Late Polish Enlightenment and the ruthenian issue (the end of the 18th - beginning of the 19th century)

Abstract

The purpose of the article to elucidate the influence peculiarities of the Enlightenment on the views formation about the nation in general and the Ruthenian issue in the Polish society at the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century. To analyze how the worldview foundations laid by the Enlightenment influenced the reception of the Ruthenians by the Poles. The research methodology is based on the principles of historicism, scientific research. In the research there have been used general scientific principles of analysis, synthesis and generalization. The scientific novelty consists in the analysis of the Ruthenian issue through the prism of the Polish Enlightenment, and also in tracing the influence of the Enlightenment on the Polish scientific thought after the partitions of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. It has been clarified how socio-political views influenced the cameralistic studies of the Polish scholars. The meaning of the term “Ukraine” in the ideas of the Polish figures of that time has been studied. The Conclusion. The development of enlightened ideas in the territory of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth caused radical social transformations. There was a change in the very understanding of the word “enlightenment”: from education or training without any religious content to the use of this word in opposition to the words “superstition” and “fanaticism”, which contributed to the growth of a religious tolerance in the country. The spread of enlightened ideas in the Polish lands is also connected with a social demand of the population to solve the problems of the political system. There appeared research papers with a moderate criticism of noble democracy and the ideas of Sarmatism, which were associated with traditions, the connection with which was often interpreted by enlightened people negatively. There was transition from reception of a person as a subject belonging to a certain ancestry to a broader category – the Motherland. Such conceptual changes in the minds of the Polish intellectuals led to the interpretation of the Ruthenians as part of the Polish nation. After all, for the Polish intellectuals of that time, the nation was a political community, and ethnic and cultural features were not of a particular importance. This conclusion is confirmed by the analyzed letters, papers, acts of F. Jezierski, H. Kołłątaj, T. Kościuszko, S. Staszic, T. Czacki, which show us that religion receded into the background, and state affiliation and common history became more important. The consolidating factor was to become the Polish language, which was to spread to religious rites, education, etc. In the era of the late Polish Enlightenment (1795 – 1822), an important change took place in the consciousness of the Polish public figures. They began to move away from didacticism, and the main emphasis was placed on proving through science, literature and education the viability of the Polish nation under the conditions of statelessness. It was at that time that the papers of T. Czacki, T. Święcki and W. Marczyński appeared with descriptions of the territories of the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. These research papers are characterized by the fact that all the territories of the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth are considered as its integral parts and there is no focus on ethnic differences of inhabitants of these territories. It is obvious that this happened because of political reception of the nation.