Abstract

Before setting up the notion of “creation of the self,” Sartre intends to defeat the very concept of creation on the ontological level. He makes the statement that the created entity would not enjoy the least autonomy because it would depend wholly upon its creator. Sartre maintains that a created being cannot escape divine subjectivity, unless it is self-supported and self-sustained, that is, uncreated. Catholic scholar Sertillanges completely changes the deal: in his view, it is because of its existential autonomy that some entity may be described in terms of dependence upon a creator, which does not jeopardize the autonomy of the creature. Focusing on the arguments rather than on the broader topic of self-creation in existentialism, this paper compares these two accounts of what the metaphysical thesis of creation amounts to.