Welcome!
This is another of the blossoming number of websites designed to aid
friends-in-Christ in their weekly engagement with the lectionary, the assigned
readings from Scripture for worship. But it must be stated clearly at the
outset that these reflections are of a highly specialized variety: "Girardian"
reflections.
What Are "Girardian" Reflections?
René Girard, now a professor Emeritus at Stanford University,
has elaborated what he refers to as "mimetic theory," but which
is also becoming known as an "anthropology of the cross." The hope with
these lectionary reflections is to illustrate the significance of this
anthropology as a new key to interpreting the Gospel. (Note: See also "Preaching
Peace," by Michael Hardin and Jeff Krantz, as an excellent
website with a similar mission as this one, to interpret the Sunday lectionary
through the lens of mimetic theory.)
The age-old need for an adequate anthropology might be made plain by
considering a portion of Karl Barth's radical theology of revelation.
In Volume 1 Part 2 of Church Dogmatics, there is a section
(§17) boldly titled "The Revelation of God as the Abolition of Religion."
Barth takes the modern position that religion is an entirely human
affair. But he comes to this conclusion not in the fashion of an atheist
like Freud, but as an evangelical who sees human religion as sorely in
need of God's same redemptive grace as is any individual human being. While
there is much brilliant theologizing in Barth's work, I would suggest that
what his work still lacks is an evangelical anthropology as brilliant
as his theology -- and that with the work of Girard we finally do have
such an anthropology. We can know more precisely how religion is a human
affair resulting in idolatry, in need of redemption.
What is the significance of such an anthropology? If religion is a human
affair, and its gods are all idols, then how can we ever hope to hear the
voice of the true God, or to see the true God's Word made manifest among
us? It would be like Isaiah prophesied, and Jesus
repeated, 'These people have ears unhearing and eyes unseeing' (Isa. 6:8).
We could never hope to penetrate the nature of our idolatry without an
anthropological revelation as piercing as the theological one. For human
idolatry is a matter of anthropology more than theology. The idolatry
is of our nature not God's. If we could come to better understand
the nature of our own idolatry, it might begin the process of finally unstopping
our ears and unveiling our eyes to better hear and see the true God.
The proposal to you in these pages is that René Girard's anthropology
of the cross takes an extraordinary step to more fully unpacking that anthropological
revelation, as it comes to us through the scriptural account of the Christ
event.
The Influence of Mimetic Theory on Hermeneutics and Preaching
Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, Jesus interpreted
to them the things about himself in all the scriptures. -- Luke 24:27
Then Jesus said to them, "These are my words that I spoke to you while
I was still with you -- that everything written about me in the law of
Moses, the prophets, and the psalms must be fulfilled." Then he opened
their minds to understand the scriptures. -- Luke 24:44-45
Wouldn't you love to know what Jesus said that Easter evening on the road
to Emmaus and in the upper room? What does it mean to understand the scriptures
according to Jesus? Could Luke possibly have given us a clue in the proclamation
he records for us in his sequel Acts? I have a suggestion: Amidst the diverse
themes and circumstances of the first five recorded sermons in church history,
Peter does ring out one common thread (my emphases):
“...this man ... you crucified and killed by the
hands of those outside the law. But God raised him up...” (Acts
2:23-24)
“...and you killed the Author of life, whom God raised
from the dead.” (Acts 3:15)
“...by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified,
whom God raised from the dead.” (Acts 4:10)
“The God of our ancestors raised up Jesus, whom you
had killed by hanging him on a tree.” (Acts 5:30)
"They put him to death by hanging him on a tree; but God raised
him on the third day and allowed him to appear..." (Acts 10:39-40)
Humankind kills. God raises to life. This is what we most desperately
need to understand about the scriptures according to the cross and resurrection
of Jesus. We are the ones who do violence, not God. And we need to finally
leave behind all idolatries of gods who are violent like us and ask us
to carry out their violence -- which is simply the unconscious way we have
of justifying our violence. When I say "unconscious," I mean a mechanism
built into our anthropology. I mean the pre-conscious idolatry for which
we are forgiven when Jesus says from the cross, "Father, forgive them for
they do not know what they are doing." In short, the first five recorded
sermons of the newly in-Spirited church proclaim the central meaning of
the Cross and Resurrection of Jesus Christ as that which reveals two things:
(1) we human beings are the ones responsible for the murder that gathers
up all others into its vortex of sin; and (2) the God of Life, through
the Son raised, is revealed as the one offering us salvation from the violence.
The latter is theological; but the former is anthropological. And further
anthropological insight helps us to finally see the nature of our idolatry,
namely, that we worship violent gods who justify our violence.
In the evangelical anthropology of René Girard, then, I find
a hermeneutic for reading Scripture that guides me more than any other
in following the preaching of Good News in line with the church’s first
five sermons. We kill, God raises. We can understand more clearly that
our anthropology is based in collective murder that looks just like the
Cross, at the same time that we fully recognize that the God who gives
us life also forgives us, calling us to a way of life based on forgiveness
instead of vengeance (or debt-keeping). And any god who requires sacrificial
violence of us, instead of mercy (Hos. 6:6; quoted in Matt. 9:13; 12:7),
is an idol. Girard articulates an anthropology in which it is made clear
that gods of sacrificial violence are idols -- which, in turn, informs
theology in discerning the true God of Jesus Christ as solely a God of
mercy, love, and life. (For an example of immense importance of learning
to read the God of the Hebrew scriptures as a God of mercy, not wrath,
see the reading of St. Paul's transfiguration of the "God of wrath" in
his letter to the Romans, in Part II of "My
Core Convictions.") Isn't this what John means when he writes:
This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to
you, that God is light and in God there is no darkness at all. (1 John
1:5)
Or his simplest of summaries: "God is love" (1 John 4:8, 16)?
"Anthropological Criticism"
In the context of modern biblical criticism, a hermeneutic guided by
mimetic theory might be dubbed "anthropological criticism." It is closely
related to what is referred to in recent years as intercultural criticism,
the awareness that one's "social location" makes a difference in interpreting
scripture. Intercultural criticism has sprung up with the increasing awareness
of the quite different reading strategies that exist between oppressors
and oppressed. Mimetic theory as an "anthropological criticism" makes this
difference explicit.
One of Girard's most prominent themes (see "Are
the Gospels Mythical?") is that myth is written from the perspective
(or "social location," to use the language of intercultural criticism)
of the perpetrators of collective violence, while Gospel (the climax of
the biblical worldview) is from the perspective of the victim of such violence.
In the resurrection of Jesus Christ, you have for the first time in history
the permanent survival of the victim's perspective becoming a thematic
in history through the Spirit of Truth, the Paraclete. It is the Paraclete's
work, therefore, that gradually makes possible a reading from the perspective
of Empire's victims.
"Anthropological criticism" explains the possibility of intercultural
criticism. It doesn't replace it, but it can give both a wider framework
and a measure for the readings from various social locations. It helps
to explain why the social location of the oppressed is generally preferred
to that of the oppressor. But mimetic theory also is realistic about the
anthropological tendency to justify vengeance. Even the oppressed's perspective
can easily become tainted with righteous violence. These days it has become
difficult to argue that violence is "righteous" unless it is that of a
victim against his or her oppressor.
Again, it is the Risen Jesus Christ who provides the measure of truth
because he returns as a
forgiving victim. The Gospel of Jesus Christ
is the measure of becoming truly human -- and the measure of what is truly
divine . . .
A Theory of Idolatry
Modern people still have their idols, their false notions about God.
I have a favorite story from Christian counselor Dennis Linn, about how
his mind was changed about God. (1) He tells
of Hilda coming into his office one day because her son had tried to commit
suicide for the fourth time. She described how her son was involved in
prostitution, drug dealing and murder, and then ended her list of her son's
"big sins" with, "What bothers me most is that my son says he wants nothing
to do with God. What will happen to my son if he commits suicide without
repenting and wanting nothing to do with God?"
Pastor Linn tells how he himself believed in the popular version of
a stern God who eternally punishes people in hell, but the counselor in
him didn't want to say so. Instead, he began by asking Hilda what she thought.
But Hilda herself was still trapped in that same idea of God. "Well," she
replied, "I think that when you die, you appear before the judgment seat
of God. If you have lived a good life, God will send you to heaven. If
you have lived a bad life, God will send you to hell." Sadly, she concluded,
"Since my son has lived such a bad life, if he were to die without repenting,
God would certainly send him to hell."
Again, Pastor Linn didn't want to directly agree with her so he tried
another indirect tactic. He had Hilda close her eyes and imagine herself
sitting next to the judgment seat of God. He also had her imagine her son's
arrival at the judgment seat with all his serious sins and without repenting.
Then he asked her, "Hilda, how does your son feel?" Hilda answered, "My
son feels so lonely and empty." So Pastor Linn asked Hilda what she would
do, to which she responded, "I want to throw my arms around my son." She
lifted her arms and began to cry as she imagined herself holding her son
tightly.
Finally, when she had stopped crying, Pastor Linn asked her to look
into God's eyes and watch what God wanted to do. God stepped down from
the throne, and just as Hilda did, embraced her son. And the three of them,
Hilda, her son, and God, cried together and held one another.
What are other notions about God that we might need to change our minds
about? Let me suggest one: the extremely popular, entrenched Christian
view of atonement as a substitutionary sacrifice -- namely, that Christ's
sacrifice on the cross is a substitutionary sacrifice to a wrathful God
who otherwise would be punishing us sinners. The hermeneutic of mimetic
theory can help us to see that the reponsibility of the cross's violence
lies fully with us human beings and not a wit with God. John 3:16 tells
us that God gave us the Son out of love, not wrath. In other Johannine
language: God gave us his Lamb to our satanic engines of sacrifice so that
this sin would be taken away from us. We finally understand that if 'God
requires mercy not sacrifice,' then we are the ones, not God, who have
required sacrifice all along. Mimetic theory provides an anthropological
explanation of how sacrifice is a human idolatrous affair. And, to the
extent that atonement doctrines follow the human logic of sacrifice, mimetic
theory is extremely valuable in exposing the idolatry of such doctrines.
(See the resource page, "The
Anthropology of René Girard and Traditional Doctrines of Atonement."
Mark
Heim's recent book, Saved
from Sacrifice performs a close reading of the biblical
and theological texts using Girard's anthropology in order to bring clarity
to atonement theology.)
A Theory of Culture
A further significance of Girard's anthropology is the powerful analysis
of culture it provides. We talk a great deal about culture these days.
Some of the talk I find helpful, but nothing comes even close to matching
the depth of Girard's work in this regard because the other analyses do
not really help us to understand how culture comes about.
Let me make an analogy to biology / zoology. Aristotle gives us a good
start in the biological sciences with his classifications of genus and
species. But Darwin truly revolutionizes these sciences for us when he
theorizes about the actual genetic mechanisms that generate the
different genus and species. Most of the analyses of culture I come across
these days operate in the Aristotelian mode of classifying cultures according
to traits, characteristics, and elements. Girard's work offers us something
akin to a Darwinian revolution for cultural anthropology by suggesting
how it is that human culture is generated in the first place. And the even
more incredible aspect is that he places the Cross of Jesus Christ at the
heart of the revelation of our coming to know anything about what otherwise
lies hidden at the foundations of culture.
Sound impossible? Perhaps. But what do the synoptic gospels really mean
when they tell us that Jesus came to bring God's Kingdom near to us? I
suggest that we interpret "kingdom" in terms of our modern talk about "culture."
Girard's work proposes to us that what generates our human culture is completely
different than what generates God's culture -- though the key to unlock
the revelation of both lies with the Cross of Christ. God, in Jesus Christ,
has come to expose the murderous foundations of human culture, to graciously
forgive us for it, and to call us to begin living in God's Culture.
Discipleship as a Call to Faith in the Nonviolent God -- and in
Nonviolence
As an anthropology that clarifies the movement out from idolatry, Girard's
work helps provide a more unified reading of the Judeo-Christian scriptures:
we can read them in terms of a gradual process of God's people being redeemed
from our idolatry. I find it meaningful to view all of scripture as on
its way to the pinnacle of insight represented by St. John's summary of
the Good News:
This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to
you, that God is light and in God there is no darkness at all. (1 John
1:5)
In Jesus Christ, truly divine and truly human, we see both that God is
Love and that we human beings are forever trying to make God into something
else. We are forever projecting all manner of dark qualities onto God which
have much more to do with our desires than with God's. Since the foundation
of our human worlds, we have created gods in our image in order to justify
our own deeds of violence, especially the "good" violence we use to
stem the "bad" violence.
In short, the Living God revealed through Jesus Christ is completely
nonviolent, and so a call to follow this Jesus is also a call to faith
in nonviolent suffering as the way to peace. I have come to increasingly
see the Christian revelation in terms of its unique teachings on nonviolence
and on love -- even love of one's enemies. The powers of violence are Satanic
powers which are, in the end, self-defeating.(2)Faith
means believing in the Living God's nonviolent power of love even in the
face of the continuing threat of human violence.
The Book of Revelation, I believe, shows us a picture of the beastly
powers of violence finally collapsing into their own hell-hole of violence,
together with a plea to the faithful to maintain their faith. In the midst
of relating his vision, John the Seer pauses to speak directly to those
faithful:
Let anyone who has an ear listen: If you are to be taken captive,
into captivity you go; if you kill with the sword, with the sword you must
be killed. Here is a call for the endurance and faith of the saints. (Revelation
13:9-10)
Nonviolence -- namely, forgiveness as radical nonretaliation toward
those who would hurt us -- as being at the heart of the Christian faith
is not a claim I can substantiate in this brief introduction, but I hope
that a regular visit to these pages can help persuade you.
For Further Introduction / Study
There is also the chance that these pages could confuse you more than
persuade you, because I've taken many Girardian reflections on biblical
texts out of their original contexts and rearranged them according to the
lectionary. If you would like a more straightforward introduction to Girard's
work, I offer an annotated bibiliography,
as well as several essays and sermons of an introductory nature, at the
bottom
of this page.
My personal recommendations for the quickest online introduction
to Girard's work would be:
-
Girard's own article "Are
the Gospels Mythical?". (Hint: Girard's answer to this question is
a resounding "No!" Quite contrary to a Bultmannian approach of our needing
to 'demythologize' the gospels, Girard contends that the Gospels are constantly
at work to 'demythologize' us!);
-
a very concise interview with Girard by Brian McDonald, "Violence
and the Lamb Slain";
-
"Preaching Peace," by Michael
Hardin and Jeff Krantz, is an excellent website with a similar
mission as this one, to interpret the Sunday lectionary through the lens
of mimetic theory. It is more essay-oriented in nature, including a number
of helpful introductory essays.
-
James Alison, Theology Website.
A key theologian who uses mimetic theory as a hermeneutic for the theological
task is James Alison. Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury,
comments on one his books, Faith Beyond
Resentment: "The very best theological books leave you with a feeling
that perhaps it's time you became a Christian. This is emphatically such
a book." A recently established website, James
Alison, Theology, is a wonderful resource into his work, with many
links to online papers and book excerpts (some back to this site).
-
a two-part essay by S. Mark Heim in the
March 7-14, 2001 issues of The Christian Century; Heim does a terrific
job of offering Girard's anthropology as a new key to understanding the
Cross and thus as a corrective to many traditional doctrines of the atonement.
Link to the online versions: "Christ
Crucified: Why does Jesus' death matter?," which sets up the problem;
and "Visible
Victim: Christ's death to end sacrifice," which answers it with mimetic
theory; Heim has now (2006) followed these essays with an excellent book,
Saved
from Sacrifice, that performs a thorough-going application of mimetic
theory to a theology of the cross
For a more substantial but accessible entry into Girard's work I highly
recommend
Gil Bailie's Violence
Unveiled: Humanity at the Crossroads. It is a book that artfully
weaves together Girardian insights with Christian perspectives on modern
life. I agree with author Sam Keen who calls Violence Unveiled,
"The single most important book of social analysis and prophetic theology
to appear in our generation."
An introductory book which I've heard Girard himself recommend is Richard
Golsan's René Girard and
Myth: An Introduction (1993). Two more recent, up-to-date, and
comprehensive introductory books are Chris Fleming's René
Girard: Violence and Mimesis (2004) and Michael Kirwan's
Discovering
Girard (2005). All three of these books are still more academic
in style and approach. Perhaps the book that's least academic in style
while being very practice-oriented is Jim Grote's and John McGeeney's
Clever
as Serpents: Business Ethics and Office Politics. It translates
Girard's "mimetic desire," for example, into "borrowed desire."
Of Girard's own works, I would recommend to the Christian reader that
the best place to start would be either The
Scapegoat, or his more recent book, I
See Satan Fall Like Lightning. Both provide a good mix of his anthropological
theory along with interpretation through biblical material. A connoisseur
of Shakespeare would delight in his A
Theater of Envy: William Shakespeare.
There are also opportunities for continuing education through
conferences and presenters:
-
The annual conference of the Colloquium on Violence & Religion (COV&R).
The 2008 conference
is set for University of California, Riverside, June 18-22. Papers for
recent conferences may be accessed at their websites: 2007
at Amsterdam, the Netherlands; 2006
at Ottawa, Canada; 2004
at Ghost Ranch, New Mexico.
-
PreachingPeace.org
sponsors regular conferences in increasing regularity and variety. The
"Nonviolent Atonement" Seminar of January 2007 is now something that they
offer regionally for those willing to host it. I highly recommend checking
out their "Conference
Info" page.
-
James Alison is also available as a speaker, one whom Archbishop
of Canterbury Rowan Williams has recently named among writers "communicating
profound theological material in an accessible way" (The Christian Century,
April 24-May 1, 2002, p. 24). He may be contacted
by email (for speaking engagements only, please).
-
I am available as a speaker/presenter. I am especially interested in opportunities
to reach sister ELCA congregations or groups. Mimetic theory, I believe,
lends a unique perspective on the crucial issues facing the ELCA around
gay and lesbian people in the church (see the overview in Part IV.4.4 of
"My Core Conviction"; see
also a Résumé of sorts for making
presentations on mimetic theory and the life of the church. Contact
Paul
Nuechterlein.
Under Construction: A Brief History of This Site
I began sending out by email weekly reflections on the lectionary from
a Girardian perspective in October 1996. As the circle of readers widened,
I finally decided on a more permanent venue than the email list. But "more
permanent" is different than "permanent." Having begun in April 2000, the
task of converting the email files to webpage files is now virtually complete,
but the plan for this site is to be under constant construction, with occasional
updating and refreshing. (Remember to click on "Refresh" or "Reload" for
pages recently visited to get the updated version instead of the cached
version). You will see the work of others on these pages as much or more
than mine. Girardian friends like James Alison and Gil Bailie
have been generous in their lending me materials to share with others.
One feature that is new to this website presentation (as opposed to
its former days as an e-list) are regular links to sermons that
I consider to be examples of having the Girardian perspective informing
them (which is the case most weeks).
I prayerfully offer these reflections for the benefit of fresh insight
into the Gospel of Jesus Christ. To Him be all the praise and glory!
Paul Nuechterlein
Kalamazoo, MI
(Résumé for making presentations)
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