Jurisprudence and Theology: The Australian School

In recent years, a distinctive approach to law and religion scholarship has developed in Australia, characterised by direct engagement with theology in addressing legal and jurisprudential questions. This collection consolidates and develops this approach under the label of the ’Australian School’ of law and religion. The volume brings together leading experts to reflect upon the intersections between jurisprudence and theology and explore jurisprudential and legal questions from various theological standpoints. It presents a contribution to the continual reassessment of the nature and origins of shared norms through the convergent spaces between law and theology, prompting a deeper understanding of the foundations of our common humanity. It also models a way of doing law and religion scholarship that diverges from the dominant focus on the sociological interactions between law and religion in the context of cultural diversity and secular governance. The consistent theme of the collection is that jurisprudence and theology are inextricably intertwined, despite the traditional disciplinary divide between the two literatures. The book addresses both horizontal and vertical perspectives on this issue--horizontal, in the sense of engaging in comparative studies of diverse legal and religious paradigms, and vertical, in the sense of exploring the relationship between legal norms and transcendent sources of value. The book will be of interest to academics and researchers working in the areas of Law and Religion, Jurisprudence, Political Theory, Comparative Law, the History of Ideas and Theology.

Jonathan Crowe is Research Professor of Law and Justice at the University of Southern Queensland, Australia.

Constance Youngwon Lee is Lecturer in Law at Adelaide University, Australia.

Joshua Neoh is Associate Professor of Law at the Australian National University.