Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason

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as long as nothing in it directly contradicts his "inner" religion, and on the other hand to the clergyman as a scholar, to whom the full freedom of criticism, even towards those symbols In this context, "symbols" refers to the "Symbolical Books" or formal confessions of faith that defined church doctrine., must be granted. In no case, however, may a synod or a council attempt to bind its successors to an unchangeable symbol: that would be "to violate and trample upon the sacred rights of humanity" (116).

b) The essay Conjectural Beginning of Human History (January 1786) is of interest because, similar to the later work Religion, it links philosophical theory to a "sacred document"—in this case, Genesis II–VI original: "1. Mose," referring to the First Book of Moses.. As a final result of considering the earliest human history, the author maintains, despite all individual evils, "satisfaction with Providence and the course of human affairs as a whole, which does not start from good and proceed to evil, but gradually develops from the worse to the better" (68).

c) The treatise What Does it Mean to Orient Oneself in Thinking? (October 1786), prompted by the Mendelssohn-Jacobi controversy A major intellectual debate regarding the limits of reason and the role of faith, triggered by Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi's claim that Moses Mendelssohn's rationalism led inevitably to atheism., already prepares the concept of faith found in Religion. Where the objective principles of reason prove insufficient, namely beyond experience, a subjective principle of reason comes into its own in both theoretical and practical fields: its need. This practical need is called the rational belief in the supersensible (e.g., the Godhead), which, however, can never—like historical faith—become knowledge, but always retains the character of a "postulate" (see above under 4.). Enemies of pure rational belief are alleged "enlightenment" from above (fanaticism original: "Schwärmerei," a term Kant used for those who claimed to have direct mystical visions or private revelations from God.), total submission of reason to facts (superstition), renunciation of all rational belief (unbelief), leading to the principle of no longer recognizing any duty (that of libertinism) (P. 137 f.).

d) In a similar sense are the Remarks on Jacobi’s Examination of Mendelssohn’s... directed against Mendelssohn's theory of common sense...