“The doctrine of Apokatastasis. A reconstruction of the history of the concept and an attempt at a philosophical interpretation”, June 10th, 2017

In the context of the second part of the block seminar for graduate, doctoral and habilitating students that took place on Saturday June 10th, 2017, at Melk Abbey, Francesco Ghia held a lecture headed “The doctrine of Apokatastasis. A reconstruction of the history of the concept and an attempt at a philosophical interpretation”. Francesco Ghia, who is Professor for Political Philosophy at the University of Trento, examines authors like Humboldt, Rosmini, Troeltsch, Weber and Jellinek in particular in the course of his research. In his lecture, he treated the history of the theological concept “apokatastasis” since Origen – the doctrine of the restoration of all things at the end of time. Starting from the central question as to the possibility of universal salvation Ghia reconstructed the debate around this controversial theologumenon from late Antiquity to Dante, Leibniz, Kant, Lessing, Herder, Hegel up until the 20th century (Bonhoeffer, Taubes) and present times. In the course of the discussion following the lecture the necessity of a renewal and actualization of the theological questions to which the doctrine of apokatastasis is linked was stressed above all: the challenge of thinking an alliance between man and God which persists even when broken.