Theoria

Used in a rather imprecise – and, indeed, uninteresting – sense, society has two possible “origins” or “sources;” the “theological/mythical” and the “political.” That is, a transcendent or an immanent “source.” Analytically, these appear as two different “sources,” but, in actuality they are one: what we might call the “theologico-political” or the “politico-theological.” (Are these equivalent? Either way, for short, the term “political theology” will be used despite the danger of an interpretation that suggests either the priority of the political over the theological or one that suggests the subject matter is a “theology” that is “political.”) In similarly imprecise language – but this time more interesting – we would not say that the “theological” and the “political” are in a dialectical relation ever moving toward a final synthesis (be it the triumph of the political over the theological or a final merging and interpenetration of the political and the theological), but, rather they are in a mutually constitutive and antagonistic relation. There is a strong sense in which political theology is the horizon of all possible politics and the ground of all possible societies. Without an end to their relationship, one is always present with the other, but in varying degrees. There is no – nor can there be – a purely or exclusively “political” or “theological” society for one would be absolutely schizophrenic and the other absolutely immobile.