Priesthood of Knowledge

Condorcet's anti-clericalism was not theological. He spent little energy disputing the existence of God. His attack was structural: the priestly class used its monopoly on sacred knowledge to maintain social and political power over a population that could not read the texts in whose name it was governed. The priest stood between believer and scripture, citizen and law, patient and diagnosis — not because mediation was epistemically necessary but because concentrated knowledge served the mediator. The critique extended beyond literal clergy: to lawyers, physicians, scientific academies. Wherever specialized knowledge created dependency, Condorcet identified the priestly structure and demanded its dissolution through universal education.