The Girard Reader (53 page)

scapegoat theory, already in your first book,
Deceit, Desire, and the Novel
, you recognize the

importance of the Gospels. But are you saying it took a number of years for the full extent of the Passion as revelation of the scapegoat mechanism to occur to you?

R.G.:
Sure. I recognized the importance of the Gospels in the individ-

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ual experiences of the novelists who came to grips with mimetic desire and came to a

knowledge of mimetic desire. In fact, they have a kind of conversion experience, and this

conversion is of the same nature as the shift from mythology to the Gospels. Of course, I

didn't fully understand that at the time.

This is the most difficult thing for people to understand about my theory -- that scapegoating

does not play an essential role in the Gospels, whereas it has an enormous role in myths since

it generates them. Many observers think that because scapegoating becomes more and more

visible in them, the Gospels must approve of it, they must advocate some kind of scapegoat

religion. But to use a modern analogy from the history of France, this would be like saying

the pro-Dreyfus people were really the scapegoaters of Dreyfus. This is the mistake so many

theologians and biblical scholars have made regarding the mimetic scapegoat theory. They

simply do not understand the enormous difference that the representation of scapegoating

makes. They think only in terms of themes rather than a hidden, generative mechanism which

cannot appear in what it generates.

J.W.:
If the Gospels could be understood by analogy to the proDreyfus party, give another

similar historical instance of scapegoating.

R.G.:
An example which I have been working on a little bit is Joan of Arc. The people who

put her on trial divinized her, or "demonized" her, in the sense of regarding her as a witch.

She was avowed to have supernatural powers and turned into a witch, whereas her

canonization by the church acknowledges another form of relationship to the supernatural

which is different from the demonized-divinized scapegoat. Now there is a form of

divinization reported in the Gospels, which is magical and mythical, for instance Herod

Antipas's belief in the resurrection of John the Baptist, and the divinization of Christ, which is

just the opposite. The Gospels seem so close to myth in a way, and yet they are poles apart.

This is a difficult problem because certain forms of monotheism move God so far away from

any involvement in the scapegoat mechanism that they view with suspicion any contact with

it in religious thought and symbolism. But I think the power and truth of Christianity is that it

completes the great forms of monotheism, as in Judaism and Islam, by witnessing to the God

who reveals himself to be the arch-scapegoat in order to liberate humankind.

J.W.:
Does the analogy of Joan of Arc imply that the scapegoating of Jesus may have

occurred even among his own followers?

R.G.:
Yes, and the conception of Jesus as some kind of primitive God.

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You find a recognition of that in Mark and Matthew especially. Peter, James, and John expect

him to be a kind of divine potentate when he comes into his full honor and glory. Herod

Antipas believes that Jesus is John the Baptist resurrected. This divinizing of John is a kind of mythical genesis. I think this is why there is a fairly long description of the murder, which is

an analog of the Passion. But not only an analog of the Passion, for there were many such

murders -- mythical, nonmythical, prophetic -- in which a crowd united against a victim.

In the Herod story the dancing of Herod's stepdaughter was important in the ritual aspects of

the action of the crowd.

J.W.:
The dancing is a textual signal of scapegoating?

R.G.:
Yes. The story of the beheading of John is one of the reasons why the synoptic Gospels

are so incredibly valuable for understanding the anthropology of revelation.

J.W.:
The Gospel of Luke omits the banquet and dancing episode.

R.G.:
Yes, but Luke has another scene in which Herod and Pilate become friends when Pilate

sends Jesus to Herod for questioning after he is arrested. This shows that Luke is aware of the

pacifying effect of scapegoating. This is the communion of the scapegoaters as opposed to

the Christian communion. So if you put this scene with the beheading of John in Mark and

Matthew, you can see how the Gospels complement each other in dealing with the mythical

tendencies of scapegoating.

J.W.:
What is the most disappointing aspect of your career?

R.G.:
I think that I have not expressed the relation of the Gospel to mythology in a way that

makes it clear to everybody. It should be possible to find more metaphors from different areas

of experience which are familiar to everyone. Also, I would like to do a better job of showing

that the Gospels enable one to read and decipher myth.

Until now the order of discovery for me has been mimetic desire, archaic religion and culture,

and finally the Christian text. It should be possible, especially for a Christian scholar, to

reverse this order and analyze myth and culture from the standpoint of the Gospels.

J.W.:
The Gospels themselves have come under attack as sources of scapegoating and

demonization. To take the Gospels seriously in the way you do is extremely difficult.

R.G.:
It is difficult because it is also too simple. Everything that happened to Jesus is

happening to the texts of revelation themselves. This scapegoating of the Gospel texts is

probably a necessary -- but not excusable -- phase that we are going through. It is a form of

ingratitude toward God, and one should say so, boldly.

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J.W.:
So to discern the relation of the Gospels to myth and misunderstanding in our culture,

where do you look? Do you find signs in our time?

R.G.:
Well, I look first to the Gospels themselves, and particularly to certain key passages.

Of course, the Gospels must look not like a tour de force but another myth to many readers

now because they are centered on Jesus, and how could this reveal mythology? But in my

view the whole theory of Satan, for example, is completely rational; the Gospels unveil Satan

as the principle of destructive mimesis in the world. Or to take another example, Herod murders John, divinizes him, but he never repents. Peter denies his association with Jesus and

later recognizes him as his risen lord, and Paul persecutes the followers of Christ before his

own revelatory experience. But both Peter and Paul repent. This is the main difference made

by the resurrection, as contrasted to human divinization or apotheosis: repentance.

J.W.:
Do you want to say any more about the use of metaphor and analogy to understand the

Gospel texts?

R.G.:
Well, I was talking about Joan of Arc. The sources about her are pretty reliable. This is a perfect example of persecution and ascription of supernatural powers to someone

considered a witch and disrupter of public order. An instance like this should be of great

interest to the Jews because of what they have suffered in history.

J.W.:
Aren't all these topics, such as the fate of Joan of Arc, encumbered with the "political correctness" and obsession with victims of those who study them?

R.G.:
Political correctness is good to the degree that we now have an awareness of

victimization and victimary mechanisms. But now this awareness supports attacks on

Christianity and its texts, which are the very inspiration of our modern concern for the victim.

J.W.:
This brings me back to what has been disappointing for you in your career. When you

speak of attacks on the Bible, particularly the Gospel texts, I take it you are talking about

your critics, at least in part.

R.G.:
Yes, I am talking about my critics in part. But you know, I think the attacks on the

Gospel are necessary; they are part of an apocalyptic situation.

J.W.:
You mean these attacks are part of a sorting or refining process in history?

R.G.:
It's part of a process that is revealing the truth of the Gospel.

But I know I am primarily responsible for what I write and how I bring my subject to

expression. Anthropologists and theologians, many of them, have not understood what I was

about, and I should be able to say it better. I would like to begin at the stage of
Things

Hidden
, where the Gospels seem to be explained by the mimetic theory rather than explaining

it. It should be possible to move in reverse to myth and mimetic

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desire. The sequence leading up to
Things Hidden
, which is true, in part, to my own creative

experience, gives the erroneous view of a theoretical movement from mimesis to myth, then

to the Gospels, whereas in fact, a more fundamental understanding goes in the opposite

direction.

J.W.:
Do you see signs that reception of your work is beginning to occur?

R.G.:
There are some signs, but I'm not sure that at this time there could be a really good

reception, especially among academics. It would be such a change in regard to Christianity

that it is most unlikely. One can always hope for a good reception of the Gospels which

would be closer and truer to them as they really are. If the mimetic theory became

fashionable, I would be really worried.

But it is difficult; there are so many tendencies toward politicization, or toward wandering off

into irrelevant individualistic spiritualities. Of course, one could go back and see

politicization throughout the whole history of Christianity. These attempts at politicization,

which take various forms, are part of the progress and regress of revelation in history.

J.W.:
What would you say is the most important aspect of your thinking to grasp? If the most

important is the most difficult, please comment on that.

R.G.:
The most important thing is too simple, I repeat, not to be difficult. It is the reversal of scapegoating, or the shift that shows that scapegoating comes from a cultural mechanism and

is not approved by God. We ordinarily like to believe that scapegoating stems from rulers or

leaders hatching a plot, but it is much more complex than that. When I use the term

"mechanism," as in "scapegoat mechanism," I mean basically and simply a generative principle which works unconsciously in culture and society. As Peter says in Acts, "And now,

brothers, I know that you acted in ignorance, as did also your rulers. But what God

announced beforehand by the mouth of all the prophets, that his Christ should suffer, he thus

fulfilled. So repent, and turn again . . ." ( Acts 3:17-19a). Everyone is guilty, yet not

completely responsible. I find the mention of the rulers especially interesting. One of our

favorite ways of dealing with scapegoating is to see it as a plot of government leaders,

whereas the rest of us have not participated in it. But scapegoating is a collective

phenomenon. It would not work if it were not. Of course, leaders can manipulate it, but there

must be something to manipulate, which is the belief of the crowd, our own belief.

In the Gospels, for example, the priests plot to scapegoat Jesus, but they cannot accomplish

this without stirring up the crowd. The crowd takes over the most significant role in the

narrative. Mark, above all,

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makes this clear. Aside from any other details about Pilate, his main fear is that a riot will

occur. Pilate is presented as knowing it is a scapegoat situation. If the situation is still fluid, a

substitute for the designated scapegoat could be offered ( Barabbas). But things have gone

too far, so Jesus is put to death. It is a crowd that has called for his death, it was a crowd that

welcomed him as he entered Jerusalem. There is nothing, by the way, anti-Semitic about this;

it is the Gospels' comment on the mimetic behavior of crowds. Another excellent example of

such behavior is found in the book of Job. The people treated him as an idol one day, but

turned against him the next.

J.W.:
I wonder whether the crowd behavior is even clearer in the book of job ( job 29:1-

30:15).

R.G.:
Yes, this is made clear by the metaphor of the mountain torrent (6: IS). It does not have a drop of water when you need it, but turns into a deluge when you don't need it. It is a

wonderful, mimetic metaphor of the crowd.

J.W.:
But back to the reversal of the scapegoating phenomenon in the Gospel texts -- do you really think this is the most difficult aspect of your model? Conceptually it is not so difficult,

but perhaps psychologically . . .

R.G.:
Let's face it, readers, including academic ones, usually read texts pretty simplistically.

They look for
themes
, and since they find a scapegoat theme in the Gospels, for instance, they conclude that the Gospels are built on scapegoating. Myths, they would say, are not about

scapegoating because they don't talk about it. But that's just the point: they don't talk about it;

they disguise their generative center. It is the most difficult thing to make people conscious of

this generative center. It is the sort of thing you either see or do not see. It's like a flash of