René Girard and His Critics: The Theological Compatibility and Framework of His Early Mimetic Theory

Goodness

The first criticism addressed in this essay is that the early Girard views human desire as inherently evil or negative and so is at odds with a Catholic understanding of the fundamental goodness of creation. In an interview with Rebecca Adams in 1992, Girard denies that he regarded desire as evil and contended that mimetic desire is inherently good: “I would say that mimetic desire, even when bad, is intrinsically good, in the sense that far from being merely imitative in a small sense, it’s the opening out of oneself.” ⁸ Girard defines mimetic (or triangular) desire as “desire according to the Other” in which the self or subject of the desire is moved to desire particular objects as he/she perceives another (or model) desiring such objects. ⁹ He identifies mimetic desire as the foundation for sociality and relationality in what he called “extreme openness” to the other. ¹⁰ Mimetic relationality is good in itself, according to Girard, because it enables a new kind of social openness toward, and connection with, other humans, beyond biological instinct and bonding. Girard wrote of cultural imitation as “positive,” and that within loving forms of desire, God’s grace is present: “Wherever you have that desire, I would say, that really active, positive desire for the other, there is some kind of divine grace present.” ¹¹ Girard even argues that mimetic desire has an intrinsic telos toward communion with God and others: “Mimetic desire is also the desire for God.” ¹² He sees human desiring as ultimately aimed at acquiring or fulfilling one’s being by imitating a model who seems to possess fullness of being. Ultimate being, according to Girard, resides with God, who then is the ultimate object of all human desire.

Despite these claims and clarifications, Sarah Coakley argues that the early Girard only spoke of the inherent distortions and destructiveness present in human desire. She also claims that his later statements are not clarifications but modifications of his underlying (negative) theory. ¹³ I argue that this is, at best, a partial reading of his early work. While his predominant focus is on desire’s negative and violent manifestations, Girard distinguishes positive and negative manifestations of mimetic desire.

In his first major work, Deceit, Desire, and the Novel, Girard speaks of the positive and negative forms of desire in terms of “vertical transcendency” and “deviated transcendency,” respectively. ¹⁴ In vertical transcendence, humans are moved to imitate and relate with models/mediators—Girard particularly identifies God—based on shared objects and goods. The relationality and distance between the subject and model of desire are respected and acknowledged. The subject understands that relationality constitutes human identity, leading the subject to find freedom and fulfilment, and so avoid conflictual horizontal relations. ¹⁵ By contrast, deviated transcendency involves the subject and model coming into conflict over shared objects of desire. The constitutive relationship between the two is denied, with assertion of the “I” over against the other, and the distance between the two collapses, resulting in rivalry. ¹⁶ In vertical transcendency, it can be seen that humans are fundamentally oriented to the good and find the organic expression and activity of goodness in the free exchange of mimetic desire. On the other hand, deviated transcendence results in unhealthy forms of imitation that lead to pride, rivalry, meaninglessness, frenzied identities, and violence. ¹⁷ Girard regards this negative form of desire as “a caricature” of the positive form, indicating that the latter is primordial. ¹⁸ While the negative manifestation of desire is historically common, it is a parasite off the rightly ordered form of desire that he later identifies as positive/pacific/loving mimesis. Instead of receiving and giving, the mimetic relation becomes one of grasping and battling, in which the movement towards the other in a shared sense of transcendence becomes rivalrous and destructive.

This distinction between vertical and deviated forms indicates that Girard’s understanding of mimetic desire is compatible with a Catholic sensibility. James Alison draws out the theological implications of this distinction:

It is this latter [the deviated form of desire] which corresponds to sin, not desire tout court. Were this not the case, then Girard would be a Lutheran thinker and his thought would not be compatible with the Catholic faith. However, as it is, it seems to me that he has given us a fecund way of making sense in dynamic terms of the “ambi-valence” of concupiscence. That is, he has provided an interdividual psychology which shows that “being-constituted-by-another” is simply part of being human, the key question being what sort of relationship to which other. ¹⁹

In Girard’s early work, furthermore, he not only identifies two valences to mimetic desire but also the possibility of conversion from negative to positive mimesis. The experience of conversion, Girard argues, is one of profound change that involves recognizing the way in which the self is formed in relation to the other, overcoming the denial of this relation (what he called the “romantic lie”). ²⁰ This change implies “creative renunciation” of deviated transcendency, resulting in detachment, conversion, and “reconciliation between the individual and the world, between man and the sacred.” ²¹ For Girard, this reconciliation is the “truth” that great novels (such as those by Proust, Cervantes, Stendhal, Dostoevsky, and Flaubert) realize: the exposure of the lie of autonomous, spontaneous desire and the truth of human desire and identity as formed in relation with others mimetically. ²² This truth, according to Girard, is discovered in the conversion of the novelist as he/she exercises and realizes freedom in mimetic relations. ²³ Importantly, Girard demonstrates that this “novelistic conversion” involves a vertical reference point, which is provided by Christianity regardless of whether the author is religiously committed or an atheist: “Christian symbolism is universal for it alone is able to give form to the experience of the novel. Repudiation of a [distorted] human mediator and renunciation of deviated transcendency inevitably call for symbols of vertical transcendency whether the author is Christian or not.” ²⁴

In making this connection, Girard identifies his understanding of conversion with the type of Christianity that has a positive view of desire. If he had an inherently negative view of desire, as is claimed, his purpose would have been served better by referring to certain forms of Protestant Christianity (that emphasize corrupt human nature and desire), or to other traditions, such as Theravada Buddhism, which fundamentally deny desire. ²⁵ Instead, he draws from works in milieus of more traditional forms of Christianity (primarily Catholic) because he identified the problem of mimetic desire in imperfect and insecure human mediators, rather than in desire or nature itself.

Within Girard’s account of transcendence is, as previously mentioned, an understanding of identity and being. Girard shows that “deviated transcendency” resulted in a distorted drive for being. He calls this drive “metaphysical desire,” which occurs when the subject fixates on the mediator’s being in an unhealthy and destructive way. ²⁶ By contrast, the subject only achieves real being or identity through conversion, the ultimate point of which is the merging of the novelistic and religious experience in Christian beliefs of love and resurrection. ²⁷ In this way, the subject accepts his/her relational identity in vertical transcendence with God, and reconciles with others. ²⁸ However, if this path is not taken, the subject’s identity becomes centered on other human mediators who become idols or rivals, unable to satisfy the infinite longing for being that characterizes metaphysical desire. ²⁹ Again, Christianity is crucial for the early Girard in clarifying this choice:

Christianity directs existence toward a vanishing point, either toward God or toward the Other [human mediator]. Choice always involves choosing a model, and true freedom lies in the basic choice between a human and a divine model. . . . Denial of God does not eliminate transcendency but diverts it from the au-delà [above/beyond] to the en-deçà [below/within]. The imitation of Christ becomes the imitation of one’s neighbor. The surge of pride breaks against the humanity of the mediator, and the result of this conflict is hatred. ³⁰

For Girard, then, mimetic desire is fundamentally oriented toward forms of vertical transcendency that liberate the subject from deviated forms of mimetic transcendence. Desire is fundamentally “good” and oriented towards “goodness”—in the traditional sense of the “transcendentals”—which finds its fullest expression, according to the early Girard, in the Christian God. ³¹ While Girard presents in detail the negative dynamics and consequences of mimetic desire, his affirmation of the fundamental goodness of this desire, in keeping with Catholic doctrine, is not a later addition or correction but is, as shown, present in his early thought. ³² It also suggests an implicit Catholic theological framework operative in Girard’s early work that leads him to emphasize different forms of desire in particular ways. This framework is further evident in Girard’s views of human freedom and nature.

Freedom

Connected to this first critique is the view that Girard’s work lacks proper appreciation for human freedom. Despite Girard’s affirmation of his belief in “freedom of the will,” ³³ scholars such as Andrew O’Shea point to his qualifications regarding the power of reason and philosophical thought to alter patterns of desire, and accuse him of eliminating the human self and freedom, even by reifying desire as an entity of its own. ³⁴

Interpreting Girard’s statements involves appreciation for the context in which they were made and an understanding of the trajectory of his work. His early work, in particular, while broad-ranging and insightful, is not philosophically systematic. He uses rhetorical strategies which seem to reify desire in order to demonstrate the power of desire in human psychology, especially as it escalates into rivalry. These statements are not meant to deny the subjectivity and freedom of the human person, nor the goodness of desire. I have already argued that Girard’s early work, while primarily focused on negative mimesis, does recognize positive mimesis and regards it as fundamental. In making this distinction, Girard is clear that humans face a choice, about which they can reason, between different models of desire: “Choice always involves choosing a model, and true freedom lies in the basic choice between a human and a divine model.” ³⁵ As mentioned, Girard discusses this choice with respect to the possibility of conversion from deviated transcendency.

Schwager provides an important analysis of Girard’s early views on freedom which help to counter recent criticisms such as by O’Shea. ³⁶ Schwager was responding to Paul Dumouchel’s critique that Girard’s view of mimesis as both mechanistic and free is contradictory. ³⁷ According to Schwager, this criticism is based on a false understanding of Girard’s work regarding the different forms of mimesis, particularly the difference between non-human (animal) and human mimesis. Pointing to “two forms of automatic, instinctive behaviour” in Girard’s thought, Schwager argues that Dumouchel does not differentiate “between the mimesis at play in the animal kingdom and that among humans, whose quasi-mechanical character does not derive from a biological trait but from the enslavement of freedom.” ³⁸ While this quasi-mechanical dynamic looks like instinctual animal behavior, it is in fact the result of a rivalrous trajectory chosen by humans to achieve self-sufficiency and fulfilment. This choice relates to a false perception of the model as totally self-sufficient, much like a divinity, which leads to an enslavement of the self: ³⁹

In my opinion, there are indeed a few phrases in Things Hidden since the Foundation of the World that sound very ambiguous and that led Dumouchel to find a contradiction in his work. But thought must not be judged on the basis of a few ambiguous phrases. The fact that Girard speaks so clearly about freedom and responsibility precisely in Things Hidden since the Foundation of the World is a clear sign for me that he has not forgotten his insights in Deceit, Desire and the Novel. Since, in a long closing citation that was in fact expanded into a whole chapter of his work The Scapegoat, he ascribes the inspiring power to overcome violence to the Holy Ghost, we may, with good reason, assume that he is also well aware of the problem of the enslavement of freedom. Thus I cannot find any fundamental contradiction in his thinking. ⁴⁰

Crucial to Schwager’s argument is that Girard provides an account of the difference between human and (non-human) animal mimesis, which informs his understanding of human freedom and consciousness. In the process of hominization, Girard shows how humanity gained the capacity to transcend the limits of instinct and biology through mimesis. The mimesis of animals remains under the direction of biological instinct and natural selection, such that, while imitation assists in strategies to obtain objects of instinctual desires, it does not determine what objects to desire. Human mimesis, by contrast, does not have pre-programmed objects as its aim and tends to be much more sophisticated in its operations than animal mimesis. Rather than relying on trial-and-error as animals do (even when imitating), humans can perceive and evaluate the intention, means, and ends of another’s action. ⁴¹

Fundamentally, for Girard, human mimesis is not mechanical or determinative in the sense of instinct. Rather, mimesis is a dynamic process that opens the human to an array of new objects and new forms of relationality. Mimetic desire directs the attention of the human subject to particular objects but does not determine the subject’s decision to pursue such an object or the means by which they do so. The potential of mimetic desire, nevertheless, is highly unstable, especially as humans invest objects with metaphysical value and often choose to pursue them violently.

The volatile mix of mimesis and freedom presented human groups with a fundamental dilemma about how to maintain peace amongst themselves, in the face of the destructive potential of mimesis. Girard claims that this dilemma was shown in the way human groups created and maintained unity in a way different than that of other animal groups. While group unity amongst animal species is primarily controlled by instinctual dominance patterns, Girard claimed that human groups resorted to scapegoating a member or minority of the group or a related group (“the surrogate victim”). ⁴² As their mimetic capacities and relations increased, human groups no longer could rely on their members automatically giving way to the most powerful member of the group, as they commonly chose to fight to the death in rivalry and vengeance. ⁴³ Thus, Girard argues that “mimetic rivalry . . . destroyed dominance patterns and gave rise to progressively more elaborate and humanized forms of culture through the intermediary of the surrogate victim.” ⁴⁴ Furthermore, Girard assumed that what he called the “victimage mechanism” or “scapegoat mechanism” reflected the fundamental freedom that humans possess (though not in an ideal form): to choose between destroying themselves in cycles of mimetic violence or constructing a temporary kind of peace. ⁴⁵ While human groups discovered the efficacy of the scapegoat mechanism in spontaneous and unplanned ways, they generally continued to resort to it (through sacrificial rituals) rather than descend into chaos and destruction (which result when each person seeks his or her own desire, in rivalries fought to the death). Where they survived, humans universally chose to bind themselves to a self-generated solution (in scapegoating), which they treated like a mechanism, in order to prevent self-destruction. ⁴⁶

Thus, from his early work, Girard highlights the volatile freedom and metaphysical character of the human subject with regards to its desire, particularly charting the human descent into self-enslavement. Rather than regarding human desire as totally corrupt, Girard identifies with subtlety the freedom and potential of human mimesis. Girard recognizes the inherent capacity for and orientation to goodness as well as the reality of distortion in human desire, reflecting a nascent theology of original sin. ⁴⁷

Human Nature

Criticism of Girard’s view of human nature is usually based on his purported identification of human desire with deviated transcendency and violence. As I have already addressed this criticism, in this section I will focus on the conclusion that critics of Girard such as Coakley draw from this inaccurate criticism, namely, that the early Girard regarded human nature as violent or corrupt. ⁴⁸

While Girard certainly identifies entrenched pathologies in human desire, his early insights into mimetic desire give a new and deeper picture of human nature, which confirms it as essentially good. What mimetic desire shows us about being human is that humans receive desire and being. Girard makes the important discovery that, apart from natural appetites, humans do not generate their own desires spontaneously. Rather, they are stimulated into social relations through receiving and appropriating the desire of another. In this sense, receptivity is the fundamental and original way of being human, accentuated by the long gestation of human infants and by being less dependent on biological instincts than other animal species for decision-making and identity. This receptivity allows humans to be highly socialized in what Girard calls mimetic or interdividual relations, and so gain a transcendent identity, purpose, and meaning. ⁴⁹

Because the receptivity of humans is at a new and unrestrained mimetic level compared to other animals, new forms of identity, autonomy, and relationship are possible, including a new sense of self-conscious being and of openness to God. Inherent in Girard’s early view of human desire and nature is a movement of transcendence that goes beyond the immanent field. In this, humans are outwardly-oriented and seek to move from their material existence into a higher plane of mimetic and spiritual fulfilment in unity and reconciliation with the divine Other, and so, with all others. Girard affirms that this mimetic way of being human is good in itself and has good effects. Mimetic desire enhances the capacity for receptivity and relationship, rather than distorting it into the acquisitiveness and rivalry that are the marks of distorted desire. This is exemplified in the way human subjects receive themselves from the other in self-gift (for example, parents to children, God to humanity), through the other seeking the subject’s good. In response, the subject seeks the other’s good in self-offering, through mimesis that is freely enacted and exchanged.

Moreover, when Girard speaks of distorted desire and deviated transcendency, he is pointing to the distortion of the human capacity to receive, which takes the form of constructing oneself over against others. In this way, mimesis contains internal criteria for the human subject to evaluate it and orient oneself authentically. Constructive forms of mimesis involve receiving desire from and with the other pacifically and harmoniously, which effects or relies on a trust in the other’s good intentions and desires. This reception of the other’s desire directs the subject towards good objects that enhance the life of the subject and other/model. Such objects can be shared in harmonious relationality, and result in greater receptivity, self-giving, and personal flourishing. ⁵⁰ Further, Girard’s view of human nature as created fundamentally good and positively actualized by constructive forms of mimetic desire enables a new understanding of sin, including original sin, in terms of the distortion of this desire, and of grace in terms of pacific, gratuitous mimesis. ⁵¹

Thus, the original state of goodness that underlies Girard’s early view of mimetic desire, and which he argues is particularly seen in the light of Christian symbolism, negates the view that he sees human nature as inherently corrupt. The original mode of mimetic desire is in the “natural” and “good” receptivity that results in both sociality and differentiation of identity. This identity is fully realized in the mimesis of self-giving, which, for Girard, is particularly revealed in the Christian symbolism that he discusses in Deceit, Desire, and the Novel. Girard’s early work, then, is demonstrably compatible with the Catholic tradition, while also suggesting that such theology is an ally and frame for the development of his theory. I will now turn to examine how Girard’s theory of culture builds on his view of desire, and respond to critiques in this area.

Violence and Peace

I have established that in Girard’s theory desire has two valences or forms. In a similar way, mimetic violence has two forms or effects for Girard: chaos and order. The latter is key for Girard as it is the basis for his view of culture and religion. Girard shows that the use of mimetic violence by human cultures, in a limited and targeted fashion through scapegoating, is ordered toward social peace. It sought to resolve the chaos produced by escalating mimetic rivalry.

Girard argues that the unstable process of hominization driven by increasingly intense forms of mimetic and metaphysical desires cannot be resolved through instinctual or dominance patterns. ⁵⁴ To survive, human groups resorted to scapegoating to realize some kind of functioning communion. Their resort to scapegoating was a result of an unexpected discovery: that focused and unanimous mimetic violence provided peace and unity. Humans chose to institutionalize this scapegoat mechanism in culture and religion (through ritual, myth, and law/prohibition). In the process, they discovered something decisive about themselves—that they would prefer to live rather than fight to the death over shared objects, and that they would prefer to live together, bonded together in mimetic transcendence (though, admittedly, against another). ⁵⁵

Thus, even though Girard clearly labelled the scapegoat mechanism as a distorted and murderous form of social ordering, he saw in it a positive orientation that was universally reflected across human cultures—namely, toward order rather than chaos, peace rather than war, and reconciliation rather than discord. Humans universally institutionalized scapegoating in their religions and cultures, which, despite their utilization of violence, are, according to Girard, “entirely concerned with peace.” ⁵⁶ In this way, the scapegoat mechanism indicates a universal human orientation towards peace and communion, even though this orientation is stunted and distorted through violent means that only achieves a temporary order.

While Milbank claims Girard perpetuates a “pagan mythos” in positing a state of crisis preceding the scapegoat mechanism, Girard provided copious evidence to prove the reality of such crises. ⁵⁷ Nevertheless, part of this dispute may be resolved by clarifying that chaos, for Girard, is pre-cultural, not cultural as such. This pre-cultural chaos is evident in the way traditional cultures commonly tell their origin stories, with order emerging out of chaos. The overriding emphasis in these stories is that order is the proper state for such cultures, as ordained by sacred entities, and that order must be carefully maintained, particularly through sacred rituals and prohibitions. In such stories, Girard identified a pattern of violence against a victim that was associated with the “sacred.”

While it takes different names and forms across cultures, Girard shows that the sacred, as present across numerous cultures, is universally believed to control chaos and give peace. In this, Girard describes the two-sidedness of the sacred—which ethnologists and theologians such as Otto had grappled with—with reference to the scapegoat mechanism. The perceived power of the sacred to inflict chaos and establish order parallels the destructive side of violence and its later constructive order. Girard demonstrates that the two sides of the sacred map onto the two stages of scapegoating violence. These two stages are projected or transferred onto the victim, who is sacralized in traditional mythologies (in what he calls “double transference”). ⁵⁸ The scapegoating and sacralization of the victim transform the destructive side of mimetic violence into a constructive social order enabled by unanimous violence against, and even in cooperation with, the victim. ⁵⁹ The victim, then, becomes a supernatural figure who is believed to be responsible for chaotic violence as the means to bring about peace:

From the purely religious point of view, the surrogate victim—or, more simply, the final victim—inevitably appears as a being who submits to violence without provoking a reprisal; a supernatural being who sows violence to reap peace; a mysterious savior who visits affliction on mankind in order subsequently to restore it to good health. ⁶⁰

Thus, for Girard, the scapegoating violence that provides the context for human culture to emerge is orientated towards order and peace. Nevertheless, he does not identify human culture with scapegoating itself. Rather, culture results from the sacralization of the victim that gives rise to ritual and prohibition. Girard outlines his view in the classic text for his anthropological theory, Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World:

Culture does not proceed directly from the reconciliation that follows victimage; rather it is from the double imperative of prohibition and ritual, which means that the entire community is unified in order to avoid falling back into the crisis, and thus orients itself on the model—and the anti-model—which the crisis and its resolution now constitute. To understand human culture it is necessary to concede that only the damming of mimetic forces by means of the prohibition and the diversion of these forces in the direction of ritual are capable of spreading and perpetuating the reconciliatory effect of the surrogate victim. Religion is nothing other than this immense effort to keep the peace. The sacred is violence, but if religious man worships violence it is only insofar as the worship of violence is supposed to bring peace; religion is entirely concerned with peace, but the means it has of bringing it about are never free of sacrificial violence. To see in my theory some sort of “cult of violence”, approval of sacrifice, or, at the other extreme, a blanket condemnation of human culture, is to miss the point entirely. ⁶¹

For Girard, then, order or peace gave rise to culture, but this peace is, unfortunately, historically dependent on violent scapegoating. Girard did not regard peace as being essentially or inevitably dependent on scapegoating, but that it is historically and empirically so. Moreover, scapegoating is always ordered to peace: it involves a limited amount of violence to guarantee order in the midst of group breakdown. Culture emerges from the state of peace provided by the scapegoat mechanism, in order to guarantee order and prevent chaotic violence by means of sacred rituals and prohibitions. Cultural order is specifically enabled by rituals that imitate the original scapegoating violence (sacrifice) and prohibitions that seek to prevent mimetic rivalries and crises from recurring (laws). If crises do recur, sacrificial rituals are used to re-establish peace or prohibitions are invoked to suppress a crisis, such as in forms of compensation and punishment that identify the cause of a crisis in a transgression that requires violent recompense. In the latter case, prohibitions mobilize forms of scapegoating to re-establish order.

Girard was clear, therefore, that human culture is not constituted by an orientation to violence per se (which would be destructive, rather than constructive). Rather, it is constituted by an orientation toward an integrated sociality (communion), which is first actualized in scapegoating violence. Girard’s account was not that religion and culture motivate violence, but that violence gives rise to and is remedied by a certain type of sacralized culture. Girard, therefore, had what one might term an “ontology of peace” underlying his work. The function of traditional religion and culture is to mitigate and minimize violence in order to prevent social collapse and stabilize human societies. In this way, traditional cultures act according to a sacrificial logic, using violence as a pharmakos or vaccination: a little dose of orderly violence to prevent larger amounts of chaotic violence.

Girard is also clear that the religio-social order that functions according to a sacrificial logic distorts the human drive for communion, and so requires redemption. This view was expressed in his early work in which he argued that deviated transcendency is in search of a vertical transcendency symbolized by Christian love. ⁶² In Things Hidden, he develops this line of his thought to provide new insight into the redemptive value of Christ’s death and resurrection, particularly with regards to overcoming violence and scapegoating. ⁶³ As Wolfgang Palaver argues, it is important to note that Girard’s work on biblical revelation is not aimed at supplanting or destroying traditional culture in a rivalrous way. ⁶⁴ Rather, the pacific communion that is sought by biblical revelation ultimately seeks to redeem what is present in traditional cultures by shedding it of its violence. If human groups can renounce mimetic violence and the scapegoat mechanism, a more stable peace is actually possible. It will be based on solidarity with the victim and mimetic integration with the other through loving sacrifice. However, if human groups cannot give up mimetic violence, Girard claims that this would have apocalyptic consequences, as the scapegoat mechanism would no longer be able to restrain violence. ⁶⁵

The Fall

Girard’s view of desire and culture that I have outlined seems to be compatible with a Catholic theology and suggests such a framework may be implicitly operative in his work. For Girard, humans emerge as beings in relationship with God in vertical transcendence but reject and distort this relationship historically in deviated transcendence (the Fall). Yet, they even show evidence of their original orientation to peace and communion in their distorted mimetic behavior, particularly its center: the scapegoat mechanism. This mechanism presents the good orientation of humanity and, moreover, how this orientation includes a movement of ultimate transcendence towards the divine, which is distorted into what Girard calls “the (violent) sacred.” This “sacred” transcendence and distorted way of living becomes ingrained in human being and relations (original sin requiring redemption).

Nevertheless, despite what seems like Girard’s compatibility with Catholic theology, there remains a question whether Girard really holds a position consistent with the theology of the prelapsarian state and the Fall, especially since he argues that a violent act formed the conditions for human cultures. ⁶⁶ It is important to state that Girard’s scene of origin (involving the original scapegoating) is a hypothetical scenario that draws together the threads of his analysis of culture. Moreover, any hypotheses about the process of hominization encounter empirical limitations. Implicit in this scenario is Girard’s view of hominization as occurring over a long period of time and revolving around a “sacred center.” ⁶⁷ This process involved hominoids developing a mimetic and metaphysical capacity that brought them into relationship with God and others in a radical new way. Girard particularly recognizes that this occurred “on the level of metaphysical desire,” the origin of which is God’s “good revelation.” ⁶⁸ This new kind of metaphysical and mimetic relationality eventually resulted in the failure of conventional group bonding, especially that based around dominance patterns which could no longer contain intensifying patterns of rivalry. According to Alison, this situation of failure opened the possibility amongst the group’s members to recognize the other as similar to the self, especially in mimetically seeking identity and ultimate being. ⁶⁹ This recognition could have resulted in non-instinctual, non-violent, and gratuitous actions of surrender, sharing, and self-giving: “Here we have God calling into being the creature who is to become a sharer in his life without any sort of rupture: animal mimesis is able to move directly into sharing in the divine creative mimesis. This uninterrupted calling into being is the content of the ‘paradise’ of Genesis.” ⁷⁰

These kinds of mimetic relations are evident in cooperative patterns found in evolutionary studies, though they invariably exist alongside competitive and violent patterns. ⁷¹ Moreover, while human groups may have existed in a state of cooperativeness prior to the scapegoat mechanism, there is insufficient evidence for Girard to state anything more than this possibility, let alone to argue that these groups possessed human cultures. ⁷² Human cultures—functioning at the level of meanings and values informing a common way of life—are, according to Girard, related to the scapegoat mechanism. ⁷³ This mechanism enabled what Girard regards as cultural institutions, based around religious ritual, to fill the gap left by dominance patterns and related forms of pre-human group ordering. ⁷⁴ The specific threshold of culture, then, is reached in religious systems based around the sacred. ⁷⁵ The sacred emerged in the human cultural imagination as the attention of human groups was transfixed by the corpse of the victim, who was believed to bring “miraculous peace” from preceding destructive violence (the double transference). ⁷⁶ The victim became the sacred—the center of transcendence and cultural relations—that brought the longed-for possibility of mimetic cooperation into historical being.

As discussed, Girard does not argue for the absolute necessity of the scapegoat mechanism in the formation of human culture. In other words, scapegoating did not have to be what caused distinctive human cultures. Rather, he identifies its historical role in forming the conditions for the foundation of particular human cultures, all of which suggest reliance on the scapegoat mechanism. ⁷⁷ He acknowledges the possibility of hominid/human groups forming a community without a victim, ⁷⁸ a possibility that his collaborators Schwager and Gil Bailie have elaborated on. ⁷⁹

Alison regards this difference between the absolute necessity and the contingent, historical reality of the scapegoat mechanism as a key distinction for Girard. It allows mimetic theory to ask “what would have been the case if there had been no fall,” ⁸⁰ and what humans were like before the advent of the scapegoat mechanism. This latter possibility may have involved the first humans developing a sense of both God and others, presenting them with a metaphysical and moral choice—to receive from the Other and relate gratuitously, or to grasp being from the Other and relate rivalrously. In choosing rivalry, the two—the divine and human other—became fused idolatrously, with the human model becoming like the divinity in the eyes of the subject, who seeks to acquire the “divine” being of the mediator. ⁸¹ In this sense, according to Girard, the story of creation (and its possibility for good relations) should be clearly distinguished from the acts of rivalry and scapegoating that resulted in cultures (synonymous with the story of Cain in Genesis). ⁸² Rivalry and scapegoating were truly a “Fall”—an unfortunate course in which humans preferred to grasp at being and unity in rivalry with their “divinity,” as Adam and Eve did, rather than relate gratuitously.

This choice for appropriation and acquisition, over gratuity and reception, is, as Girard outlines, institutionalized in culture through sacrificial ritual. In ritual, the surviving group both rejects and worships the sacralized victim, who is the divinity for that group, ironically enabling the group members to achieve peace despite their distorted choice. Distorted mimesis, then, is directed not only against human victims, but also against God, who is projected onto the divinized victim in such a way that the divinity is both blamed and praised for the violence. For mimetic theory, God is “the Lamb slain since the foundation of the world” (Rev 13:8), displaced by the idolatrous projections of violent transcendence. ⁸³ This fall from relationship with God results in a kind of double bind—rivalling and rejecting the Other while worshipping the false sacred—that entrapped human culture and consciousness. Nevertheless, it was a “necessary sin” that enabled the survival of human groups and became the means of their ultimate redemption in conversion. ⁸⁴

Further, in divinizing their victims, Girard shows that human groups resorted to mythical justifications that negated the impulse of conscience towards the admission of guilt. In this regard, Schwager argues that it is important to recognize that the ability of hominoids (who became the first humans) to direct aggression outwards against a victim was effective because of a primitive sense of collective moral outrage that was emotionally and mimetically charged. ⁸⁵ The moral covering that justified victimization was enshrined in copious cultural myths accusing the victim of a moral transgression. This moral justification was a sign of the distortion of humanity’s sense of the good, which legitimized the distorted form of peace and communion based on scapegoating violence. It is indicative of a “prelapsarian” sensibility in which humans possessed an original sense of goodness and justice that was subsequently tainted by the fall as they distorted this sensibility to cover-up violence and acquisitive desire.

That moral consciousness was used and suppressed in the scapegoating process also indicates, according to Bailie, that there was an awareness amongst human groups of the possibility of a non-violent alternative to scapegoating. ⁸⁶ This sense of a moral alternative was embedded in the mythological remembrance of victimization in which the victim-god was regarded as having acted gratuitously to save the group from destruction. In conceptualizing the divinized victim as sacrificing self to save and restore the group to “good health,” such myths point to and privilege a form of positive mimesis. ⁸⁷ From their origins, then, archaic human cultures demonstrate an awareness of gratuitous mimesis—in the sacrifice of the divinized victim for the group—both as a calling to and remembrance of such mimesis which may have existed prior to violent mimesis.

Nevertheless, the emphasis on gratuitous mimesis in the remembrance of the divinized victim acted to obscure the violence of the human protagonists. This “positive spin” alleviated the group of any responsibility for the victims’ expulsion or death. Such a spin set a dangerous precedent, though it did, at least, present a mimetic alternative to rivalrous violence. ⁸⁸ This tension is reflected in the history of humanity’s mimetic relations, where there are decisions of acquisitiveness, pride, idolatry, and disobedience to God, as well as an awareness of an alternative and superior possibility in gratuitous mimesis. Despite this tension, Girard argues that cultural imitation can be positive. ⁸⁹ Similarly, Schwager posits that, although cultures were founded on the scapegoat mechanism, positive actions of self-sacrifice can be present within them, such as the actions of family members for each other or of warriors for the tribe. ⁹⁰

In summary, a scenario of hominization can be formulated according to mimetic theory where there was some basic, non-violent social cooperation (or at least the possibility of it), as part of which mimetic relations and rivalries intensified. In this new context—where there is an interplay of cooperation and competition, authenticity and inauthenticity—scapegoating was used to resolve these tensions, from which culture developed. Thus, there is space in Girard’s thought for a prelapsarian state preceding the scapegoat mechanism, after which there is a rejection of God and the loss of original goodness. The divinized victim concretely represents humanity’s rejection of God and its disobedience in preferring deviated transcendence over vertical transcendence. Moreover, the collective moral outrage of the mob that serves to justify the scapegoating presents an original goodness that has been distorted and twisted.

Sin and Sacrifice

Girard’s view of morality and freedom implies a final question that this essay should address to alleviate any further criticism of his early work: Is the kind of distorted moral consciousness that Girard posits consistent with the Catholic doctrine of sin, as both an offense against “reason, truth, and right conscience” and against God, the church, and other people, and so capable of giving an account of conversion and sacrifice? ⁹¹ I argue that Girard’s understanding of human morality, awakened in mimesis, is consistent with the doctrine of sin because, as I discussed above, he views early humans as having a sense of goodness and divinity (in vertical transcendence), both of which were distorted. Moreover, I show that this understanding is not an afterthought or correction but is already evident in his early work and that it helps him to make a later correction in his understanding of sacrifice that reflects consistency with his early work. ⁹²

As discussed, the sense of the totally transcendent Other (God) is implicit in vertical transcendency. The orientation to the Other, as well as the value of other humans, is also implicit in horizontal mimetic relations as human subjects become fixated on particular models/rivals. Mimetic desire intensifies under the influence of metaphysical desire, such that the desire for the object becomes “aimed at the mediator’s being.” ⁹³ In Deceit, Desire, and the Novel, Girard claims that models/mediators of desire, by way of their possession of the object of desire, become like divinities for the subject. They seem to possess the perfect self-sufficiency of being that the subject ultimately yearns for—God is merged with the model. In this way, both other humans and the divine take on special status in human consciousness. Humans see infinite value in the being of both, and ultimately seek unity with both.

A fundamental problem arises, however, when the subject “wants to become the Other [mediator] and still be himself.” ⁹⁴ By becoming fixated on the mediator, while denying the mediator’s influence on their own identity, humans became entrapped in “the romantic lie,” which manifests the fragmenting effect of sin. Metaphysical yearning is distorted into the “false promise . . . of metaphysical autonomy.” ⁹⁵ This false promise swells “the voice of pride” such that Girard identifies original sin in it. ⁹⁶ In “the unique possession of that subjectivity which broadcasts its impotence and its dazzling supremacy,” the human subject asserts itself over against others and even the divine, who possesses ultimate being and supremacy. ⁹⁷ In this way, the subject

loudly proclaims that he does not wish to change his being and that he is self-sufficient. . . . The more one becomes a slave the more ardently one defends slavery. Pride can survive only with the help of the [romantic] lie, and the lie is sustained by triangular desire. The hero turns passionately toward the Other, who seems to enjoy the divine inheritance. . . . Nothing separates himself from divinity, nothing but the mediator himself, whose rival desire is the obstacle to his own desire. ⁹⁸

In this last sentence, Girard points out how human subjects, through the mediation of the model, ultimately seek divinity, in order to, paradoxically, gain a sense of self. In deviated transcendence, the subject wants to achieve divinity alone but is dependent on the mediation of the other (in horizontal relations) and the divine (in vertical transcendence). It places the subject in a double bind, which ultimately leaves humans enslaved and unfulfilled: the subject wishes to both worship and supplant the mediator/rival. Girard demonstrates this condition through his analysis of the masochist-sadist relationship: “Every victim of metaphysical desire, including the masochist, covets his mediator’s divinity, and for this divinity he will accept if necessary—and it is always necessary—or even seek out, shame, humiliation, and suffering.” ⁹⁹ In grasping at divinity, humans place themselves on the path of sin through distorted desire and rivalry, which becomes centered on what Girard identifies as the “idolatry of . . . a hundred thousand rivals.” ¹⁰⁰ Moreover, the early Girard’s identification of a “radical difference” between Christian/divine love and deviated transcendency led him to the conclusion that “the imitation of Christ” (as true model for mimetic and metaphysical desire) is distorted into “the imitation of one’s neighbor.” ¹⁰¹ This distortion results in the human subject becoming frustrated, rivalrous, and unhinged such that “the surge of pride breaks against the humanity of the mediator, and the result of this conflict is hatred. . . . Hatred is the reverse image of divine love.” ¹⁰²

This surge of pride eventually results in generalized conflict, which, if resolved, generates the ultimate idolatry according to Girard—the violent or false sacred. Girard hints at this pride-filled, idolatrous solution in Deceit, Desire, and the Novel when he identified the subject’s “hatred of the omnipotent mediators” and in the way “the hated outsiders are the true gods.” ¹⁰³ He expands on these points in Violence and the Sacred and Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World in discussing the scapegoat mechanism. The sacralized victim is regarded as the ultimate self-sufficient being who sits outside human insecurity and disorder to manipulate and resolve it. Divinity, mimetic self-sufficiency, and ultimate power are conflated in the sacralized victim. In this way, the transcendent yearning for being and communion that humans feel, and which manifests as a search for God, is historically actualized as a projection onto a human other—a human victim—in what the Bible calls “idolatry.” For Girard, the truly transcendent Other—the Creator who is authentic self-sufficient being—is replaced with temporal beings who are projections of human aspiration and violence. ¹⁰⁴ What humans sense they should be aiming for—relationship with the Creator and perfect Being(s)—is co-opted to explain and justify the powerful transcendent effects of scapegoating violence. Reference to the divinity/sacred is a displacement of the original or natural sense of God as transcendent Other. ¹⁰⁵

It is plausible, then, to posit a theology of sin in mimetic theory which manifests as a grasping for being from God, who is projected onto the mediator/rival and the sacred victim. The grasping for being that is at the heart of mimetic rivalry and scapegoating is, thus, a grasping at ultimate being, that is the being of God. Thus, this grasping constitutes a loss of relationship with the divine Other, who is rejected and expelled as the sacred scapegoat and replaced by violent, idolatrous projections. This grasping, rather than receiving, is contrary to human nature (as discussed earlier) and is a distortion of being-in-relationship-with-the-Other. In this distortion, humans manifest an infinite and unrestrained metaphysical desire, which, as distorted, becomes the driver for fragmented, violent, and meaningless identities. ¹⁰⁶ As humans grasp and appropriate, rather than receive, they ultimately reject the giftedness of creation and relationality, in favor of a panicked grasping for being and order in the form of the violent sacred. There is a prioritization of a violent and temporary order (which Girard identifies as satanic, in that it uses accusatory violence to contain violence ¹⁰⁷ ) over a more fundamental ontological and social peace (true to humanity’s mimetic or interdividual nature), which constitutes a disobedience and infidelity to God’s plan for creation. ¹⁰⁸ According to Girard, this choice is discovered as it is undistorted in conversion. Humans discover the sinful character of their own identities and cultures in the light of an alternative, namely, the biblical revelation, which enables humans to receive being in covenantal relationship with God. In this way, the human grasping for desire/being is transformed in the discovery of humanity’s original receptivity to God and others. ¹⁰⁹

Through conversion, Girard suggests, humans could be freed from distorted mimesis (while acknowledging their complicity in it), and enact loving forms of Christian self-sacrifice. ¹¹⁰ Girard’s increasing reference to sacrifice, alongside conversion, as double-sided (true/false, pacific/violent) further presents the centrality of theological notions such as sin and redemption to his thought. Though he initially regarded the term “sacrifice” as only capable of describing violent scapegoating, he famously changed his mind about the use of this term to allow that such scapegoating represents an inauthentic form of sacrifice, in contrast to authentic forms involving loving self-giving. He made this change when he realized his restrictive meaning was influenced by his determination to differentiate Christianity from traditional religion and by a “humanistic and progressivist illusion.” ¹¹¹

Critics such as Coakley regard this as merely a cosmetic change to his fundamental positions. ¹¹² Yet, based on how I have shown Girard’s compatibility with Catholic theology, it can be seen that his change in the use of sacrifice better reflects his fundamental positions (which Schwager helped him to recognize ¹¹³ ), such as in relation to his interpretation of the judgement of Solomon and Christ’s salvific actions. ¹¹⁴ Describing self-giving love for the good of the other as a type of authentic sacrifice allowed Girard to express what was present from the beginnings of his work: the movement of vertical transcendence, symbolized by Christianity in divine self-giving love, as the true movement of human being and the proper foundation for human communion.