PE025-612 - Christian Political Thought

  • 2,853 Standard Tuition Fee
  • 12
    Credit Points
  • 0.125 EFT 
  • 6
    AQF level
  • Category developing unit
    B
  • Philosophy & Ethics Unit Discipline

Learning outcomes

On successful completion of this unit, students will

A. Know and understand

1. Demonstrate Developing knowledge and understanding of Christian political thought.

B. Be able to

1. Analyse the nature and elements of Christian political thought in a variety of historical contexts

2. Comment Critically on Christian political thinking in relation to selected contemporary issues

3. Present Analytical, evidence-based perspectives on Christian political thought

C. Be in a position to

1. Applying perspectives and skills from ‘Christian Political Thought’ to contemporary Christian living and ministry contexts

Content

Section A: History of Western Political Thought

A survey and comparison of 6 of the following:

- Hebrew Political Thought (Old Testament)

- Greek and Roman Political Thought (Plato, Aristotle, and Cicero)

- Early Christian Political Thought (New Testament, Justin Martyr, Tertullian)

- The Constantinian Settlement

- Medieval Political Thought (Augustine, Gelasius, and Aquinas)

- Reformation (Luther, Calvin, and the Anabaptists)

- Protestant Orthodoxy and the formation of liberal politics (Hobbes, Locke, Rutherford)

- Anti-Revolutionary Protestantism (Groen, Kuyper, Chalmers)

- Modern Catholic political thought (Leo XIII, John Paul II, Maritain)

- Twentieth century Protestant thought (Reinhold Niebuhr, Karl Barth, Oliver O’Donovan)

 

Section B: Application of Christian political principles

An examination of 3 of the following:

- Church and state in the post-Christian west

- Christian mission and politics in a secular age

- Christian responses to contemporary political ideologies

- Christian political witness: quietism, activism, and the church

- The possibility of a Christian nation

Set Readings

Primary sources:

- O’Donovan, O., and O’Donovan, J. L., From Irenaeus to Grotius (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1999).

- Augustine of Hippo, City of God against the pagans, trans. R. W. Dyson (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

- Ballor, Jordan J. (ed.), Makers of Modern Christian Social Thought (Grand Rapids: Acton Institute, 2016)

- Prinsterer, Guillame Groen van, Unbelief and Revolution (Lexham, 2018)

- Mitchell Cohen, ed., Princeton Readings in Political Thought: Essential texts from Plato to Populism (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2018)

- Forhan, Kate, and Cary Nederman, Medieval Political Theory: A Reader: The Question for the Body Politic 1100-1400 (Routledge, 1993)

 

Secondary Sources:

- Oakley, Francis, The Emergence of Modern Political Thought in the Latin Middle Ages, 3 vols (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2010–2015)

- Elshtain, Jean Bethke, Sovereignty: God, State, and Self (New York: Basic Books, 2008)

- O’Donovan, Oliver, The Desire of the Nations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1996)

- Koyzis, David T., Political Visions & Illusions, 2nd ed. (Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2019)

- Vandrunen, David, Politics After Christendom: Political Theology in A Fractured World (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2020)

- Strange, Alan D., Empowered Witness: Politics, Culture, and the Spiritual Mission of the Church (Wheaton: Crossway, 2024)

- Yi, Wang and others, Faithful Disobedience: Writing on Church and State from a Chinese House Church Movement, ed. Hannah Nation and J. D. Tseng (Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2022)

- Jeffrey Stout, Democracy and Tradition (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2003)

- Littlejohn, W. Bradford, The Peril and Promise of Christian Liberty: Richard Hooker, the Puritans, and Protestant Political Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2017)

- Radner, Ephraim, Mortal Goods: Reimagining Christian Political Duty (Gand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2024)

- Bauckham, Richard, The Bible in Politics, 2nd ed. (Westminster John Knox Press, 2017)

- Bretherton, Luke, Christ and the Common Life: Political Theology and the Case for Democracy (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2019)

- Saunders, Benjamin B., The Crisis of Civil law: What the Bible Teaches about Law and What It Means Today (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2024)

- Baker, Hunter, Political Thought: A Student’s Guide (Wheaton: Crossway, 2012)

- Geest, Fred van, Introduction to Political Science: A Christian Perspective (Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2017)

- Klosko, George, ed., The Oxford Handbook of the History of Political Philosophy (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2011)Balot, Ryan K., A Companion to Greek and Roman Political Thought (Blackwell, 2009)

- Brett, Mark G, Locations of God: Political Theology in the Hebrew Bible (Oxford University Press, 2019)

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