Abstract

This paper discusses the meaning of the Last Judgment as an act of fulfillment of justice, an inevitable “universal transformation” of mankind. The author points out the distinctive role of the Last Judgment in Western tradition, examines the consistency of the Western idea of God, and then suggests that our conceptualizations of the Last Judgment are distorted by discounting the question of how humankind might be embraced by “divine mercy”. The paper extensively refers to History as Apocalypse by Thomas Altizer, and The Drama of the Hope for Salvation by Wacław Hryniewicz.