Abstract

The Malebranchian Reception of Pascal’s Anthropology. The Question of the Transmission of Original Sin. The comparison between the theoretical positions of Pascal and Malebranche on the opportunity to shed light rationally on the ways of original sin proves to be highly instructive from three perspectives. On the one hand, it enlightens us on the strategy adopted in each of these apologetic projects towards the mobilization of physiological arguments with strong materialistic undertones. In return, it injects a little dynamism into their thwarted reception, especially at the time of the Enlightenment. Finally, this comparison establishes a subtle link between two authors who have been dealt with very sparsely by traditional commentaries, concerning their conception of the use of skepticism in epistemology. Thus, through the problem of the ways of sin transmission, this is not a rethinking of the relationships between reason and faith, but is, rather, a particular use of reason and of Descartes’ analyses.