Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Exegesis and Encounter

2020; Brill; Volume: 2; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1163/25889613-bja10001

2588-9613

Kristóf Oltvai,

Karl Barth and Christian Theology

Abstract Though the problem of conceptual idolatry has captivated contemporary scholarship on the relationship between philosophy and theology, these discussions’ doctrinal consequences remain underdeveloped. I intervene in these debates by engaging and elucidating Martin Luther’s critique of scholastic metaphysics, a critique which foregrounds ontotheology’s spiritual and ecclesial detriments. Luther’s reforming works, from his pivotal 1525 De servo arbitrio to his last major project, the 1545 Genesis commentaries, reveal how a metaphysical theology based on natural reason leads to Pelagianism by generalizing faith to a rational conceptual norm, the moral Law. Returning, however, to Scripture’s “grammar” – which, when read plainly ( simpliciter ), deconstructs natural reason’s vanity – allows us to encounter Christ ‘in person’ rather than in the concept. Luther thus suggests sola scriptura as a method for resisting ontotheology, but with dramatic dogmatic consequences, such as justification by faith alone. These consequences complicate modernity’s, and especially modern philosophy’s, theological origins and implications.