|
November 27, 2003
Trevor, some people who have been reading this weblog have commented on the difficulty they are experiencing in understanding Bataille They have asked for a bit of help in terms of links.
In this post I will spell out Bataille's conception of the sacred. Here is a link to discussion on Bataille and the sacred on the ABC's Encounter program. That program explores the connections between religion and life. The link gives some background to the way Bataille has been received in Australia. The connections between Chritianity, the sacred and continental philosophy are briefly explored here.
Bataille's conception of the sacred is part of his critique of modernity. This is an the larger cultural framework through which market capitalism debases the world by means of the commodification of the individual's relation to the spiritual and the physical. This commodification of life separates the physical from the spiritual and constructs the very categories that constrict us as subjects.
The philosophical context is provided by Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit which charts the historical disappearance of the Sacred as the condition of the possibility of modern reason that is increasingly conceived of as a mere means-purpose relation. So we have the loss of a whole range of human experiences that do not fit into the categories of an instrumental reason that is concerned with utility.
On Bataille's account transgressing this modern enframing of our mode of life by instrumental reason involves a sense of the sacred that is tied to the sacrificial. The sacrificial (eg., van Gogh's act of cutting off his ear) transgresses the clearly marked line of utility within modern European culture. It goes beyond the rational, the scientific, the normal; and points to a beyond of modern liberal culture. This is both beyond Europe and beyond modernity, as it points to a more primal and primary state before modernity. Sacrifice points to, or opens up, a pathway to the spiritual.
So Bataille’s philosophical relationship to Hegel's philosophical narrative of modernity is to reveal the ‘impossible’ and ‘unthinkable’ ‘Other’ of Hegel’s spirit of modernity. In his Theory of Religion (1948), he argues for a ‘return to the Sacred’ by withdrawing the ‘thing’ from the sphere of profane objectivity of instrumental reason and restoring it to its sacred origin. This restitution, according to Bataille, is the meaning of ritual sacrifice as a religious practice, as we encounter it in archaic religions. It is an interruption of the profane secular production process, in which suddenly and violently, the Sacred reappears.
It is transgression of taboos which gives human beings access to the sacred itself. If the profane world is the world of taboos, then the sacred world depends on limited acts of transgression. It is the world of celebrations, sovereign rulers, and God. Acts that would be unthinkable in the everyday world, (such as adultery, homosexuality and other forms of non-reproductive sexuality, drug use, cannibalism, incest, human sacrifice) are permitted and even required in the realm of the sacred.
Bataille would argue that what is declared to be taboo is prohibited precisely because it offers, as it were, a doorway to the sacred.
|
Thanks for this entry and the one following.
I appreciate your time in trying to set this out more clearly. Doesn't strike me as an easy task.
I have to admit, that I do get a bit delirious about some of the references to Christianity. I guess I can say, hey that's life but permit me some spleen Gary:
The opening statement of one article...
"In esoteric Christianity, to choose
a starting point, the notion of the Fall denotes that of pre-physical spirit/consciousness, the fall of pure spirit into the bonds of matter. It was a Fall into the enslavement of physical restraints and pragmatics; as well as physical needs and desires (the fallen angels
were first cast out of heaven because of a desire to sit closer to God).
Numerous strains of religious thought have
stressed the goal of liberation from material
enslavement and most especially from desire, which
is in effect the front line of material and bodily
enslavement; thus the Franciscan vows of poverty, the hindhu-buddhist concept of nirvana, (achieving the absence of desire) etc."
'Esoteric' would be a mild understatement. Try extraterrestial. I am curious where such authors get their conceptions of Christianity or why they choose an 'esoteric' variety above the 'traditional'. A definition of the 'esoteric' would be good. A few sources might be better. A statement why the 'esoteric' (or try 'unorthodox') should be used for comparison. "The fall of pure spirit into the bonds of matter"??? Sheesh!
Philosophers may like to separate body and spirit or posit one as higher than the other in some form. And it's unfortunate that many Christians have fallen into that form of anthropological duality (largely due to the influence of Philosophy particularly in popular and pietistic literature) not to mention dualities of other kinds. But both Judaism and Christianity don't make that distinction nor posit a such a hierarchy. Never have. The enslavement of the physical? We then die and become these little disembodied spirits floating around in some ether called heaven where we are truly free?
Is everyone who writes this stuff some sort of screwed up lapsed Catholic of the extra-biblical kind or something? Or some Spong devotee. Or not capable of dealing with Christianity as anything but a monolith of their own choosing? Preferably a monolith of the unrepresentative kind?
OK I'm all done now. And I still say thanks for spelling this out and giving us the links