The atheism dispute is without doubt one of the most crucial philosophical controversies of overdue eighteenth and early 19th century Germany. Johann Gottlieb Fichte, one of many best philosophers of the interval, was once accused of atheism after publishing his essay 'On the floor of Our trust in a Divine World-Governance', which he had written in accordance with Karl Friedrich Forberg's essay 'Development of the concept that of Religion'.

Fichte argued that reputation of the ethical legislation comprises confirmation of a 'moral global order', which he pointed out with God. Critics charged either Forberg and Fichte with atheism, thereby prompting Fichte to release a public crusade of safeguard that incorporated his danger to surrender his place on the collage of Jena if he have been subjected to any executive reprimand. Fichte used to be pressured to make solid this hazard while his paintings used to be censured. The dispute ultimately died down however it prompted many different thinkers for years to come.

J. G. Fichte: The Atheism Dispute (1798–1800) is the 1st English remark dedicated completely to the atheism dispute in addition to the 1st English translation of accumulated writings from the Atheism Dispute. This ebook brings jointly many significant essays and files when it comes to this dispute. those contain the nameless polemic 'A Father's Letter to his scholar Son approximately Fichte's and Forberg's Atheism', Fichte's essays 'Appeal to the general public' and 'Juridical Defense', and diverse records from the college of Jena and the ducal courts of Dresden, Weimar, and Gotha. lots of the texts are translated from German into English for the 1st time, and all are followed by way of complete commentaries and unique notes. Bowman and Estes convey to an English conversing viewers the total information of this controversy, which ended Fichte's profession in Jena and profoundly prompted his method of speaking philosophical and spiritual concepts.