Dual anthropology as imago Dei

Abstract

There are two important contributions of Edith Stein to the subject of this article: 1) her anthropological proposal which brilliantly synthesizes the phenomenological analysis of the human being inaugurated by Edmund Husserl and the contribution of medieval philosophy through the reading, in particular, of the texts of Augustine and Thomas Aquinas; 2) her personal reflection on the question of feminism, which was spreading in her time in Germany, a reflection that leads to her theory of which I define as a "dual anthropology". While investigating the male and female human being, Stein puts herself in different points of view: psychological, sociological, historical, philosophical and even teological, which allows her to comprehensively analyse a complex phenomenon envolving human customs, which has been happening for millenia in mankind history: the submission of the feminine. She proposes, on the contrary, equality between both, even in difference. Researching the origins of this phenomenon from the theological point of view, Edith Stein refers to the Scriptures of the Judeo-Christian tradition and revisits the contribution of Genesis and the action of the Redemption of Jesus Christ. It is a proposal that should be considered truly constructive and, in our view, one of the most important in the field of gender studies; in it one can find a convincing critique of inconsistent theories from contemporary culture.