The experience of reading Slavoj Zizek is akin to the experience of
watching a David Lynch film: if one tries to find a strict linear plot,
or even a theme, one is doomed to fail. From chapter to chapter with
Zizek, as it is scene to scene with Lynch, one struggles to find a
coherent narrative that strings everything together. In the same way
that it is hard to say what Mulholland Drive (or Lost Highway, or Inland Empire,
or most of Lynch's projects, for that matter) is "about," it is hard to
say what exactly Zizek's books are "about." Although Zizek's newest
book, Event: A Philosophical Journey Through a Concept, aims to
explore the metaphysical concept of Event (what do we mean when we say
something is an Event, what are the causes of Events, do all Events need
causes, and so on), the book rarely stays on this subject. This is
typical Zizek: his books rarely stay on the theme he claims it to have
(see: The Fragile Absolute or First as Tragedy, Then As Farce for further examples).
Naturally,
such a writing style can be immensely frustrating. When one reads
Zizek, one must learn how to read in a new way. "In a narrative," Zizek
tells us, we often need a "shift in perspective [in order to] get what
the story is really about" (13). It is characteristic of the master of
counter-intuition to give advice such as this, but in reality he is
perhaps providing a hermeneutic to reading his own texts: if you read
Zizek the way you'd traditionally read philosophy, you won't get much
out of his work.1
How,
then, should one read Zizek? In a similar fashion that one should watch
a Lynch film: by engaging with what is occurring right in front of you,
not trying to connect it with anything that has occurred before it, nor
expecting it to connect with anything that will happen in the future of
your experience. Undoubtedly, parts of Zizek's books (again, as with
Lynch's films) are utter nonsense. One must only glance at the chapter
"Felix Culpa" (specifically, pages 35-40) in Event to see some of
the worst exegesis on the Fall and the life / death of Christ ever
written. Zizek's theology makes some radical claims that come down to
nothing more than poor interpretation, logical fallacies, and
theologically immature understandings of the inner life of God /
Trinity: Christ's death destroys metaphysics2 , Adam's Fall was logically required so that Christ should come 3, and that God "created the world out of purely selfish vanity"(39) 4.
Due
to such views, it is hard not to see Zizek as the clown that many have
pegged him to be (particularly from the analytic camp). But putting such
a label on Zizek and thus not paying close attention to what he has to
say is a very unwise move – Kierkegaard's proclamation "Once you label
me, you negate me" is quite appropriate concerning Zizek. I certainly do
not claim to offer an apologetic for Zizek – I am skeptical of him
myself – but I do believe one might miss some profound moments if she chooses to see Zizek only as an eccentric cultural theorist.
A prime example of Zizek doing fine work
is his chapter "Buddhism Naturalized," which reads well as a stand-alone
essay. In the chapter, Zizek forges a link between contemporary
neuroscience / eliminatative materialism and Buddhism.
"Brain
scientists are telling us that the notion of Self as a free autonomous
subject is a mere user's illusion; that there is no Self, there are just
objective neuronal processes. They key question here is: how do we as
humans relate to this insight? Is it possible not only to think the
self-less world as a theoretical model, but to live it? to live as
'being no one'?" (59).
This, of course, is nothing
new for anyone who has kept up slightly with neuroscience and philosophy
of mind. But what Zizek brings to table is the idea that what
contemporary neuroscience is asking us to do, i.e., forget our notion of
"Self," is what Buddhism also strives to do with Its concept of
Enlightenment:
"Buddhist Enlightenment, in which the
Self directly, in its innermost self-experience, assumes its own
non-beings, i.e., it recognizes itself as a 'simulated self,' a
representational fiction. Such an enlightened awareness is no longer
self-awareness: it is no longer I who experiences myself as the agent of
my thoughts: 'my' awareness is the direct awareness of a self-less
system, a self-less knowledge. In short, there effectively is a link between the position taken by radical brain sciences and the Buddhist idea of an-atman (of the Self's inexistence)" (61).
Regardless of Zizek's credibility as knowledgeable person concerning religion and philosophy of mind,
this is undoubtedly one of the most creative moves I have read
concerning these subjects. It would be interesting to have a handful of Buddhist scholars and eliminatative materialists (Paul and Patricia Churchland, Daniel Dennett, etc ) hash this idea out.
Event, like Zizek himself, is frustrating, creative, simultaneously both predictable and unpredictable, absurd, and counter-intuitive, It's a smorgasbord of
Marxism, Lacanian psychoanalysis, high and low culture, theology,
and Hegelian dialectic. While Zizek is certainly not the most logically
rigorous philosopher, he will certain make his readers think. And is
that not one of the most important jobs of philosophy?
1 The is
true, of course, of Lynch's films: if you watch a Lynch film the way you
would a traditional film, you will likely get little out of it. In this
sense, Zizek's books are quite Lynchian – though I am aware that I am
not using this term in the "macabre and mundane" utterance in which it
is typically used.↩
2 Zizek
believes that, in Christ, God falls to Earth, thus destroying the
non-physical realm. And, since Christ dies, God is dead. Further, Zizek
does not believe in Christ's bodily resurrection: "we should not take
the resurrection as something that happens after Christ's death,
but as the Holy Ghost" (35). Zizek's trinitarian theology is essentially
this: God "falls" in the form of Christ, Christ dies, and the holy
Ghost alone is among Christians in the natural realm. As such,
metaphysics is destroyed.↩
3 I suppose that such a perspective should be
unsurprising coming from Zizek: he has claimed that Calvinism is the
purest form of Christianity↩
4 The inner life of God is, obviously, a very
tough subject to discuss – perhaps the most abstract and challenging in
theology and the Philosophy of God. For this reason, I do not want to
give Zizek a hard time – I certainly cannot claim to be an expert on the
subject! However, Zizek's claim that God is ultimately selfish seems to
go against the fundamental Trinitarian understanding of God. As Daniel
Castelo correctly notes in his short work Theological Theodicy,
"God did not create in order to start being relational; on the contrary,
God created out of God's life, which is inherently relational. What the
triune God did in creation the cosmos was not unnatural or unusual for
God since within God's life is Father, Son, Holy Spirit. Being relational is not what God decided to be but what God has always been"
(42). As such, God creating is not a purely selfish act. Because God's
inner life is a constant relational giving and receiving between Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit, we can expect God to create and be in relation
with humans in a similar way: God constantly pours himself into us, and
we worship him. Selflessness and selfishness, then, and perhaps less
easily demarcated then we would like to think. I believe that Robert
Jensen makes an argument of that sort somewhere, but at this moment I
cannot remember where.↩
Thursday, September 11, 2014
Sunday, September 7, 2014
David Bentley Hart on realism in literature.
"Realism is a worthless standard to apply to any work of art, and what we call realism is as often as not a cheap parlor trick, a mediocre writer's attempt to distract us from his lack of poetic range by flaunting an overdeveloped talent for mimicry or an unrestrained appetite for inventories of inconsequential detail."
– David Bentley Hart, "Tolstoy and Dostoevsky (and Christ)."
I always get excited when Hart, who usually writes about religion and philosophy, strays into the realm of literary criticism. This is one of my favorite essays of his (along with a more recent piece he wrote on Nabokov), and I think he nails literary realism on the head here. Not too long ago I was arguing with someone about Zadie Smith (whose fiction I find remarkably overrated) and Hart's quote came to mind as apt criticism of White Teeth.
– David Bentley Hart, "Tolstoy and Dostoevsky (and Christ)."
I always get excited when Hart, who usually writes about religion and philosophy, strays into the realm of literary criticism. This is one of my favorite essays of his (along with a more recent piece he wrote on Nabokov), and I think he nails literary realism on the head here. Not too long ago I was arguing with someone about Zadie Smith (whose fiction I find remarkably overrated) and Hart's quote came to mind as apt criticism of White Teeth.
Saturday, September 6, 2014
Kierkegaard on Divine Compassion.
"Divine compassion, however, the unlimited recklessness in concerning oneself only with the suffering, not in the least with oneself, and of unconditionally recklessly concerning oneself with each sufferer – people can interpret this only as a kind of madness over which we are not sure whether we should laugh or cry. Even if there had not been any other obstacle for the inviter, this alone would have been sufficient for him to come to grief in the world.
"Let someone make just a little venture in divine compassion – that is, be just a trifle reckless in being compassionate, and you will promptly see how people will judge it. Let someone who could have better conditions in life, let him not, remaining in such a difference of conditions, give much to the poor, philanthropically (that is, superiority) visit the poor and sick and miserable – no, let him completely give up his difference and earnest seek the company of, completely live with, the poor and lowly of the people, the workers, the manual laborers, the cement mixers, etc.!
"[...] For people are willing enough to practice compassion and self-denial, willing enough to seek after wisdom etc., but they want to determine the criterion themselves, that it shall be to a certain degree. They do not wish to do away with all these glorious virtues; on the contrary, they want – at a cheap price – to have as comfortably as possible the appearance of and the reputation for practicing them. Therefore as soon as the true divine compassion appears in the world it is unconditionally the sacrifice. It comes out of compassion for people, and it is people who trample it down."
- Soren Kierekgaard, Practice in Christianity, pp 58, 60.
When the Christian feels the need to be convicted, when she feels as if she is doing Christianity "right," she should go straight to Kierkegaard. I've rekindled my love for him the past few days, and this passage in Practice in Christianity hit me with a particularly powerful conviction. To strive towards this sort of unlimited recklessness, I think of my beloved prayer attributed to St. Francis:
Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace;
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is error, the truth;
Where there is doubt, the faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
And where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master,
Grant that I may not so much seek
To be consoled, as to console;
To be understood, as to understand;
To be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.
[I am, however, curious as to what Susan Wolf, who wrote the fantastic essay "Moral Saints," would have to say about Kierkegaard on this one. ]
"Let someone make just a little venture in divine compassion – that is, be just a trifle reckless in being compassionate, and you will promptly see how people will judge it. Let someone who could have better conditions in life, let him not, remaining in such a difference of conditions, give much to the poor, philanthropically (that is, superiority) visit the poor and sick and miserable – no, let him completely give up his difference and earnest seek the company of, completely live with, the poor and lowly of the people, the workers, the manual laborers, the cement mixers, etc.!
"[...] For people are willing enough to practice compassion and self-denial, willing enough to seek after wisdom etc., but they want to determine the criterion themselves, that it shall be to a certain degree. They do not wish to do away with all these glorious virtues; on the contrary, they want – at a cheap price – to have as comfortably as possible the appearance of and the reputation for practicing them. Therefore as soon as the true divine compassion appears in the world it is unconditionally the sacrifice. It comes out of compassion for people, and it is people who trample it down."
- Soren Kierekgaard, Practice in Christianity, pp 58, 60.
When the Christian feels the need to be convicted, when she feels as if she is doing Christianity "right," she should go straight to Kierkegaard. I've rekindled my love for him the past few days, and this passage in Practice in Christianity hit me with a particularly powerful conviction. To strive towards this sort of unlimited recklessness, I think of my beloved prayer attributed to St. Francis:
Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace;
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is error, the truth;
Where there is doubt, the faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
And where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master,
Grant that I may not so much seek
To be consoled, as to console;
To be understood, as to understand;
To be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.
[I am, however, curious as to what Susan Wolf, who wrote the fantastic essay "Moral Saints," would have to say about Kierkegaard on this one. ]
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