Analysis and Critic of Cassirer’s interpretation of Pierre Bayle’s epistemology in Dictionnaire Historique et Critique

This article analyses and criticized Cassirer’s interpretation of Pierre Bayle’s epistemic positions in his Dictionnaire Historique et Critique. Cassirer presupposes that Bayle, just like any Enlightenment’s encyclopedia writers, uses the critical scrutiny in studying the historical narrations to serve the detachment from external authorities which are obstacles to man’s autonomy in understanding historical facts rationally. Cassirer, in whatever cost, tries to justify Bayle’s inclusion under the Enlightenment, but after logical analysis of his claims we’ll find that the product is a series of logically inconsistent- contradictory and anachronistic claims e.g., positivism, Copernican revolution in history, critic of historical reason and others. However, by considering Bayle’s work, especially the structure of Dictionnaire in its historical and theological context, we will find that historical particular events don’t have per se research value and indeed are parts of the broader web which lead us to universal problems that mere reason could not able to solve. The suspension of judgment which caused by Bayle’s epistemic skepticism is not a defect to be solved by using an affirmative foundation but is exactly at the service of his fideism which was neglected by Cassirer.