Experience History: The Great Awakening By James West

The Enlightenment began in Europe in the 18th century; American colonists believed that God’s greatest gift to mankind was reason which allowed people to follow the moral teachings of Jesus. The Enlightenment challenged the role of religion and divine right and this helped Colonial America to see that it was possible to challenge God and divine right. The movement challenged the role of God and allowed people to see that they were important and had the ability to shape their own lives. The Great Awakening ended up weakening the importance of clergy as believers started relying on their own conclusions.

Davidson, James West in his book the Experience History: Interpreting America’s past: McGraw-Hill Higher Education, copyright in 2013. Print.

The Enlightenment stated that people are born with a clean state. That people are born good they are just influenced by the environment. Some beliefs of Americans were that God intervened directly in human affairs. In the European Enlightenment philosophers stressed the power of human reason to promote progress by revealing the laws that governed both nature and society. John Locke preached during the late 17th century, he believed that all men are born with natural rights; those rights are life, liberty, and property. John Locke proposed that human lives could be changed through education and purposefully action. Benjamin Franklin turned into deism and believed that God created the world to run according to the laws and nature of reason without His intervention. Great Awakening gave the colonists a shared national religious experience. The Great Awakening services were so popular that some had to be held outside in the open nature. Reasons for the Great Awakening were that people felt that religion was dry dull and distant preachers felt that people needed to be concerned with inner emotions as opposed to outward religious

With so many new denominations, it was clear that no religion would dominate any region. Although the Great Awakening was a reaction against the Enlightenment, it was also a long term cause of the revolution.

"The Impact of Enlightenment in Europe." Ushistory.org. Independence Hall Association. Web. 6 Apr. 2015. The enlightenment caused people to think differently about religion. In Europe people began to take control over their own faith and religion. Many argued that they could find God even without the pastors and churches. This source will describe the involvement of some scientists in the Enlightenment in America.

People were beginning to doubt the existence of a God. The age of reason was spreading rapidly across Europe. In the late 17th century, scientist Isaac Newton was challenging the old order. Newton's laws of gravity and motion described the world in terms of natural laws beyond any spiritual force. John Locke defended the displacement of a monarch who would not protect the lives, liberties, and property of the English people. Jean-Jacques Rousseau stated that society should be ruled by the "general will" of the people. Baron de Montesquieu declared that power should not be concentrated in the hands of any one individual. He recommended separating power among executive, legislative, judicial branches of