European philosophy and original sin in Stephen Mulhall
Abstract
Stephen Mulhall has distinguished himself as one of the most rigorous and constructive contemporary thinkers on European philosophy and its complicated relationship to Christian theology. A prominent locus of that relationship in his work is the Christian doctrine of original sin, and its criticism but also structural recapitulation in the work of Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sartre and others. This article begins with an overview of relevant themes and their development in Mulhall's writings. I then offer an account of the internal tensions Mulhall identifies in Heidegger et al's ambivalent contestation of original sin, and of his own response. The centre of this response is a reconfiguration of the character of the divine, and of human participation in that divine, as radical self-abnegation. I conclude with an appreciative critique of Mulhall's proposal as insufficiently responsive to the eschatological framework within which original sin has its doctrinal and ontological place in Thomist thought.
Citation
Wolfe , J 2017 , ' European philosophy and original sin in Stephen Mulhall ' , New Blackfriars , vol. 98 , no. 1076 , pp. 387–398 . https://doi.org/10.1111/nbfr.12287
Publication
New Blackfriars
Status
Peer reviewed
ISSN
1741-2005Type
Journal article
Collections
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