The end and purpose of law

Hans Barion and Gustav Radbruch on spiritual and temporal authority

Bibliographic Data

ID9957005
AuthorsMårten Björk (0000-0002-7866-6094, corresponding author)
Year2025
Volume79
Issue1
Pages39-58
Publication date2025-01-02
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueStudia Theologica - Nordic Journal of Theology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0039-338X • E-ISSN: 1502-7791
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/0039338x.2025.2492003
OpenAlexW4412014535
LanguageEN
References cited10

Carl Schmitt dedicated his final book, Political Theology II: The Myth of the Closure of Any Political Theology (1970), to the canonist and Catholic priest Hans Barion. This essay interrogates Barion’s conceptualisation of the end and purpose of spiritual and temporal authority as articulated in his defence of the Third Reich in 1933. By juxtaposing Barion’s characterisation of the Roman Catholic Church as a suprapolitical religion with the legal scholar and Weimar Minister of Justice Gustav Radbruch’s assertion in 1932 that Christianity proclaims the world of law and politics to be “unessential”, I delineate two contrasting visions of law, politics, and religion in the twilight of the Weimar Republic. Both Barion and Radbruch advanced a “nonpolitical” or “suprapolitical” interpretation of religion. For Barion, the nonpolitical entailed an apolitical acceptance of state authority, with a marked preference for authoritarian governance. Radbruch, by contrast, construed the nonpolitical essence of Christianity as an antipolitical critique of law and politics as such, viewing the state as a necessary evil. My analysis concludes by arguing that this debate transcends its historical and theological context, offering insights of enduring relevance in an era marked by political instability and economic crises

Political science · Judicial and Constitutional Studies · Law · Law in Society and Culture

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