LA DIALETTICA DELLA GIUSTIFICAZIONE. LUTERO VERSUS LUTERO

The dialectic of justificat ion. Luther versus Luther. The essay considers Lutheran theology from the perspective of the Enlightenment thinking. Inspiration is drawn from the relationship between philosophy and religion sketched out by Leibniz in the Théodicée and in some of his earlier writings. Examinations are made of the dispute between Leibniz and Bayle and, in particular, of the relationship between the power/impotence of reason with respect to faith. The essay continues by clarifying the essential nucleus of Lutheran theology:the insuperability of the dialectic opposition between contraries. The author explores the centrality of the dialectic of opposites to demonstrate how Lutheran theology was inverted into an anthropology dominated by the negative. To become a true Christian and to rise above sin, man must repeat the process of self-emptying, the same undertaken by God to reveal himself in Christ. Both the dynamic of divine revelation and that of human justification by Grace are based on the notions of estrangement, self-alienation and that of “difference”, a constant in the opposition between form/essence, wisdom/foolishness, passive/active, sin/elevation, external strength/internal charity.