Özet:

Enlightenment Age is one of the most important intellectual, political, and social moments in the modern Western history. In the nineteenth and especially twentieth centuries, there have been many claims about that Enlightenment thought have been transcended. But against these arguments Enlightenment is still going on affecting the history of modern thought. Enlightenment demolished worldview of middle ages and initiated modern Western world. Evaluations and commentaries about Enlightenment can extend from history to politics, economics, art, religion, literature, poetics, novel, architecture, medicine and music. Besides Enlightenment thought is generally known by epistemology discussions. But it cannot be reduced to its contributions to epistemology. Most important philosophers for these discussions are Locke, Hume, and Kant. Kant in his famous article titled “What is The Enlightenment?” answered his question as a “Sapere aude!” (dare to know). Accordingly, Enlightenment is mankind's exit from its self-incurred immaturity by using his reason. In other words, that means to transcend ancient regime. Consequently, Enlightenment thought, first of all is about political thinking. In other words, Enlightenment is known by its political victories. The political thinking of Enlightenment is certainly not one-dimensional. Basically, it can be found at least two aspects of political thinking in the eighteenth century. One of them is Anglo-American liberal-republican political thought, which is mainly formed according to Whig thinking. Another one is the enlightened despotism or absolutism, which is mainly seen in the Continental Europe. This article focuses on these two aspects of Enlightenment thinking. To understand these differences is necessary to have a healthy and sound explanation of Enlightenment.

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