.gif) Cover of the first edition | |
| Author | René Girard |
|---|---|
| Original title | La Violence et le sacré |
| Translator | Patrick Gregory |
| Language | French |
| Subject | The sacred,sacrifice |
| Publisher | Editions Bernard Grasset,Johns Hopkins University Press |
Publication date | 1972 |
| Publication place | France |
Published in English | 1977 |
| Media type | Print (Hardcover andPaperback) |
| Pages | 455 (first edition) |
| ISBN | 978-1472520814 |
Violence and the Sacred (French:La violence et le sacré) is a 1972 book aboutthe sacred by the French criticRené Girard, in which the author explores the ritual role ofsacrifice. The book received both positive reviews, which praised Girard's theory of the sacred, and more mixed assessments. Some commentators have seen the book as a work that expresses or points toward a Christian religious perspective. However, the book has also been seen as "atheistic"[1] or "hostile to religion".[2]Violence and the Sacred became highly influential, inanthropology,literary criticism, and evenChristology. It has been compared to the classicistWalter Burkert'sHomo Necans (1972). Girard further developed its ideas in a subsequent book,Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World (1978).
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Girard discusses the ritual role of sacrifice, seeking to explain the fact that it sometimes appears as "a sacred obligation to be neglected at grave peril" and at other times as "a sort of criminal activity entailing perils of equal gravity". He explores the concept of the "sacrificial crisis" and the role of thescapegoat. Aspects ofGreek culture he explores includeGreek tragedy,Ancient Greek religion, and the Greek philosopherHeraclitus. Among modern thinkers, he reviews the theories of the sociologistHenri Hubert and the anthropologistMarcel Mauss and discusses the work of the philosopherFriedrich Nietzsche and the intellectualGeorges Bataille. He reevaluatesTotem and Taboo (1913), a work bySigmund Freud, the founder ofpsychoanalysis. He writes that whileTotem and Taboo has been widely rejected, he views the work differently and sees its concept of collective murder as close to the themes of his own work. He also reevaluates Freud's theory of theOedipus complex, and theincest taboo. He also discusses the work of the anthropologistClaude Lévi-Strauss.[3]
Violence and the Sacred was written while Girard was distinguished professor at theState University of New York at Buffalo and resulted from a decade of research.[4] The book was first published in French in 1972 byEditions Bernard Grasset. In 1977,Johns Hopkins University Press published an English translation by Patrick Gregory. It was also published byThe Athlone Press in 1988 andContinuum in 2005.[5]
Girard was awarded thePrix de l'Académie française forViolence and the Sacred,[6] which is considered his major work.[7] It became a highly influential book in anthropology, literary criticism, and even Christology.[8]Violence and the Sacred received positive reviews from G. H. de Radkowski inLe Monde,[1] the criticVictor Brombert inThe Chronicle of Higher Education,[9] Frank McConnell inThe New Republic,[10] and Vincent Farenga inComparative Literature.[11] The book received mixed reviews from Homer Obred Brown inModern Language Notes,[12] Winifred Lambrecht inLibrary Journal,[13] John E. Rexine inThe Modern Language Journal,[14] and James A. Aho inSA: Sociological Analysis.[15]
According to Chris Fleming, de Radkowski considered the book an "enormous intellectual achievement" in that it provided the "first authentically atheistic theory of religion and the sacred".[1] Brombert described the book as "fascinating and ambitious", and important. He identified it as part of a trend toward interdisciplinary studies in France, and wrote that it provoked many reactions and thatEsprit devoted a large part of an issue to it. He believed that Girard's treatment of Freud, of anthropology, and of linguistic data, would lead to critical reactions. He credited Girard with providing interesting discussions of Biblical stories, Greek myths and rituals, taboos, and the fears aroused by twins. He praised Girard's discussion of the "predicament of a modern society that seeks ever greater numbers of sacrificial victims in a desperate attempt to restore the efficacy of a lost sense of ritual". However, he believed that Girard's discussion of religion focused too much on violence and did not explain its most "important principles". He also found the work's methodology questionable.[9]
McConnell considered the book important, and argued that it complemented the philosopherMichel Foucault'sDiscipline and Punish (1975). He praised Girard's discussion of the cultural origins of judicial systems and the relevance of the concept of the sacrificial crisis to modern society.[10] Farenga described Girard's theory of sacrifice as "brilliant", though he believed that its details would be criticized. He found Girard's discussion of Freud convincing. He suggested thatViolence and the Sacred reassessed the "Greco-Roman" tradition of western thought in the same way that Girard's subsequent bookThings Hidden Since the Foundation of the World reassessed the "Judeo-Christian" tradition, and that Girard's work had a "Christological" background. He contrasted Girard's ideas with those of the philosopherGilles Deleuze and the psychoanalystFélix Guattari, as presented inAnti-Oedipus (1972), as well as withcritical theory anddeconstruction.[11]
Brown maintained thatViolence and the Sacred formed part of a body of work in which Girard provided valuable readings of literary texts and interpretations of myths. He compared it to the work of the criticEdward Said and the classicistNorman O. Brown. However, he believed it also had features that detracted from its virtues and would cause controversy. He argued that Girard's explanation of sacrifice must in turn depend on an explanation of ritual, and that Girard's thesis that collective murder produced human culture suffers from unresolved theoretical problems. He concluded that the work's importance derived not from its "claims to science" but from its "compelling vision of the plight of modern man". He suggested that, if exposing the nature of the "sacrificial crisis" undermines it and "destroys its authority and power to protect us from our own violent impulses" thenViolence and the Sacred would be "the ultimate recognition leading to total planetary reciprocal violence that would destroy mankind." He found the book "distractingly shrill".[12]
Lambrecht credited Girard with raising important questions and bringing together many different fields of inquiry, but argued that his work depended on controversial assumptions and that he "has a tendency to generalize data that might better have been left as particular examples."[13] Rexine observed that the book received praise upon its publication in French despite being "acknowledged as unorthodox, even atheistic." He considered the work bold and "rich in ideas", and credited Girard with recognizing "the profound importance of the sacred, of ritual, of sacrifice, of religion, and of violence" in human society. However, he believed that Girard's analysis of the ancient Greek dramatists, his reappraisals of Freud and Lévi-Strauss, as well as his "African and Asian comparisons with ancient Greek ritual and religious practice", would be questioned by scholars. He criticized Girard for failing to distinguish between the concept of violence and that of power, and for basing his thesis about religion and violence primarily on ancient Greek religion while largely ignoring contemporary religions such asChristianity andIslam, as well as theEastern religions. He also criticized his style of writing, finding it repetitive, pompous, and verbose.[14]
Aho believed that the book deserved "careful consideration by researchers studying the links between religion and violence" and that it showed both the positive and negative aspects of interdisciplinary scholarship. He found it "convoluted" and "overly difficult". He suggested that Girard based his sociology of religion partly on an "intimate knowledge of mythology" and partly on his imagination. He believed that, like some of the founders of sociology, Girard was overly ambitious. He suggested that Girard was "unfamiliar with contemporary literature on scapegoating, thephenomenology of religious experience, and the sociologies of comparative religion and violence", and made untestable claims.[15]
The classicist Norman O. Brown, the journalistJoseph Bottum, the theologianLeo D. Lefebure, and the philosopherRoger Scruton, have seenViolence and the Sacred as a work that expresses or points toward a Christian religious perspective.[16] Brown maintained that Girard's purpose inViolence and the Sacred is to frighten people into returning to orthodox religion and thatPope John Paul II liked the book.[17] According to Bottum, while literary critics gave the book "ecstatic reviews", many reviewers missed "the implications of Christian revelation" it contains. Bottum described the book as one of a series of works, includingThings Hidden Since the Foundation of the World, in which Girard discusses the cultural role of the scapegoat. He believed that they cost Girard some of "the influence in American and European academic circles that he gained in the 1960s and 1970s". He attributed the decline of Girard's influence on literary criticism to his increasingly obvious interest in biblical revelation following the publication ofViolence and the Sacred.[18]
Lefebure identifiedViolence and the Sacred as part of a body of work that led Girard to conclude that "the Christian revelation unveils the patterns of violence and provides the divine response." He noted that, "Having become convinced that the gospel alone reveals the full truth of the human condition, Girard entered the Catholic Church", and that Girard's subsequent workThings Hidden Since the Foundation of the World expressed a "Christian perspective".[19] Scruton, who has comparedViolence and the Sacred to works by authors such as Nietzsche and Bataille, as well as to those of the composerRichard Wagner, the theologianRudolf Otto, and the historian of religionMircea Eliade,[20] concluded that, despite its merits, Girard's "imaginative" theory fails to explain the sacred. He also suggested that the theory could be viewed as being in part a "Christian apologetic".[21]
Fleming wrote thatViolence and the Sacred, the work of Girard's that "Anglophone theorists" were most familiar with, appeared to suggest that Girard was "hostile to religion". He suggested that this view of the work as "atheistic" was a result of Girard's suggesting that "the social and the sacred are coeval; that violence lies at the heart of the sacred; and that the institutions of the sacred give concrete cultural form to the misrecognition and transcendalization of human violence." However, he maintained thatThings Hidden Since the Foundation of the World complicated this view of Girard's perspective without simply overturning it. He saw Girard's theory of sacrifice, as expressed inViolence and the Sacred, as having significant strengths.[2] It has been compared to the classicist Walter Burkert'sHomo Necans by the literature scholar William Johnsen and the religious studies scholarCatherine Bell;[22][23] Johnsen also praised Girard's discussion of Freud, describing it as brilliant.[24] Conversely, Nidesh Lawtoo argued that Girard's focus on triangles of desire, ambivalent relations with father figures, and founding murders at the origins of culture, remain overdetermined by Freud, including Girard's focus on the cathartic effects of violence, which Lawtoo connects to Freud's and Breuer's "cathartic method" .[25] The philosopher Ludger Hagedorn questioned Girard's use of Heraclitus, his emphasis on violence rather than power, and his understanding of Nietzsche's concept of theApollonian and Dionysian.[26]
