based on the feeling of absolute dependence. A religious recognition
of this assumption must occur a priori, as a realization of basic facts.
Recognition is thus an attachment to the starting point of religious
thinking. It is attached to something that is‘always already assumed
in every pious self-consciousness’.^151 In this sense, it is a part of the
condition of the possibility of understanding religious matters.
WhileAnerkennungfigures prominently in the description of the
feeling of absolute dependence, it remains an auxiliary concept that
highlights the actual point that religious consciousness manifests this
feeling. Schleiermacher joins the tradition of Zinzendorf and Spalding
in claiming that recognition occurs a priori; it is not a consent to
rational argument but a presupposition of later religious reflection. As
an auxiliary concept recognition has a somewhat thin content; in
another context, Schleiermacher can speak of‘recognized doctrines’^152
that constitute the corpus of dogmatics. This way of speaking may be
reminiscent of Fichte’slegaluseoftheterm.
Schleiermacher’s most important and influential use ofanerkennen
is found in the statement regarding justification:
That God justifies the person who converts entails that God forgives his
sins and recognizes him as a child of God. This change of a person’s
relationship to God occurs only when he has a true faith in the
Redeemer.^153This place is (i) the clearest early source of the explicit terminological
expression of justification as recognition in the sense of downward
divine act. Although we found some roots of this view in Luther (see
section 2.6), here the idea is unequivocally stated. More importantly,
(ii) this quote shows how theology in the modern era starts to
claim explicitly that humans are recognized by God. Although we
have encountered various ways to express mutuality, the oldagnitio
veritatis nevertheless meant primarily the human recognition of
religious truth and authority in the sense of upward recognition.
Now God is the subject of downward recognition. In addition, (iii)
Schleiermacher employs the old resources of Roman law (cf. section
2.1) that speak aboutfilium agnoscere, recognizing a child.
Whether Schleiermacher here assumes Fichte’s and Hegel’s view
that recognition occurs in a mutual and person-constituting fashion
(^151) Der christliche Glaube, §32, 201. (^152) Der christliche Glaube, §27, 175.
(^153) Der christliche Glaube, §109, 191.
The Modern Era 145