Mimetic Theory & “Oversensitivity,” a Dangerous Combination?

In a nutshell modern man’s predicament as gleaned from Mimetic Theory could be characterized as follows: unrelentingly aggravated mimetic desire cannot these days progress all the way to a culmination (elimination of the scapegoat, resulting in social peace), and not just to an intermediate stage – only producing more and more aggravation – of scapegoating. Students or followers of MT tend to see it all clearly, including their inner drives and impulses. If they are very sensitive, and especially if on top of that they happen to be Christian, this sudden seeing of everything in a new light seems to require of them a thorough personal reevaluation of their motives and actions, past and present, and a commitment to a very demanding way of life. It opens them to suffering and can even lead them over the edge.

It comes as no surprise then that there have been reports by those apparently painted into a corner by Mimetic Theory that MT may be a dangerous concoction, even possibly leading to psychosis. It is thus only to have been expected that an opinion suggesting “oversensitivity” in the case of Rene Girard himself should be advanced, this disposition apparently aiding and abetting his development of MT, or, rather, both sides of the equation mutually contributing to and reinforcing each other. Moreover, it all may seem inevitable for a truly sensitive soul, on account of the theory’s religious angle and the exaggerated claims as regards scapegoating and violence.

Also, warning signs are apparently justified regarding those students of MT who seem to overly rely on it, trying to explain in its light the totality of human experience, inevitably laying themselves open to the dangers of MT’s virulent treatment of human desire. This is all the more relevant these days as MT pushes one to see each and every form of desire, viewed always as a triangular other-created desire (including what is called “metaphysical desire,” but mercifully excluding the “innermost” variety, directed toward the divine within man) as leading to scapegoating. Scapegoating is the ultimate sin, the worst thing a properly informed modern man (as every Westerner, not only a Christian, is expected to be) can possibly engage in. Scapegoating is violence, even if it tends not to be physical any more (though many a time it is, especially when it is directed at those the perpetrators, sometimes unbeknownst to themselves, do not regard as truly their peers). Jesus Christ was totally nonviolent, and so should we all be, Christian and non-Christian alike, to merit inclusion in modern Western civilization.   

Is avoiding violence at all costs really indicated by MT outside the religious context? According to Girard, scapegoating is a collective activity that is ultimately purposeful, even if and when, paradoxically, it is done unawares. It is supposed to bring peace to a community or society ravaged by a wave of an undifferentiation of shared hatred brought on – more often than not these days – by the initial reciprocal sentiments of injustice and contempt prevalent in that society. But also for this latter-day scapegoating to progress to a true-to-form Girardian scapegoat resolution what is needed is the elimination (expulsion, killing, etc.) of the scapegoat. For this to happen normally the scapegoat must be guilty as charged, no matter what that charge might be.

In the post-Christian Western world of ours the violence inherent in the scapegoating, as well as the elimination of the scapegoat, is mostly symbolic, since we have been trained to recognize in our sane state the scapegoat’s innocence (at least of the charges leveled against him in a scapegoating frenzy), as was Jesus, the ultimate Innocent Scapegoat, which has a somewhat mitigating effect.

Moreover, the violence of the culmination of a scapegoating episode could have been depicted in the times past and viewed as “normal” only if it resulted in the real elimination of the scapegoat. “Symbolic” elimination might not do the trick, the sought-for peace may not be restored. It also tends to expose every facet of the process involved, including the unexpected prevalence of scapegoating, drawing also those who would rather resist its pull.  And having been made aware of this mechanism, as any MT student would be, someone might suffer all the more for not being able to resist indulging his/her violent impulses as they emerge seemingly instigated by others’ violent or hateful actions. If so, one might be driven to adopt a religious perspective, as proposed also by Girard.

Only to find out that in a post-Resurrection world one is expected to love one’s enemies, which “discovery” has only been truly made (by some) in our post-Christian Western world, with all that it entails: thus from “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,” to “do not resist an evil person; but whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also. If anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, let him have your coat also. Whoever forces you to go one mile, go with him two,” etc.

It is necessary to see that the specific injunctions above as to how to go about “not resisting an evil person” bear the marks of a deliberate strategy, as beautifully shown but Walter Wink. The same can be said about the actions of all those great men who followed the path of nonviolent resistance to injustice (Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., etc.). These were also aided by their charisma and renown.

Can one be expected to react in the same manner when out-of-the-blue confronted with somebody’s hate and/or violence, or even a prolonged and unrelenting scapegoating? It is hardly a viable proposition for a regular fellow, even a compassionate Christian.

But the Sermon on the Mount goes even further and deeper: “you are to be PERFECT, as your heavenly Father is perfect,” and this from Jesus who elsewhere rebuked someone for calling Him merely “good:” “Why do you call Me good? No one is good except God alone.”

Yet it is only this “PERFECTION” that is a state allowing man to be habitually loving. It has little to do with man’s moral striving, which can only produce a pious afterthought to an instinctual reaction.

Now Western Christianity does not even have a true theology of theosis or divinization, a transformative process that is expected to result in man’s likeness to, or union with, God – in this lifetime, not in the hereafter. As opposed to Eastern Orthodoxy which holds that theosis is the purpose of human life achievable through a synergy between human activity and God's uncreated energies.

An adherent of a religion while on this earth can normally achieve only, or even aspire to, what is there in that religion’s tenets or dogmas. This holds for all religions, not only for various Christian denominations. No wonder that Western Christianity’s preoccupation with morality, laced with guilt-feelings as it is, can hardly produce loving people. Even its mystical or contemplative strains are concerned with arriving at the “true self” (as opposed to the noxious “false” one) instead of  letting God’s energies dismantle the barriers constituting the very self itself. Then and only then can those energies, which I view as love, flood the whole of one’s being, which was created in the image of God. Then the image may be subsumed in the likeness to God, in a this-lifetime union with the Trinity.

It must be observed that this is something Girard never truly advocated or even explored. Our desires are left hanging there with no possibility of being satisfied or assuaged. In such a non-contemplative or mystical setting imitation of Christ is reduced to a moral striving that, many a time, instead of producing a spiritual person may land one in deep guilt-ridden spiritual trouble.

MT is just a highly rationalistic (as is Western Christianity in general), left-brain elaboration of problems that in the past used to be mostly emotional, but now are also more and more rational in the sense that their solutions are expected to be rational as well, instead of simply cathartic in nature. And that regardless of whether one is versed in MT or not.

But Christianity in this respect has also another facet, namely apophatic, mystical. There any problem that might surface is actually upheld as such, so that one may relate to it as a whole person, maintaining an apparent inherent tension therein, instead of trying to solve it intellectually. In such a setting the synthesis (i.e., a solution) of a problem one, or one’s community, is facing, broken down into a thesis and antithesis, is only discerned “through the mirror darkly.”

It actually echoes the effective dismissal of a rationalistic, discursive approach to logismoi (known in the West as deadly sins) proposed by Evagrius Ponticus in the late IV century Egyptian Desert monastic setting: one was expected to combat every sinful prompting with an antirrhesis (rejection) gleaned by him from his laborious Biblical research, or patterned on such an approach. Instead, in the Christian East then prevailed (and it does also now) the so-called monological approach – based on a repeated prayerful invocation of Jesus’ name and his mercy, expressed in the context of one’s sinfulness, called the Jesus Prayer, not on a tailor-made Bible-based refutation of the (first discerned) sinful prompting. 

Recognition at every passing moment of one’s life that one is a sinner is the kind of “levelling effects of the Gospel” that is truly called for the Christian student of MT, instead of his/her just realizing their equality as rampantly mimetic, desire-driven interdividuals. If put into the proper framework of a contemplative method, this recognition could move mountains. We are interdividual violent scapegoating sinners that, nevertheless, have a divine spark deep down within ourselves. But this love within will never be able to enflame us as long as we erect our selves (even if deemed “true”) over against our neighbors. 

For the sake of sanity, and with a view to becoming a loving person, the MT student’s overblown world of envy-driven desire – and his/her realization of their sinfulness, for that matter – must initially be treated with the balm of a developing apatheia, the first sign of a progress towards theosis. (Any non-MT student would certainly also benefit.) This dispassionateness allows one to see the existing hierarchies in a more objective light, not one immediately driving him/her into action in indignation over an apparent violence of injustice, mistaking one’s other-created (often deliberately by the powers that be) desire for one’s true need. The developing purity of heart also contributes to caring more about any injustice impacting one’s neighbor rather than oneself. This being a case of seeing the world through Christ’s eyes, one may not be far from “seeing God,” promised to those pure in heart in the Sermon on the Mount, which is another step towards man’s theosis.

Only in such a framework is the Christian’s progress towards perfection feasible or even conceivable. That lacking, we will never be free from violence in our hearts, we will never be truly loving. The way of contemplation holds out a promise that such a loving disposition can be achieved in this lifetime of ours, though it is a lifetime task. The (free) choice to pursue this goal is ours.