The Metaphysical Contention of Political Theology

Abstract The question of the exact role of theology in Schmitt’s political theology remains undecided. Several authors have raised this question and distinct answers have been given. In order to reach an accurate representation of the political–theological dimension in Schmitt’s work, I will attempt an interpretation which takes into account not only Schmitt’s more widely known theses, but also the perceived esoteric and unsaid aspects of his work. Against Heinrich Meier’s prominent thesis, in his The Lesson of Carl Schmitt, of the strict theological nature of political theology, my thesis is that Schmitt gives precedence to the political over theology and that political theology is a theology and metaphysics of the political. Starting from Peterson’s theological objections, centered on Trinitarian dogma and eschatology, I will reconstruct the trail of political theology throughout Schmitt’s work in view of its epitome in the notion of a Trinitarian stasiology and in the figure of the katechon. It is the connection between these two themes which defines Schmitt’s positive and polemical political theology, which can be designated as a katechontic and metastatic political theology. The katechon itself will be defined as the metapolitical and transcendental condition of possibility of the political. The Nomos of the Earth will also be a necessary reference point for the correct understanding of the connection between theology and politics, given the theme of “detheologization,” as well as Schmitt’s lifelong engagement with the problem of the state in the work of Thomas Hobbes.