Structural violence and original sin in René Girard An alternative interpretation of Mimetic Theory
Main Article Content
Abstract
Most studies about René Girard’s Mimetic Theory sustain the idea that mimetic desire’s natural dynamics of violent expansion ended up engendering a posteriori the scapegoat mechanism (whose core is sacrifice) as a means of salvation for society. In this paper, however, an interpretive alternative is offered, which is as follows. Sacrifice was not really an element that emerged merely a posteriori due to mimetic desire’s violent consequences. Rather, mimetic desire’s violent traits are created by sacrifice, which planted them into mimetic desire a priori, as their ontological cause. In addition, it is claimed that, epistemologically speaking, there is an antecedence of the scapegoat mechanism over mimetic desire in the chronological context of Girard’s Works, which is apparent when the term ‘mimetic desire’ is coined in La Violence et le Sacré (1972) in a second moment of his intellectual evolution, after having discovered the scapegoat mechanism. In other words, mimetic desire flows into violence and death inevitably as it is destruction-oriented from the very beginning of human history, due to the influence of a special sacrifice that is represented by the scapegoat mechanism. That sacrifice was original sin.
Downloads
Article Details
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
The Publications Service of the University of Extremadura (the publishing house) retains the economic rights (copyright) of the works published in the Anuario de la Facultad de Derecho. Universidad de Extremadura.. The reuse of the content is allowed under a license:
CC BY
Recognition
This license allows others to distribute, remix, tweak and build upon your work, even for commercial purposes, as long as you are acknowledged as the author of the original creation. This is the most helpful license offered. The maximum dissemination and use of the materials subject to the license are recommended.
For more information, see the following links:
References
Crossroad publishing company.
Avery, V. (2013). Jewish vaccines against mimetic desire: René Girard and Jewish Ritual. University of Exeter.
Barahona, Ángel. 2023. “Girard y Nietzsche: el asesinato colectivo de Dios.” Cauriensia 18: 623-644. https://doi.org/10.17398/2340-4256.18.623
Chantre, B. (2023). René Girard: biographie. Grasset.
Doran, R. (2011). "René Girard’s concept of conversion and the ‘Via Negativa’: revisiting ‘Deceit, desire and the novel’". Religion and Literature 43 (3): 170-179.
Dumouchel, P. (1981). "Violence et non-violence". Esprit 60 (2).
Dupuy, J. P. (2016). La jalousie: une géométrie du désir. Éditions du Seuil.
Farneti, R. (2008). "A Political Theology of the Empty Tomb: Christianity and the Return of the Sacred". Theoria: a Journal of Social and Political Theory 116: 22-44.
Girard, R. (2016). Shakespeare: los fuegos de la envidia, 2ª ed. Anagrama.
Girard, R. (2015). La piedra desechada: antijudaísmo cristiano y antropología evangélica. Caparrós Editores.
Girard, R. (2012). El sacrificio. Encuentro.
Girard, R. y Vattimo, G. (2011). ¿Verdad o fe débil? Diálogo sobre Cristianismo y relativismo. Paidós.
Girard, R. (2010). Clausewitz en los extremos: política, guerra y apocalipsis. Katz.
Girard, R. (2006a). Aquel por el que llega el escándalo. Caparrós Editores.
Girard, R. (2006b). Los orígenes de la cultura. Trotta.
Girard, R. (2002). Veo a Satán caer como el relámpago. Anagrama.
Girard, R. (1998). La violencia y lo sagrado, 3ªed. Anagrama.
Girard, R. (1996). Cuando empiecen a suceder estas cosas. Encuentro.
Girard, R. (1986). El chivo expiatorio. Anagrama.
Girard, R. (1985). Mentira romántica y verdad novelesca. Anagrama.
Girard, R. (1982). El misterio de nuestro mundo. Sígueme.
Grande, P. B. (2009). Mimesis and desire: an analysis of the religious nature of mimesis and desire in the work of René Girard. Lambert.
Johnson, W. L. (1992). Violence as grace: a ‘Theopoietic’ reading of mimetic violence in René Girard and Flannery O’Connor. UMI.
McDonald, B. (2002). "Violence & the Lamb Slain [interview with René Girard]". Touchstone 16 (10): 40-43.
Moosbrugger, M. (2013). "René Girard and Raymund Schwager on religion, violence, and sacrifice. New insights from their correspondence". Journal of religion and violence 1 (2): 147-166.
Moreno Fernández, A. (2015). "La filogénesis humana según la teoría mimética de René Girard". Daimon: Revista internacional de Filosofía 64: 133-144.
Payne, M. (2007). Theocritus and the invention of fiction. Cambridge University Press.
Ruiz Lozano, P. (2005). Antropología y religión en René Girard. Facultad de Teología de Granada.
Stork, P. R. (2007). Human rights in crisis: a cultural critique. VDM.
Tomelleri, S. (1996). René Girard: la matrice sociale della violenza. Franco Angeli.
Webb, E. (1988). Philosophers of consciousness: Polanyi, Lonergan, Voeglin, Ricoeur, Girard, Kierkegaard. University of Washington Press.
Wilmes, A. (2017). "Portrait of René Girard as a post-hegelian: masters, slaves, and monstrous double"s. The Philosophical Journal of Conflict and Violence 1 (1): 57-85.