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WHICH INITIATION DOES NOT LEAD ÁSTRAY FROM THE IRUE MYSTERIES merit.”!® For theoretical reasons, the assumption of this Christological article of faith is completely beyond Kant’s scope ("an unfathomable mystery"""), though not assuming this mystery of a saving faith"" "might be disadvantageous to reason in many respects, most of all morally.” 3. The third mystery which Kant discusses is the mystery of election [Erwählung]. It concerns an issue that pertains to Kant’s eschatological doctrine of “the last judgment,” namely “some unconditional decree [Ratschluss] [issuing in] electing one part of our race to salvation, the other to eternal reprobation.”!” As election is also a matter of grace—granted to one human being, yet denied to another—in this case it concerns “what God alone can do” according to his attribute of judge and taking into account the moral property of justice. What complicates any understanding of this third type of grace is the fact that references to God as lawgiver and as author of salvation must also be taken into account as being united. In the fear of God as lawgiver, this first reference entails unconditional obedience to the law and categorical observance of duty. In this respect, according to principles of justice, any sentence of the judge (the divine above us and conscience within us) will be of guilty and not guilty. Before the law, it is impossible that any merit can be accrued over and above the strict observance of duty. This judge does not know anything about moral advantage. Hence, the verdict will be damnation or absolution. In this case, no possibility is opened up for anything “which God alone can do” regarding the attainment ofthe final moral end for one and the same person. On the other hand, God in his goodness (benevolence) and love for humankind (the beneficient Ruler of the world) will “judge human beings insofar as a merit can yet accrue to them over and above their guilt, and here his verdict is: worthy or unworthy.”'°® Worthiness (as merit) must be won by love of the law, and under this moral condition it implies moral receptivity to God’s goodness (salvation). Hence, if a human being, though guilty of sin, through conversion has made himself meritorious and worthy to be loved by God, “then the pronouncement of the judge proceeds from love”'” and by this, he elects human beings “as his own” and brings them to salvation. Kant concludes: “this again does not yield the concept of a divine justice but must at best be deferred to a wisdom whose rule is an absolute mystery to us." 10 a Religion, Ak 6, 143. Religion, Ak 6, 143. See Religion, 6: 115: “We call the faith of every individual receptive of [worthy of] eternal happiness, a saving faith." Religion, Ak 6, 76. Religion, Ak 6, 143. Religion, Ak 6, 146n. Religion, Ak 6, 146n. Religion, Ak 6, 142. 10. 8 105 10 a 10 a 10 æ 10 © 11 o e 239 + Daréczi-Sepsi-Vassänyi_Initiation_155x240.indb 239 6 2020.06.15. 11:04:22
