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Political Theology and Secularization Theory in Germany, 1918–1939: Emanuel Hirsch as a Phenomenon of His Time*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 June 2011

John Stroup
John Stroup
Affiliation:
Yale Divinity School
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Extract

According to Goethe, “writing history is a way of getting the past off your back.” In the twentieth century, Protestant theology has a heavy burden on its back—the readiness of some of its most distinguished representatives to embrace totalitarian regimes, notably Adolf Hitler's “Third Reich.” In this matter the historian's task is not to jettison but to ensure that the burden on Protestants is not too lightly cast aside—an easy temptation if we imagine that the theologians who turned to Hitler did so with the express desire of embracing a monster. On the contrary: they did so believing their choice was ethically correct. How could this come to pass in the homeland of the Reformation?

Type
Research Article
Information
Harvard Theological Review , Volume 80 , Issue 3 , July 1987 , pp. 321 - 368
Copyright
Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1987

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References

1 “Geschichte schreiben ist eine Art, sich das Vergangene vom Halse zu schaffen.” Text according to Günther, Horst, ed., Goethe Eifahrung der Geschichte (Frankfurt: Insel, 1982) 9Google Scholar = Maximen und Reflexionen, no. 105, according to Ms. Christa Sammons, Curator of the Yale Beinecke Library Collection of German Literature.

2 Ericksen, Robert P.. Theologians under Hitler: Gerhard Kittel, Paul Althaus and Emanuel Hirsch (New Haven/London: Yale University Press, 1985) 28–70. 124–67Google Scholar; Trillhaas, Wolfgang, “Emanuel Hirsch in Göttingen,” in Müller, Hans Martin, ed., Christliche Wahrheit und neuzeitliches Denken: Zu Emanuel Hirschs Leben und Werk (Theologische Beiträge und Forschungen 4: Tübingen: Katzmann, 1984) 37–59Google Scholar; Strohm, Theodor, Theologie im Schatten politischer Romantik (Gesellschaft und Theologie. Systematische Beiträge 2; Munich: Christian Kaiser, 1970) 158–59.Google Scholar My thanks are extended to Prof. Gordon Kaufman for making available to me the MS of his review of Ericksen, Theologians. See also Seban, Jean-Loup. “The Theology of Nationalism of Emanuel Hirsch,” Princeton Seminary Bulletin n.s. 7 (1986) 157–76.Google Scholar

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4 Sontheimer, Denken, 43–50; Hughes, Consciousness, 375–76; Mohler, Revolution, 78–90. Mohler (Revolution, 85, 111) argues convincingly that, since the temporal linearity of Christianity had deeply marked language for two thousand years, Weimar conservatives at times used “linear” or “arrowlike” terms to express what at bottom were concepts of cyclical recurrence; hence the occurrence of “apocalyptic” or “eschatological” rhetoric of catastrophic decadence among conservatives need not signify anything more than linguistic inertia, without in any way denaturing their basic adherence to the premise of eternal recurrence. Cf. Cohn, Norman, The Pursuit of the Millennium (2d ed.; New York: Oxford University Press, 1970)Google Scholar; Peuckert, Will-Erich, Die Grosse Wende: Das apokalyptische Saeculum und Luther (Hamburg: Claassen und Goverts, 1948)Google Scholar; Knoll and Schoeps, Zeiten; Löwith, Karl, Nietzsches Philosophie der ewigen Wiederkunft des Gleichen (Berlin: Verlag Die Runde [!], 1935).Google Scholar

5 On the dubious utility of the ambiguous concept of “irrationalism” as a key for unlocking the political and intellectual mysteries of German history, see Rücker, “Irrational,” who concludes (587) that—since Karl Popper finds it in the Left and Lukács in the Right—therefore: “Fazit des neueren Begriffsgebrauchs: Irrational denken und des Im. schuldig sind—die anderen.”

6 Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy, § 23 in idem, Basic Writings (ed. and trans. Kaufmann, Walter; New York: Random House, 1968) 137Google Scholar = Nietzsche, , Die Geburt der Tragödie: Der griechische Staat, (ed. Baeumler, Alfred; Stuttgart: Alfred Kröner, 1930) 182.Google Scholar On the problematical concept of “secularization” see Lübbe, Herman, Säkularisierung: Geschichte eines ideenpolitischen Begriffs (Freiburg i. B./Munich: Karl Alber, 1965)Google Scholar and Zabel, Hermann, “Säkularisation, Säkularisierung,” in Brunner, Otto, et al., Geschichtliche Grundbegriffe (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1984) 789–829.Google Scholar

7 Nietzsche, Birth, §§ 5, 24, pp. 52, 141.

8 Ibid., § 23, pp. 135–36; cf. Mohler, Revolution, 78–86, 112–21, esp. 80 n. 2, citing Guardini, Romano, Der Heilbringer in Mythos, Offenbarung und Geschichte (Zürich: Thomas, 1946).Google Scholar

9 Nietzsche, Birth, § 23. p. 137 = ed. Bäumler, p. 182.

10 Ibid., § 23, pp. 136–37. Let me stress that here I do not present a full interpretation of Nietzsche's eternal return, but rather its possibilities for legitimating a cyclical pattern as basis for “conservative rebirth” after “liberal decay” as that pattern came to be used after Nietzsche's death.

11 For documentation on these points see Appendix B on cultural criticism in the wake of Nietzsche.

12 Hughes, Consciousness, 376.

13 Ibid., 378, citing Parsons, Talcott, The Structure of Social Action (2d ed.; Glencoe, IL, 1949) 179.Google Scholar

14 Lübbe, Säkularisierung, 100; Schlunk, “Säkularismus,” RGG 5 (2d ed.; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck)37–39.

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16 For documentation on these points see Appendix C on paganism and religiosity.

17 The latter phrase I owe to Prof. John Murrin of Princeton. Note that Riefenstahl's film of the Berlin Olympics seems to have been entitled “Olympia” in German and in French “Les Dieux du Stade.” See Ford, Charles, Leni Riefenstahl (Paris: La Table Ronde, 1978) 188.Google Scholar

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19 See Loofs, Friedrich, Leitfaden zum Studien der Dogmengeschichte (4th ed.; Halle: Max Niemeyer, 1906)Google Scholar: “Die Geschichte hatte bei den Griechen für die Frage der Weltanschauung überhaupt keine Rolle gespielt,” citing in n. 1 Windelband, Wilhelm, Lehrbuch der Geschichte der Philosophie (3d ed.; Tübingen, 1983) 209–10Google Scholar; Dobschütz, Ernst von, “Zeit und Raum in Denken des Urchristentums,” JBL 41 (1922) 212–23Google Scholar; attention is directed to these writers by Barr, James, Biblical Words for Time (Naperville, IL: Allenson, 1962) 137–38.Google Scholar

20 In this space it is not possible to determine what is of lasting value in proponents of the circlearrow dichotomy, nor to assess the complex role of Karl Löwith. See Guardini, Romano, Das Ende der Neuzeit (Basel: He, 1950)Google Scholar; Cullmann, Oscar, Christ and Time (trans. Filson, Floyd V.; reprinted Philadelphia: Westminster, 1964)Google Scholar; Boman, Thorleif, Hebrew Thought Compared with Greek (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1960)Google Scholar; Barr, Biblical Words; idem, The Semantics of Biblical Language (London: Oxford University Press, 1961)Google Scholar; Momigliano, Arnaldo, “Time in Ancient Historiography,” in History and the Concept of Time (History and Theory) (Studies in the Philosophy of History 6; Middletown: Wesleyan University Press, 1966) 1–23Google Scholar; Mohler, Revolution, 82; Mühlen, Karl-Heinz zur, Nos extra nos (BHTh 46; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1972).Google Scholar

21 Wichelhaus, Manfred, Kirchengeschichtsschreibung und Soziologie im neunzehnten Jahrhundert und bei Ernst Troeltsch (Heidelberger Forschungen 9; Heidelberg: Carl Winter. 1965)Google Scholar; Fischer, Dietrich, Die deutsche Geschichtswissenschaft von J. G. Droysen bis O. Hintze in ihrem Verhältnis zur Soziologie (Phil, diss., University of Cologne, 1966).Google Scholar

22 Augustine City of God book 6; see esp. 6.12: “tres theologicas, quas Graeci dicunt mythicen physicen politicen.” On the history of the concept, see (with bibliography) Fiorenza, Francis, “Religion und Politik,” Christlicher Glaube in moderner Gesellschaft (Basel/Wien: Herder, 1982) 59–101Google Scholar; Schindler, Alexander, ed., Monotheismus als politisches Problem: Erik Peterson und die Kritik der politischen Theologie (Studien zur evangelischen Ethik 14; Gütersloh: Mohn, 1978)Google Scholar; Taubes, Jacob, ed., Religionstheorie und Politische Theologie, vol. 1: Der Fürst dieser Welt. Carl Schmitt und die Folgen (Munich/Paderborn: Fink/Schöning, 1983)Google Scholar and vol. 2: Gnosis und Politik (1984) (my attention was called to this series by Prof. Dr. Walter Sparn of Bayreuth); Peterson, Erik, Der Monotheismus als politisches Problem (Leipzig: Jakob Hegner, 1935)Google Scholar; Berkhof, Hendrik, Kirche und Kaiser (trans. Locher, Gottfried W.; Zollikon-Zürich: Evangelischer Verlag, 1947)Google Scholar; Williams, George Huntston, “Christology and Church-State Relations in the Fourth Century,” CH 20 (1951) 3: 3–33; 4:3–25Google Scholar; Markus, R. A., Saeculum (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970)Google Scholar; Kantorowicz, Ernst H., The King's Two Bodies: A Study in Medieval Political Theology (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1957)Google Scholar; Schrey, Heinz-Horst, “‘Politische Theologie’ und ‘Theologie der Revolution’: Die Rezeption des Neomarxismus durch die Theologie,” ThR n.s. 36 (1971) 346–77Google Scholar and n.s. 37 (1972) 43–96; Picht, Georg, “Die Dialektik von Theorie und Praxis und der Glaube,” ZThK 70 (1973) 101–20Google Scholar; Wiedenhofer, Siegfried, Politische Theologie (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1976)Google Scholar; Spülbeck, Volker, Neomarxismus und Theologie: Gesellschaftskritik in Kritischer Theorie und Politischer Theologie (Freiburger Theologische Studien 170; Freiburg/Basel/Wien: Herder, 1977)Google Scholar; Seifart, Arnulf, Der Gott der “politischen Theologie”: Die Entwicklung der Gottesdiskussion vom kämpfenden Nationalgott bis zur christlich motivierten Strategie des Guerillakrieges (Zürich/Einsiedeln/Köln: Benziger, 1978)Google Scholar; Mühlen, Karl-Heinz zur, Reformatorische Vernunftkritik und neuzeitliches Denken (Beiträge zur historischen Theologie 59; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1980) 304–6.Google Scholar

23 Maier, Albert, ed., Donoso Cortés: Briefe, Parlamentarische Reden und diplomatische Berichte (Cologne: Bachem, 1950)Google Scholar; Schramm, Edmund, Donoso Cortés: Leben und Werke eines spanischen Antiliberalen (Ibero-amerikanische Studien 7; Hamburg, 1935)Google Scholar; Dempf, Alois, Christliche Staatsphilosophie in Spanien (Salzburg: Anton Pustet, 1937) 146–65Google Scholar; Westemeyer, Dietmar, Donoso Cortés: Staatsmann und Theologe: Eine Untersuchung seines Einsatzes der Theologie in der Politik (Münster/Westfalen: Regensberg, 1940)Google Scholar; Schmitt, Carl, Donoso Cortés in gesamteuropäischer Interpretation (Cologne: Greven, 1950)Google Scholar; Przywara, Erich, Humanitas (Nürnberg: Glock und Lutz, 1952) 243–56Google Scholar; Gurian, Waldemar, “Louis Veuillot,” CHR 36 (1951) 385–414Google Scholar; Graham, John T., Donoso Cortés: Utopian Romanticist and Political Realist (Columbia, MO: University of Missouri Press, 1974).Google Scholar

24 Cortés, Juan Donoso, An Essay on Catholicism, Authority and Order Considered in Their Fundamental Principles (1925; trans. Goddard, Madeleine Vincent; reprinted Westport, CT: Hyperion, 1979) 4.Google Scholar Cf. Fiorenza, “Religion und Politik,” 77: “In ihrem Eintreten für einen Parallelismus zwischen religiösen und politischen Ideen nahm die politische Theologie der katholischen Restauration mit umgekehrten Vorzeichen die marxistische Analyse von Staat und Gesellschaft vorweg. Der Marxismus kann nämlich als eine Umkehrung der zentralen These der katholischen Restauration interpretiert werden. Diese wollte den Parallelismus zwischen politischen und religiösen Ideen hervorheben, um dann zu argumentieren, dass eine Veränderung von theologischen und religiösen Ideen zu einer Veränderung politischer und gesellschaftlicher Muster führe. Der Marxismus hingegen will mit seiner Ideologiekritik das Umgekehrte betonen, nämlich dass Veränderungen in den politischen und gesellschaftlichen Mustern die religiösen Überzeugungen beeinflussen.” It is not arguable that the “real” existence of “society” or “class” or “self” is as philosophically problematical as that of “God”? Is there then any philosophical necessity for preferring as a solid point of departure any one of these ideas over any other?

Clearly after 1750 or so there occurred some analogous shift in theology and politics, in that (among “advanced” thinkers) transcendence and divine right political hierarchy gave way to Idealistic panentheism and ideas of sovereignty immanent within the “people.” Whether these analogous shifts “prove” that ideas about “God” are “really” projections of our ideas about “society,” “self,” and “politics” is, however, not immediately evident. Instead, what we may see here could simply be the triumph of a belief in the inevitability of such analogous linkage accompanied by corresponding mental labors among theologians. To be sure, a vague sense that ideas about deities and ideas about earthly orders were linked was widespread and can be found in antiquity; but with Feuerbach, Durkheim, etc., claims to illuminate these matters were put into a new sharpness, so that they became a weapon against religious belief, or (otherwise viewed) a weapon against “revolution.”

25 Donoso, “Rede von 30. Januar 1850 über die soziale Frage in Spanien in ihrer Beziehung zur allgemeinen Lage Europas,” in Maier, Donoso, 210–37 esp. 222: “Gott ist die Menschheit. Das ist das Glaubenbekenntnis des Pantheisten.” Donoso in Maier, Donoso. 77 and 79: “Die Lehren die Spinoza und Voltaire, die Kant, Hegel und Cousin vorgetragen haben und die ausnahmslos als verderblich bezeichnet werden müssen, sind samt und sonders auf die Grundideen des Rationalismus zurückzuführen.… Die Gesellschaft ist dem Untergang geweiht, weil wir aus unseren Söhnen keine Christen mehr machen wollen und weil wir selbst keine wahren Christen mehr sind.” According to Schmitt (Donoso, 56), when in Berlin Donoso said of the intellectuals there that their “Gehirne durch den Hegelianismus—causa principalisima del giro radical—desorganisiert und verwüstet sind.” Cf. Graham, Donoso, 166 n. 13. Cf. Westemeyer, Donoso, 76–77 and 182. See also Schoeps, Hans Joachim, Vorläufer Spenglers (2d ed.; BZRGG 1; Leiden: Brill. 1955) 83–88.Google Scholar

26 “Stammler, Rudolf,” Encyclopaedia Britannica Micropaedia 9 (15th ed.); Weber, Max, “R. Stammlers Überwindung der materialistischen Geschichtsauffassung” in idem, Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Wissenschaftslehre (ed. Winckelmann, Johannes; 2d ed.; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1951) 291–359Google Scholar; “Kelsen, Hans,” Encyclopaedia Britannica Micropaedia 5 (15th ed.) 753; Métall, R. A., Hans Kelsen (Vienna: Deuticke, 1968)Google Scholar; Kelsen, Hans, Das Problem der Souveränität (Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1920)Google Scholar; idem, Der soziologische und der juristische Staatsbegriff (Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1922)Google Scholar; Friedrich, Carl Joachim, The Philosophy of Law in Historical Perspective (2d ed.; Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1976) 163–77Google Scholar; Friedmann, W., Legal Theory (5th ed.; New York: Columbia University Press, 1965) 84–85Google Scholar, 276–79, 576–77; Bauer, Wolfram, Wertrelativismus und Wertbestimmtheit im Kampf um die Weimarer Demokratie (Beiträge zur Politischen Wissenschaft 3; Berlin: Dunker & Humblot, 1968) 368–409.Google Scholar

27 All quotations are from Emerson, Rupert, State and Sovereignty in Modern Germany (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1928) 165Google Scholar (cf. 254). See 166–67: Stammler contributed to the theory of sovereignty by pointing to “a means of escape from what the Neo-Kantians customarily called metajurisprudence. This side of the Kant-Stammler teachings was given special emphasis by later members of the school such as Julius Binder, Hans Kelsen, and Fritz Sander. The term metajurisprudence is used to include any theoretical procedure which finds the sources of law outside law itself. If the law is to be regarded, argue the Neo-Kantians, as a system of thought complete in itself, then it must be wrong to go beyond law in the search for its sources.… Not the spirit of the people, the monarch, or the State creates law, but law creates itself, establishes the means by which it is to be changed, and lays down the conditions under which the will of the people, the monarch, or the State is legally valid. Thus the self-inclusive legal system comes itself to be sovereign.”

28 All quotations from Emerson, State, 170, 72.

29 For Kelsen, see Emerson, State, 165; for repressing sovereignty, see Schwab, Challenge, 50, citing Kelsen, Das Problem der Souveränität und die Theorie des Völkerrechts (Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1920) 120Google Scholar: “Die Souveränitätsvorstellung muss radikal verdrängt werden.” Cf. Schwab, Challenge, 48.

30 Kelsen, , “Gott und Staat,” Logos 11 (1922/1923) 261–84Google Scholar; cf. Kelsen, Staatsbegriff.

31 Schmitt, Carl, Politische Theologie: Vier Kapital zur Lehre von der Soveränität (Munich/Leipzig: Duncker & Humblot, 1922)Google Scholar; in part identical is Schmitt, “Soziologie des Soveränitätsbegriffes und politische Theologie” in Erinnerungsgabe für Max Weber (Munich/Leipzig: Duncker & Humblot, 1923) 2. 3–36.Google Scholar The second edition of Politische Theologie appeared in 1934; the fourth appeared with Duncker & Humblot in 1985. Meanwhile Schmitt published Politische Theologie II: Die Legende von der Erledigung jeder politischen Theologie (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1970)Google Scholar; Schmitt, Carl, Political Theology (trans. Schwab, George; Studies in Contemporary German Social Thought; Cambridge: MIT Press, 1984).Google Scholar

32 Schmitt, Die Diktatur: Von den Anfängen des modernen Souveränitätsgedankens bis zum proletarischen Klassenkampf (2d ed.; Munich/Leipzig, 1928)Google Scholar; Bendersky, Joseph W., “Carl Schmitt in the Summer of 1932: A Reexamination,” Revue européene des sciences sociales 16:44 (July 1978) 39–53Google Scholar; idem, “Carl Schmitt Confronts the English-Speaking World,” Canadian Journal of Political and Social Theory 2 (1978) 125–35Google Scholar; idem, “The Expendable Kronjurist,” Journal of Contemporary History 14 (1979) 309–38CrossRefGoogle Scholar; idem, Carl Schmitt: Theorist for the Reich (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1983)Google Scholar; Schwab, Challenge, 30–132; cf., however, Muth, Heinrich, “Carl Schmitt in der deutschen Innenpolitik des Sommers 1932,” in Schieder, Theodor, ed., Beiträge zur Geschichte der Weimarer Republik (Historische Zeitschrift, Beiheft 1; Munich: Oldenbourg, 1971) 75–147.Google Scholar Muth is still of the opinion that it is correct to say (138): “Im Gefolge Hugenbergs und der Deutschnationalen hat er [Schmitt] dann das Seine zur Unterminierung der Reichsverfassung nach Kräften beigetragen.” See, however, Schwab, Challenge, 92–96. How Muth's position can be harmonized with that of Schwab is an issue that cannot be pursued in an article devoted chiefly to Emanuel Hirsch. What one makes of Schmitt's efforts before 1933 will in part depend on whether one thinks diagnosing a condition as pathological can contribute to making it worse.

33 For documentation on these points see Appendix D on Carl Schmitt.

34 See (in addition to Politische Theologie) Schmitt, Die Diktatur (Munich/Leipzig: Duncker & Humblot, 1928)Google Scholar; idem, Die geistesgeschichtliche Lage des heutigen Parlamentarismus (2d ed. 1926; reprinted Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1969)Google Scholar; idem, Der Hüter der Verfassung (Beiträge zum Offentlichen Recht der Gegenwart 1; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1931)Google Scholar; idem, Legalität und Legitimität (1932; reprinted Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1968)Google Scholar; idem, Der Begriff des Politischen (1932; reprinted Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1979)Google Scholar; Schneider, Peter, Ausnahmezustand und Norm (Quellen und Darstellungen zur Zeitgeschichte 1; Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1957).Google Scholar

35 Translation from Schmitt, Carl, Political Theology: Four Chapters on the Concept of Sovereignty (trans. Schwab, George; Cambridge: MIT Press, 1985) 5.Google Scholar

36 This phrase comes from Prof. George Schwab.

37 See Schwab, “Introduction,” in Schmitt, Political Theology, xxiv, a passage kindly called to my attention by Prof. Schwab.

38 Schwab, Challenge, 32–33, 86–89; Bendersky, “Carl Schmitt in the Summer of 1932.”

39 Löwith, “Dezisionismus,” 98: “Was Schmitt an Kierkegaard hervorhebt, ist ausschliesslich dessen scheinbare Apologie der Ausnahme, weil, wie der erste Satz der politischen Theologie lautet, souverän ist, wer über den Ausnahmezustand entscheidet.” Cf. Krockow, Entscheidung, 55–57.

40 Schmitt, “Die Wendung zum totalen Staat (1931),” in idem, Positionen, 146–57; Schmitt, “Weiterentwicklung des totalen Staats in Deutschland (1933),” in idem, Verfassungsrechtliche Aufsätze (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1958) 359–66Google Scholar; Jänicke, Herrschaft, 36–48; Schmitt, Hüter, 73–91.

41 See n. 40 above; Schwab, Challenge, 77–79, 85–89, esp. 86, 145–49; Schmitt, Der Hüter der Verfassung (Beiträge zum Öffentlichen Recht der Gegenwart 1; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1931).Google Scholar

42 Cf. Muth, “Carl Schmitt in der deutschen Innenpolitik,” 145–46.

43 Schmitt, Politische Theologie (2d ed. reprinted as 4th) 49: “Alle prägnanten Begriffe der modernen Staatslehre sind säkularisierte theologische Begriffe.” The translation here departs only slightly from that of Blumenberg, Legitimacy, 92. For a similar version, see Schmitt, Political Theology, 36. Cf. Marxen, Andreas, Das Problem der Analogie zwischen den Seinsstrukturen der grossen Gemeinschaften (Phil. diss. Bonn, 1937).Google Scholar

44 Here and throughout this article the author's original text using “an “before unaccented syllables starting with h has been suppressed by the editorial staff. The author, in order to gain publication of this article, has had no alternative: he has given in here in order to get the work into print. He is neither persuaded by arguments and authorities advanced in favor of the change nor gladdened by the progress of linguistic barbarism. As Jacob Burckhardt wrote, “My mental picture of the terribles simplificateurs who will overrun our old Europe is not a pleasant one” (cited by Nichols, James Hastings, “Jacob Burckhardt,” in Burckhardt, Force and Freedom: Reflections in History [ed. Nichols, ; New York: Pantheon, 1943] 43).Google Scholar

Doubtless the root cause of the editorial drive to impose uniformity even in articles lies in the unending process of centralization, standardization, and Nivellierung that is as characteristic of the postmodern age as it was of that modern age of progress concerning which Burckhardt wrote: “One thing after another must be sacrificed, position, property, religion, distinguished manners, higher scholarship …” (ibid., 42).

45 Schmitt, “Das Zeitalter der Neutralisierungen und Entpolitisierungen (1929),” in idem, Positionen, 120–32; cf. idem, “Die politische Theorie des Mythus (1923),” in Positionen, 9–18; idem, review of Koselleck, Reinhart, Kritik und Krise in Das Historisch-politische Buch 7 (1959) 301–2Google Scholar; Kesting, Hanno, Geschichtsphilosophie und Weltbürgerkrieg (Heidelberg: Carl Winter, 1959)Google Scholar; Forsthoff, Ernst, Der totale Staat (2d ed.; Hamburg: Hanseatisches Verlagsanstalt, 1933)Google Scholar; Böckenförde, Ernst-Wolfgang, “Die Entstehung des Staates als Vorgang der Säkularisation,” in Säkularisation und Utopie: Ernst Forsthoff zum 65. Geburtstag (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1967) 75–94Google Scholar; reprinted in Schrey, Heinz-Horst, ed., Säkularisierung (Wege der Forschung 424; Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1981) 67–89.Google Scholar

46 Schmitt, Politische Theologie, esp. 49–66 and idem, “Zeitalter.” Cf. idem, Die geistesgeschichtliche Lage des heutigen Parlamentarismus (1926; reprinted Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1969) 89Google Scholar (with reference to Sorel, Mussolini, and Lenin, as well as Weimar weakened by secularization and “neutralization” or the removal of religious legitimacy): “Die Theorie vom Mythus ist der stärkste Ausdruck dafür, dass der relative Rationalismus des parlamentarischen Denkens seine Evidenz verloren hat.” For utilization of Schmitt's “neutralization” or secularization ideas in Nazi Germany, see Steding, Christoph, Das Reich und die Krankheit der europäischen Kultur (ed. Frank, Walter; Hamburg: Hanseatisches Verlagsinstitut, 1938)Google Scholar; see esp. “Neutrales Mittlertum in der Schweiz” (95) (94), “Karl Barth und die dialektischen Theologie” (95), and (97, gesperrt): “Young- und Dawes-Plan, Bank für Internationalen Zahlungsausgleich und dialektische Theologie Karl Barths sind ein und dasselbe.” Steding, like Schmitt, represents a further development of certain conservative and plebiscitary tendencies in the complexity of Max Weber: note the use of Schmitt in Steding, Politik und Wissenschaft bei Max Weber (Breslau: Korn, 1932)Google Scholar; see also Mommsen, Wolfgang J., Max Weber und die deutsche Politik 1890–1920 (2d ed.; Tübingen, 1974) 52Google Scholar, 403–15, 444, 455; and Loewenstein, Karl, Max Weber's Political Ideas in the Perspective of Our Time (trans. Richard, and Winston, Clara; Boston: University of Massachusetts Press, 1966)Google Scholar; also Dempf, Alois, “Religionssoziologie,” Hochland 18 (1921) 747Google Scholar, cited by Fischoff, Ephraim, “The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism,” in Eisenstadt, S. N., ed., The Protestant Ethic and Modernization (New York/London: Basic Books, 1968) 70.Google Scholar

47 Peterson, Monotheismus; Schindler, Monotheismus.

48 Schwab, Challenge, 16–17, 38, 48, 69–70, 86–87, 94–95, 100–105, 114, 120, 130–32, 141; idem in Schmitt, Political Theology, xiv, xvii, xxiv.

49 Here I follow on the whole the work of Prof. George Schwab, which, while once highly controversial, is now largely accepted by Schmitt specialists. Prof. Schwab has made many useful suggestions for improving the understanding of Schmitt in this study. Pointing in a direction similar to the studies by Schwab is much of the work of Ellen Kennedy, which shows that the kinship between the work of Schmitt and that of other political theorists, including those in the Frankfurt School, has been obscured by writers after 1933; in the interest of covering over these similarities, the complexity of Schmitt's thought has often been ignored in order to turn him into a simple precursor of Hitler. See Kennedy, Ellen, “Carl Schmitt und die ‘Frankfurter Schule’: Deutsche Liberalismuskritik im 20. Jahrhundert,” Geschichte und Gesellschaft 12 (1986) 380–419Google Scholar; cf. Bloom, Allan, The Closing of the American Mind (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1987)Google Scholar; Perels, Joachim, ed., Recht, Demokratie und Kapitalismus: Aktualität und Probleme der Theorie Franz L. Neumanns (Baden-Baden: Nomos, 1984).Google Scholar However, there are writers aware of such recent scholarship who nonetheless see every reason to assess the Weimar Schmitt in extremely harsh terms; Muth (n. 32 above) still can speak of Schmitt's “Unterminierung der Reichsverfassung”; see also Neumann, Volker, “Verfassungstheorien politischer Antipoden: Otto Kirchheimer und Carl Schmitt,” Kritische Justiz (1981) 235–54Google Scholar esp. 252, which can be taken to suggest that some of the Weimar moves made by Schmitt and those associated with him left openings utilized by the Nazis, however contrary that may have been to Schmitt's intentions (“Entworfen für autoritäre Herrschaft einer staatstragenden Elite wurde die Theorie und Praxis des starken Staates zum Einfallstor für nationalsozialistische Machtgelüste”). See also 254 n. 105: “Die antisemitischen Ausfälle [Schmitt's—J.S.] waren nicht bloss ‘lip service to the terminology of National-Socialist propaganda’, wie George Schwab, The Challenge of the Exception, Berlin 1970, S. 101, allzu wohlmeinend schreibt.” On Schmitt's shameful and opportunistic anti-Semitism, see, e.g., the comments in Schwab, Challenge, 138: “His recently acquired anti-Semitism was certainly opportunistic in so far as no traces of this pernicious, parochial and provincial attitude can be detected in his writings prior to 1933.” See also Muth, “Carl Schmitt in der deutschen Innenpolitik,” 138, and Maschke, Günter, “Im Irrgarten Carl Schmitts,” in Intellektuelle im Bann des Nationalsozialismus (Hamburg: Hoffmann & Campe, 1980) 204–41.Google Scholar Cf. also Gruchmann, Lothar, Nationalsozialistische Grossraumordnung: Die Konstruktion einer “deutschen Monroe-Doktrin” (Schriftenreihe der Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte 4; Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1962) 20–27CrossRefGoogle Scholar, 121–45. For background on the theory of institutions as it touches Schmitt's thought, see Hauriou, Maurice, Die Theorie der Institution (ed. Schnur, Roman; trans. Hans and Jutta Jecht; Schriften zur Rechtstheorie 5; Berlin: Duneker & Humblot, 1965).Google Scholar

50 For documentation on these points see Appendix D on Carl Schmitt.

51 Busch, Eberhard, Karl Barth (trans. Bowden, John; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1976) 134Google Scholar; the second quotation comes from Busch himself.

52 Hirsch, Emanuel, Geschichle der neuern evangelischen Theologie im Zusammenhang mit den allgemeinen Bewegungen des europäischen Denkens (5 vols.; Gütersloh: Bertelsmann, 1949–1954).Google Scholar

53 See the titles in Schiitte, Hans-Walter, Bibliographie Emanuel Hirsch (Berlin/Schleswig-Holstein: Die Spur, 1972).Google Scholar

54 For documentation on these points see Appendix E on Emanuel Hirsch.

55 Hirsch, Christliche Freiheit und polilische Bindung (Hamburg: Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt) 6.

56 Hirsch reviews Schmitt, Politische Theologie in ThLZ 48 (1923) 524–25Google Scholar; reviews Die geistesgeschichtliche Lage and Romischer Katholizismus in ThLZ 49 (1924) 185–87.Google Scholar

57 Hirsch, Review of Politische Theologie, 524.

58 Ibid.

59 Hirsch, Christliche Freiheit, 53.

60 Hirsch, Der Weg der Theologie (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1937) 24–25.Google Scholar

61 Hirsch, Die Reich-Gottes-Begriffe des neuern europäischen Denkens (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck &Ruprecht, 1927) 20.Google Scholar

62 See Böbel, Wahrheit; also idem, “Allgemein menschliche und christliche Gotteserkenntnis bei Emanuel Hirsch,” Neue Zeitschrift für systematische Theologie und Religionsphilosophie 5 (1963) 296–335Google Scholar; Gerdes, Hayo, ed., Wahrheit und Glaube: Festschrift f¨r Emanuel Hirsch zu seinem 75. Geburtstag (Itzehoe: Die Spur, 1963).Google Scholar

63 Hirsch, Werke, III: Christliche Rechenschaft (Berlin/Schleswig-Holstein, 1978) 2. 280.Google Scholar Here I use “autonomy” and “heteronomy” for want of better expressions; cf. Pohlmann, R., “Autonomie,” Historisches Wörterbuch der Philosophie (Stuttgart: Schwabe, 1971) 701–19.Google Scholar

64 For documentation see Appendix F on Karl Holl.

65 Here and in the remainder of this paragraph I paraphrase Bornkamm, Luther, 114–17, and Dillenberger, God, 18–27. Cf. Holl, “Was verstand Luther unter Religion?” in idem, Gesammelte Aufsätze, vol. 1: Luther (2d/3d ed.; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1923) 36–37Google Scholar: “Bei ihm [sc. Luther] führte Gott selbst ganz unmittelbar im Gewissen den Beweis für sein Dasein.” See also in this connection the two treatments of Holl by Rückert cited in Appendix F on Karl Holl.

66 Holl, Luther, 41 cited in Dillenberger, God, 22; cf. Dillenberger, God, 19.

67 Dillenberger, God, 21; Holl, Luther, 45; Rückert, Vorträge, 370–72. On the “hidden God” see, besides Dillenberger, Kohler, Rudolf, “Der Deus absconditus in Philosophie und Theologie,” ZRGG 7 (1955) 46–58Google Scholar; Richter, Julius, “Luthers ‘Deus absconditus’—Zuflucht oder Ausflucht?” ZRGG 7 (1955) 289–303Google Scholar; Bandt, Hellmut, Luthers Lehre vom verborgenen Gott (Theologische Arbeiten 8; Berlin: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 1958)Google Scholar; Adam, Alfred, “Der Begriff ‘Deus absconditus’ bei Luther nach Herkunft und Bedeutung,” Luther-Jahrbuch 1963 (ed. Lau, Franz; Hamburg: Wittig, 1963) 97–106Google Scholar; Gerrish, B. A.. “‘To the Unknown God’: Luther and Calvin on the Hiddenness of God,” JR 53 (1973) 263–92.Google Scholar

68 Dillenberger, God, 10–11, 24–25; Pauck, Wilhelm, “The Historiography of the German Reformation during the Past Twenty Years,” CH 9 (1940) 311Google Scholar, cited in Dillenberger, God, 25–26.

69 Holl, Reden, vii–viii, 38, 45, 51, 55–56, 82–84, 86–89, 90–91, 98–99.

70 These themes echo throughout Holl's sermons. See esp. Holl, Reden, 55, 57, 89. Hirsch (Kierkegaard-Studien [Gütersloh: Bertelsmann, 1933] 2. 695Google Scholar n. 1) speaks of “Karl Holls für die damalige Lage glänzende Kierkegaard-Darstellung im Kolleg 1908, die mir einen starken Stoss auf Kierkegaard hin gegeben hat”; cf. ibid., 2. 958; also Eilert Herms, “Die Unformungskrise der Neuzeit in der Sicht Emanuel Hirschs,” in Müller (ed.), Wahrheit, 95–96 n. 47, citing the second of these passages with its reference to Holl. In view of this evidence, it seems necessary to modify Schjørring, Gewissensethik, 145: “So wie Karl Holl Hirsch kaum auf Fichte hingewiesen haben dürfte, kann er ihn auch nicht zum Studium Kierkegaards angeregt haben.” Cf. Krockow, Entscheidung; Eklund, Harald, Theologie der Entscheidung (Uppsala: Universitets Arsskrift, 1937Google Scholar; Uppsala: Lundquist, 1937). For details on the German reception of Kierkegaard, see Kloeden, Wolfdietrich von, “Einfluss und Bedeutung im deutsch-sprachigen Denken,” in Thulstrup, Niels and Thulstrup, M. Mikulová, eds., The Legacy and Interpretation of Kierkegaard (Bibliotheca Kierkegaardiana 8; Copenhagen: Reitzel, 1981) 54–107Google Scholar (on Hirsch, 64–66; on Ernst Jünger, 58; Heidegger, 83–87; “Entschluss“Beslutning,” 88; Dempf, Przywara, Balthasar, 57–60; Guardini, 59; Haecker, 95; Tillich, 76–83).

71 Holl, Reden, 41–48, 86–91.

72 Zur Mühlen, Vernunftkritik, 199; cf. Tilgner, Volksnomostheologie, 141.

73 Wolf, Ernst, “Gewissen,” RGG 2 (3d ed.; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1958) 1550–57Google Scholar, esp. 1553–54; cf. idem, Peregrinatio (2 vols.; Munich: Kaiser, 1962, 1965) 1. 81–112Google Scholar; 2. 52–118. See in particular the remarks in Dillenberger, God, esp. 48 n. 32 (on “the lack of a decisive doctrine of revelation in [Hirsch's] interpretation of Luther” so that divine hiddenness is pertinent to theodicy but not to ethics as human responsibility); also ibid., 19 (Holl on caprice in God), 25 (conscience), 42,48–56.

74 Dillenberger, God, 48–51, esp. 49, 56, 63–64, 66, 69, 145, 168; Hirsch, Luthers Gottesanschauung (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1918) esp. 26–27.Google Scholar

75 Hirsch, , “Luther und Nietzsche,” Luther-Jahrbuch 2/3 (1920/1921) 61–106Google Scholar (listed in the table of contents, p. 2, under “II. Aus Luthers Zeit—für unsere Zeit”); cf. Hirsch, , “Luthers Rechtfertigungslehre bei Kant,” Luther-Jahrbuch 4 (1922) 47–65.Google Scholar

76 For documentation see Appendix G on “irrationalism” and Schicksal.

77 For documentation on these points see Appendix G on “irrationalism” and Schicksal.

78 The second of these claims in its strongest (Hidden God is behind Hitler) form is the implication of a synoptic reading of the following works by Hirsch: “Luther und Nietzsche”; “Vom verborgenen Suverän,” in Althaus, Paul, Hirsch, Emanuel, Wilm, Walter, and Rendtorff, Heinrich, eds., Glaube und Volk 2:1 (Küstrin: Verlag Deutscher Osten, 1933) 4–13Google Scholar; Die gegenwärtige geistige Lage im Spiegel philosophischer und theologischer Besinnung: Akademische Vorlesungen zum Verständnis des deutschen Jahrs 1933 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1934)Google Scholar; Christliche Freiheit und politische Bindung (Hamburg: Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt, 1935).Google Scholar I cannot explore here the position of theologians such as Althaus, Werner Elert, and Friedrich Gogarten with regard to Hirsch's political use of the theme of divine hiddenness, nor can I look at such figures as Amo Deutelmoser.

79 See esp. Holl, “Die Kulturbedeutung der Reformation,” in idem, Gesammelte Aufsätze (3d ed.) 1.533.

80 Hirsch, “Luther und Nietzsche,” 83: “Dionysos ist ein natürliches Nachbild des lutherischen Gottesbegriffes, das Dionysische ein naturalistisches Nachbild der lutherischen Frömmigkeit.”

81 Hirsch, “Luther und Nietzsche,” 83–85.

82 Ibid., 84.

83 Ibid., 84–88.

84 Ibid., 85–97.

85 Hirsch, Lage, 15–16; cf. 11–12, 16, 28–29, 71, 91, 97, 98, 130, 135, 136, 141; also 117.

86 Ibid., 16, 29; for Heidegger and Hirsch's crises, see Ibid., 72 (“Alles Grosse steht im Sturm”), 52. 51, 101, 71, 77, 73. For the notion that peoples are “verjüngt” by “Krisen” see Hirsch, Deutschlands Schicksal (n. 93 below) 35, 36 (“Krisen machen jung”). Cf. Heidegger, “The Self-Assertion [Selbstbehauptung] of the German University,” 480; Hirsch, Lage 52 (“Geheimnis des Seins”) 46 (“Entschlossenheit”), Ibid., 52, contends that, if existential philosophy does not agree with him in a Christian interpretation of 1933 as a Gottesbegegnung in the “boundaries” of national particularity so that one perceives “das Rauschen der verborgenen göttlichen Gnade,” then instead it must identify G5d with μ⋯ ⋯ν., a chaos of meaninglessness: “Dann versteht sie das Geheimnis des Seins, welches in der schicksalsumringten Existenz ihr sich künden möchte, als Sorge und Selbstbehauptung.” The Anglo-Saxon may perhaps be excused from exegesis or even translation of this passage, since, as a well-known philosopher has argued, philosophy is possible only in Greek and German. In any event, it cannot be said that Hirsch gained transparency by his encounter with Heidegger. “Was bleibet aber, stiften die Dichter” (Hölderlin, “Andenken,” IV, 63, vs 59).

87 For documentation on these points see Appendix H on the “Two Kingdoms” and Hirsch.

88 Hirsch, Reich-Gottes-Begriffe, 22–23, 25–29; cf. Troeltsch's negative review, ThLZ 48 (1923) 23–24Google Scholar; Hirsch, Werke, III. 1. 2, 280.

89 Hirsch, Gottes-Reich-Begriffe, 23.

90 On the young Hirsch's personal encounter with Feuerbach's claim that God is mere human self-perception, see Lage, 82.

91 See, from the 1930s and 1940s, Hirsch, Werke, III. 1. 2, 198–220 on revelation, esp. 210: “Der erste, der die beiden Urbeziehungen am Gottesbewusstsein begrifflich sauber unterschieden hat, ist Schleiermacher in seiner Dialektik gewesen.” Hirsch's defense of “revelation” rests on his theory of language (III. 1. 2, 196–204), a topic which needs further investigation. The quotations are from Hirsch, Geschiehte (1949–54) 5, 283, 287; cf. 291 and Böbel, Wahrheit, 81–82. Hirsch, Werke, III. 1. 2 is a reprint expanded with full lecture notes of his Leitfaden zur christlichen Lehre (Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1938).Google Scholar

92 See esp. Böbel, Wahrheit.

93 Hirsch, Deutschlands Schicksal: Staat, Volk, und Menschheit im Licht einer ethischen Geschichtsansicht (3d ed.; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1925) 21–23Google Scholar, 31; cf. 90–93, 62–63, 24–25, 60–61, 58–59, 48–53, 34–37. Other sources for Hirsch's view of history include: Hirsch, Christentum und Geschichte in Fichtes Philosophie (Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1920)Google Scholar; idem, “Oswald Spenglers ‘Untergang des Abendlandes,’” Geisteskampf der Gegenwart 56 (1920) 127–33Google Scholar; idem, “Grundlegung einer christlichen Geschichtsphilosophie,” in Die idealistische Philosophie und das Christentum (Studien des apologetischen Seminars 14; Gütersloh: Mohn, 1926) 1–35Google Scholar; Schweer, “Ethik,” 20–26, on which I here depend; Schneider-Flume, Theologie, 13–115; Tilgner, Volksnomostheologie, 136–57; Ericksen, Theologians, 124–41. See also Hirsch, Geschichte (1949–54) 4, 401–7 on Fichte's Staatslehre of 1813; idem, “Das Ringen der idealistischen Denker um eine neue, die Aufklärung überwindende Gestalt der philosophischen Aussagen über Gott(1932),” in Müller (ed.), Wahrheit, 142–204.

94 See Hirsch, Deutschlands Schicksal; cf. the treatments by Böbel, Schweer, and Schneider-Flume; but see Tilgner, Volksnomostheologie, 136–45.

95 See, e.g., Hirsch, Deutschlands Schicksal, 49–63 (“Die Gemeinschaft der Gewissen”) 68; cf. Böbel, Wahrheit, 43, 81–83; on decision in Hirsch, see Schneider-Flume, Theologie, 13–53; cf. Ericksen, Theologians, 127–33 on the refutation of meaninglessness and relativism and Hirsch's sympathy with the notion of “the life cycle of civilizations” (131).

96 The clearest statement on this point is Hirsch. Geschichte (1945–54) 4, 402 (“Herz”); but see the works by Hirsch listed in n. 82 above for his use of Fichte in his period of concern with Spengler.

97 Cf. Hirsch, Deutschlands Schicksal, 32–35, 92 (cycles); n. 84 above; idem, Christentum (1920) 22; idem, Geschichte (1949–54) 4, 404–5 (on Fichte, 1813): “Also Religions- und Staatengeschichte gehören zusammen und geben erst zusammen und geben erst mit ihrem Ineinander ein verständliches Bild des Geschichtsverlaufs.” Then (404–5 ) follows Fichte's historical rhythm of “Glaube” and “Verstand” and the destruction of the superstitious, “unechten Glaubensinhalt” by “Verstand.” This Fichtean scheme appears to be the plan behind Hirsch, Das Wesen des Christentums (Weimar: Verlag Deutsche Christen, 1939).Google Scholar

98 Hirsch, Deutschlands Schicksal, 35–36 may imply such criticism. Here I do not claim that Hirsch shows a consistent and unthinking (“mechanical”) reliance on cyclical thought. I do claim that one ought to examine Hirsch's works keeping in mind the currency of cyclical patterns among conservatives of his time. Like some other educated conservatives. Hirsch did not adhere rigidly to a doctrine of cycles; what seems to have appealed to him was a pattern of (“cyclical”) ebb and flow that could somehow explain how Weimar “decadence” bears an inevitable connection with subsequent national “rebirth.” The distance from God of the epoch 1648–1933 as a result of individualistic, rationalistic freedom is the central point of all sections in Hirsch, Lage, that deal with the years before Hitler. Immanentization: Hirsch, Werke, III. 1. 2, 97, 112; cf. Bultmann, Rudolf, “Hirschs Auslegung des Johannes-Evangeliums,” EvTh 4 (1937) 115–42Google Scholar; Hirsch, , Studien zum vierten Evangelium (BHTh 11; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1936)Google Scholar; idem, Das vierte Evangelium in seiner ursprünglichen Gestalt verdeutscht und erklärt (Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1936) esp. 5Google Scholar: “Im Anfang war das Wort, und das Wort war bei Gott, und Gott von Art (sic) war das Wort.”

99 E.g., Hirsch, Lage, 29 (“Spätkultur”).

100 E.g., Ibid., 71, 114.

101 E.g., Ibid., 7–16, 97.

102 Cf. Ibid., passim: the point is that true German freedom requires authoritative Bindung. On revelation see Böbel, Wahrheit, 85; Hirsch, Freiheit; and idem, “Suverän.” See also Gogarten, Friedrich, “Säkularisierte Theologie in der Staatslehre,” Münchener Neueste Nachrichten 86 (2. März 1933) 1–2Google Scholar and (3. März 1933) 1–2; idem, Politische Ethik (Jena: Diedenchs, 1932) 185–86.Google Scholar

103 Cited as a sentence of Hirsch from 1938 by Schneider-Flume, Theologie, i.

104 A frequent theme in much of Hirsch, Lage; see also idem, Das kirchliche Wollen der Deutschen Christen (Schriftenreihe der Deutschen Christen 6; Berlin-Charlottenburg, 1933)Google Scholar; also idem, Deutsches Volkstum und evangelischer Glaube (Hamburg: Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt, 1934).Google Scholar

105 Cf. Tilgner, Volksnomostheologie, 144, 139, 128; Schneider-Flume, Theologie, 58.

106 Tilgner, Volksnomostheologie, 144–52; Dillenberger, God, 48.

107 Cf. Hirsch, Wesen; Moore, “Christian Writers.”

108 Tilgner, Volksnomostheologie, 151.

109 Cited in n. 78 above; see Schweer, “Ethik,” 86–90; Schjørring, Gewissensethik, 155 n. 7 and 157 n. 11; Schneider-Flume, Theologie, 153–59; Ruh, Ulrich, Säkularisierung als Interpretationskategorie (Freiburger Theologische Studien 190; Freiburg: Herder, 1980) 175–80, 279–99.Google Scholar

110 See n. 86 above.

111 Hirsch, “Suverän,” 7; “einem heimlichen Ja,” “deutsche Sendung,” 5.

112 Ibid., 7; cf. 5–6, 8–13.

113 Cf. Schweer, “Ethik,” 86–89; as Schweer notes (86 n. 2) Hirsch does not here undertake an explicit discussion of Rom 13:1–7—though the meaning is clear enough. Schweer says (89 n. 1) that Hirsch here prepares a “knife” for use against the Weimar Republic.

114 Hirsch, Lage, 117. See also the articles by Rendtorff and Nowak cited in n. 76 above.

115 See, e.g., Hirsch, Freiheit, 26, 29; idem. Werke, III. 1. 2. 279–45.

116 Ibid., III. 1. 2, 280. For Hirsch's own concept of “Autonomie” see Lage, 41 and Werke, III. 1. 157. Cf. Werner Conze, et al., “Freiheit,” Geschichtliche Grundbegriffe, 2. 425–542.

117 Cited in n. 2 above; cf. on Stammler, Hirsch, Deutschlands Schicksal, 73.

118 Hirsch, “Recht und Religion,” Archiv für Rechts- und Sozialphilosophie 29 (1935/1936) 226–38 esp. 228.Google Scholar

119 Tillich, Paul, “Die Theologie des Kairos und die gegenwärtige geistige Lage,” Theologische Blätter 13 (November 1934) 305–28Google Scholar; cf. 313: “Damit hast Du das Jahr ‘1933’ dem Jahre ‘33’ so angenähert, dass es für Dich heilsgeschichtlich Bedeutung gewonnen hat.” Cf. Ericksen, Theologians, 179–83. (There are many English versions of Tillich's sentence; cf. the one by Nuovo, Victor and Scharlemann, Robert P. in The Thought of Paul Tillich [ed. Adams, James Luther et al.; San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1985] 364.)Google Scholar

120 Hirsch, Wesen, 158–65; Lundström, Gösta, The Kingdom of God in the Teaching of Jesus: A History of Interpretation (trans. Bulman, Joan; Richmond: John Knox, 1963) 125–26Google Scholar, 131 n. 7; Lehmann, Martin, Synoptische Quellenanalyse und die Frage nach dem historischen Jesus (BZNW 38; Berlin: De Gruyter, 1970).Google Scholar This is not the place to follow the trail of this notion backward; suffice it to say that it would lead us back to Paul Haupt and beyond.

121 “Deutsch-christliches Bekenntnis,” dated “Berlin, zur Weihnachtszeit 1933” and signed by Hirsch, . Haenchen, Ernst, and others, reprinted in Junge [!] Kirche 2 (1934) 28–30Google Scholar; see p. 30: “Wir können heute nur von solchen Christen rechte kirchliche Führung in der Wirklichkeit von Volk und Staat erwarten, welche in der nationalsozialistischen Bewegung eine für alle Deutschen verbindliche neue Gestalt deutschen Lebens erkennen.” Cf. Ericksen, Theologians, 167–77.

122 Tillich. “Theologie,” 312; idem, Protestantismus und politische Romantik in Gesammelte Werke, 2. 212–15; cf. Elert, Werner, “Über die Herkunft des Satzes Finitum infiniti non capax,” ZSTh 16 (1939) 500–504.Google Scholar

123 Writers on Holl and Hirsch frequently speak of their “ethicizing.” “Pseudo-ethicizing” is the better term, unless one concede that ethics is merely rationalization of inclination and self-interest. Note Holl's review of Hirsch, Deutschlands Schicksal (Appendix F), with approval of Hirsch's unrepentant nationalism in 1920: “Man möchte wünschen, dass [dieses Buch] in vieler Hände, zumal in die Hände unserer Jugend käme. Es hat die Kraft in sich, den Geist zu erwecken, der uns jetzt vor allem not tut.”

124 Cf. Troeltsch, Ernst, Gesammelte Schriften, vol. 1: Die Soziallehren der christlichen Kitchen und Gruppen (1922; reprinted Aalen: Scientia, 1961) 848–940Google Scholar (“Die Mystik und der Spiritualismus”).

This sentence has aroused some comment. By way of clarification I would add that I certainly do not question Troeltsch's hearty support of the Weimar Republic. I rather mean to imply that the “ethicizing” of politics supported by appeal to Troeltsch and the “Left Wing” of the Reformation (in opposition to the Two Kingdoms position and the Enlightenment separation of religion and politics) is an extremely ambiguous matter. I see no good reason to suppose that “ethicizing” politics by injecting religion into it can guarantee protection against fanaticism, intolerance, and persecution. Even those who persist in claiming that the so-called Two Kingdoms doctrine somehow caused Hitler's rise (in the face of evidence that the “Third Reich” represents an outgrowth of a mania which is quasi-religious in essence), must admit that religion has something to do with recent events in, for example, Iran.—Yes, but that is the wrong religion and not the one I had in mind.—Precisely my point. The great achievement of the English Enlightenment lay in its (temporarily successful) effort to exclude as many religious passions as possible from politics. Alas, the Reign of Terror illustrates the difficulty of the problem.

125 For documentation on these points see Appendix I on the world-political context of “secularization” and “political theology.”