Løgstrup and Natural Law

The aim of this conference is to consider the relation between the thought of the philosopher and theologian K. E. Løgstrup and the natural law tradition. While Luther’s influence on Løgstrup is well-known, and while Luther was himself a natural law theorist, the connection between Løgstrup and natural law has not been much explored, and indeed has even been denied by Alasdair MacIntyre and others. This conference will look at this issue in more detail, and consider questions such as whether Løgstrup was a natural law theorist at all; whether Løgstrup’s central concepts of ‘life as a gift’ and ‘sovereign expressions of life’ might be understood in natural law terms; Løgstrup’s use of the ‘golden rule’ which also formed part of the natural law tradition; where Løgstrup might stand in the division between Lutheran and Thomistic natural law accounts; and whether the very idea of natural law makes sense given recent developments in anthropology, which might suggest that there are no universal ethical norms at all, including the ‘sovereign expression of life’.