Meslier the First Atheist

Abstract

This chapter introduces the thought of Jean Meslier, a Catholic priest in the Champagne region who wrote the first apology of atheism by an atheist. After introducing the reader to his biography, the chapter details his critique of religion, but also his attempt to build an ethical theory and just world. By situating his religious thought in the early eighteenth-century, it argues that Meslier is the radical par excellence, much more vocal than Voltaire and others. It shows that Meslier’s context is one of Cartesianism (rather than Spinozism) and situates his religious thought within this tradition. Finally, it shows that his political thought, interpreted in France as a form of communism, should be read as a radical Republican tract.