CRUCIFIED BY GOD: KAZANTZAKIS AND THE LAST ANFECHTUNG OF CHRIST

Christ's struggles in Nikos Kazantzakis's The Last Temptation against temptations of the flesh and trials of the spirit can be read as a post/modern analogy of the differentiation-as formulated by Martin Luther and reaffirmed by Soren Kierkegaard-between earthly 'temptation' [Versuchung] and divinely instigated spiritual trial [Anfechtung]. Moreover, Kazantzakis's novel enriches previous literature on Anfechtung by vividly and appositely illustrating how Anfechtung and temptation may coexist antagonistically within the same trial of Christ. Through this Kierkegaardian-Lutheran lens, Kazantzakis's novel may thus be read as evocatively transcribing a humanistic rendition of the angefochtene Christus which implicitly collapses the 'infinite qualitative difference' between humanity and divinity so essential to Kierkegaard's own modern rehabilitation of the archaic notion of Anfechtung.