Back الفصل بين الكنيسة والدولة Arabic Separació entre l'Església i l'Estat Catalan Trennung zwischen Staat und religiösen Institutionen German Χωρισμός Κράτους και Εκκλησίας Greek Apartigo de eklezio kaj ŝtato Esperanto Separación Iglesia-Estado Spanish جدایی دین از دولت Persian Kirkon ja valtion ero Finnish Séparation de l'Église et de l'État French הפרדת הדת מהמדינה HE
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The separation of church and state is a philosophical and jurisprudential concept for defining political distance in the relationship between religious organizations and the state. Conceptually, the term refers to the creation of a secular state (with or without legally explicit church-state separation) and to disestablishment, the changing of an existing, formal relationship between the church and the state.[1] The concept originated among early Baptists in America. In 1644, Roger Williams, a puritan minister and founder of the state of Rhode Island and The First Baptist Church in America, was the first public official to call for "a wall or hedge of separation" between "the wilderness of the world" and "the garden of the church."[2] Although the concept is older, the exact phrase "separation of church and state" is derived from "wall of separation between Church & State," a term coined by Thomas Jefferson in his 1802 letter to members of the Danbury Baptist association in the state of Connecticut.[3] The concept was promoted by Enlightenment philosophers such as John Locke.[4]
In a society, the degree of political separation between the church and the civil state is determined by the legal structures and prevalent legal views that define the proper relationship between organized religion and the state. The arm's length principle proposes a relationship wherein the two political entities interact as organizations each independent of the authority of the other. The strict application of the secular principle of laïcité is used in France, while secular societies such as Denmark and England maintain a form of constitutional recognition of an official state religion.
The philosophy of the separation of the church from the civil state parallels the philosophies of secularism, disestablishmentarianism, religious liberty, and religious pluralism. By way of these philosophies, the European states assumed some of the social roles of the church in form of the welfare state, a social shift that produced a culturally secular population and public sphere.[5] In practice, church–state separation varies from total separation, mandated by the country's political constitution, as in India and Singapore, to a state religion, as in the Maldives.
- ^ The Oxford Companion to the Supreme Court of the United States (1992), Kermit D. Hall, Ed. pp. 717–726
- ^ "Establishment Clause: Separation of Church and State". The Free Speech Center. Retrieved 28 March 2024.
- ^ "Jefferson's Letter to the Danbury Baptists (June 1998) - Library of Congress Information Bulletin". www.loc.gov. Retrieved 28 March 2024.
- ^ "The Enlightenment | History of Western Civilization II". courses.lumenlearning.com. Archived from the original on 17 April 2021. Retrieved 20 January 2021.
- ^ Separationism Archived 2020-08-07 at the Wayback Machine, Princeton University WordNet Archived May 8, 2016, at the Wayback Machine reads: "separationism: advocacy of a policy of strict separation of church and state."