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An Exploration of the Relationship between the Doctrine of Law and Gospel and that of the Two Governments and Its Social Ethical Implications: Focusing on Luther and Barth

  • The Korean Journal of Chiristian Social Ethics
  • Abbr : 기사윤
  • 2016, (34), pp.139-174
  • DOI : 10.21050/CSE.34.05
  • Publisher : The Society Of Korean Christian Social Ethics
  • Research Area : Humanities > Christian Theology

Lee, Chang-Ho 1

1장로회신학대학교

Accredited

ABSTRACT

Protestant soteriology is basically personal(or private) in that salvation is examined in terms of spiritual relationship between God and individual believers. The doctrine of ‘law and gospel’ is crucial to doctrinal discussions about such personal salvation. Generally speaking, repenting sins, acknowledging the gospel and receiving God’s justification in the work of the law are key to the ‘salvation of justification by faith.’ If this is the case, are law and gospel the revelatory medium that discloses God’s will only about personal salvation? Luther addresses the civil( or social) use of the law which has to do with legal and administrative systems regulating socio-political communities. While Barth honors Luther’s emphasis on the continuity between the doctrine of law and gospel and that of the two governments, he develops his own notion of the continuity in a way that reinforces the unity of law and gospel (as well as the spiritual government and the secular government) in Christo-centric terms. The aim of this paper is to investigate the relationship between the doctrine of ‘law and gospel’ and that of the two governments and to explore its social ethical implications. To fulfill this, I will explicate Luther’s and Barth’s doctrines of ‘law and gospel’ and of ‘the two governments’ and explore the correlation of these two doctrines in terms of their analogy(or similarities). Based on this theological and ethical investigation, I attempt to extrapolate some ethical implications and compare these two theologians, highlighting similarities and differences among the two.

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