Law as Eschatology

Abstract

Religion is a reoccurring theme within international law, as both an external phenomenon that confronts the profession and an internal dynamic that influences the logic and sensibility of the profession. A key concept within theological belief and study is ‘eschatology’, which addresses the end of days and how believers might orient their lives accordingly. While scholars engaged in global governance discourse often analyse the relationship between theology and law, there is a tendency to neglect and avoid any rigorous study towards the specific content of religious doctrine. In this paper, our goal is to provide a concise analysis of the theological variations of eschatology and how they map onto international legal argument and more generally Western philosophical ‘modernity’ in relation to governance. The argument is not that theological eschatology provides a ‘deep structure’ to the logic of the discipline, but that these fields conceptually overlap in provocative ways, which raise questions about the secular and universal character of law and politics.

Keywords: eschatology, international law, legal theory, disenchantment, secularism, futuristic, inaugural, realized, personal, cosmic, national, post-foundational, law and religion, modernism, legal history