Published November 20, 2025
Today—Nov. 20—marks the 80th anniversary of the beginning of the Nuremberg Trials, the proceedings that brought the Nazi regime before the bar of justice for its world-historical barbarism.
I confess that the events of Nuremberg fascinate me. On the one hand, the idea that a temporary military tribunal comprised of the Allied Powers would formulate legal standards almost ex nihilo to put Nazi leaders on trial raises perennial philosophical questions about legal authority and legitimacy. Was this a court with true jurisdiction or simply the moral will of the victors? The question still lingers.
Yet as a professor of Christian ethics, it is not merely the procedural complexity that holds my attention—it is the moral gravity. Nuremberg was not simply a courtroom. It was humanity’s attempt to reckon with evil so horrific and so intentional that ordinary categories seemed insufficient. The Nazis’ crimes were grotesque and intentionally dehumanizing, and those crimes demanded justice. The trials stand as evidence that human conscience and the laws of nations cry out for justice.
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Andrew T. Walker, Ph.D., is a Fellow in the Evangelicals and Civic Life Program at The Ethics and Public Policy Center. He is also the Dean of the School of Theology and Professor of Christian Ethics and Public Theology at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, and the founding Managing Editor of WORLD Opinions. He co-hosts The Bully Pulpit, a weekly podcast exploring faith, culture, and politics from a conservative Christian perspective.
