Offenbarung, Vernunft und Religion

Jan Rohls has put the group of ideas surrounding »Revelation, Reason and Religion« at the beginning of his The History of Christian Ideas. He goes back to antiquity, during which Christian theology was regarded as the true philosophy and Christianity could be seen as a manifestation of reason. It was not until the Middle Ages that a clear distinction between reason and revelation was made, and the Reformation also adhered to this distinction, according to which reason is a prerequisite for revelation, philosophy for theology. When the prevalent Aristotelianism was replaced by newer philosophical systems, there was a more intense focus on the question of the relationship between revelation and reason during the Enlightenment. At the same time Christianity was regarded as a religion in the sense that it was an integral part of human nature, and as a historical event, which meant that the relationship between religion and reason became a problem.