Mission Impossible Complete

After reading Monstrosity of Christ I have been looking forward to Creston Davis’ follow-up: the exploration of the contemporary relevance of St. Paul’s thought among both radical atheists and radical theologians. Apparently, since St. Paul's ideas are engaged by several contemporary thinkers, this means he has 'a new moment'. Of course, this book is not really about St. Paul at all, but hey, which book about St. Paul ever was? This book is instead another step forward in the editor’s endeavour to think with, through, and beyond the ideas of Slavoj Zizek and John Milbank (who in this project is flanked by theological comrade in crime, Catherine Pickstock). No more.


I should say I am deeply sympathetic to Creston Davis’ project. The attempt to find ways of combining the ideas of his two former teachers might be the only response that remains true to them both. Paradoxically, one might say. Or dialectically. I believe which term you prefer comes down to what blogs you like to read (i.e. whose approval you are after).


The mere fact of having been taught by both Milbank and Zizek gives Davis a kind of street cred that not everyone can boast. This biographical fact itself suggests that, at least in Creston Davis’ head (since he has simply had to make it work somehow), Milbank’s metaxology and Zizek’s dialectics can be fruitfully combined. And indeed, it is Davis’ own contributions to the book, together with Catherine Pickstock’s wonderful reflection on the liturgy and the senses, which are (to me at least) the most interesting.


Not that Milbank and Zizek are boring, not at all. But when reading the allegedly new reflections on Paul from the two ‘ultimate fighters’ from Monstrosity, I realized that I have read most of this before. This is where the book disappoints a little. Milbank’s style is entertaining if you like the metaphysical ‘zapping’  of enemies. But the in-it-to-win-it theologian’s essay on Badiou has been available (albeit in draft form) online long before the publication of this book (which raises interesting questions regarding online and printed publishing, but that’s for another day). Zizek’s essays are as entertainingly rebellious as ever (he is that school yard bully you think is cool so long as he's not after you), but his arguments are yesterday, today and forever the same. And, hey, why not? 


Now, here's the point. In his (dauntless or hopeless, I leave that to the reader) attempt to combine these two thinkers, it seems to me that Davis is, in some weird way, actually being faithful to both of them. Not that either would embrace everything he writes, as if Milbank and Zizek were a quarreling couple, who after a therapeutic session with Dr. Davis realize that they are in fact meant for each other. Not that. But simply because neither of them could be content with less than Everything. We are discussing ontology, after all. Neither Milbank nor Zizek would admit that there is anything that ultimately escapes his own ontological framework, because then they wouldn’t be doing ontology anymore. Ontology speaks of Everything, and there is no ‘outside’ space for the opponent to inhabit. 


This is what makes Davis’ project seem (to me, at least, though blog wars will go on) to be the only appropriate response to the incompatibility of Milbank and Zizek. Both will fit the other into his own ‘system’ of thought rather than reject him as simply ‘outside’ it. To Milbank, then, Zizek is fundamentally a protestant assuming the possibility of a qualitative break from stale tradition and hence failing to account for human creativity as improvised participation in God’s life. To Zizek, by contrast, Milbank is fundamentally an ideologue providing a vague yet final theodicy in the face of even God’s ultimate suffering, disguised as aristocratic babble of cosmic/societal harmony. Of course dressed up in a dispute over who is ‘more Christian’, but that’s not only beside but really quite far off the point. In this sense they are really engaged in an all-or-nothing battle. But precisely for that reason, it would be inadequate to simply choose one of them. To choose one and reject the other would, in some ways at least, be to deny the all-encompassing nature of the system one chose, and allow the rejected ‘outsider’ a legitimate foothold beyond the reach of one’s categories – which would reveal one’s blind spot – which would be the end of one’s ontology.


And of course, the conflict itself can be construed in the terms of both sides. "It's harmonic difference!" "No, its dialectic constitutive contradiction!" Ad infinitum. Fun for the kids.

Davis’ clever response has been, primarily, to produce these two books, thus literally placing these two articulated universal ontologies next to one another in a shared space. Not only does this open up room for thinking about the nature of the space where such an unlikely meeting is somehow made possible, but it challenges the reader to join Davis in the effort of holding things together (without simply postulating a common enemy in liberal capitalism). Or, if you like, to deny the necessity of the violent rejection of one in favour of the other. Now, this ‘positive’ approach, I think, implicitly betrays Davis’ debt to thinkers such as William Desmond (who Milbank draws on for conceptual clarification in Monstrosity). Death and dialectics are not simply eradicated, but 'swallowed up', all St. Paul-style.


In this subtle way, Davis simultaneously kills and resurrects both of his former teachers. He also thereby ensures that he pisses off two opposing camps of devoted followers in one and the same move, which, to my mind, is probably not a bad thing. So having read both Monstrosity of Christ and Paul’s New Moment I now eagerly await a book to complete the trilogy – this time one written primarily by Creston Davis perhaps flanked by like-minded explorative thinkers who respect both Milbank and Zizek enough to neither follow nor reject either (though this is of course impossible to avoid – Dialectic! Paradox!), but rather think with them till the end, and then a bit further. Maybe that book will feature numerous footnotes with the name ‘William Desmond’ in them. I’d like that, I think.     


Christian Tradition 4 - epilogue

I ended my 3-part series on Christian tradition quite abruptly, so I thought I would add a little note on where I am trying to take these ideas. While I am so amateurish it's not even funny, I will still try to point out some of the more high-brow philosophical paths I dream of walking one day. I am pulled by certain intiuitions rather than a clearly defined agenda, brought to the fore by my reflection on the dynamics of tradition.

One way to articulate these concerns, is that I think we need to engage the problem of how to construe human creativity, representational naming and construction (this is not a list, I am just not sure what to call it), as something else than a sort of alien intrusion upon a more authentic (whether actual or virtual) Reality, while at the same time resisting the temptation to retreat into solipsistic phenomenology, thus 'forgetting' the always-already presence of metaphysical speculation and presumption. In other words, we can't pretend not to have presumptions about the whole of Reality, even though we don't know how to articulate these. And we need to fit our own act (or the 'event') of thinking the structure into the structure, even in the very 'newness' of this act/event.

Here many so-called 'postmodern' philosophies tend to disappoint, exhibiting only a consistent albeit 'dialectic' and self-contradictory working-out (ad absurdum) of the 'modern' logic they claim to (at least ironically) distance themselves from. Whether they speak of 'perspectives', 'illusions', 'representations', or 'cultures', there is always a subtle denigration of the human element compared to Reality as such. Even when they erase the ontological status of 'the human', and speak of fissures or fractures in Reality itself (of which the level we call 'human' is perhaps only a set of events randomly collected for someone's convenience, or some kind of cosmic attempt of self-healing), the represented/repeated/static/named is always of somewhat less ontological solidity than the always-elusive Real. The numerous available 'death-of-god' theologies so popular among many 'emerging' churches disappoint equally, for the same reasons. The 'metaphysics' they fear is, I think, simply a gigantic straw man constructed by themselves for the rushing pleasure of demolishing it - a rush that is allegedly a 'trace of the Real'. However, since these thinkers can only 'enter the void' by deconstruction and a complete rejection of any 'merely human' erection of metaphysical orders, these (theo-)philosophies cannot but deny, ignore and/or forget the instance of their own 'active' thinking, but only deconstruct whatever has been thought - allegedly by others. The 'merely human' is hence only secondary, ontologically speaking, even though it can never be completely eradicated.

Some of the places I register more consistent and fruitful concern with these ideas are:

1) Some writings of self-proclaimed 'radical orthodox' theologian John Milbank, whose early work explored the philosophy of Giambattista Vico, whose philosophy of history and historiography dealt  with questions regarding the relationship between historical action and the act of representing this in historical writing. Milbank's later explorations include ventures into (neo-Platonic) theurgy and (Eastern Orthodox) Sophiology. A central concern in his oeuvre, at least in my reading, is precisely one of the relation between human creativity/representation/construction and Reality as a whole - a question he approaches through categories such as 'mediation', 'relation', and 'participation' in a transcendence represented in (somewhat updated Thomist) terms of Creation, Incarnation and Trinity. While Milbank is perhaps more known for a certain (un)popular historical narrative of theological deviation and decline as lying at the root of the modern secular (where the sensed experience, representation, and 'realness' of Reality have somehow been split apart), I think that to make this narrative as such the central element in his oeuvre is a misreading.

I think the undeniable relevance of Milbank's metaphysics regarding the ontological status of human making has lately been drowned out by quick 'translations' of his work in public debates over 'Red Tory' policy (which tend to anger those who insist on debating within the terms of the modernity Milbank rejects), or, within the rather narrow confines of Dominican scholarship, questions over his reading of - the in that context seemingly untouchable - Thomas of Aquinas. However, on the perspective of Milbank's own metaphysics of human action and Reality, such re-readings of Aquinas are (I would think) not necessarily in themselves any more of a problem than any other instance/act of translation or exegesis.

2) Some writings of French philosopher (and so not primarily sociologist or anthropologist, though he does carry the burden of those titles) Bruno Latour, as well as his former mentor Michel Serres (by the way - thanks to the people over at this fine blog for linking to my pieces on Serres!). Serres invariably describes - albeit in sometimes very poetic and beautiful language - a Reality that is mediation and relation all the way up and all the way down - often centered around the mundane world of the French parish. Reading his work alongside that of Latour reveals how much the latter is indebted to his mentor, even though his (strikingly similar!) metaphysics are articulated in a kind of 'deep empiricism' and material case studies rather than poetic stories and reflections. (It also seems Latour prefers referencing Alfred Whitehead when it comes to philosophy - though his sensitivities are definitely 'Serresian'). Latour's point of departure is precisely the false break between the 'Human' and 'Nature'.

Bruno Latour's big ideas have lately been taken up by a group of philosophers in a movement loosely labeled 'Speculative Realism', who are (rightly so!) utterly unapologetic about their metaphysical speculation. While these readings are right to consider Latour a philosopher, and do deal with some key texts in his oeuvre, my own (amateur!) opinion is that they miss the facets of his work that emerge when he is read alongside Michel Serres, as well from a consideration of his own subtle Catholicism (Harman in fact expresses positive surprise over the fact that Latour's Catholicism does not seem to hamper his ability to speak of God 'on level with' material objects and mediation - as if this was somehow a curious thing. One wonders whether he has heard of "sacraments"...?). Placing relation rather than 'flux' or 'chaos' at the (moving) centre of his metaphysics seems to me to already allow for the kind of ontological 'borders between things' that these sophisticated 'object-oriented' thinkers are calling for. Another key (paradoxical, perhaps, to mentioned philosophers) is that Latour's own PhD was on biblical exegesis, and centered on nothing less than the question of faithful translation - the relatively reliable transmitting of some-thing from one context to another, and the dynamic between stability and change in such events. That Latour has lately extended his ideas to speculate about Reality as such should come as no surprise, even though he is more famous for what he did during what was arguably only a 20-year detour through so-called Science Studies and the articulation of 'Actor Network Theory'.