Dénes Dienes: History of the Reformed Church Collég in Sárospatak (Sárospatak, 2013)

János Ugrai: „THE PERIOD OF NATIONAL ADVANCEMENT” 1777-1849 - Environmental conditions - The spirit of the age: from the enlightenment to the fall of the war of independence

76

FROM THE ENLIGHTEMENT

TO THE END OF THE WAR

OF INDEPENDENCE

the shrinking of the scope of duties of the churches quickened under the push of enlightened absolutism, and, with the bourgeois pursuits of modernization of the Age of Reforms, became a continuous process. The April Laws of 1848 can be considered as being the first wave of this phenomenon. In the heat of the March Revolution, feudalism was swept away by the leading powers of the Age of Reforms and a civil, parliamentarian administrative system was established. Within this context, not only were the rights of the sovereign limited but also the financing of the ecclesiastical and educational activities of churches and their fundamental oversight organized. The thus formed Ministry of Religious Affairs and Public Education symbolized an essentially new interpretation of the role of the state.

Along with secularization, the other determinative new wrinkle of this era was the politics of tolerance. The notion of religious tolerance had taken root in the Habsburg Monarchy one hundred years previously in the wake of acknowledging principles similar to that espoused by John Locke. The Edict of Tolerance issued by Joseph II (1781) is also of epoch-making significance in the life of the College in Patak. As a consequence of this, Protestants were granted a solid legal basis by which to preserve and defend the autonomy of their church life and schooling. The singular significance of the edict is underlined by the fact that it was one of the three decrees which Joseph II did not repeal as he languished on his deathbed. Moreover, the diet of 1791 reinforced the ecclesiastical and educational autonomy of the Protestants and this was also sanctioned by Leopold II. Throughout our time these two sources of law served as the reference to the protection of the rights of Protestants. Although article 26 of the law of 1791 did not ensure the full equality of rights between Protestants and Catholics - the sovereign having intervened in the life of the Reformed and Lutheran churches several times later on - it can be stated that, from the end of the 18th century onwards, the frequency of religious offences and the gravity of the individual cases decreased. Achieving the right of equality was hindered by the legal obstruction of conversion to the Protestant faith and by the denomination- specific educating of children issuing from Catholic-Protestant mixed marriages in an entirely disproportional way. Both rules pertaining to these issues led to numerous abuses. However, these local conflicts did not escalate nor did they extend beyond the boundaries of any given community. Although this situation did little to strengthen the mutual trust of the different denominations in each other, it did not significantly damage their relationships. By the first half of the 19th century, the fact of adhering to either the Catholic or the Protestant faith was decreasingly divisive. The majority of the very vocal gentry which became involved in the political frays of this Age of Reforms was Protestant and, therefore, ever-widening spheres of public influence opened up to them.

Enlightened absolutism had a significant impact on the development of schooling, also. In this respect, it is to be noted that the age of Enlightenment was also the century of pedagogy or education. Hence, the enlightened thinkers pointedly called for the radical transformation of the former ideological and social structures, and in this it was to the schools that first-priority significance was accorded. The lasting achievements of the age of Enlightenment (technological development, results attained in hygienic and foodstuff relations, and in the prolongation of human life, urbanization, etc.) naturally gave rise to