Chapter 6: Mimetic Eschatology

Modernity is eschatological because the bad – violence – and the good – love – are, catalyzed by the Christian revelation, accelerating to astronomical proportions while innovation arms them both with powerful instruments. Depending on what forces within modernity are developed, humanity will soon look radically different: a prosperous Kingdom or an apocalyptic wasteland. We are in desperate need of a solution.

Our solution cannot be collective. We cannot simply reintroduce prohibitions and sacrifice since, Girard argues, truth cannot be ignored once revealed. The Christian revelation’s concern for justice will only, if ever so slowly, continue to gain ground. But even if we could, it would not be desirable. In limiting violence through prohibitions and sacrifice, we would also have stopped the development of love and innovation. A satisfying strategy cannot be reactionary and would instead need to renounce violence, cultivate love, and accelerate innovation on a societal scale.

In a surprising twist, despite his praise of the positive potential of modernity, Girard does not believe such a societal solution is possible. His defeatism is fully audible in his last book: “We have to destroy one another or love one another, and humanity, we fear, will prefer to destroy itself.”[1] Apocalypse is inevitable: “The disaster is thus insignificant in relation to its certainty.”[2] With depressing conviction, Girard declares the Christian revelation, which sought to bring humanity into maturity by removing the crutches of sacrifice, a failure: “Christ will have tried to bring humanity into adulthood, but humanity will have refused. I am using the future perfect on purpose because there is a deep failure in all this.”[3]

This degree of pessimistic certainty is indeed a late development for Girard. He once believed “that universal knowledge of violence would suffice”[4] to renounce violence and develop love. That is to say, a rational understanding of metaphysical desire and mimetic rivalries would be enough to limit violence. And an intellectual grasp on how we are fundamentally similar – becoming easier by the day as prohibitions are removed and differentiation is dissolving – would be enough to cultivate identification and love. This is an empty hope for the same reason politics cannot contain wars of extermination: rationality has no hold over intense mimetic desires. It is precisely now, Girard laments, when the rational truth of undifferentiation – identity with the other – is most available that rivals enter into the fiercest mimetic rivalries because of this high degree of undifferentiation:

When there is no longer anything separating enemy brothers and everything tells them to unite, since their very lives depend on the union, neither intellectual obviousness nor appeals to common sense, to reason or to logic are of any use. There will be no peace because war is fed precisely by the nothing that alone remains between the adversaries and that is nourished by their very identity.[5]

The eschatological paradox of modernity is this. At a time when people have never been more radically alike and equal, people see the most radical and diametrically-opposed differences in each other.[6] Modernity, undifferentiated and exposed, becomes infested with internal mediation. Rivals see nothing in the other but the false differences they erect. Under these circumstances, to resist the urge of mimetic rivalries is “something only geniuses and saints can do.”[7] This is the crux of Girard’s disbelief that there can ever be a societal solution. He despairs over the fact that the more we seek truth and justice, the more we inch towards the Kingdom, the more we realize the conditions of undifferentiation and exposure which contains the greatest potential of love – the more we bring about internal mediation, mimetic rivalries, and violence.

We have arrived at another paradox: “The future of the world is out of our control, and yet it is in our hands.”[8] That is to say, we can no longer prevent the world from descending into apocalypse because mimetic rivalries have taken upon a will of their own. Yet, whatever violence that does ensue solely comes from human decisions. We should remind ourselves of the humanism of Girard’s theology: Satan is not a sentient being but the victimage mechanism, God is withdrawn and non-interventionist only making an appearance for revelation, and apocalypse will come solely from human rather than divine violence.

6.1 Holderlin’s Sorrow

It is incongruent, then, to this humanism that the only solution Girard does prescribe relies solely on divine intervention “that will take place in a beyond of which we can describe neither the time nor place.”[9] This solution, as will soon be abundantly clear, is only available to very few individuals. The idea here must be: since the world will inevitably descend towards apocalypse, and the societal wide renunciation of violence and cultivation of love is impossible, we can resort to doing so individually to make ourselves worthy of the Kingdom whose foundation is now solely left in the hands of God.

The path of individual salvation lies in an imitation of Christ, which encourages the renouncing of violence and development of love in five ways.

First, Christ will never enter rivalry with anyone because he is withdrawn. Greek gods, such as Apollo, enter into human society during war – or, at least, people perceive this to be the case – and become mimetic rivals with human heroes. Christ, on the other hand, is always at a safe distance and, unlike other models, will never become your rival.

Second, the imitation of Christ itself will not start mimetic rivalries with others. Again, the idea here can be drawn out with a comparison to Greek religion. A woman can claim to have had sex with Dionysus because of the latter’s frequent presence, and have that relationship be the object which sparks mimetic rivalry with her peers. Christ, however, is so withdrawn that no one can really say to “possess” him in any meaningful way.

Third, because Christ is distant, he does not imitate any worldly person. Girard advises: “the aspect of Christ that has to be imitated is his withdrawal,”[10] specifically, his refusal to imitate anyone at all.

Fourth, after the resurrection – when his divinity is unquestionably confirmed to all – Christ could have become a model widely esteemed and imitated by everyone. Instead, in Girard’s own words, “he withdraws at the very point when he could dominate.”[11] What must also be imitated then, alongside his refusal to imitate, is, paradoxically, his refusal to be imitated. Since we have developed the intimate connection between esteem, metaphysical autonomy, and imitation, the imperative to not be imitated must be interpreted as a commandment to not be esteemed as to not appear autonomous and worthy of imitation. Indeed, this is Girard’s exact intuition: “To imitate Christ is to refuse to impose oneself as a model and [in order to not be a model] to always efface oneself before others. To imitate Christ is to do everything to avoid being imitated.”[12] We must remind ourselves that, in internal mediation, to be imitated is just as dangerous as to imitate given how mimetic rivalries corrupt model and subject alike.

These four aspects of imitating Christ, specifically his withdrawal, force the individual to renounce violence. Specifically, imitating Christs renounces violence because it renounces any worldly imitation: one does not imitate and one is not imitated by any other human whatsoever. Girard is quite literal in his advice of withdrawal. Holderlin, the 18th century poet and philosopher who retreated into a tower for the last forty years of his life, is Girard’s example par excellence.

But it is not enough to just renounce violence. Fifth, to imitate Christ is to see all other humans through Christ and His love. This enables us to be undifferentiated and identify with others as, in Girard’s words, “brothers ‘in’ Christ.”[13]

Girard’s embrace of Holderlin’s renunciation might seem an extreme conclusion. But his hand is forced: to develop love one must be undifferentiated from others. Yet, if one is also exposed, then one enters into internal mediation succumbing to, as Girard puts it, “the irresistible attraction that others exercise upon us, and that always leads to violent reciprocity.”[14] Thus, the only way to both cultivate love and renounce violence is to be unexposed – distant and withdrawn from society.

Certainly, Girard’s advice to withdraw should not be read as an insistence that every single relationship in modernity is a mimetic rivalry, that those who interact with society are all delirious with metaphysical ambitions. Our historical conditions do, however, encourage development along these lines while removing resources for reconciliation. To frame the complexity of the situation in the psychological, historical framework we have already been developing: because of diminishing sacrificial resources, mimetic rivalries can no longer be diffused and will increasingly end in violence. Since there is no reliable way of preventing object competition from descending into mimetic rivalry, all internal mediation has to be avoided.

We can either reintroduce differences or limit exposure. The former is not only impossible but will also thwart the cultivation of love. Thus, the only, or so it would seem, available choice for an individual – and this certainly is not feasible for all of society – is to drastically limit one’s exposure to anyone whatsoever.

Our sympathies to the complexity of Girard’s problem, however, does not preclude our dissatisfaction with the defeatism of his solution. Commentators, echoing this sentiment, are troubled by “Girard’s embrace of Holderlin’s mystical quietism.”[15] They are quick to point out that Girard’s late pessimism ignores the positive potential of humanity in his earlier writings.[16] The dark road that mimesis leads down in Girard’s last work is a far cry from the hopeful picture he paints in his earlier works when he declares: “Mimetic desire is intrinsically good.”[17]

Immanently within Girard, one may ask: what good was Christian love for Holderlin if he was so distant from the ones whom he identified with? If there was any love developed at all, it was an impotent love. One may challenge Girard’s depiction of Holderlin as “innocent” and “holy”, treating visitors “ceremoniously.”[18] A commentator points out: “contemporaries of Hölderlin found their visits to him harrowing: unable to converse, devoid of companionship, Hölderlin's demeanor was characterized by acute anxiety rather than contemplative peace.”[19] One may wonder whether there is a deep incompatibility. Girard first describes, within a deeply humanistic theology, a non-interventionist and withdrawn Christ, only to lay the entire burden of founding the Kingdom of God on his, rather than human, shoulders. In the final analysis, Girard’s solution ironically succumbs to the escapist flaws he attributes to Buddhism: “the nonviolence of Eastern religions is the search for a position outside of violence, nirvana, etc., at the price of all action. But this search abandons the world in a way to itself.”[20]

Externally to Girard, one may wonder how many Holderlins a society can sustain. One may question whether an abstinence from all the channels of innovation that have created, in Girard’s own words, “the most energetic and creative [society] that has ever been”[21] is a fair personal price for nonviolence. Most worryingly, to those outside the Christian faith – a group that has easily accessed Girard’s other insights due to his humanistic interpretations – this individualistic solution spells nothing less than the end of humanity with no salvation in sight.

It need not be so.

Footnotes

[1] Girard, Battling, 48 - 49.

[2] Girard, Battling, 48.

[3] Girard, Battling, 118.

[4] Girard, Battling, 44.

[5] Girard, Battling, 48.

[6] This phenomena has not escaped other social theorists. It is often attributed to Tocqueville and coined the Tocqueville principle. While the phenomena that Girard and Tocqueville observe are quite similar, the mechanisms are slightly different.

[7] Girard, Battling, 133.

[8] Girard, Battling, 49.

[9] Girard, Battling, 48.

[10] Girard, Battling, 50.

[11] Girard, Battling, 122.

[12] Girard, Battling, 122.

[13] Girard, Battling, 123.

[14] Girard, Battling, 100.

[15] Reineke, After the Scapegoat, 146.

[16] See Moosbrugger, The Future of (Post-)Modernity.

[17] Girard, Lightning, 15.

[18] Girard, Battling, 124.