Journal articles on the topic 'Theology of law'

This article contrasts natural theology’s vicissitudes in recent centuries with its more promising prospects in contemporary philosophy and theology. It interrogates certain genres of theology regarding their relation to natural theology, focusing on feminist theology, eco-theology, apologetics and the theology of natural law. It concludes with a reflection on the aspects of natural theology that are particularly prominent at present, and asks if the degree of revival currently enjoyed by natural theology may even be the precursor of a greater role in the academy.

The relation of religious law to theology is basic to any faith community. In this article, chiefly in terms of Roman Catholicism, but it is hoped of wider application especially within Christianity, the relation of canon law to theology is examined through papal allocutions to the judges and other members of the Church court known as the Roman Rota. There are significant British links to the Rota before and after the Reformation. The 2009 allocution by Benedict XVI is the focus for considering the theological and normative authority of such allocutions. Pius XII has been one of the few canonists to become Pope in modern times, and the co-ordinated set of allocutions from 1945 to 1949 given by him to the Rota is therefore taken as the focus for reflecting on the nature and functions of canon law today. This involves the consideration of both theology and law, including secular law. The ecclesiological character of canon law will emerge as central.

“Legal theology” must mean more than theological reflection on legal topics just as “feminist theology” means more than theological reflection on “women's issues.” This is no simple application procedure, but a dynamic interaction between two fields of play, each with an internal variety of methods, considerations, and arguments. Amidst the varieties of Christian theology, Christian feminist theology has distinct methodological features that reflect experiences of subjugation and political commitments to equality and mutuality. Similarly, Christian legal theology—should it in fact develop—cannot claim to represent all Christian reflection as though Christian theology is monolithic and neutrally applied to a stagnant list of legal topics. Rather, Christian legal theology would reflect a distinctive way of doing theology in light of experiences, commitments, and practices within the “world of law.” Given the variety internal to Christian theology and the world of law, the configurations for Christian legal theology are indeed myriad.

AbstractPolitical Theology and International Lawoffers an account of the intellectual debates surrounding the term “political theology” in academic literature concerning international law. Beneath these differences is a shared tradition, or genre, within the literature that reinforces particular styles of characterising and engaging predicaments in global politics. The text develops an argument toward another way of thinking about what political theology might offer international law scholarship – a politics of truth.

Ecclesiology is the study of the church which explores the origins, nature, and purposes of the church universal. Its method includes developing categories to indicate the attributes of the church, as e.g. one, holy, catholic, and apostolic; the people of God; and the fellowship of the spirit. One aim of ecclesiology is to teach and help us understand what may be authentic, required, permissible, or appropriate church structures, such as in ministry, government, discipleship, evangelism, worship, and teaching. Legal theology might be considered to be a branch of ecclesiology. Many scholars refer to church law as applied ecclesiology, and in so doing they speak of a “theology of church law” and a “theology in church law.” The former is a doctrinal and perhaps more speculative exercise; the latter is more descriptive and scientific.

This paper outlines a constructive account of natural law for the twenty-first century, rooted in the Reformed theological and confession heritage. It suggests how natural law can provide us with a deep theological way of affirming the existence of an objectively meaningful natural order, discusses the importance of natural law for maintaining the accountability of all human beings before the divine judgment, and reflects on how natural law serves as crucial foundation for the church’s ministry of the gospel to a hurting and needy world.

In the post-9/11 environment, the American Muslim community has finallyrealized that it can no longer keep the rest of American society at arm’s lengthwhile seeking to establish its own infrastructure and ensuring its continuity asa distinct community. One example of this community’s increased participationin American civil society is its new-found interest in interfaith dialogue.With such reasoning in mind, the Muslim community has partnered with variousfaith communities to create the National Religious Campaign againstTorture (NRCAT), which was launched during the “Theology, InternationalLaw, and Torture: A Conference on Human Rights and Religious Commitment”conference sponsored by Princeton Theological Seminary, 13-15 January2006, in Princeton, New Jersey.Religious leaders from across the nation, as well as Mohamed Elsanousi(director, Communication and Community Outreach, Islamic Society ofNorth America [ISNA]) Mohammed Shafiq (executive director, Center forInterfaith Studies and Dialogue, Nazareth College, and imam, IslamicCenter of Rochester); and Azhar Azeez (member, ISNA Executive Council and director, Islamic Association of Carrollton) as representatives of ISNA,worked together at this conference to build a powerful, spiritually basedcoalition. Over 160 eminent religious and academic figures, authors, journalists,retired government and military officers, human rights activists, andlawyers spoke ...

Theology, the study of God, consists of a network of subdisciplines: biblical theology, moral theology, ecumenical theology, and so on. Each branch of theology has its own distinctive object of study, methods, and purposes. For example, pneumatology studies the Holy Spirit, practical theology uses the pastoral cycle, and liberation theology seeks to transform unjust societal structures that oppress the marginalized. Each branch of theology has its own distinctive community of scholars. It is a common view (though perhaps a contested one, as between the different church traditions) that the main purpose of Christian theology is to proclaim the Gospel of Christ. The branches of theology, in turn, are vehicles for each of this core purpose. Legal theology could become a branch of theology with its own distinctive objects of study, methods, and purposes. What follows explores these themes, how the subdiscipline of legal theology might be defined and developed in the context of the study of the systems of law, order, and polity, of churches across the Christian traditions that deal with, for example, forms of regulation, ministry (lay or ordained), governance (institutions and functions), discipline, doctrine, worship, rites, property, and external relations. It does so as to the following. (1) The object of study: legal theology should at its core be about the relationship between theology and church law—more particularly, the relationship between church law and each of the other branches of theology. (2) The method of study: legal theology may involve the theological study of church law and/or the legal study of theology using standard juristic methods (such as text and context, critical, historical, analytical) as well as methods used in the other branches of theology (3) The purpose of study: the development of a community of scholars collaborating with a view to its impact on ecclesial practice. Theology is indispensable to a full understanding of the place of law in the life of the church; and law provides evidence to test the propositions of theology in the practical life of the church as this is translated through norms to action.

‘It is not at all easy (humanly speaking) to wind up an Englishman to a dogmatic level’.This quotation is, of course, from Newman's Apologia, where many memorable things are said. Yet, even in England, it seems inescapable to treat of faith and doctrine if we are to consider Roman Catholic canon law. As Christian believers, consequently holding certain doctrines about Christ and his Church, we have a theology of canon law and a theology in canon law. We explore the theology of canon law whenever we consider why there is canon law at all in a Church founded on the unique saving grace of Jesus Christ, and we explore the theology in canon law whenever we consider how faith and doctrine show themselves in the making and application of canon law.

Abstract Early Reformed theology of law was very similar to Thomas Aquinas’s, although it also dissented from aspects of his work. This early Reformed thinking about law came to influential expression in the Marrow of Modern Divinity. The Marrow’s theology of law focused on concerns of Reformed soteriology while continuing to resemble much of Thomas’s scheme. This revised Reformed approach was generally helpful, yet did not give enough attention to the movement of redemptive history. Therefore, this article proposes a theology of law that incorporates earlier Reformed developments but also seeks to reform them further by taking redemptive-historical considerations into fuller account.

Abstract In contrast to much contemporary Reformed and broader evangelical theology, Francis Turretin, the great Genevan theologian of High Orthodoxy, considers natural law in favorable terms, notably under Topic 11 of his Institutes of Elenctic Theology. This essay offers an exposition of Turretin’s account of natural law and compares it to that of Thomas Aquinas. It is shown that there is substantial agreement between Turretin and Aquinas on the notion and content of natural law, despite their different approaches to the subject. This conclusion supports ongoing efforts to reevaluate and reappropriate natural law and Thomism in Reformed theology.

THE END OF THE LAW? Law, Theology, and Neuroscience by David W. Opderbeck. Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2021. 260 pages. Paperback; $31.00. ISBN: 9781498223898. *"It's not you but your brain." As this powerful meme has begun to characterise our generation, we encounter children under neurological treatment for their behavioral/mental deficits and seniors losing their self-identity due to neurological degeneration. It is indeed evident that our mental experiences are bound to our brain states--yet are we really nothing else than our brain? Many intellectuals of our day argue so--our psyche is an epiphenomenon of our brain state, and so we have no free will. *Recent advances in neuroscience, especially with non-invasive neuroimaging techniques enabling scientists to "read out" one's decision ahead of a person being consciously aware of their own decision, have underpinned a new movement called neurolaw. According to neurolawyers, humans are no longer legally or morally accountable for their behaviors as science leaves no room for the existence of free will; consequently, law should be re-oriented from retribution to treatment of criminals. Indeed, neurolaw seeks "to explain and reform the legal system from the ground up based on neuroscience" (p. 2). Despite, or because of, its radicality, the neurolaw movement can be an attractive alternate to the legal tradition of Western civilization, which is rapidly losing its Greco-Roman/Christian foundations in law and ethics. It is also in line with the trend that our contemporaries increasingly seek justice through facts/science and empathy instead of transcendent values and rationality. *Although neurolawyers optimistically hope that this shift will lead our world from conflicts in subjective values/beliefs to facts of science, and from moral retribution to humane treatment of criminals, in this book Seton Hall University Law School Professor David Opderbeck carefully considers their optimism legally, philosophically, and theologically--and concludes that, with no place for transcendence, their optimism is misplaced. Neurolaw's reductionism loses not only the place of personal responsibility in law and jurisprudence, but loses a rich and complex understanding of human nature and relationality. Opderbeck argues that theology can defend the transcendence of law and human morality, without losing its integrity to science, by understanding the laws of nature as empowering nature to fulfill its telos--its divine purpose. This move is key to a unified epistemological view on science and law, such that human-made laws empower humans with freedom and personhood--physically, legally, and morally. Consequently, the author reframes positive law (i.e., human-made law) as calling humans to the divine law of love. *In the first three chapters, Opderbeck illustrates how Western law made the historical shift from its foundational transcendent values, through legal positivism, to neurolaw. Contrary to the contemporary jurisprudential trend, the four rudiments of Western law, i.e., Ancient Greek, Roman, Hebrew, and Christian jurisprudence, commonly state that positive law has transcendent sources and is preceded by the ideal of law or universal moral principles (chap. 1). In contrast, today's Anglo-American legal scholarship, dominated by legal positivism and instrumentalism, removes transcendent grounds for law, replacing it with a hope that economics and science can guide the law by providing a measurement of "good" and predictions of its outcome (chap. 3). The current reductionist trends in neuroscience paint this picture with a greater hope by revealing detailed biological determinants of human behavior. *In chapters 4 and 5, Opderbeck provides a methodological basis for his analysis in the later chapters. He favors critical realism and fides et ratio approaches as they permit separate and yet complementary research in the two domains. He then demonstrates how together these can help to uncover the meaning of the law from the facts of paleoanthropology and sociobiology. Whereas sociobiologists such as David S. Wilson suggest that the contingent evolution of social orders in animals indicates that law is a construct with no transcendence, Opderbeck highlights the emergence of unique human cognitive abilities such as abstraction, language, and writing, which he argues enable the law to transcend the social orders observed in other species. *After showing that the facts of paleoanthropology and sociobiology can be interpreted differently from a materialist view, Opderbeck continues his philosophical criticism of the reductionism/materialism on which neurolaw is based (chap. 6). He points out that the fields of neuroscience and the philosophy of mind retain positivist assumptions. The author then identifies three problems in materialistic/reductionistic/positivist views of the law. First, reductionism cannot provide a coherent epistemological ground to make a truth statement since reason and consciousness are only illusory. Second, neurolaw proposes social engineering toward achieving behavioral normalcy in the population, but this leads to obscurity in value judgement--and, more seriously, to totalitarianism. Finally, materialism easily leads to nihilism. *Opderbeck's theological vision (and counterproposal to neurolaw) is uncovered in the last three chapters of the book. In chapter 7, he discusses the ontology of the human mind and free will. For this, he rejects the nonreductive physicalism of theologians such as Nancey Murphy and Robert van Gulick. He then finds more promising a neo-Aristotelian, teleological understanding of natural law as "powers and capacities" that emerge within nature (p. 173). These, rather than deterministic neurobiological rules, can be key to theological synthesis of science and law. To him, this view not only provides a plausible causal or explanatory framework but requires complementary room for transcendence: God's trinitarian, perichoretic transcendental love provides the telos for creation, and so the purpose of positive (human-made) law is to fulfill this transcendental telos through the "powers and capacities" of natural law *Opderbeck then assigns his last chapter to an applied problem, namely the problem of violence in the enforcement of law. Indeed, this issue appears to be one of the most important motivations for neurolawyers: neuroscience seeks to transform the means of law enforcement from retributive violence to more humane, neurological treatment. Nonetheless, through discussions of Pascal, Derrida, and Agamben, the author demonstrates that the law cannot bring justice without violent enforcement. Therefore, by forgoing divine transcendence it is impossible for neurolaw to overcome the problem of the violence of law. Opderbeck thereby puts forward the necessity of Christian teleology for an ultimate hope. Law is not a matter of deterministic rules but of love and life, and law is not of enforcement but empowering. What makes humans is not our capacity to make free choices but to be free to love and live; this is our telos. *The End of the Law? is a scholarly interdisciplinary book, which crosses over the philosophies of law, mind, science, and theology in order to challenge or re-orient the current dominance of legal/scientific positivism, reductionism, and physicalism among intellectual groups. This dense book suits those who are already exposed to philosophical analysis on some of these topics (or, for readers unfamiliar with some of this terrain, but willing to do some background reading). Despite the degree to which it engages questions in philosophy, the book ultimately seeks to re-orient the law around Trinitarian theology. As this will limit its plausibility in public legal spheres, I do wonder if the philosophical argument could have been further developed for those who do not hold to Trinitarian theology (or any theology). *As a neuroscientist I would add one further note. There is little interest within neuroscience today in the problem of free will. In fact, students are discouraged from studying the question, as it is considered an unsuitable subject for scientific investigation. Most of us stay "scientifically agnostic," although individual scientists have their own philosophies or perspectives. Given that neuroscience is still restricted to a deterministic regime, free will can only be falsifiable but not verifiable, because it is widely considered beyond the laws of nature. It is, therefore, not surprising that one finds only evidence against free will, which comes from the epistemological constraints of the discipline of neuroscience today. I strongly suggest that proponents of neurolaw scrutinize at what point neuroscience reaches its methodological limits before assuming a particular ontological interpretation of experimental results to be "neuroscientific" or even unfalsifiable. The neurolaw program appears to be built without adequate recognition of these interpretive limits within neuroscience, no doubt due to its positivist assumptions. Overall, in Opderbeck's book readers will encounter rich and complex discussions across different fields integrating law, science, and theology. Although Opderbeck writes from a Roman Catholic perspective, this book does not feel like an in-house discussion--his foundational arguments are rooted in classical Trinitarian metaphysics and Protestants willing to work through Opderbeck's conceptually dense discussions will find much of value in this work. *Reviewed by Kuwook Cha, postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Physiology, McGill University, Montreal, QC H3A 0G4.

This study aims to describe the legal nature between secularism and theology. The research method used is a literature study with a qualitative descriptive approach using content analytics. The results of the research are secularism and theology is part of the school of natural law (kodrati). Secularism i.e. the rejection of religious thought from life even denies the existence of God from the reality of life whereas the center of life through reason and even secularism can resemble a new religion, hence the law is secular based solely on the will of the people's reason alone. That the legal nature of the theological dimension in the Islamic perspective, namely the narrative based on the revelation of Allah and the Sunnah of the Apostle, shows that a set of rules is extracted from and based on the revelation of the Quran and Sunnah. Law in Islam is seen as having two dimensions, namely Shari'a and fiqh. Sharia is fundamental and absolute values, impossible to change, while jurisprudence is a special field formulated by fuqaha'. Secularism in the sense of rationalism in Islam has always been guided by nash which is like thinking of a mujtahid, so the result is not too far from the truth values that nash teaches. Western rationalism, on the other hand, relies solely on the ability of reason alone, so that it is often found that a law is finally amended again because it is incompatible with the values of justice, good and bad.

The article investigates the possibility of applying political theology as a specific methodological approach to international law. As the key theses of political theology were originally formulated by C. Schmitt in the context of national law acting in a homogeneous environment, political theology discourse in the modern philosophy of international law is mainly related to the universalist projects of global law based on an analogy with national law. The first of such strategies, the expansionist strategy, presupposes the construction of global order by the world hegemon. The second, the cosmopolitan strategy, assumes that international law can be built on the basis of an ongoing process of discussion of the global order foundations by the widest possible range of actors. Both of these strategies charm “eternal peace” and are nourished by a common messianic spirit and, therefore, are utopian. However, Schmitt’s international law legacy offers an atypical non-universalist and anti-messianic view on international law as a heterogeneous global legal order based on spatial concepts. Despite the fact that the application of political theology to this kind of order is difficult, it shall not be excluded for several reasons. The pluralistic structure of the heterogeneous order can be seen as a katechon that holds back the end of history. Finally, the political theology of international law can be applied to analyze the historical transformations of the international legal order.

On October 23-25, 2009, the Journal of Law and Religion celebrated its twenty-fifth year of publication devoted to “Speaking about Law and Religion” with a Symposium that brought a diverse group of scholars. A highlight of that Symposium was a celebratory luncheon held on October 24 that featured a conversation about law and religion between Douglas Sturm, Professor Emeritus, Becknell University, and Milner Ball, Professor Emeritus, University of Georgia School of Law. These two scholars, one a theologian who takes law seriously in his work, and one a lawyer who takes theology seriously in his work, have inspired many to enter the conversation about the intersection of law and religion to which each of them have made so many contributions over the years.Among Milner Ball's many contributions is the inspiration he provides to many who, like him, seek to explore a new vision of law as an enterprise that can nurture the life of all in the world we share, and the courage he displays by drawing on theology for this task. He demonstrated this many years ago by posing a provocative question to a critic of his work who said, “she did not want or expect theology” in reading a draft of his book Lying Down Together: Law, Metaphor, and Theology. Milner's response was “if not theology, then what?” Since then he has continued to offer his own contributions that take this question seriously at the very heart of his work. Two notable examples, The Word and the Law (University of Chicago Press 1993), and Called by Stories: Biblical Sagas and their Challenge for Law (Duke University Press 2000).

Between 1670 and 1687, Locke wrote some classifications of the branches of knowledge and some adversaria containing guidelines for the writing of commonplace books. Both are to be found in his notebooks and journals. Locke’s classifications represent an important source for investigating the role and relevance he attributed to traditional academic disciplines such as Theologia, Metaphysica, and Physica, and, in particular, his manner of conceiving of the object of theology. With reference to the latter, the classifications show important modifications over time: the first schemes (1670–72) are representative of a naturalistic approach to theology, whereas later schemes (1681) are more sensitive to the model introduced by the theological systems of Reformed theologians such as Polanus and Ames, who insisted on the practical dimension of the discipline. ‘Ethica sive lex naturae’, one of the subheadings of Theologia in Locke’s earlier classifications, is absent from those he wrote in 1681, having been substituted by ‘Moralia’: this substitution seems to be motivated by Locke’s intention to emphasize the relevance of the performance of moral duties, the objects of ‘Moralia’, in Christian life. In a later scheme dating from c.1686–7, Locke remoulds his manner of classifying completely—the outline is similar in some respects to the division of the sciences on the last pages of the Essay concerning Human Understanding. Theologia is subsumed under Physica, whereas Politia and Prudentia, two of the main headings in Locke’s earlier classifications, are positioned under a new heading, Practica, inspired by the Aristotelian model. Ethics is located under this heading, before Politia and Prudentia. This ordering might be due to Locke’s intention to emphasize the priority of ethics and its basis, natural law, with respect to politics and civil law, a priority which was not clearly represented in his previous schemes. In order to investigate the role and relevance attributed to ethics and natural law in Locke’s various classifications, I will focus on each scheme separately; in the conclusion, attention will be drawn to another, later outline of Theologia which Locke composed in 1694, where ethics is once again one of the branches of theology but there is no longer any mention of natural law. Revelation, not natural law, appears to be the basis of ethics in this later scheme.

In Makassar City, located in South Sulawesi, one of the contributing factors to divorce is the level of theological comprehension or grasp of the teachings of the Islamic faith. Comprehension of the theology can shape perspectives on the duties of the husband and the wife within the marriage institution. This study employs a qualitative-empirical methodology using a theology of law framework. Theology of law is a methodological approach in Islamic studies that focuses on integrating and interconnecting many aspects. The data was gathered through comprehensive interviews and analysis of documents. The informants interviewed were husband and wife who had divorced. The research findings indicate a robust correlation between theology and the Islamic law. An individual with a moderate and contextual theological comprehension will likewise possess a flexible and moderate comprehension of the Islamic legislation. Conversely, an individual with a limited and inflexible comprehension of theology will interpret the Islamic law based on the Qur’an and likely have extremist perspectives. Moreover, the incidence of divorce is a manifestation of Allah SWT's decree or fate. In Jabariyah theology, the acceptance of fate leads to a lack of initiative in pursuing settlement through the established religious courts. These theological reasons are not independent, but rather influenced by economic circumstances and inherited issues that contribute to conflict and discord, ultimately resulting in divorce. From a legal theology standpoint, it is important to highlight that an interpretation of theology that passively submits to and embraces destiny, without making any attempts at reconciliation, leads to divorce, resulting in a failure to effectively apply the Islamic law. According to the Islamic law, a divorce is preceded by a mediation process in a religious court, during which the husband and the wife are given the opportunity to carefully consider all the adverse consequences.

This article discusses environmental theology with Islamic law from the perspective of scholars and scholars in Makassar City, South Sulawesi. The research uses qualitative methods with a theological approach and Islamic law as an analytical tool. Theology is used to analyze Islamic concepts of the environment as opposed to Islamic law. In obtaining the data, researchers interviewed religious figures who became role models for the people of Makassar, in addition to using literature study techniques. The results showed that Makassarese Muslim scholars are well aware that environmental theology is an alternative solution to overcome the environmental crisis. They believe that the two main sources of Islam, the Quran and Hadith, pay great attention to the protection and maintenance of the environment. Similarly, Prophet Muhammad PBUH is the best example among leaders who care deeply about the environment. Furthermore, this study also concludes that first, environmental theology is a theology that not only discusses man's relationship with God but also discusses man's relationship with social, cultural, environmental, and social reality. Environmental theology focuses on the extent of human concern for nature and the environment. Second, the foundation of environmental theology can be traced from two main sources of Islam, namely the Qur'an, and Hadith. The Qur'an pays great attention to the protection and preservation of the environment. Likewise, Prophet Muhammad PBUH, in his various traditions also emphasized the importance of protecting and maintaining the environment. Third, environmental theology is closely related to Islamic law specifically ecological fiqh, which focuses on practical explanations of how to protect the environment. If environmental theology is oriented towards philosophical foundations in environmental conservation, then Islamic law requires the importance of protecting the environment as a benefit for humans and nature.

Lady Damaris Cudworth Masham, an English philosopher and theologian, holds a distinctive place in the intellectual discourse of late seventeenth century England. As the daughter of Ralph Cudworth, a prominent Cambridge Platonist, and a close friend and student of John Locke, Damaris Masham participated in a number of discussions at once, related in one way or another to the basic tenets of Christian theology and moral philosophy. The first of these is a dispute with the English Malebranchians, primarily John Norris and his intellectual companion Mary Astell, regarding the concept of the love of God. The second important debate concerned the defence of John Locke's rational Christianity against attacks from deists and enthusiasts. In addition to the defence of moderate conformist theology against radical non-conformism, Masham's writings also offer a special vision of Christian moral life, in which there is room for pleasures, the precepts of natural law and the commandments of Christian Revelation. Natural law occupies an important, but underexplored place in Masham's moral philosophy and theology. This paper is intended to fill said gap and is devoted to the reconstruction of Masham's approach to natural law and its connection with other crucial concepts of her moral theology: pleasures, sociability, reason, Revelation. In order to accomplish this goal, we interpret Masham's writings in light of relevant contexts and consider them as polemical arguments in which natural law plays an important, but limited role.

Kant rejected ‘theological morality’, insisting that no one, including God, can be the ‘author’ of the moral law because the moral law is a categorically necessary, non-positive law. Kant was also no religious enthusiast and clearly intended to rule out certain kinds of dependence of ethics on theology. Such considerations make it tempting to suggest that Kant was fully committed to what has been called the ‘autonomy of ethics’ from theology. Yet an observant reader of Kant's corpus is constantly confronted with passages in which Kant discusses philosophical theology, connections between moral philosophy and theology, and even argues that we should ‘recognize all our duties as divine commands’ (KpV, 5: 129).

One of the ways of thinking God in contemporary philosophy is reflecting on violence. In fact, reflecting on violence implies always at the same time to refer to the difficulty of thinking about the co-implication of law and violence, a typical prerogative of divine action. From this perspec-tive, political theology is concerned with the status and the possibilities or impossibilities of rep-resenting violence in a given political order. Three are the classical texts in the backdrop of this reflection on the hiatus between law and violence: Walter Benjamin Critique of Violence of 1921, Carl Schmitt’s Political Theology of 1922 and Derrida’s Force of Law of 1989. The article exam-ines another paradigm, that of Ernesto Laclau. The article concludes that only a non-presentable idea of God as a negative fundament allows for a non-authoritarian political idea. But this non-presentable character is only made possible by revolutionary politics.

Wolfhart Pannenberg is considered by many to be one of the preeminent living Protestant theologians. Now retired, Pannenberg's active career spanned almost five decades. From 1968 to 1994 he was Professor of Systematic Theology at the University of Munich; previously he taught in Mainz and Wuppertal in Germany. Pannenberg has published prolifically, culminating with his three-volumeSystematic Theology. Even in retirement, Pannenberg has continued to publish extensively, producing several volumes over the past decade. He has lectured in the U.S. on numerous occasions, and many of his books and articles have appeared in English translation. In this country, Pannenberg is generally associated with the theology of hope, a now-dated movement that was characterized by an emphasis on eschatology and the proleptic anticipation of the future through the events of history. But that association reflects only a limited aspect of Pannenberg's lengthy career, one since eclipsed by the further development of his thinking and concerns.The breadth of Pannenberg's interests is vast. In addition to his concentration on the classical themes of theology, he has explored other subjects from a theological perspective, among them sociology, science, nature, anthropology, politics and ethics. Over the course of his career, Pannenberg has repeatedly addressed questions of law and jurisprudence, beginning with essays in the early 1960s and continuing up to a publication that appeared in 2004. For the most part, these writings consist of thematic essays, a form Pannenberg has used extensively for a wide variety of subjects. In addition to these essays, portions of Pannenberg's larger works treat law and jurisprudential themes, though as subsidiary topics. His continuing concern with law reflects his view that law is strongly tied to ethics, an area to which he has devoted more attention after he completed hisSystematic Theology. Taken together, Pannenberg's writings on law constitute a coherent and reasonably well-articulated theory of law, though one that has unfortunately received limited attention, and no sustained exposition in English. Nonetheless, because of Pannenberg's prominence, and because of his incisive analysis, his work on law deserves attention in this country as well.

Abstract Some scholars have contrasted Calvin’s and Edwards’s understanding regarding the third use of the law. They believe that Calvin emphasized the third use of the law for believers’ sanctification and that there is no room for virtue ethics in Calvin’s theology, while Edwards’s ethics is virtue ethics and there is no room for the third use of the law in Edwards’s theology. In contrast, this article uncovers that both Calvin’s and Edwards’s ethics combine features of both virtue ethics and divine command ethics. Accordingly, Edwards holds the same view as Calvin regarding the third use of the law.

The arrangement of Islamic law in the Indonesian legal system, which is manifested in statutory regulations, is an indication that Islamic law has become part of the Indonesian legal system. This is interesting when viewed using Thomas Aquinas' legal theology which introduces a legal dichotomy based on its sources, namely lex aeterna, lex naturalist, and lex humana. The dichotomy becomes a perspective to see at what level Islamic law is embedded in the Indonesian legal system. This research examines the existence of arrangement of Islamic law in statutory regulations from the perspective of legal theology, with research questions: (a) What is the justification for the arrangement of Islamic law substance in the Indonesian legal system? (b) How is the arrangement of the substance of Islamic law in the Indonesian legal system when viewed from the teachings of Thomas Aquinas' legal theology? This is normative legal research, by analyzing secondary data in the form of laws and libraries related to the arrangement of Islamic law and the teachings of the legal theology of Thomas Aquinas. The results indicate that the justification for the arrangement of the substance of Islamic law in the Indonesian legal system has a strong foothold because it is stated in the Pancasila "God Almighty" and Article 29 of the 1945 Constitution of the Republic of Indonesia. The teachings of legal theology of Thomas Aquinas show that arrangement of the substance of Islamic law in statutory regulations does not necessarily reduce the degree of Islamic law, because the substance of Islamic law in statutory regulations does not transform lex aeterna into lex humana.

Here is a model for “legal theology,” a way of learning and teaching about God that arises in and responds to the desire to understand the significance of law: a son is moved to ask “what is the meaning” of the law followed by his father, and the father is commanded to explain by teaching about God's deliverance. There are three similar commands in Exodus (Exodus 12:26, 13:8, 13:14), linked in tradition, where sons wonder and fathers are commanded to explain how a particular law signifies God's redemption. These four commands in Exodus and Deuteronomy indicate a method for legal theology.

ABSTRACTRichard Hooker's theology of law was rarely far from pragmatic concerns. He wanted to promote a peaceful and prosperous human community before God while holding that moral right consists in conformity to the divine will. In this paper, we tread a narrow path between Hooker as ‘villain’ because of his role in preparing for the modern separation of ethics from metaphysics and as ‘unqualified hero’ whose ethically substantive and teleological theology of law took inspiration from Holy Scripture and the angels' worship of God. The claim is that Hooker's theology of law still provides a fertile environment in which to think practically today about questions such as: What is the nature of divine authority? What is law for? What should characterize the human exercise of authority?

The paper considers the relationship between law and theology within the Covenant Code. The first part of the discussion reviews the influence of the "divine law" hypotheses of Alt and Noth, on contemporary scholarship. Particular reference is made to the consequences which Weinfeld draws from this hypothesis, for his view of the secularisation process in the Deuteronomic code.