Kant und Spalding über menschliches Verdienst und Gnade Gottes. Philosophie und Theologie im Dialog

The Lutheran theologian Johann Joachim Spalding is currently being feted by Kant scholarship as one of the primary sources of Kant’s anthropology and ethics. Yet his role in Kant’s philosophy of religion still awaits careful consideration. This article aims to fill this gap, if only partially, by focusing on the relationship between human merit and God’s grace. With this purpose in mind, Spalding’s and Kant’s theses shall be presented as a kind of disciplinary chiasmus, with the philosophical considerations of the theologian Spalding about human merit set against the theological reflections of the philosopher Kant about God’s grace. That it was necessary for neither the former to renounce his Lutheran beliefs nor the latter his view of human autonomy is a finding which might prove valuable not only for Kant scholarship, but also for current interdisciplinary dialogue.