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Badiou is his clear awareness that the JPS: Next let’s talk about this idea of the
authentic Christian notion of love is incarnation, as you read it in The Puppet
something basically very violent and and the Dwarf, as symbolizing an internal
unilateral, it’s totally different for me from difference, a lack in God. The other side
the pagan notion where love is this kind of of that speculative judgment is the way
universal balance, you love the whole you read Christ, from the perspective of
universe, you say yes to everything—no! finitude. Now for orthodox Christianity,
Love—you find this in Christianity—is one- Christ is the icon of God: what can be
sided, unilateral. Love means “I love you known of God is seen in Christ. Now for
more than everything”: love is precisely your materialist idiom, you want to say
what Buddhists would have called the origin something like “Christ is the icon of
of evil. Love is a kind of radical imbalance. humanity, or of what in humanity is not
Here I think you get (as I tried to put it in quite human”—is that what is breaking
my Fragile Absolute) a very fine analysis of through from the perspective of finitude?
this logic of finitude already in the Bible,
already in Paul, in Corinthians. It’s very SZ: One thing I would like to specify is that
mysterious, that part, that paragraph on love nonetheless I violently reject this so-called
[I Corinthians 13]. The mystery is the “humanist” reading of Christianity, which
following one. He [Paul] oscillates basically says that simply, in a kind of Fuerbachian
between two versions, and the key point I boring statement, that God is only the
think is to read them together. The first one projection of various aspects of being
is a kind of radical affirmation of love’s human, and so on. No, I think this “more in
priority, in the sense of “even if I got to the human than humanity”—you have to
know everything, and have all the power, take it very radically. The basic message of
without love I would be nothing, etc.” But religion, to put it in a nutshell, is that
then two paragraphs later, he says—as if humanity cannot stand on its own, that you
since now we don’t know everything—all need an otherness, not a natural otherness
that we have is love. And I think that the like the earth or the all-embracing feminine .
two are to be read together. This is the . . Here I may be approaching not so much
paradox of Christianity, for me, that it’s not gnosticism as certain not a little bit heretical
God sitting up there and was a good enough twists, because I want to say not only that
guy to come to us . . . what we have to think, humanity only knows God through Christ
in a way, is the self-limitation of divinity but that only through Christ does God know
itself. himself. We all know that this is a well-
The basic message is that I think there is known gnostic, or not so much gnostic as a
a certain dimension of Christianity which for certain mystic tradition or heretical move,
more complex reasons is missed, I think, by this idea that our knowledge of God is
Badiou, because of his overall view that divine self-knowledge, and so on.
there is no place for finitude, as for example But this is also how I read Jewish
in his critique of Heidegger where he misses iconoclasm. I don’t think Jewish iconoclasm
the point. He even goes into this mode is opposed to Christianity. Those who claim
where being-toward-death is just the animal Jews got it correctly, let’s not conceive God
level of being threatened . . . although I in an anthropomorphic way, Christians
don’t identify Heidegger’s being-toward- screwed it up in a half-pagan way—no!
death with death drive, Badiou is also They don’t get it. The true lesson already of
missing that, because he cannot elevate Jewish iconoclasm is against this gnostic
finitude to its transcendental a priori dignity. fake mysticism. The only terrain of the
He remains precisely, at a certain level, a divine is contact with other humans. The
pre-kantian metaphysician. divine is not [there] in this gnostic way, you
withdraw into some absolute knowledge.
Images of God [are not proscribed] because
God is tout autre, beyond, and every image must have done something wrong. The other
betrays him, but because the space of the guys have more and more refined versions
divine is not up there, it’s here, in human and so on. But again, the shocking news for
interactions, and I think this is perhaps only me is that when God appears, you remember
brought to a conclusion in Christianity. he says “every word that Job says is true.” In
But again I cannot emphasize enough, I a way Job doesn’t even have to answer
am not playing the old game, “theology is because God, in a way . . .
just the alienated self-image of humanity”
and so on. The whole problem is precisely JPS: God answers for him?
that humanity never coincides with itself.
SZ: Yes, God says everything Job says is
JPS: Does this have to do with why for true and everything those four ideologists
you the true anti-type of Christ is not said is false. So God clearly takes sides. This
Adam, but Job. Why is that, exactly? is for me really the single maybe most
radical theological breakthrough, especially
SZ: On the one hand, as we all know, this is if you read it with Rene Girard. I don’t
one of the standard readings of Christianity, always follow Girard but here I think he was
that Job’s suffering in a way points towards right that what matters is this parallax as
Christ’s suffering. such, that is so uncanny. It’s not simply who
is right: in a way, nobody is right. The point
JPS: But you also, in The Puppet and the is not simply that God was wrong . . .
Dwarf, propose the character of Job as I tend to agree with historicist critics of
the first great critic of ideology. What is Christianity about this first scene with the
uncanny about Job however, is that devil. Probably this was a remainder of
unlike the modern liberal subject who some previous pagan tradition where you
considers herself as having the legal right have something like this, a gentleman’s
to the criticism of the state, of religion, of conversation between God and devil, let’s
any authority, etc., Job does not presume make a deal, and so on . . . but I wouldn’t
that he has the right to criticize God. make too much out of that. OK, they took it,
After God’s “answer” to Job—an answer OK! Bricolage, it’s how you write sacred
which takes the form of a kind of obscene books! What interests me more is that you
slide-show of the history of God’s have two perspectives, and you cannot say
power—Job remains silent. How, then, this or that is the true one. You cannot say
can you claim that Job is the first critic of simply Job was right, God was cruel, you
ideology? How and in what sense are we cannot say it was just illusion, there is this
to interpret Job’s silence as critical? undecided openness. This is for me such a
tremendous breakthrough. Why? It’s not the
SZ: There is sympathy with God: Job usual oriental openness, where all our
correctly reads this very strange text, this perspectives are finite. . . it’s not just
divine boasting: “I created monsters, sea different finite perspectives on some more
serpents, who are you?” [Job replies:] “I primordial maternal chaos or whatever. No,
sympathize with you, I know that this is a the gap is between God and man . . . Never
show to conceal that you are impotent. . .” forget this.
Where I see this critical-ideological That’s my thesis: you just have to
dimension is more in this—I would really transpose this radical gap back into God
like to write about these three or four guys himself and you get Christ. This is the big
who confront Job. In these three or four mystery I’m struggling with. This is in the
guys you see a spontaneous categorization subtitle of the book [The Puppet and the
of different modes of ideology. The first guy Dwarf], “the perverse core of Christianity.”
is a pretty brutal, simplistic ideologist. He In a way I am sorry for that subtitle because
says God is God, you suffer because you some of my more vulgar materialist
antitheological friends misread it and you are out, then you are not even human,
thought that I was saying Christianity is in there are only my brothers and if you are not
itself perverse, and that I want to point to my brother you are not even people. OK,
some perverse core in a negative way. Or OK, but my point is that Badiou nonetheless
some people even misread it as if in a kind is still more precise. I speak here ironically
of vulgar Deleuzian way that I want to assert of Badiou’s Leninism. The shattering point
“yes, Christianity is perverse!”—you know, is that truth is unilateral, that universal truth,
people who praise perversion as liberation, no less universal for that reason, is
and so on. No, no none of it! accessible only from an engaged position.
My desperate problem is how to draw, We don’t have, “you are saying this, I am
how to extract the Christian notion of saying that, let’s find the neutral position,
redemption from this financial transaction the common.” Truth is unilateral.
logic. This is what I’m desperately looking This is where I think Agamben misreads
for. Here I think it is crucial to read Christ’s Badiou (because Agamben’s book is
sacrifice not literally as paying a debt. It is explicitly in polemic with Badiou) precisely
also—we should just trust our intuitions concerning universality. What Agamben
here—because the message of Christ’s tries to prove is that Paul’s position is not
sacrifice is not “now I take it for you, you universality but even double division—you
can screw it up again.” No, it just opens the cut a line, a division between those who are
space for our struggle, and this is the in and those who are out within every
paradox I like. This is what I like in what community. But I would say that precisely
maybe is the best chapter of this book, the this is the Paulinian-Hegelian notion of
fifth one [of Puppet]. To put it in very universality, not universality as a positive
simple terms, Christ’s redemption doesn’t encompassing feature. Universality is a line
mean that, OK, now we can go watch hard- that cuts universally and this is, how shall I
core movies because we are redeemed each put it, absolutely unique in Christianity and
time. No, it’s done, the Messiah is here, it’s this is what we are losing with these gnostic
done, means that the space is now open for wisdoms and even with political correctness,
struggle. It’s this nice paradox that the fact tolerance, and so on, because the notion of
that the big thing happened does not mean truth there is not that of a fighting truth but
it’s over. It precisely opens the space for that of differences, space open for
struggle. This is what I find again so everything. This notion of truth as painful,
incredible. Which is why to the horror of truth means you cut a line of difference . . .
some of my Jewish friends, who doesn’t like which is why for me, as I claim, you know
this idea that in Christianity everything that mysterious statement of Christ’s “I
happened whereas in Judaism the Messiah is came here not to bring peace but a sword”—
always postponed, always to-come, and so I don’t think this should be read as “kill the
on. No, I like here this crazy radicality of bad guys.” It is a militant work of love.
Christianity which is that, no, it happened, it
already happened. But precisely that doesn’t JPS: A cut within ourselves?
mean everything is already decided. No,
again, what intrigues me is that I find here SZ: Yeah, yes! This is why again, in a
such a shattering revolution of the entire totally different way (you put it
economy. . . wonderfully) this too, is in a movie that I
And another aspect which is linked to this like, Fight Club, where at first, you hit
entire economy—and here I do agree with yourself. This is the most difficult part. The
Badiou—I do not agree with his critics who change is a change in you. Herbert Marcuse
think Paul’s famous “for me there are no of the Frankfurt School, so sadly forgotten
Jews nor Greeks” simply means everybody today, put it in a very nice way in his essay
can become a member, it is universally on liberation, “freedom is the condition of
open. Then you can play all these games: if
liberation.” In order to liberate yourself you Christianity is the religion of love. It’s a
must be free. positive ontological constituent of love: you
We see this today, with feminists, that only love someone who is an abyss, whom
the first step in liberation is that you you don’t know. Love always means this. . .
perceive that your situation is unjust. This In order to love someone, it should be an
already is the inner freedom. The problem is abyss . . . it should be a lacking in perfect
not, at first, that the situation for women was being, but at the same time a being with an
bad, but [rather] that they just accepted it as impenetrable excess. There is no love
a fact. Even in revolution it goes like this. If without this. You have all that mystical stuff
you look at the French Revolution, the shift where you say yes to the universe, but that’s
was purely ideological. They overthrew the not what is uniquely Christian love.
king when they started to perceive that And here I think, again, as for the essence of
position as unjustified. Look at it in an Christianity Kierkegaard got it first. When
objective way. The ancienne regime was, in he emphasized that it is totally wrong to read
the second part of the 18th century, much Christ as a metaphor in the sense that first
more liberal and open than before. It’s just the truth appears just as a person but then
that the implicit ethical standards changed. with the Holy Spirit we know that it’s not a
My big obsession with Christianity is that person but just a universal notion of love, or
there is something extremely precious in this whatever. The greatness of Kierkegaard is to
legacy that is being lost today. show that our only access to eternity is
through temporality. Not in this fake
JPS: This is a question about idolatry, Hegelian sense that eternity is just the
one of the greatest, perhaps the greatest totality of the movement of the temporal, but
theme of monotheistic religion, and of the this crazy paradox that in a specific
Jewish, Christian, and Islamic scriptures. historical moment something happened.
You claim provocatively in The Puppet Only through that passage do you get
and the Dwarf that “the ultimate idolatry eternity. That is to say, if you go directly to
is not the idolizing of the mask, the image, eternity, you get nothing, you miss eternity
but the belief that there is some hidden, itself. So if I were to pick out one writer
positive content beyond the mask” (138). here who got it, it would have been
What do you mean, exactly, by this technically Kierkegaard. It’s also clear that
phrase? the Kierkegaardian triad aesthetic-ethical-
religious is so clearly the Lacanian
SZ: The key point for me is that Hegelian imaginary-symbolic-real. It fits so perfectly.
statement which I make all the time, which Also, what interests me in some of my
is that what dies on the cross is not a finite works is to explain this relation between
representative of God, but the God beyond sexuality and love. Not in some cheap New
himself. So that “Holy Spirit” means Age religious sense where the ultimate
precisely, we are on our own, in a way. This religious experience is to have good sex,
terrible opening, this freedom, which, and because you get the yin-yang balance and so
here I am quite dogmatic: what we really on . . . what I think is that something is
mean by freedom was opened only through missing for me, in Kierkegaard. I develop
Judeo-Christian space. Freedom in this this, I think, in my Wagner book. It’s that
radical sense only is or appears as a correlate you have a.) the aesthetic mode of sexuality
of what Lacan would have called desire of which is, basically—I know it’s more
the Other qua Other. Without the abyss of complex than this—seduction, Don
the other, without perceiving the other in an Giovanni, blah blah. Then you have the
abyss, without not knowing what the other ethical mode which is marriage. Then where
wants, you are not free. If you know what is the religious mode? I think it is courtly
they other one wants, and you are the object love, this absolute logic, and so on. But
of his desire . . . Here it can be said also why something is missing there. And the whole