Part of a much larger study in the intellectual history of Sophocles (and Greek tragedy in general) in the 18th century, this chapter brings to light, for the first time, Jean Terrasson’s incisive and highly influential attempt to dismantle Christianising and Neo-Classicist interpretations of both Greek tragedy and Aristotle’s Poetics and to replace ancient tragedy and theory of tragedy as dangerous and outdated products of pagan religion and mentality with a new, and in his view vastly superior, concept of modern tragedy