History of Atheism



Ancient Times
Some men have always disbelived in gods or supreme powers. The only problem is that the phenomenon of atheism could not be easily described early on, as primitive languages had no way to symbolize negation, or existence. Hence saying "gods don't exist" would be a daunting task indeed. The arrival of phonetic language changes that. Atheistic views started to emerge in India, then Greece.

India : Probably the first sign of skeptic thought comes from the Rig-Veda, a text which is thought to have been written around 1000 BC. The philosophy promoted in it could be said to be atheistic by omission, as shows us this creation hymn :

"Who knows for certain? Who shall here declare it? Whence was it born and whence came this creation? The gods were born after this world's creation. Then, who can know from whence it has arisen? None know whence creation has arisen and whether he has or has not produced it. He who surveys it in the highest heaven, he only knows, or happily, he may know not".

Around 500 BC, Buddhism, inspired by the Rig-Veda, became a theistic philosophy. Jainism, an atheistic religion, also began around that time.

Early Greek Freethinkers
The first real freethinkers or atheists who seem to have produced work specifically dealing with religion in a negative way were found in ancient Greece. Although most of these works have not survived to the present day (and charges of atheism were often politically motivated and really not based upon fact), we know that Anaxagoras was accused of impiety and forced to leave Greece. He supposedly held that the sun was a red-hot body and that the moon was a physical object which was larger than Greece. He did not, however, apparently make an attack on the popular religious beliefs.

The Greek historian Thucydides never invoked the supernatural or attributed any historical events to that cause. This was quite a radical approach in those days and contrasts strongly with the writings of Herodotus, the other famous Greek historian. The third person usually lumped together with Thucydides and Anaxagoras as an atheist is Pericles. He was certainly friendly with the other two men, but there is nothing specifically atheistic in Pericles' surviving writings. Two other Greeks frequently accused of atheism were Hippo and Diogenes. None of Hippo's writing survives, so it is impossible to examine it while only a few scientific fragments of Diogenes are known to us. Aristophanes' play The Clouds put atheistic words in Diogenes' mouth, however, Protagoras was tried and had his work on gods publicly burned. The actual work seems to have merely stated that he did not and could not know whether the gods existed or not. Although Socrates was tried and condemned to death for atheism it is not at all clear whether this charge had any real basis in fact, or was merely "trumped up". Socrates dealt with ethics and left theological questions entirely alone. Finally we can say with confidence that Theodorus of Cyrene was an atheist from the contents of his work On the Gods.

Another current of thought that lasted for a long period of history was Stoicism, which preached an early form of panthenism. The universe was considered as a living thing, gods and souls considered as material objects part of the universe.

In these days, and for a long time, atheism was considered as anything that was astray from the mainstream religious movement. Indeed the early Christians were considered as atheists because they worshipped other gods.

Roman Skeptics
There is no sign of atheism in the early days of Rome. Much of Roman philosophy was simply borrowed from the Greeks, although even the Greek influence was not of major importance until the second century B.C. Epicurus held that the gods were totally isolated and aloof from human affairs, although they did exist. Although Epicurus was a Greek, his most famous follower (in the sense of someone who adopted his ideas) was the Roman poet Lucretius. His poem On the Nature of the Universe is one of the finest pieces of atheist poetry ever written, and is perhaps the only poem which has been able to successfully present a philosophical system. Cicero and Horace, in their writings, typify a secularist approach to the world, but this is not the same thing as saying they were atheists. The works of Seneca can also be viewed as secularist and perhaps Epicurean. Lucian was a sort of Roman Voltaire, poking fun at contemporary religious beliefs. The reason that he could get away with this is that the average Roman, if asked "Why do we believe in the gods?," would have answered "Because the State, in its laws, tells us to."

The Roman Emperor, Marcus Aurelius, took the attitude of neither believing nor disbelieving in the gods. He viewed this attitude as the proper one for men to take. In the second and third century A.D., there lived the last and perhaps greatest of the Roman skeptical philosophers. This was Sextus Empiricus. He held the view that nothing was evil in its nature and that men should seek a moral position beyond the struggle of good and evil. The idea was that freedom from mental excitement on these issues will secure a man peace of mind. Sextus Empiricus was especially important in that most of his works have survived, thereby being able to greatly influence the work of later philosophers. It should be mentioned in passing that the Romans had a tendency to view believers in all religions other than theirs as atheists. Thus the Jews and the early Christians were called atheists and were treated as atheists would be.

Dark Ages
After the dawn of atheism, we now assist to its violent dampening. Indeed atheistic views are not exposed as much as they were in the Antiquity or will be during the Enlightement, for understandable reasons. It is thought that the death of Hypatia of Alexandria at the hands of Christian monks marks the end of Greek rationalism. Hypatia was a great female philosopher, mathematician, and inventor, and has become a symbol of rationalism in modern times.

The Magna Carta, signed in 1215, is said to have contributed more then any other text to the end of the divine rights of kings.

There was very little recorded sign of atheism throughout this period.

Re-awakening in Middle Ages
In the Dark Ages there was no philosophy as such, while in the Middle Ages the universities, where such things were discussed, were completely under the control of the Church. It was only with the growing independence of the universities from church control in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries that atheism and skepticism could again become possibilities. At the same time that the Dark Ages were engulfing Europe, there was still a flowering of civilization in the Moslem world. In the twelfth century, the philosopher Averroes was an able exponent of freethought in the Moslem world.

During the Middle Ages, there were many authors and thinkers who did much to help reawaken the belief in reason and the interest in science. Among these were Roger Bacon, Chaucer, Peter Abelard and William of Occam. While these men were not atheists, they helped break the grip that religion had upon the people of Europe.


Renaissance
The Renaissance brought a flowering in all areas of human thought. There developed along with this a growth in freethought and atheist writing. One of the greatest opponents of accepting anything on the mere authority of the Church was Leonardo da Vinci. He insisted upon experiment as a means of obtaining knowledge. Niccolo Machiavelli was a constant critic of the Church, and reputed to be an atheist. He never avows his atheism in his writings, however (few at that time would). Bonaventure Des Perriers, the author of Cymbalum Mundi, openly ridiculed Christianity in that work. Rabelais mocks many of the Christian traditions in the early editions of his Gargantua and Pantagruel (even though Rabelais had been a monk for years).

Martyrs for Freethought

The beginnings of modern freethought can be traced to the 1500s and 1600s. One of the major influences upon thought in this period was Michael Montaigne. His Essays were highly skeptical, rather deistic (although this word was not used until much later) and very against the concept of witchcraft. In England, Christopher Marlowe had a reputation for atheism, and in fact a court case against him on the charge was pending when he was killed in a fight. Shakespeare rarely reveals his personal religious feelings, but his plays are characterized by a notable lack of religious piety.

The death of Giordano Bruno at the stake in 1600 marks the beginning of the modern period of freethought. Bruno was an Italian "theologian" and writer. After running into opposition from the Inquisition over his writings, Bruno traveled all over Europe, leaching, writing, and debating. He was often in great danger of being arrested. After fourteen years of this, he was in Venice when he was betrayed to the Inquisition by a former pupil. Bruno was in trouble with the Inquisition for having denied the divinity of Jesus, having said that the world was eternal and that there is transmigration of souls. He also accepted the Copernican idea of the solar system and often lectured on it. Bruno was tried, protesting his innocence, but the Inquisition did not find people innocent. Bruno spent the next seven years in prison in Rome. Finally, in February of 1600, he was burned at the stake. There were many other freethought martyrs during the next two hundred years.


Age of Enlightenment
The seeds that humanism planted during the Renaissance began to sprout during the Age of Enlightenment. Martin Luther caused a major schism in Christianity, and the Protestant Reformation introduced the personal reading of the Bible. T

19th Century
The French Revolution (1789-1799) shocked the world in its violence and marked the end of another era. Religion began to reform and tried to blame the deists and other movements for the social turmoil that resulted. This reform is evident in the image of God, which is now shown as a loving, humanist deity. Rationalism, and later on Freethinking, organizes itself and starts to bring about social reform.

In 1841, Ludwig Feuerbach wrote a book called "The Essence of Christianity", which was one of the first German atheistic influences. The book theorized that God was man's projection of himself.

A year later, George Jacob Holyoake (1817-1906) was arrested for blasphemy. An English freethought organizer, he coined the term "secular". In 1859, Charles Darwin publishes his famous book "Origin of Species", which gave atheists their first natural explanation of animal and human life.

During the rest of the nineteenth century, in both Britain and America, there was a large amount of freethought activity. Many freethought publishers were in business; many freethought organizations flourished; many freethought lecturers spoke; many freethought books were written.

Although the so-called "Golden Age of Freethought" has passed, and such men as Robert G. Ingersoll, Charles Bradlaugh and George Jacob Holyoake are gone forever, there is no question that there has been and will be enough developments in the history of freethought and atheism in the twentieth century to stimulate the writing of books. The lecturer is gone, from freethought as well as from most other fields. Rarely has atheism or freethought received the use of radio and television that the more orthodox religions receive. More people are now no longer afraid to openly state their lack of formal or orthodox religious beliefs. Some of the history of freethought and atheism has been chronicled, and such radical ideas as birth control, evolution, and the separation of church and state which originated with freethinkers have been popularly accepted.

20th Century
The Scopes Trial, in 1925, started the war against creationism. Clarence Darrow, an agnostic lawyer, fought in court against fundamentalist preacher William Jennings Bryan to maintain the right of a teacher in Tenessee to teach evolution. Darrow lost, but the trial had enormous repercussions on the creationism/evolution debate.

The "Freethinker" newspaper was the most prominent atheist periodical in England as the century began. An active group called the Leicester Secular Society was having meetings and engaging in community activism in their own secular hall which had been built in the latter 1800's.




Article Here

I always thought of atheists as free thinkers ..they dont have any rules to follow...they just live life to the fullest....to worrying over if they are going to hell or heaven...to them..life is life, you live it and then you die. I personally dont think there is anything wrong with it, even though I follow God myself!

"Free Thinker" is another word for Atheist. And, speaking for myself without alluding to a blanket indictment of "most" Atheists, I'll say that it certainly gives one a heightened awareness of self, personal responsibility, integrity and honor. There is no deferring to any outside invisible entities or agencies, for those choices I make and their subsequent repercussions , should things go wrong. No, "The devil made me do it" excuses, no repentance to some invisible fiction of the superstitions, that shall do nothing at all to revert what has already occurred. If there is any forgiveness needed it is from those that I've wronged, or hurt in some way. Because they felt the pain of that, and they are the only one's that can pardon the act. But even that does nothing to change what is.

I think the notion of repentance unto an invisible being is what gives license to some of the most unscrupulous people to do as they will, believing they can live with themselves if they only later ask forgiveness from the unseen. Alleviating that conscience, if they have any, because they've atoned to some thing rather than that someone they harmed. It's a cowards out, in my opinion, because it abdicates personal responsibility for the behavior, the personal character that would do such a thing, unto something other than ones self. Be it devil or god. And when one can feel forgiven in their own sense of self, by atoning to something they hold faith in, it lessens the impact of their personal guilt because they imagine , now that the candles have been burned, the penance served, etc... that it's all ok. But that behavior, that which harmed someone else in some way, came from inside one's self. Self, was the channel for the "sin", the offense. Nothing else is responsible, unless we defer to superstitions and thereby demean our own integrity in the process.

My family, both sides, have been Atheists since the dawn of our time. And I'll tell you it's incredibly empowering to know who you are and to accept responsibility for that, all your days. Rather than imagine some fiction is personally invested in your wellbeing, judges your actions outside of that which you levy upon yourself, and shall save or damn you at the end of life. Living like that, for me, would be about as righteous as saying with a straight face; Minnie Mouse saves! While I live my life, make my choices, suffer or enjoy the consequences and all the while curb my intellect to the thought that somewhere that I can't see, there's a giant mouse that gives a damn, watching over it all, taking notes and waiting to have a stern talk with me about all that, after I'm dead.

Being a free thinker doesn't make you an atheist. An atheist can be just as closed minded as a religious person. You said that your entire family is atheist...so are you thinking freely or are you just beleiving in what your family has told you? Do you look at your own beleifs and think that maybe your wrong? Have you studied the beleifs of others and compared them to your own? Are you open minded? etc.

People are not born either Atheist or Theist...they are born ignorant to both(like an animal). An atheist is a person who doesn't believe in a god...you can't not belive in a god if you don't know what a god is. Babies, young children, and animals don't think about the complications of of the complex ideas of existence and life.

P.S. I'm not saying that your closed minded, ignorant, or wrong. I was just saying it as general statement. No offense.

How can you be a free thinker and follow a religion? A religion does the thinking for you, it sets your boundaries and tells you what is right and wrong. As a free thinker you set your own boundaries and make your own choices based on the situation you're in, not what some prophets said. You take all the facts into account and make the best conclusion you can while keeping them in mind. But the religious don't do that, they take what their religion has to say, and they follow it. If they do not follow all of what their religion has to say, I would deduce that they are free-thinkers, because they decided something was wrong after looking at the facts.

No offense taken. I know I am not close minded, wrong in my choice of personal faith, nor am I ignorant of other theist philosophies.


Perhaps this shall assist your understanding of the context of "Free thinker" , when I said Atheists are often called that as well.

Free thought is a philosophical doctrine that holds that beliefs should be formed on the basis of science and logical principles and not be comprised by authority, tradition, or any other dogmatic belief system that restricts logical reasoning. The cognitive application of free thought is known as freethinking, and practitioners of free thought are known as freethinkers.

As for the family thing, I see where you're heading. Implying a correlation to following tradition, as is often the case with believers and their allegiance as theists. Longevity is seemingly a standard in my family. I have known my great grands, as well as my grand parents, on both sides. And while there is no family bible there is a recorded history of our ancestors. My great grandma's (both sides) were Atheists and they, having known both their parents, told us of their Atheism and like that. There's a family book that is kept on both sides of the family, that traces the ancestry as far as anyone can recall. All were Atheists. None held allegiance to any god form, in fact it was so natural that it wasn't as if it were a concentrated will to stand out as a stark anti-theist, it was just a way of life. My heritage embraced the power of nature, because they were farmers in the beginning. They recognized the cycles of the growing times, and how that and themselves, were responsible for the family surviving during the depression, etc... They accorded no reverence to an invisible being, for all this, they simply knew that nature and her cycles, the earth beneath their feet, were the sustainer of themselves and they it, with the turning of the crops, etc...


My ancestors were well aware of the theistic community, what with churches or temples strewn about. No one asked, because my family has always lived in the rural area's of the States or their homeland. And it wasn't an issue either, because people simply minded their own. During the depression, my grands would make biscuits and leek soups, and hand them out to those that were hungry in their area. Da, (grandfather) would allow homeless to warm up for the night in the barn, where there was always extra stalls filled with fresh hay from the fields harvest. So they did what they could for those in need, offering what they had out of the charity in their hearts. Not out of a sense of what was expected by christian principles.

My family and I as well, believe one's goodness, one's sense of morality. Ones personal character, honor, integrity and sense of truth in who they are, is not imparted by the necessity to have a relationship with a fable or out of superstition in giving life to beliefs in heavens or hells. Rather, we believe it is first innate. One is born with the the mentality from whence their character is developed, by the examples set around them in their family and peers. I was born and raised by very good people and that nurtured to the fore, what was already in me, to come forth and develop as I grew into the woman I am today. I learned by example, one might say. And the examples in my immediate family experience were Atheists.

I also can understand why one would say people are born ignorant of god, as it is something they do not know until they are told. This is why the article I posted imparted that sense that all people are born "Atheists", because that is at it's simplest definition, no god. No cognizant understanding of that metaphor, or myth, until it is imparted unto them. If it is at all.

Hypatia was certainly not an atheist. She was the last great pagan teacher of the Roman Empire. Her death symbolized the end of Science, until the Renaissance, at least.

Hypatia was a rationalist and a free thinker. Hypatia ~ A victim of bigotry

I was born a misanthrope. I remember it as if it were yesterday. All was dark....the only thing I knew I....I'm here, I'm me, there's some strange rumblings sounds, and all kinds of gross juice floating around me. Then all I sudden I went down this slippery slide with a bright light opening at the end. I exited my home into this bright room with a really friggin huge guy holding me, and I was like " Let go of me man! I hate you! Why am I speaking!?" and such.

Listen, my point is this. Although the idea of drying your hair off with a blow dryer while still in the shower, may seem like a good idea. It's not.

I love jelly beans

Oh me to. Meeee toooo.

I was born a misanthrope! I can see the jehovah witnesses scrambling for the Websters now, saying: "It's a new cult! I just know it!"

Hahaha Dictionaries and encyclopedias are regifted in the area I live...forget fruitcake!

Makes me feel sorry for the future.

If you really want to do the right thing, then I suggest eating gummy bears - The Doctrine of Gumby (link)

~Note to self: Save the world, shop for gummies~