A Study Of Martin Luther's Two Kingdoms Theory

In the Middle Ages,the Catholic Church advocated the Two Swords Theory on the relationship between politics and religion.At the same time,the Church had both the worldly authority and the spiritual authority.The worldly government submitted itself to the rule of the Church.Such claim intensified the contradictions between the Church and the worldly government,and the social order was at stake.Opposing the Two Swords Theory with the Theory of Two Kingdoms,Luther demonstrated the legality of worldly power,divided the boundaries of worldly power and spiritual power,and reconstructed the social order of the Christian state,exerting far-reaching influences on later generations.Fettered by the times and social environment,the Theory of Two Kingdoms also has its limitations which need to be treated dialectically.By clarifying the ideological sources,theological foundation,historical formation process and logical system of the Theory of Two Kingdoms,the paper dialectically analyzes the theory and its influences on later generations.The whole paper is divided into four chapters.The first chapter expounds the necessity to study the Theory of Two Kingdoms by means of literature review.In the second chapter,the theoretical foundation of Luther 's Theory of Two Kingdoms was grasped by analyzing the ideological sources and theological foundation of the theory.As the central part of the paper,the third chapter discusses the content of the Theory and dialectically evaluates it from the perspective of its historical formation process and logical system.In the fourth chapter,Luther's Theory of Two Kingdoms is connected with the modern society to explore the influences of the Theory on the modern society.