Zvi Ben-Dor Benite
What is Aufklärung: Lessing, Mendelssohn, Kant

This lecture examines the pivotal shift in the German Enlightenment (Aufklärung) toward religious tolerance, human rights, and intellectual autonomy through the works of Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, Moses Mendelssohn, and Immanuel Kant. Beginning with Lessing and Mendelssohn, the discussion highlights their deep personal friendship and collaborative efforts to advance freedom of thought, religious pluralism, and Jewish emancipation in 18th-century Prussia. It explores how Lessing’s literary masterpieces—such as Nathan the Wise and its famous Ring Parable—argued for practical morality over dogmatic truth, while Mendelssohn’s philosophy harmonized traditional Jewish faith with Enlightenment rationalism to champion civil rights and liberty of conscience. The lecture then turns to Immanuel Kant, whose foundational essay “Answering the Question: What is Enlightenment?” defined the era through its famous imperative, sapere aude (“dare to know”). By tracing these thinkers, the lecture demonstrates how Lessing and Mendelssohn laid the practical and social groundwork for pluralism, paving the way for Kant to construct a revolutionary philosophical system centered on human freedom, critical reason, and moral responsibility.