Racionalita v osvícenství a její evropský kontext: Dobrovský, Palacký, Masaryk
Rationality in Enlightenment and Its European Context: Dobrovský, Palacký, Masaryk

Summary/Abstract: The enlightenment is an intellectual movement which refuses obskurant traditionalism and dogmatism of baroque period, religion included. In contrast, the enlightenment applies its own instruments: rationality, logic and humanism. With a creation of its own spiritual, ethical and aesthetic principles it provides among others a basis of contemporary concepts of civil liberty, democracy, progress and human rights. The goal of this paper is to refer to originality of thinking of three Czech enlighteners, Dobrovský, Palacký a Masaryk, who are rightly, in terms of their philosophical and religious struggle, assigned among enlighteners at the European level. But to achieve the European level is not possible without being open to intellectual streams which embrace us and without a creative connection with them. Therefore thinking in the European context, the main issue for a great Czech thinker of those days such as Dobrovský, Palacký or Masaryk, does not mean only to translate foreign ideas into Czech language, but to evaluate them critically and to contribute significantly to general humanity, ethics and justice. To accomplish these noble ideas, Czech enlighteners looked for new ways to a rational aproach of the original structure of values of lived experience, they struggled for its reflective availability, its clearness. Especially the clearness of the structure of values - clearness in the frame of reason - assures the intelligibility of our lived experience and offers the possibility how to get oriented in our current life.

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