This essay rewards careful and considered reading.
Although it doesn't mention Rene Girard explicitly, this essay invokes a lot of Girardian themes, which could enrich the thesis still further. Girard would identify the "mystery of lawlessness" in terms of sacrificial violence, in which society channels its rivalries and tensions onto a scapegoat or scapegoat class. The orgy of mob violence restores the social order, because the need for vengeance and the need to "do something" has been satisfied, and what's more, directed at victims who cannot themselves seek revenge (even if they are not all killed) because of their outsider, dehumanized status. They are not full members of society. Historically, Jews, Blacks, deviants, prisoners of war, or convicts served this function. Or sometimes, as both you and Girard mention, the king himself.
The Left and Right now vie to dehumanize the other, so that when the Dionysian storm, which grows ever stronger the longer that landfall is postpone, finally arrives, that it will be the other side that falls victim to the frenzy.
This pattern is far older than Christianity. Indeed, some theologians argue that Christianity carries the seed of the transcendence of the pattern of sacrificial violence. Normally, after the murderous orgy, the victim is mythologized as an arch-villain or demon, the repository of the evil that has now been removed from society. The Christ story insists on the innocence of the victim. It has been construed to mean "Jesus was innocent but everyone else is a sinner who deserves to go to hell," but the true teaching, if I may, is about the innocence of all victims and the unholiness of the scapegoating pattern.
What a lovely essay. I’m still digesting it but an initial thought is on times arrow. As both Christian theology and the modern myth of progress (which you discuss in your Marxism book) have a distinct identity in time and of a beginning and the end of history presumably modern states have as part of their mythos that despite their continuous progress one day it’s all going down in flames despite their best efforts? Seems very schizophrenic and maybe explains a lot of recent politics.
It seems to me that part of your understanding of the New Testament writings is that Jesus of Nazareth was a victim of exaggerated and false advertising and wishful thinking (magical thinking?) by the first generation of early Christians. For instance it is obvious from his writings that Paul was convinced he had encountered the Resurrected Jesus as a divine being and attested others had done so also, 1 Corinthians chapter 15.
I’ve begun to wonder if there is a ritual intent to the acts of many Republicans, most notably those who stormed the capitol on January 6th. Lately, I have noticed an odd trend amount many of my acquaintances, who are older Trump-supporting people. It seems that they are not truly serious in their politics and beliefs. I have described this to my husband as “it seems like they all think they are LARPing, but the consequences are real.” There is this sense of shock that there are legal consequences for the January 6th uprising, as if everyone should know they were just playing. The left is quick to dismiss this as white Boomer entitlement (and I can’t say that they are entirely wrong there) but I see something weirder. I see Boomers who used to make their own decisions about politics now being Trumpers because it’s this cool idea to get with their friends and pretend they are the last bastion of American Decency holding the line against hordes of Satanic pedophiles. They don’t really believe a lot of it, but it’s “cool”. They care more about their game than the stability of their Social Security checks or their children or grandchildren’s future. It’s absolutely terrifying because they are not rational. They don’t care about the consequences of their actions or their chances of actually getting their way- they just are driven to perform in a political theater of their own imagination. So, not really what you are driving at but I’m realizing how much this theater of Satanic pedophiles vs defender of patriarchy/ patriotism is rooted in old ideas about what the state does and how it rewrites freedom and independence as misery and servitude to the Devil. Like many abusers, any opposition to their agenda must be the result of some outside influence leading the victim astray, rather than a natural reaction of the victim to escape abuse. So the relatively free and egalitarian societies of the indigenous must be rewritten as servitude to Satan. That is a more ancient example, but in the modern day we still see the assumption that liberated women and LGBT people are secretly miserable, enslaved to a political agenda.
This past year I read “The Occult Features of Anarchism” by Erica Lagalisse which gets into how leftist theories of salvation come from religious and spiritual ideas of salvation, despite often considering themselves to be secular. Your essay here added more to that idea for me, and explains why things are feeling so polarized here in the US -- each side truly believes the other one is evil.
This essay rewards careful and considered reading.
Although it doesn't mention Rene Girard explicitly, this essay invokes a lot of Girardian themes, which could enrich the thesis still further. Girard would identify the "mystery of lawlessness" in terms of sacrificial violence, in which society channels its rivalries and tensions onto a scapegoat or scapegoat class. The orgy of mob violence restores the social order, because the need for vengeance and the need to "do something" has been satisfied, and what's more, directed at victims who cannot themselves seek revenge (even if they are not all killed) because of their outsider, dehumanized status. They are not full members of society. Historically, Jews, Blacks, deviants, prisoners of war, or convicts served this function. Or sometimes, as both you and Girard mention, the king himself.
The Left and Right now vie to dehumanize the other, so that when the Dionysian storm, which grows ever stronger the longer that landfall is postpone, finally arrives, that it will be the other side that falls victim to the frenzy.
This pattern is far older than Christianity. Indeed, some theologians argue that Christianity carries the seed of the transcendence of the pattern of sacrificial violence. Normally, after the murderous orgy, the victim is mythologized as an arch-villain or demon, the repository of the evil that has now been removed from society. The Christ story insists on the innocence of the victim. It has been construed to mean "Jesus was innocent but everyone else is a sinner who deserves to go to hell," but the true teaching, if I may, is about the innocence of all victims and the unholiness of the scapegoating pattern.
What a lovely essay. I’m still digesting it but an initial thought is on times arrow. As both Christian theology and the modern myth of progress (which you discuss in your Marxism book) have a distinct identity in time and of a beginning and the end of history presumably modern states have as part of their mythos that despite their continuous progress one day it’s all going down in flames despite their best efforts? Seems very schizophrenic and maybe explains a lot of recent politics.
It seems to me that part of your understanding of the New Testament writings is that Jesus of Nazareth was a victim of exaggerated and false advertising and wishful thinking (magical thinking?) by the first generation of early Christians. For instance it is obvious from his writings that Paul was convinced he had encountered the Resurrected Jesus as a divine being and attested others had done so also, 1 Corinthians chapter 15.
I’ve begun to wonder if there is a ritual intent to the acts of many Republicans, most notably those who stormed the capitol on January 6th. Lately, I have noticed an odd trend amount many of my acquaintances, who are older Trump-supporting people. It seems that they are not truly serious in their politics and beliefs. I have described this to my husband as “it seems like they all think they are LARPing, but the consequences are real.” There is this sense of shock that there are legal consequences for the January 6th uprising, as if everyone should know they were just playing. The left is quick to dismiss this as white Boomer entitlement (and I can’t say that they are entirely wrong there) but I see something weirder. I see Boomers who used to make their own decisions about politics now being Trumpers because it’s this cool idea to get with their friends and pretend they are the last bastion of American Decency holding the line against hordes of Satanic pedophiles. They don’t really believe a lot of it, but it’s “cool”. They care more about their game than the stability of their Social Security checks or their children or grandchildren’s future. It’s absolutely terrifying because they are not rational. They don’t care about the consequences of their actions or their chances of actually getting their way- they just are driven to perform in a political theater of their own imagination. So, not really what you are driving at but I’m realizing how much this theater of Satanic pedophiles vs defender of patriarchy/ patriotism is rooted in old ideas about what the state does and how it rewrites freedom and independence as misery and servitude to the Devil. Like many abusers, any opposition to their agenda must be the result of some outside influence leading the victim astray, rather than a natural reaction of the victim to escape abuse. So the relatively free and egalitarian societies of the indigenous must be rewritten as servitude to Satan. That is a more ancient example, but in the modern day we still see the assumption that liberated women and LGBT people are secretly miserable, enslaved to a political agenda.
This past year I read “The Occult Features of Anarchism” by Erica Lagalisse which gets into how leftist theories of salvation come from religious and spiritual ideas of salvation, despite often considering themselves to be secular. Your essay here added more to that idea for me, and explains why things are feeling so polarized here in the US -- each side truly believes the other one is evil.
Bring it on because I've been dying of boredom for years