Theology, political

The concept of political theology was the subject of important controversies in European, and especially German, philosophy, social science and jurisprudence in the twentieth century. After the First World War, a debate took place between the jurist Carl Schmitt, an influential right-wing critic of parliamentary democracy in the Weimar Republic, and the theologian Erik Peterson. Another debate was occasioned by a new, leftist political interpretation of biblical texts in the years after 1960. In that context, ‘political theology’ designates philosophical positions influenced by neo-Marxist philosophies, such as the critical theory of the Frankfurt School. The earlier controversy between Schmitt and Peterson played a role in this later debate as well. Johann Baptist Metz is probably the most important representative of political theology in the later controversy.