Particular court

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The Archangel Michael weighing souls, fresco in the parish church of Aulzhausen

The particular court (“personal court”, “individual court” also “special court”) is the subject of the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Churches on the fate of the soul after death. The particular judgment is one of the so-called four last things : death, judgment, heaven and hell. In the particular court, the good and bad deeds of a person are weighed up immediately after their death.

In Christian iconography , the Archangel Michael is assigned the role of “ soul weigher ” at judgment .

Theology of the particular court

According to the Gospels and Acts of the Apostles , at the end of time the dead will rise to be tried before the judge Jesus Christ , who will judge according to God's direction. The main difference between the particular judgment and the final judgment is that the particular judgment takes place immediately after the death of every person and not on Judgment Day. It is about God's judgment on the soul of the individual and is not, like the Last Judgment, connected at the same time with the resurrection of the body. The doctrine of the particular judgment developed in connection with the doctrine of the purgatory about the purification that a soul experiences after death if it is not taken directly into heaven as holy.

According to the writings of some early Church Fathers such as Justin Martyr , Irenaeus and Clement of Alexandria, and the church writer Tertullian , the saved souls will not be admitted to Heaven until Judgment Day and will spend the time between death and resurrection in a beautiful place, where they awaited their glorification.

The Doctor of the Church Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) justifies the particular judgment in his Summa theologica : Every person is both an individual and part of the whole human race. Therefore, he deserves a double judgment. The individual judgment is spoken about him after death, "but not for the body, but only for the soul". The second judgment must "take place over him as part of the whole human race". The punishment would be completed in the last judgment, "for after him the wicked are tormented in body and soul at the same time".

The bull Benedictus Deus Pope Benedict XII. of 1336 about the divine vision of souls after death (Visio beatifica) also states that the souls of those who have died in mortal sin "descend immediately after their death into the underworld, where they are tormented with the torments of hell".

In the Catechism of the Catholic Church , referring to St. Irenaeus, Pope Benedict XII. and the documents of the Council of Trent :

“Each person receives eternal retribution in his immortal soul at the moment of death. This happens in a special judgment that relates his life to Christ - either through purification or by entering directly into heavenly bliss or by immediately damning himself forever. "

historian

The medievalist Philippe Ariès argues that the doctrine of the particular court gained importance in the course of the 14th and 15th centuries. Ariès sees the reason for this in the growing importance of the individual, who in the late Middle Ages increasingly dealt with the preparation for a good death ( Ars moriendi ).

The Russian historian Aron Gurevich takes a controversial position . He is of the opinion that both courts - Last Judgment and Particular Judgment - coexisted independently in the imagination of the entire Middle Ages . Gurevich speaks of a “paradoxical coexistence” between what he calls the “small eschatology ” and the “great eschatology” that affects every individual in two ways: when it comes to his own fate and at the same time for him as a member of the community that will be judged on Judgment Day.

For the French historian Jacques Le Goff , the development of the particular court at the end of the 12th century was analogous to the development of the doctrine of the purgatory.

See also

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ^ John McHugh, Particular Judgment in The Catholic Encyclopedia , Vol. 8. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1910 http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08550a.htm
  2. ^ Summa theologica, q. 88
  3. ^ Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1022