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The Reign of God
A Critical Engagement with Oliver O'Donovan's Theology of Political Authority
Jonathan Cole
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eBook - ePub
The Reign of God
A Critical Engagement with Oliver O'Donovan's Theology of Political Authority
Jonathan Cole
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The Reign of God constitutes the first detailed and systematic critical engagement with Oliver O'Donovan's political theology. It argues that O'Donovan's theological account of political authority is not tenable on the basis of exegetical and methodological problems. The book goes on to demonstrate a way to refine O'Donovan's theology of political authority by incorporating insights from his earlier work in moral theology. This can provide a cogent basis for thinking that the Christ-event redeems the natural political authority embedded in the created order and inaugurates its new historical bene esse in the form of Christian liberalism.
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Chapter 1
OLIVER OâDONOVANâS ENGLISH-LANGUAGE RECEPTION AND THEOPOLITICAL INFLUENCES
Impact and Reception
OâDonovan has had a significant impact on contemporary Western Christian political theology.1 Nicholas Wolterstorff has described Desire as no less than the twentieth centuryâs âmost important contribution to political theology.â2 In Richard Neuhausâ view, it was that rare book that âinterrupts the conversation and sets it off in new directions.â3 For Philip Lorish and Charles Mathewes, it ârecast the field of âpolitical theologyââ and âinaugurated a new era in theological thinking on politics.â4 Jonathan Chaplin found Desire âthe most arresting, challenging and rewarding work of political theology to have appeared in a long time.â5 David Novak went so far as to credit OâDonovan with having ârevived political theology as a field of enquiry.â6 âEven OâDonovanâs strongest critics,â James McEvoy notes, âacknowledge the significance of his contribution to political theology.â7
Desire and Judgment (the latter described by OâDonovan as Desireâs âsequelâ and the second phase in âa single extended train of thoughtâ) in particular have elicited substantial scholarly interest and engagement.8 The journal Studies in Christian Ethics devoted an entire edition in 1998 to Desire, which included a response from OâDonovan.9 In 2001, The Scottish Journal of Theology published articles engaging Desire by Wolterstorff and William Schweiker along with a response from OâDonovan.10 In 2002, the Scripture and Hermeneutics Seminar published the results of a dialogue with OâDonovan called A Royal Priesthood? The Use of the Bible Ethically and Politically: A Dialogue with Oliver OâDonovan.11 The journal Political Theology dedicated an entire edition in 2008 to Judgment, including a response from OâDonovan.12 The latest addition to this growing body of work engaging OâDonovanâs political theology is the 2015 festschrift edited by Robert Song and Brent Waters, The Authority of the Gospel: Explorations in Moral and Political Theology in Honor of Oliver OâDonovan.13
OâDonovanâs political theology has also been the subject of several book-length comparative studies. These include Paul Doerksenâs Beyond Suspicion: Post-Christendom Protestant Political Theology in John Howard Yoder and Oliver OâDonovan, David McIlroyâs A Trinitarian Theology of Law: In Conversation with Jurgen Moltmann, Oliver OâDonovan and Thomas Aquinas, and Dorothea Bertschmannâs Bowing Before ChristâNodding to the State? Reading Paul Politically with Oliver OâDonovan and John Howard Yoder.14 OâDonovanâs political theology has also been the focus of, or featured substantively in, a growing number of essays, many of which again bring him into dialogue with other scholars.15 Desire is also regularly cited in prominent works in political theology and OâDonovanâs name has appeared in introductory texts to the field.16
It is interesting to observe that, while OâDonovan has been the subject of several comparative studies, his political theology has not been the subject of a dedicated book-length study.17 It is also noteworthy that a significant proportion of the comparative studies brings OâDonovan into conversation with John Howard Yoder.18 This trend testifies to the level of interest OâDonovanâs political theology has generated amongst Mennonite scholars and/or those sympathetic to Yoderâs political theology, no doubt as a consequence of the implicit, and sometimes explicit, rebuttal of Yoderâs political theology entailed in OâDonovanâs.19
Like all significant thinkers, OâDonovanâs thought has elicited both praise and criticism, often from the same voice.20 Although criticisms of OâDonovanâs political theology are substantial and widespread, they have generally tended to be tentative and somewhat inconclusive. Several reasons can be adduced for this tendency. Some respondents have probably found themselves reluctant to follow criticisms to their logical conclusions on account of their genuine respect and sympathy for OâDonovan and his project. Others might have found themselves reticent to make conclusive pronouncements on OâDonovanâs subtle and complex thought within the confines of journal articles, the main vehicle for critical responses to date.
A further possible reason is OâDonovanâs discursive style, which is liable to frustrate the best efforts to arrive at definitive judgments of his work. Desire, by way of example, contains a self-described âcentral thesis,â namely, that âtheology, by developing its account of the reign of God, may recover the ground traditionally held by the notion of authority.â21 But that thesis is enmeshed in a web of sub-theses and elaborated amidst wide-ranging discussions that at times do more to obscure than clarify the bookâs central thesis. Chaplin has surely spoken for many when he observed of Desire that âwhat the text says, with its dense prose and multiple, interlocking themes, is not obvious even after repeated readings.â22 The way that OâDonovanâs discursive mind might have frustrated attempts by interlocutors to comprehensively and conclusively evaluate his work can be illustrated by the controversy over his alleged defense of Christendom in Desire.23 OâDonovanâs sympathetic account of ChristendomââChristendom is response to mission, and as such a sign that God has blessed itââhas been the subject of a number of critical essays.24 Yet OâDonovan has expressed surprise at this critical focus on his reading of Christendom given what he describes as âits modest thesis,â even describing it as âan afterthought.â25 To that end, he subsequently sought to clarify for critics that he does not, in fact, advocate a return to Christendom.26 However, describing the chapter on Christendom (Chapter 6ââThe Obedience of Rulersâ) in a book with seven chapters as an âafterthoughtâ is perhaps the epitome of English understatement. The final chapter, âThe Redemption of Society,â deals with the transition from Christendom to liberalism, in which case it would be accurate to say that two of the seven chapters of Desire deal substantively with the meaning and legacy of Christendom. Even so, OâDonovan makes a valid point with respect to the âmodest thesisâ of these chapters, for they do not advance his theory of political authority. That work is completed by the end of Chapter 4 (the fifth chapter deals with the status of the church in light of the normative conception of political authority developed in the first four chapters). This is why OâDonovan can characterize Chapter 6 as an âafterthought,â given the book is, as Andrew Shanks rightly observed, âquite unambivalently focused on the political-theological issue of authority.â27
Lorish and Mathewes have speculated that OâDonovanâs impact has âperhaps [been] unduly limited by the impression of rebarbative indirectness and obliqueness that marks his prose.â28 Separately and more recently, Mathewes has described OâDonovanâs prose as âintricate,â âfamously chewy,â âdense,â and âdemanding a serious effort of decryption by the reader.â29 While judgments of this nature are unavoidably subjective, they do reflect something of a consensus about the difficulty of OâDonovanâs prose. There is really no point in tip-toing around the issue; OâDonovan is âdifficult,â as no less than Rowan Williams has noted.30 Or, as Lorish and Mathewes wryly put it, OâDonovan has never been accused of âwriting too simplistically.â31 In fact, OâDonovan himself has conceded that some might find his English âtoo involved.â32 The widely acknowledged difficulty of OâDonovanâs work might have frustrated, perhaps even deterred, some of OâDonovanâs potential interlocutors from engaging his work more systematically, or even at all. Still, the density of OâDonovanâs prose, a reflection of the density of his thought, has proved no impediment to him deservedly acquiring a reputation as one of the most important figures in contemporary Christian political theology. Moreover, as Williams, again, has rightly noted, OâDonovanâs writing is âenrichingâ and provides extraordinary âstimulus ⊠for all who have engaged with it.â33
Theopolitical Influences
A full intellectual history of OâDonovan is beyond the scope of the present work. However, an embryonic intellectual history is offered here by way of further contextualizing his political theology and reception. I have restricted myself to the influences nominated by OâDonovan himself and those identified by his readers, which diverge in some interesting ways. A comprehensive and more critical evaluation of OâDonovanâs intellectual influences properly awaits a systematic intellectual history, currently a gap in the scholarship on OâDonovan and something which would represent a valuable contribution in due course.
It is no secret that OâDonovan is deeply influenced by Augustine. In the preface to his first book, The Problem of Self-Love in St. Augustine, OâDonovan said that âto live with [Augustine] intermittently for ten years, to think, to pray, to preach, to teach under his tutelage, has been a life-shaping experience of which, I fear, the reader of this study will gain barely an idea.â34 OâDonovan has acknowledged that his account of government-as-judgment can âclaim to speak from the Augustinian tradition.â35 And when asked in an interview to nominate âthe best article or essay a young paster could read on politics,â he suggested book XIX of City of God.36
Many scholars have noted the profound influence of Augustine on OâDonovanâs political thought and his political theology is widely characterized as âAugustinian.â William Cavanaugh places OâDonovan within a âcurrent revival of Augustineâs political thoughtâ and Peter Leithart describes OâDonovanâs political thought as a âreviv...