed the world at creation with self-sustaining and self-acting powers and then surrendered it wholly to the operation of these powers acting as second causes.” (p.13)
30. ^ Basil Willey, The Seventeenth Century Background: Studies in the Thought of the Age in Relation to Poetry and Religion, 1934, p.59ff.
31. ^ Gay. (see above). "By utilizing his wide classical learning, Blount demonstrated how to use pagan writers, and pagan ideas, against Christianity. ... Other Deists were to follow his lead." (pp.47-48)
32. ^ Note that Locke himself was not a deist. He believed in both miracles and revelation. See Orr, pp.96-99.
33. ^ Gay. (see above). “Among the Deists, only Anthony Collins (1676–1729) could claim much philosophical competence; only Conyers Middleton (1683–1750) was a really serious scholar. The best known Deists, notably John Toland (1670–1722) and Matthew Tindal (1656–1733), were talented publicists, clear without being deep, forceful but not subtle. ... Others, like Thomas Chubb (1679–1747), were self-educated freethinkers; a few, like Thomas Woolston (1669–1731), were close to madness.” (pp.9-10)
34. ^ Gay. (see above). Gay describes him (pp.78-79) as "a Deist in fact, if not in name".
35. ^ Waring. (see above). p.107.
36. ^ Stephen, Leslie (1881). History of English Thought in the Eighteenth Century 3rd Edition 2 vols (reprinted 1949). London: Smith, Elder & Co. ISBN 978-0844614212. Archived from the original on 30 June 2015. Retrieved 4 January 2019. `{{cite book}}`: ISBN / Date incompatibility (help) Stephen’s book, despite its “perhaps too ambitious” title (preface, Vol.I p.vii), was conceived as an “account of the deist controversy” (p.vi). Stephen notes the difficulty of interpreting the primary sources, as religious toleration was yet far from complete in law, and entirely not a settled fact in practice (Ch.II s.12): deist authors “were forced to .. cover [their opinions] with a veil of decent ambiguity.” He writes of Deist books being burned by the hangman, mentions the Aikenhead blasphemy case (1697) [1] Archived 2019-01-06 at the Wayback Machine, and names five deists who were banished, imprisoned etc.
37. ^ Gay (Fröhlich), Peter Joachim, ed. (1968). Deism: An Anthology. Princeton etc.: Van Nostrand. ISBN 978-0686474012.
* "All Deists were in fact both critical and constructive Deists. All sought to destroy in order to build, and reasoned either from the absurdity of Christianity to the need for a new philosophy or from their desire for a new philosophy to the absurdity of Christianity. Each deist, to be sure, had his special competence. While one specialized in abusing priests, another specialized in rhapsodies to nature, and a third specialized in the skeptical reading of sacred documents. Yet whatever strength the movement had—and it was at times formidable—it derived that strength from a peculiar combination of critical and constructive elements." (p.13)
38. ^ Tindal: "By natural religion, I understand the belief of the existence of a God, and the sense and practice of those duties which result from the knowledge we, by our reason, have of him and his perfections; and of ourselves, and our own imperfections, and of the relationship we stand in to him, and to our fellow-creatures; so that the religion of nature takes in everything that is founded on the reason and nature of things." Christianity as Old as the Creation (II), quoted in Waring (see above), p.113.
39. ^ Toland: “I hope to make it appear that the use of reason is not so dangerous in religion as it is commonly represented .. There is nothing that men make a greater noise about than the "mysteries of the Christian religion". The divines gravely tell us "we must adore what we cannot comprehend" .. [Some] contend [that] some mysteries may be, or at least seem to be, contrary to reason, and yet received by faith. [Others contend] that no mystery is contrary to reason, but that all are "above" it. On the contrary, we hold that reason is the only foundation of all certitude .. Wherefore, we likewise maintain, according to the title of this discourse, that there is nothing in the Gospel contrary to reason, nor above it; and that no Christian doctrine can be properly called a mystery." Christianity Not Mysterious: or, a Treatise Shewing That There Is Nothing in the Gospel Contrary to Reason, Nor above It (1696), quoted in Waring (see above), pp. 1–12
40. ^ Stephens, William. An Account of the Growth of Deism in England. Archived from the original on 5 January 2019. Retrieved 4 January 2019. (1696 / 1990). Introduction (James E. Force, 1990): "[W]hat sets the Deists apart from even their most latitudinarian Christian contemporaries is their desire to lay aside scriptural revelation as rationally incomprehensible, and thus useless, or even detrimental, to human society and to religion. While there may possibly be exceptions, .. most Deists, especially as the eighteenth century wears on, agree that revealed Scripture is nothing but a joke or "well-invented flam." About mid-century, John Leland, in his historical and analytical account of the movement [View of the Principal Deistical Writers [2] Archived 2019-01-05 at the Wayback Machine (1754–1755)], squarely states that the rejection of revealed Scripture is the characteristic element of deism, a view further codified by such authorities as Ephraim Chambers and Samuel Johnson. .. "DEISM," writes Stephens bluntly, "is a denial of all reveal'd Religion."”
41. ^ Champion, J.A.I. (2014). The Pillars of Priestcraft Shaken: The Church of England and its Enemies, 1660-1730. Cambridge University Press (Cambridge Studies in Early Modern British History). Champion maintains that historical argument was a central component of the Deists' defences of what they considered true religion.
42. ^ Paine, Thomas. The Age of Reason. "As priestcraft was always the enemy of knowledge, because priestcraft supports itself by keeping people in delusion and ignorance, it was consistent with its policy to make the acquisition of knowledge a real sin." (Part 2, p.129)
43. ^ “It can't be imputed to any defect in the light of nature that the pagan world ran into idolatry, but to their being entirely governed by priests, who pretended communication with their gods, and to have thence their revelations, which they imposed on the credulous as divine oracles. Whereas the business of the Christian dispensation was to destroy all those traditional revelations, and restore, free from all idolatry, the true primitive and natural religion implanted in mankind from the creation.” Christianity as Old as the Creation (XIV), quoted in Waring (see above), p.163.
44. ^ Orr. (see above). p.134.
45. ^ Orr. (see above). p.78.
46. ^ Orr. (see above). p.137.
47. ^ Age of Reason, Pt I:

> I believe in one God, and no more; and I hope for happiness beyond this life.

and (in the Recapitulation)

> I trouble not myself about the manner of future existence. I content myself with believing, even to positive conviction, that the power that gave me existence is able to continue it, in any form and manner he pleases, either with or without this body; and it appears more probable to me that I shall continue to exist hereafter than that I should have had existence, as I now have, before that existence began.

48. ^ Most American Deists, for example, firmly believed in divine providence. See this article, Deism in the United States.
49. ^ See for instance Paine, Thomas. The Age of Reason., Part 1.
50. ^ David Hartley, for example, described himself as "quite in the necessitarian scheme. See Ferg, Stephen, "Two Early Works of David Hartley", Journal of the History of Philosophy, vol. 19, no. 2 (April 1981), pp. 173–89.
51. ^ See for example Liberty and Necessity (1729).
52. ^ Hume himself was uncomfortable with both terms, and Hume scholar Paul Russell has argued that the best and safest term for Hume's views is irreligion. Russell, Paul (2005). "Hume on Religion". Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Retrieved 17 December 2009.
53. ^ Hume, David (1779). The Natural History of Religion. “The primary religion of mankind arises chiefly from an anxious fear of future events; and what ideas will naturally be entertained of invisible, unknown powers, while men lie under dismal apprehensions of any kind, may easily be conceived. Every image of vengeance, severity, cruelty, and malice must occur, and must augment the ghastliness and horror which oppresses the amazed religionist. .. And no idea of perverse wickedness can be framed, which those terrified devotees do not readily, without scruple, apply to their deity.” (Section XIII)
54. ^ Waring. (see above).
55. ^ "Excerpts from Allen's Reason The Only Oracle Of Man". Ethan Allen Homestead Museum. Archived from the original on 2 May 2008. Retrieved 1 May 2008.
56. ^ "The Deist Minimum". First Things. 2005. Archived from the original on 1 September 2006. Retrieved 14 September 2006.
57. ^ Holmes, David (2006). The Faiths of the Founding Fathers. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, USA. ISBN 0-19-530092-0.
58. ^ David Liss (11 June 2006). "The Founding Fathers Solving modern problems, building wealth and finding God". Washington Post. Archived from the original on 12 May 2017. Retrieved 20 September 2017.
59. ^ Gene Garman (2001). "Was Thomas Jefferson a Deist?". Sullivan-County.com. Archived from the original on 30 August 2006. Retrieved 14 September 2006.
60. ^ Walter Isaacson (March–April 2004). "Benjamin Franklin: An American Life". Skeptical Inquirer. Archived from the original on 12 October 2007.
61. ^ Franklin, Benjamin (2005). Benjamin Franklin: Autobiography, Poor Richard, and Later Writings. New York, NY: Library of America. p. 619\. ISBN 1-883011-53-1.
62. ^ "Benjamin Franklin, Autobiography". University of Maine, Farmington. Archived from the original on 10 December 2012.
63. ^ Benjamin Franklin, On the Providence of God in the Government of the World (1730).
64. ^ Max Farrand, ed. (1911). The Records of the Federal Convention of 1787. Vol. 1\. New Haven: Yale University Press. p. 451\. Archived from the original on 8 March 2011. Retrieved 26 February 2011.
65. ^ Frazer, following Sydney Ahlstrom, characterizes Jefferson as a "theistic rationalist" rather than a Deist, because Jefferson believed in God's continuing activity in human affairs. See Frazer, Gregg L. (2012). The Religious Beliefs of America's Founders: Reason, Revelation, Revolution. University Press of Kansas. p. 11 and 128. ISBN 9780700618453. See Ahlstrom, Sydney E. (2004). A Religious History of the American People. p. 359. See Gary Scott Smith (2006). Faith and the Presidency: From George Washington to George W. Bush. Oxford U.P. p. 69\. ISBN 9780198041153.
66. ^ a b Gelpi, Donald L. (2007) [2000]. "Part 1: Enlightenment Religion – Chapter 3: Militant Deism". Varieties of Transcendental Experience: A Study in Constructive Postmodernism. Eugene, Oregon: Wipf and Stock. pp. 47–48\. ISBN 9781725220294. Archived from the original on 22 January 2023. Retrieved 22 January 2023.
67. ^ a b Fischer, Kirsten (2010). Manning, Nicholas; Stefani, Anne (eds.). ""Religion Governed by Terror": A Deist Critique of Fearful Christianity in the Early American Republic". Revue Française d'Études Américaines. 125 (3). Paris: Belin: 13–26\. doi:10.3917/rfea.125.0013. eISSN 1776-3061. ISSN 0397-7870. LCCN 80640131 - via Cairn.info.
68. ^ a b Paine, Thomas (2014). "Of the Religion of Deism Compared with the Christian Religion, and the Superiority of the Former over the Latter (1804)". In Calvert, Jane E.; Shapiro, Ian (eds.). Selected Writings of Thomas Paine. Rethinking the Western Tradition. New Haven: Yale University Press. pp. 568–574\. doi:10.12987/9780300210699-018. ISBN 9780300167450. S2CID 246141428. Archived from the original on 27 August 2016. Retrieved 7 August 2021.
69. ^ In its own time it earned Paine widespread vilification. How widespread deism was among ordinary people in the United States is a matter of continued debate."Culture Wars in the Early Republic". Common-place. Archived from the original on 2 March 2014.
70. ^ Horowitz, Mitch (3 July 2025). "Occult American". Mystery Achievement. Substack. New York, NY. Retrieved 9 July 2025.
71. ^ Walters, Kerry S. (1992). Rational Infidels: The American Deists. Durango, CO: Longwood Academic. ISBN 0-89341-641-X.
72. ^ Devillere, Citizen (1987). Archives parlementaires de la révolution français. Éditions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique. pp. 361–362.
73. ^ Allen Wood argues that Kant was Deist. See "Kant's Deism" in P. Rossi and M. Wreen (eds.), Kant's Philosophy of Religion Reconsidered (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1991). An argument against Kant as deist is Stephen Palmquist's "Kant's Theistic Solution". http://www.hkbu.edu.hk/~ppp/srp/arts/KTS.html Archived 2005-07-22 at the Wayback Machine
74. ^ Gay. (see above). “After the writings of Woolston and Tindal, English deism went into slow decline. ... By the 1730s, nearly all the arguments in behalf of Deism ... had been offered and refined; the intellectual caliber of leading Deists was none too impressive; and the opponents of deism finally mustered some formidable spokesmen. The Deists of these decades, Peter Annet (1693–1769), Thomas Chubb (1679–1747), and Thomas Morgan (?–1743), are of significance to the specialist alone. ... It had all been said before, and better. .” (p.140)
75. ^ a b c Mossner, Ernest Campbell (1967). "Deism". Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Vol. 2\. Collier-MacMillan. pp. 326–336.
76. ^ Van den Berg, Jan (October 2019). "The Development of Modern Deism". Zeitschrift für Religions- und Geistesgeschichte. 71 (4). Leiden and Boston: Brill Publishers: 335–356\. doi:10.1163/15700739-07104002. eISSN 1570-0739. ISSN 0044-3441. S2CID 211652706.
77. ^ José M. Lozano-Gotor, "Deism", Encyclopedia of Sciences and Religions (Springer: 2013). "[Deism] takes different forms, for example, humanistic, scientific, Christian, spiritual deism, pandeism, and panendeism."
78. ^ Mikhail Epstein, Postatheism and the phenomenon of minimal religion in Russia, in Justin Beaumont, ed., The Routledge Handbook of Postsecularity (2018), p. 83, n. 3: "I refer here to monodeism as the default standard concept of deism, distinct from polydeism, pandeism, and spiritual deism."
79. ^ What Is Deism? Archived 2016-04-17 at the Wayback Machine, Douglas MacGowan, Mother Nature Network, May 21, 2015: "Over time there have been other schools of thought formed under the umbrella of deism including Christian deism, belief in deistic principles coupled with the moral teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, and Pandeism, a belief that God became the entire universe and no longer exists as a separate being."
80. ^ Hartshorne, Charles (1964). Man's Vision of God and the Logic of Theism. Archon Books. p. 348\. ISBN 0-208-00498-X. `{{cite book}}`: ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)
81. ^ Taylor, C (2007). A Secular Age. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. p.256.
82. ^ Taylor. (see above). p.257.
83. ^ Taylor. (see above). p.262.
84. ^ Essien, Anthonia M. "The sociological implications of the worldview of the Annang people: an advocacy for paradigm shift." Journal of Emerging Trends in Educational Research and Policy Studies 1.1 (2010): 29-35.
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96. ^ "Atatürk, Kemal", World Encyclopedia, Philip's, 2014, doi:10.1093/acref/9780199546091.001.0001, ISBN 9780199546091, retrieved 9 June 2019
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99. ^ a b c Sarfati, Yusuf (15 April 2019). "State Monopolization of Religion and Declining Piety in Turkey". Berkley Forum. Washington, D.C.: Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs (Georgetown University). Archived from the original on 16 May 2021. Retrieved 17 January 2022.
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## Bibliography

[edit]

Wikiquote has quotations related to Deism.

### Histories

[edit]

* Betts, C. J. Early Deism in France: From the so-called 'deistes' of Lyon (1564) to Voltaire's 'Lettres philosophiques' (1734) (Martinus Nijhoff, 1984)
* Craig, William Lane. The Historical Argument for the Resurrection of Jesus During the Deist Controversy (Edwin Mellen, 1985)
* Hazard, Paul. European thought in the eighteenth century from Montesquieu to Lessing (1954). pp 393–434.
* Herrick, James A. (1997). The Radical Rhetoric of the English Deists: The Discourse of Skepticism, 1680–1750. U of South Carolina Press.
* Hudson, Wayne. Enlightenment and modernity: The English deists and reform (Routledge, 2015).
* Israel, Jonathan I. Enlightenment contested: philosophy, modernity, and the emancipation of man 1670-1752 (Oxford UP, 2006).
* Lemay, J. A. Leo, ed.Deism, Masonry, and the Enlightenment. Essays Honoring Alfred Owen Aldridge. (U of Delaware Press, 1987).
* Lucci, Diego. Scripture and deism: The biblical criticism of the eighteenth-century British deists (Peter Lang, 2008).
* McKee, David Rice. Simon Tyssot de Patot and the Seventeenth-Century Background of Critical Deism (Johns Hopkins Press, 1941)
* Orr, John. English Deism: Its Roots and Its Fruits (1934)
* Schlereth, Eric R. An Age of Infidels: The Politics of Religious Controversy in the Early United States (U of Pennsylvania Press; 2013) 295 pages; on conflicts between deists and their opponents.
* Willey, Basil. The Eighteenth Century Background: Studies on the Idea of Nature in the Thought of the Period (1940)
* Yoder, Timothy S. Hume on God: Irony, deism and genuine theism (Bloomsbury, 2008).

### Primary sources

[edit]

* Paine, Thomas (1795). The Age of Reason. Archived from the original on 16 August 2019. Retrieved 13 April 2009.
* Palmer, Elihu. The Principles of Nature. Archived from the original on 5 August 2019. Retrieved 13 April 2009.
* Deism: An Anthology by Peter Gay (Van Nostrand, 1968)
* Deism and Natural Religion: A Source Book by E. Graham Waring (Frederick Ungar, 1967)
* The American Deists: Voices of Reason & Dissent in the Early Republic by Kerry S. Walters (University of Kansas Press, 1992), which includes an extensive bibliographic essay
* Deism: A Revolution in Religion, A Revolution in You. Archived from the original on 19 April 2009. Retrieved 13 April 2009. by Bob Johnson, founder of the World Union of Deists
* God Gave Us Reason, Not Religion. Archived from the original on 29 July 2019. Retrieved 19 November 2015. by Bob Johnson
* An Answer to C.S. Lewis' Mere Christianity. Archived from the original on 9 September 2019. Retrieved 19 November 2015. by Bob Johnson

### Secondary sources

[edit]

* Addante, Luca (2019). "Part II: Europe and The Iberian Connection – Unbelief, Deism, and Libertinism in Sixteenth-Century Italy". In García-Arenal, Mercedes; Pastore, Stefania (eds.). From Doubt to Unbelief: Forms of Scepticism in the Iberian World. Studies in Hispanic and Lusophone Cultures. Vol. 42\. Cambridge: Modern Humanities Research Association. pp. 107–122\. doi:10.2307/j.ctv16km0hq.11. ISBN 978-1-781888-69-8. S2CID 242496485.
* Aldridge, A. Owen (October 1997). "Natural Religion and Deism in America before Ethan Allen and Thomas Paine". The William and Mary Quarterly. 54 (4: Religion in Early America). Williamsburg, Virginia: Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture: 835–848\. doi:10.2307/2953885. ISSN 1933-7698. JSTOR 2953885.
* Bonoan, Raoul J. (1992). "The Enlightenment, Deism, and Rizal". Philippine Studies: Historical and Ethnographic Viewpoints. 40 (1). Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University: 53–67\. ISSN 2244-1638. JSTOR 42633293.
* Champion, Justin A. I. (1999). "DEISM". In Popkin, Richard H. (ed.). The Columbia History of Western Philosophy. New York: Columbia University Press. pp. 437–445\. ISBN 9780231500340. JSTOR 10.7312/popk10128.70.
* Ericksen, Robert P.; Heschel, Susannah (1999). Betrayal: German Churches and the Holocaust. Minneapolis: Augsberg Fortress. ISBN 978-0-8006-2931-1.
* Hussaini, Sayed Hassan (2016). "Islamic Philosophy between Theism and Deism". Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia. 72 (1: Teísmos: Aportações Filosóficas do Leste e Oeste / Theisms: Philosophical Contributions from the East to the West). Braga: Aletheia - Associação Científica e Cultural: 65–83\. doi:10.17990/RPF/2016_72_1_0065. ISSN 0870-5283. JSTOR 43816275.
* Lynch, John (2012). "Religion in the Age of Enlightenment". New Worlds: A Religious History of Latin America. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. pp. 64–105\. ISBN 9780300166804. JSTOR j.ctt1npmbn.8. LCCN 2011041757.
* Lyttle, Charles (March 1933). "Deistic Piety in the Cults of the French Revolution". Church History. 2 (1). Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the American Society of Church History: 22–40\. doi:10.1017/S0009640700120049. ISSN 1755-2613. JSTOR 3691955. S2CID 154689430.
* Perry, Seth (April 2021). "Paine Detected in Mississippi: Slavery, Print Culture, and the Threat of Deism in the Early Republic". The William and Mary Quarterly. 78 (2). Williamsburg, Virginia: Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture: 313–338\. doi:10.5309/willmaryquar.78.2.0313. ISSN 1933-7698. S2CID 234772508.
* Phillips, III, Russell E.; Pargament, Kenneth I.; Lynn, Quinten K.; Crossley, Craig D. (August 2004). "Self-Directing Religious Coping: A Deistic God, Abandoning God, or No God at All?". Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. 43 (3). Chichester, West Sussex: Wiley-Blackwell on behalf of the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion: 409–418\. doi:10.1111/j.1468-5906.2004.00243.x. ISSN 1468-5906. JSTOR 1387634. S2CID 144102287.
* Piland, Tiffany (2011). The Influence and Legacy of Deism in Eighteenth Century America (MLS thesis). Rollins College.
* Prince, Michael B. (2020). "Defoe's Deist Masterpiece: The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe and The Farther Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, 1719". The Shortest Way with Defoe: Robinson Crusoe, Deism, and the Novel. Charlottesville, Virginia: University of Virginia Press. pp. 134–207\. doi:10.2307/j.ctvzgb6pp.7. ISBN 9780813943664. S2CID 241840122.
* Taussig, Harold E. (July 1970). "Deism in Philadelphia During the Age of Franklin". Pennsylvania History: A Journal of Mid-Atlantic Studies. 37 (3). University Park, Pennsylvania: Penn State University Press: 217–236\. ISSN 2153-2109. JSTOR 27771874.

## Further reading

[edit]

Wikisource has the text of the Encyclopædia Britannica (9th ed.) article Deism.

* Diller, Jeanine (Winter 2021). "God and Other Ultimates – 2.2 Models of God". In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. The Metaphysics Research Lab, Center for the Study of Language and Information, Stanford University. ISSN 1095-5054. OCLC 643092515. Archived from the original on 15 March 2022. Retrieved 23 March 2022.
* Draper, Paul, ed. (2008). "God or Blind Nature: Philosophers Debate the Evidence". infidels.org. Colorado Springs, Colorado: The Secular Web. Archived from the original on 17 March 2022. Retrieved 23 March 2022.
* Staloff, Darren (January 2008). "Deism and the Founding of the United States". nationalhumanitiescenter.org. Research Triangle Park, North Carolina: National Humanities Center. Archived from the original on 15 October 2008. Retrieved 28 August 2021.

## External links

[edit]

Look up deism in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

* "World Union of Deists". www.deism.com. 1997–2021. Archived from the original on 19 August 2021. Retrieved 10 March 2025.
* "Church of The Modern Deist". moderndeist.org. 2012–2021. Archived from the original on 14 April 2021. Retrieved 10 March 2025.
* "Elemental Process Deism". elementalprocessdeism.com. February 2025. Retrieved 10 March 2025.

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