It is widely known that early on in his teaching career Karl Barth advanced a concept of the ‘orders of creation’, but that he retracted that concept in his later work in reaction to the tragic use that had been made of it by the National Socialist movement in Germany. However, two aspects of this movement remain relatively unexplored: first, the underlying material continuity between Barth's early ethics and his later ethics that this movement occludes; and second, the significant methodological shift in Barth's theology which this movement attests. This article explores both these aspects of Barth's theological development through his treatment of the ‘orders of creation’.