Skip Navigation



Literature and Theology Advance Access published online on April 3, 2008
Literature and Theology, doi:10.1093/litthe/frn013
This Article
Right arrow Full Text
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Podmore, S. D.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

© The Author 2008. Published by Oxford University Press 2008; all rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Crucified by God: Kazantzakis and The Last Anfechtung of Christ*

Simon D. Podmore

Howard and Edna Hong Kierkegaard Library, St Olaf College, Northfield, MN 55057, USA

podmore{at}stolaf.edu


  Abstract

Christ's struggles in Nikos Kazantzakis's The Last Temptation against temptations of the flesh and trials of the spirit can be read as a post/modern analogy of the differentiation—as formulated by Martin Luther and reaffirmed by Søren Kierkegaard—between earthly ‘temptation’ [Versuchung] and divinely instigated spiritual trial [Anfechtung]. Moreover, Kazantzakis's novel enriches previous literature on Anfechtung by vividly and appositely illustrating how Anfechtung and temptation may coexist antagonistically within the same trial of Christ. Through this Kierkegaardian-Lutheran lens, Kazantzakis's novel may thus be read as evocatively transcribing a humanistic rendition of the angefochtene Christus which implicitly collapses the ‘infinite qualitative difference’ between humanity and divinity so essential to Kierkegaard's own modern rehabilitation of the archaic notion of Anfechtung.

‘God himself is crucifying him!’1


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?




Disclaimer:
Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.