Professional paper

https://doi.org/10.21464/fi38401

Alienation and Deification: On Being Fully Human

Teresa Forcades i Vila ; Universitat de Barcelona, Gran Via de les Corts Catalanes 585, ES–08007 Barcelona

Abstract

In this paper are briefly presented some key aspects of how human alienation and human freedom were conceived and experienced in the context of Reformation and October Revolution. An attempt is made to answer the following question: Is it true that the negative anthropology of the Reformers was paradoxically associated with an expansion of individual and social freedom, while the positive anthropology of the Soviet revolutionaries was associated with a reduction thereof? It is accepted today that the Reform helped to foster and to consolidate the notion of political and personal freedom in Europe, but not without contradictions and at the expense of forming a close alliance with the emerging political and economic powers that were beginning to establish the new world order known as “capitalism”. Moreover, the October Revolution, that understood itself as bringing into practice Marx's ideas and opening the door of history to a new Era of freedom and prosperity, helped to form a regime ruled by a professional bureaucracy concentrating in its hands all economic and political power and setting into motion a blind mechanism of oppression of the individual and the community. Nevertheless, the October Revolution had one unexpected aftermath: The Western expansion of the Christian belief on theosis (divinization).

Keywords

Reformation; October Revolution; alienation; divinization

Hrčak ID:

219464

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/219464

Publication date:

14.2.2019.

Article data in other languages: croatian

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