From I Samuel 8 to Genesis 1: Towards a Political Theology of Difference

One way of understanding Political Theology is as the reading of modern political concepts as secularized theological concepts, influentially promoted by Carl Schmitt. Chief among theological concepts secularized into modern politics, for Schmitt, is God, whose rule translates, through the writings of Jean Bodin and Thomas Hobbes into modern sovereignty. For Hobbes, the sovereign is a "mortal God," and God's rule over Israel is the only ancient political model worthy of emulation. While scholars have increasingly engaged the role of theology in modern political thought, there has been little reckoning with the particular Judeo-Christian notion of God – an overlord alluded to in gendered terms – that is the prototype for modern sovereignty. This understanding of God has shaped and limited the modern political imagination, inviting understandings of sovereignty as domination. This article explores the possibility that visions of politics or sovereignty absent domination, being pursued in our time, would be enriched by – and may indeed require – an expansion of our theological imagination.