Page 120 - Eclipse of God

Religion and Ethics 93

cally different human dimension. The absolute norm is given
to show the way that leads before the face of the Absolute.
The presupposition for this connection between the ethical
and the religious, however, is the basic view that man, while cre-
ated by God, was established by Him in an independence which
has since remained undiminished. In this independence he
stands over against God. So man takes part with full freedom
and spontaneity in the dialogue between the two which forms
the essence of existence. That this is so despite God’s unlimited
power and knowledge is just that which constitutes the mys-
tery of man’s creation. In this is founded the lasting reality of
the distinction and decision which man consummates in his
soul.
The stream of Christianity, flowing over the world from the
source of Israel and strengthened by mighty influxes, especially
the Iranian and the Greek, arose at a time in Hellenistic civ-
ilization, and especially in its religious life, when the element
of the people was being displaced by that of the individual.
Christianity is “Hellenistic” insofar as it surrenders the concept
of the “holy people” and recognizes only a personal holiness.
Individual religiousness thus attains a hitherto unheard- of in-
tensity and inwardness, especially since the ever- present image
of Christ permits the individual a far more concrete relation of
following after and imitation than does the imageless nature
of the God of Israel, who is a self- revealing but not less a self-
concealing (in no way, to be sure, as people are accustomed
to say, a hidden) God. With this God, not fixing Himself to
any form and withdrawing Himself from every manifestation,
the peoples won to Christianity would certainly not have been
able to enter into an unmediated relation. They did not stand,
like Israel, in a fundamental relationship to Him as the people
of a covenant. In connection with this Christian individualism,