Протестантская либеральная теология XIX века: модели мировоззренческой секуляризации

Вопросы теологии. 2025. Т. 7. № 3. С. 375–391.

Zolotukhin V. V.

This paper aims to describe strategies of worldview secularisation in Protestant liberal theology. The research argues, there exists at least three such strategies. The first is left-Hegelian (from Strauss’s The Life of Jesus to L. Feuerbach and K. Marx). Within its framework, the speculative-idealist doctrine of the self-knowledge of divine Reason through human by means of biblical criticism, is reinterpreted, so that human becomes not the only perfect manifestation of the divine idea, but its creator. In this way the soft apologia of religion is transformed into its criticism. The second model is inclusive-theological. Here the conflict between science and religion is eliminated in such a way that religion becomes an ethical hermeneutics of the Scripture based on an actual consensus within the religious community. In this case, religious ideology tends to be assimilated by liberal democracy. The third model grows out of the second, while cognitive caution leads to consistent inclusivism with simultaneous cessation of theorizing about religion. These worldview shifts quickly, almost synchronously, began to be reflected in the legislation of European states concerning the teaching of religion and theology.

Keywords: религиоведение, секуляризация, religious studies, secularisation, Protestant theology, протестантская теология