What Luther discovered, which we too often hide from, is the theological and existential discovery that God is crucified, that the monster takes God, that death and separation destroy God. And this is not to be celebrated, but despaired. Just like Paul, we are in much fear and trembling. For Luther, like Nietzsche, God is dead. But unlike Nietzsche, Luther is more radical, for it is not our conceptions of God that are dead, but God in Godself. For Luther, God is dead, dead on a cross by choice. The monster has taken God (for God desires to be so with us in the real world, a world where death is our destiny, that God too takes on this destiny).

–Andrew Root, The Promise of Despair, p. 72

Painting by Nata Era

Tags:andrew rootDeath of GodDespairLutherNietzsche