---

Jesus saying, “I will tell of things which have been kept secret from the foundation of the world,” represents a retelling of the human drama that will unveil the misinterpretations and uncomfortable hidden truths that formed our world … and us. In this retelling Jesus pauses at every point we tried to avoid, examines every conclusion we have hastily drawn, and questions every god we invented. The aim is nothing less than undoing our misinterpretations and offering us a whole new meaning-making (telling) language.

In search of this foundational event, we need to travel back a few hundred thousand years to observe the processes that made us human. We find the earth bursting with a myriad of life forms, each competing fiercely for survival. Major environmental changes, such as the expansion of savannas and the availability of food, cause some species to go extinct, while others prove more adaptable. Among these is a species of hominid that exhibits remarkable adaptability, allowing them to spread and survive across a wide area.

Significantly, some members of this group develop a novel capacity that sets them apart from other hominids. While most can pick up projectiles and throw them, this group does something surprisingly new. They repeat the action, practicing and imitating each other, ultimately becoming highly skilled in the behaviors they mimic. This increased capacity for imitation, or mimesis, proves to be advantageous in their harsh environment. In particular, becoming proficient in throwing projectiles allows them to kill their prey without entering the animal’s dangerous perimeter, thus avoiding injury and death on many occasions. Moreover, the range of their bodily movements evolve differently because of this novel capacity to imitate.[1] These new mimetic abilities open up a whole new world of possibilities for this family of hominid, making them more adaptable to their environments and allowing them to adapt the environment to their needs for survival.

In our emergent human origins story, suppose this new complexity of imitative capacity in our hominid population need not remain limited to bodily behavior. Their appetites, passions, mental activity, and social interactions also undergo a complexification. Observing another to imitate actions suggests a new awareness of the distinction between self and other. Initially these new behaviors are driven by unconscious processes, but it also suggests the beginning of the emergence of a primitive self-awareness. And a new level of self-awareness opens up the possibility of a deeper relational connection with the other who is like self. Consequently, relational connection becomes even more complex and intense.[2]

These hominids’ passions are no longer energized by instinctual appetites alone; instead, their intensified mimetic capacity allows desires to become mobile. Slowly but surely, they break free from instinctual boundaries with surprising consequences. Freedom and creativity abound. Communities become more complex. We are speaking here, though, of a community still dominated by an alpha. When a dominant animal rules a primitive community, violence is sporadic and relatively well-controlled. (The dominant animal grabs whatever it desires, and the rest makes do with whatever is left.) Occasionally the alpha’s dominance might be tested. However, with the proliferation of desire, conflict increases. All these newfound capacities have a darker side as well. The intensity of conflict mirrors the development of mimetic abilities.

Although in this imaginative scenario we see only the first traces of self-awareness emerging, it already influences a sense of identity. Not only is group identity essential for survival in this environment, but we see the early flickers of individual identity beginning to emerge too. When passion increases and feelings intensify, an inevitable awareness of the interiority of those feelings becomes more acute. I want to draw attention to the creativity, novelty, and complexity of mental capacities produced by the process of mimesis itself.

The authors of the Genesis origin account share the same intuition, when they define humanity in terms of their reflective capacity—beings created in the image and likeness of God (Genesis 1:26). And the Yahwist origin accounts of Genesis 2 and 3 also imagine a period of creative development, of the awakening of desire, and the complexification of relationship to precede the first act of violence.

But to return to our narrative: greater intensity of feeling has consequences. When intense passions are frustrated, they erupt, and these eruptions become so chaotic and violent that the dominant animal can no longer control the violence. We can see how the communal structure could break down, status boundaries disappear, and passions run wild in a violent frenzy of all against all. Many proto-human communities would have destroyed themselves in this way, and those communities that survived were severely damaged by the losses.

The evolution of these new mimetic capacities gave significant advantages and simultaneously introduced great danger to these hominids. In our story, for thousands of years, these events replay themselves. Uncontrolled violence becomes a seemingly insurmountable obstacle to advancement. The unconscious yearning for a solution intensifies. How can these proto-humans retain the advantages yet reduce the danger inherent in the evolution of their mimetic capacities? They need a catalyst, a revolution that can push them over the brink of this obstacle.

A Creative Leap

Then it happens. A community at some point finds itself in the familiar scenario of escalating tension again. Frustrations grow. All the members feel it, but they don’t know why the escalation of conflict is happening or how to stop it. For them, the movements of desire are unconscious, and the consequent chaos is mysterious. Then suddenly one of its members snaps and kills another. This unleashes retributive violence. Tension grows. Will this be another frenzy of violence, everyone turning on everyone else? The group is swept along as if by an unseen yet irresistible current. However, something unforeseen happens; at the very moment when the group is about to descent into uncontrolled and violent cathartic release, one of the community members points to another. The source of the frustration is suggested by this gesture. Violence finds a focus. A crowd converges upon a single victim. One dies instead of many. The philosophical anthropologist, René Girard, identifies this spontaneous process as scapegoating.[3]

Girard speculates how when the blind passion subsides and the violence ceases, the chaotic noise makes way for a moment of silent attention. In this flicker of contemplation, everyone glimpses a symbol that overflows with meaning: the corpse of their victim: One that was in the community is now out; yet this death means life for the remaining community. Chaos has been transformed into order by this dead body. This scapegoating process will be repeated incalculable times, and each time the symbol will grow in signification until reaching a threshold that radically moves symbolic thought onto a new foundation.

The gesture of pointing of the finger, of accusation, would set in motion such a significant process that it would be experienced as a palpable presence. The Hebrew Bible names this process, the satanos. The word satanos is not a name but a noun. As such it is often used with the definite article as in “the” accuser, “the” adversary, “the” stumbling block. However, over time, Girard believes this process played such a substantial role in human development that it took on a personality of almost ontological reality. Girard explains: Satan is imagined and symbolized as a person, as “someone,” because satanic power becomes attached to the victim as the victim mechanism does its work. The victim is viewed as a devil or demon.[4] It is significant to note that the very symbol of evil emerges out of the scapegoating process. As we’ll see later, when the process gets exposed, the symbol will be transformed as well.

Complex Symbolic Thought & The First Crucifixion

The mimetic cycles and the scapegoating mechanism are not processes which humans invented but rather, the very processes that made us human. These evolutionary events transformed animals into humans by providing the possibility for complex symbolic thought and language. Scientists know that animals do have a primitive culture in the form of co-operation and toolmaking. However, they lack complex symbols. Some of the great apes have been taught the meaning of basic words. They know, for instance, that a.p.p.l.e. refers to a certain kind of fruit. But none could be taught the symbolic meaning of “you are the apple of my eye.” An excess of meaning in our symbolic thought and language seems to be unique to humankind.[5] The corpse of the scapegoat serves precisely as the kind of symbol that contains such an excess of meaning that it can serve as the catalyst for the emergence of the uniquely human, complex symbolic thought.[6]

The very possibility of meaning relies on the recognition of differences. The chaos that precedes the act of scapegoating violence represents a crisis of undifferentiation. At this stage of the crisis, rationality does not guide the frenzied mob; an irrational act of violence brings a cathartic end to the chaos. We have here a moment of possibility: a moment in which their irrational passions are satisfied thereby creating room to consider the meaning of the moment. Mindless rage gives way to focused wonder. In no other event might opposites become as intense and obvious as in the corpse of the scapegoat. It symbolizes the death that brought life; the chaos that brought order; the violence that brought peace; the outcast and the community; the curse and the blessing; the demonic and the divine. I would suggest that maybe this was the first moment in which we vaguely heard the appeal of “the lamb slain from the foundation of the world” (Revelation 13:8), to our conscience. Or more precisely, the innocence of our victim created an opportunity for conscience, a sense of right and wrong, to emerge. I propose that this is the foundational event, the first crucifixion in a sense. Although no wooden cross is present, the contradictions symbolized in this event creates a juxtaposition that anticipates the cross.

The recent discovery of mirror neurons in primates underscores the intensification of mimetic capacities in their evolution.[7] As observed before, a new level of mimetic capacity also enables a new level of conflict. Basic forms of scapegoating have been observed amongst primates. Scapegoating therefore seems to be a natural and important step toward limiting uncontrolled violence, toward increasing co-operation, and toward the beginnings of culture. Girard presents his argument as follows:

We have to show that the intensification of mimetic rivalry, which is already very much in evidence at the level of primates, destroyed dominance patterns and gave rise to progressively more elaborate and humanized forms of culture through the intermediary of the surrogate victim. At the point when mimetic conflict becomes sufficiently intense to prohibit the direct solutions that give rise to the forms of animal sociality, the first ‘crisis’ or series of crises would then occur as the mechanism that produces the differentiated, symbolic, and human forms of culture.[8]

Girard posits the corpse of the scapegoat as the original symbol, and so for him this entails that violence has shaped the very capacities humans have in the process of meaning-making. Concepts of the sacred, of sacrifice, of violence, and of the divine originate here for Girard. Wrathful gods who delight in sacrifice and justify our violence find their origin in this event, or rather, in the misinterpretation of this event. This leads to a startling conclusion: If we were to have any hope of transforming these concepts, we would have to revisit the event that birthed them and reinterpret the symbol in which they originate.

The Birth of a New Community

Our story now progresses from a scenario involving pre-human hominids and the process of hominization to early human communities. Uncontrolled violence destroyed many primitive communities. However, the scapegoating process introduced a new kind of violence—a sacred violence—for it saves the community from the uncontrolled violence. In primitive communities where there are no laws to limit violence, conflict easily escalates. When at the height of mimetic crisis, the crowd becomes united in their accusations against a scapegoat, it brings about a new unity within the community. Rivals become friends when they share a common enemy. In expelling or murdering the scapegoat they experience a cathartic release and a seemingly “magical” peace descends upon the community. Magical, because they don’t recognize the true nature of the process that made this peace possible.[9] In the same way they identified the scapegoat as the reason for all the chaos, they now identify it as the reason for the peace. Consequently, the community deifies the scapegoat. All the elements necessary for the birth of a new community, a new beginning, and a new sense of the sacred become present in this “saving” event. Girard states:

Thus, there is at least one moment in which peace is restored within the community, and the community never praises itself for this reconciliation; it regards this new acquisition of order as a gift from the victim it just killed. This is both malefic because it caused the crisis, but also beneficial because its death restored peace, and therefore the scapegoat becomes divinized in the archaic sense, that is, the all-powerful, Almighty both for good and for bad simultaneously.[10]

A community that had found itself in the clutches of a chaotic monster, about to be devoured by uncontrolled violence, now finds itself born anew into a new unity and a new peace. It’s not hard to see why Girard proposes this event as foundational in the formation of civilizations. It’s important to note as well that Girard refers not to just one specific event that happens one time, but a series of events that forms a pattern and accumulates meaning over time.

We recognize the practice of scapegoating because it still happens on so many levels within our families, communities, and nations. Yet few before Girard recognized the significant anthropological role it played in the formation of civilizations. If indeed these events of scapegoating violence were foundational for human development, in structuring our brains and social interactions, then we cannot simply hastily glance over them and move on to consider the more positive aspects of human rationality. Our history has shown again and again that if you place good and rational people in the right situation, they become capable of committing unimaginable acts of violence. Our rationality has not completely mastered the unconscious passions that formed us. In fact, we often still employ our rationality in the service of justifying our passions. This brings me to an inevitable conclusion: our beliefs or rationality alone cannot save us from our violent origins; rather, we need a deep transformation of our desires, or more accurately, the source of our desires.

Ritual and Myth

Let’s return to our archaic scenario. What happened next, after the scapegoating event and its mystification? For the effect and meaning of the scapegoating mechanism to continue, the community needs to remember the event. And the best way of remembering in a pre-literate age will be through re-enactment. Consequently, rituals develop.[11] The ritualistic repetition of the scapegoating violence forms the basis for religious sacrifice.

Imagine being part of such a primitive community and the events that lead to scapegoating. We don’t want the violence so destructive of our community to erupt again, and we also don’t want to suffer the same fate as our victim. How do we protect ourselves? We might ask, what caused the victim to suffer this fate? For whatever caused the violence should be avoided! Because we are unwilling to see ourselves as the cause of the victim’s suffering, we look for other causes. In our blindness we soon identify the causes of the victim’s punishment: it must be certain actions, words, and objects that defiled the victim and caused purity to demand revenge. As we have seen, the scapegoat’s corpse probably serves as the first and most universally revered source of defilement. Moreover, the associated objects and actions that lead up to the final murder soon become “taboos” as well.[12] Over time, different communities develop a great diversity of taboos in different religions. What might be sacred in one might be meaningless in another. An object’s sacred status will be determined by its presence in the events that led up to the final violence. Thus, we find a great diversity in religious practices, yet the actual practice of sacrifice is universal in archaic religions.

We can conclude that religions might have great diversity in their reasoning and speculation about what caused these violent events, but despite the diversity of rituals and origin myths, all point to a common, culminating event of sacred violence. Oral and later written myths or sacred stories will play a complimentary role to rituals. Many origin myths follow the pattern of a story of mimetic crisis that gives birth to chaotic monsters and a creative act of violence that saves the community from annihilation. As each community develops their own myths, rituals, and religious traditions, a multitude of gods are created in the image and likeness of that community.[13]

There’s one big problem: because what Girard calls the scapegoating mechanism results from a misinterpretation of the problem of violence, the effects wear off. The actual problem is twisted mimetic desire, bound to flare up again. But when a similar crisis befalls the community, they remember what saved them the previous time and their ritual re-enactment of the selection and sacrifice of a scapegoat becomes part of a cycle that preserves the community.

Religion and Civilization

As we have seen, religion and culture not as the inventions of rational human beings but as essential processes in the evolution of humanity. The scapegoating process functions as a catalyst in the development of symbolic thought. This increased mental capacity leads to ritual and myth, which in their turn develop into religion. A society that can control violence can then develop into a civilization. Ritual, myth, religion, and culture all intertwine. The scapegoating mechanism makes it all possible. (But remember, the scapegoating process is dependent on increased mimetic capacities). Consequently, at the foundation of every civilization lies a kind of tomb, a monument to what Girard calls the “founding murder.” Even the pyramid, the above-ground tomb, he points out, did not need to be invented, for it is the shape of “the pile of stones in which the victim of unanimous stoning is buried. It is the first pyramid.”[14]

When Girard first developed these ideas, it was popular to blame religion for violence. In contrast, Girard believed that religion does not cause violence, rather, violence causes religion. The problem of violence goes much deeper than any one belief system or institution.[15] In fact, the human race births religion out of the need to contain violence. In this regard Girard says:

One of the central points of the mimetic theory which could contribute a good deal to the debate, if we take it seriously, is that religion is the mother of culture. In the process of the emergence of cultural elements, one also needs to stress that there is no absolute beginning. The process is extremely complex and progressive.[16]

Long after the establishment of these early archaic societies, our more modern civilizations remain bound by the myths and violent mechanisms on which they were founded. Empires, for instance, sincerely believing in their divine right to domination, have taught their slaves using the Bible that slavery must be God’s will and purpose. Nations, believing in their divine right to luxury, have persuaded their young men to sacrifice themselves in wars to guarantee their excessive way of life. In order to wash our hands of their blood, we convince ourselves that our victims either deserved their fate, or that they heroically volunteered to sacrifice themselves.

But when the one sacrificed becomes exposed as a victim, rather than a hero, the very foundations of the system founded on murder start to crumble. When the innocence of our victims and the guilt of the community is revealed, we no longer have a legitimate reason for their slaughter. This will be an important point for Girard theologically in his interpretation of the passion narratives of the Gospels. He urges us to find a new foundation for our civilizations, lest they remain vulnerable to the violence that birthed them. Girard notes: “Christians heartily distrusted the sovereign states in which Christianity emerged and spread, on account of the violent origin of these states.”[17] Christianity and the revelation contained in the Hebrew Bible and New Testament play decisive roles in both the revealing of the victim and in the possibility of a new kind of community, not based on scapegoating.

Reinterpretation and Conversion

The narratives collected in the biblical scriptures began in the ancient Near East. These biblical stories have similar themes, characters, events, and structures to those of their neighbors. Canaan, Syria, Mesopotamia and to some degree, Egypt, shared a similar culture. Smaller tribes within the larger culture developed unique versions of common stories. Yet, despite their similarities, Girard believes the Hebrew scriptures begin to offer something radically new. Girard sees the biblical scriptures as a progressive deconstruction of the myths of culture (stories which Girard says are always told from the point of view of the persecutor), revealing our own troubled relationship with violence and sacrifice. He summarizes the Biblical anthropological revelation as follows:

The mimetic anthropology is devoted both to the acknowledgement of the mimetic nature of desire and to the unfolding of the social consequences of this knowledge, to the revelation of the innocence of the victim and to the understanding that the Bible and the Gospels do it for us in advance.[18]

In the anthropological story we’ve developed so far, all the gods are creations of human beings, birthed in the misinterpretation of extreme experiences such as the tensions between violence and peace. The Bible does contain many aspects of this anthropological narrative: namely, it foregrounds the processes of mimetic desire, conflict, and scapegoating. However, new possibilities of meaning emerge in both the old and the new Testaments. The idea of conversion comes about because of a radical subversion of meaning we see as the narrative unfolds. Through the counter-intuitive transformation of meaning, the presence of the true God becomes implied—a God present in flesh.[19] Rather than manipulating our narrative from the outside, God transforms meaning from the inside. We could say we have here a surprising yet powerful witness to a God that is both immanent and transcendent, intertwined with the world, yet calling it to transcend itself.

Unlike other interpreters of myth such as Joseph Campbell, Girard didn’t consider the Biblical narratives as simply another iteration of the same basic mythic story. Rather, he shows how the Biblical text deconstructs the origin myths themselves, shows the foundation on which they are built. He concedes that to deconstruct myth, the biblical stories must have some aspects in common with myth to expose what is false. Girard draws this distinction: “In biblical monotheism we cannot suspect God of being the product of the scapegoat processes that quite visibly produce the gods in primitive polytheism.”[20] The nonviolent God revealed in the Judeo-Christian scriptures has a different origin, he argues, untainted by scapegoating and human violence.

Whereas myth hides the truth of the scapegoating mechanism and the innocence of the victim, the biblical scriptures begin to reveal it. This happens gradually, but it starts right at the beginning. For instance, the Bible also affirms, like the myths, that the first civilization began with a founding death—yet, instead of calling it a sacrifice, the Bible names it for what it is: a murder which founded a civilization. “Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him” (Genesis 4:8). “Cain was then building a city, and he named it after his son Enoch” (v.17). Throughout his work, Girard demonstrates how a radical self-critique of the practice of sacrifice and repudiating the role of God in violence permeates the scriptures. Making this distinction between myth and Scripture clear, Girard writes:

The myth and the biblical story are in basic opposition over the decisive question that collective violence poses: Is it warranted? Is it legitimate? In the myth the expulsions of the hero are justified each time. In the biblical account they never are. Collective violence is unjustifiable.[21]

Another striking example of the subversion of the meaning of myth can be found in Genesis 1. Most scholars recognize the similarity of the Genesis 1 creation story and the Near East myth of Enuma Elish. The stories have a similar beginning and structure, namely: God begins creating. There is chaos. But then the bible introduces a surprising twist. Chaos is not overcome by violence, as in Enuma Elish, but by the spirit of Elohim hovering over the deep. God creates order out of chaos with a word, rather than with violence. So for Girard, the bible offers new possibilities of meaning in a world where violence has seemed to be the only solution.

The human story finds a crescendo in the story of Jesus, as his message and life becomes the most comprehensive subversion of myth – a re-telling of what was hidden from the foundation of the world. The biblical narrative does not simply reproduce the symbols and meanings of myth but progressively subverts them. And I will argue that subversion requires an entering in, an intimate familiarity with the subject, so that it can be transformed from the inside out. We can see how something truly new and creative unfolds in the biblical narrative. This progression in the narrative, this openness to new possibilities of meaning, I see as a profound affirmation of a God who is open; a God who invites us to realize greater beauty and greater meaning; a God who uses persuasion rather than force. God is part of the human drama, involved in the temporal cycles of human development.

The Event of Jesus Christ

I see the life and message of Jesus as an unveiling of the scapegoating mechanism, and as a new and true interpretation of the events that made us human. Girard concurs:

From an anthropological standpoint I would define Christian revelation as the true representation of what had never been completely represented or what had been falsely represented: the mimetic convergence of all against one, the single victim mechanism with its antecedent developments, particularly “interdividual” scandals.[22]

The theological implications are profound. Recognizing the transformation of meaning throughout the scriptures proves essential in grasping the significance of Jesus Christ, who came in the fullness of time (Ephesians 1:10), to give us understanding (1 John 5:20), and unveil what was hidden since the foundation of the world (Matthew 13:35). The hiddenness of the scapegoating mechanism forms the very foundation upon which the world order was established.[23]

The principles upon which our civilizations were (and in some ways still are) based would be exposed in the events of Jesus’ life. Jesus’ story summarizes the human story, then offers a conclusion that we were unable to reach ourselves before this moment. The circular events in which chaos gives way to order and order succumbs to chaos, the never-ending cycle of victors and victims has finally been interrupted by this truly new event. Jesus not only exposes the events and models that formed us, but provides us with a new model of what being human could mean. Girard explains:

All archaic religions grounded their rituals precisely around the re-enactment of the founding murder. In other words, they considered the scapegoat to be guilty of the eruption of the mimetic crisis. By contrast, Christianity, in the figure of Jesus, denounced the scapegoat mechanism for what it actually is: the murder of an innocent victim, killed in order to pacify a riotous community. That’s the moment in which the mimetic mechanism is fully revealed.

… Now, I think that the unconscious nature of sacrificial violence is revealed in the New Testament, particularly in Luke: ‘Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing’ (Luke 23:34).

… Without the Cross, there is no revelation of the fundamental injustice of the scapegoat mechanism, which is the founder of human culture, with all its repercussions in our relationships with each other. [24]

Religion and culture developed by means of the scapegoating mechanism, and to function they depend on the truth about the mechanism being concealed. In contrast, Jesus came to reveal the truth about the innocence of the victim. As such Jesus inaugurates the end of religion.[25] We can see how the whole setting of Jesus’ story serves as a micro-cast of the human drama, of our conflicted history. Once again, the archaic story we looked at gets reenacted: Israel once again finds herself in subjection to a pagan empire—the Roman Empire. Within the Jewish nation there are numerous factions and competing voices. In the midst of the frustration, the desire for deliverance intensifies. Many would-be messiahs have raised their voices in the thick of these tensions and incited the crowds. Most of these would-be saviors met a violent end. The gospels all seem to race toward the last week of Jesus’ life and death. Multiple conflicts, plots, and schemes converge in this last week, one in which all these frustrations fuse and become focused on one culprit.

Within this chaotic environment Jesus’ teaching and actions are starting to make people nervous. The religious authorities have also noticed him and grow increasingly offended at his teaching and popularity. He constantly steps beyond the accepted boundaries, embracing outcasts and thus blurring the social differences. All these events race toward the Passover feast when Jews from all over the region would flock to Jerusalem. We have all the elements for conflict present: national tensions, religious zeal, and personal frustrations. Individuals, families, and nations seem to be obliviously swept along currents of conflict. Everything we have been unaware of, including the unconscious processes upon which we have built our identities and founded our communities—the realities we tried to hide with our myths—are what Jesus comes to make us conscious of.

We saw earlier how the process of accusations—our internal chaos and frustrated desires, misinterpreted as the guilt of the scapegoat—became personified in the symbol of the satan, or what the New Testament often refers to as the Devil. Scripture confirms that it is the event of the crucifixion that defeats the Devil (Hebrews 2:14). How? Notice how the closer the gospel narratives move to the actual passion event, the less visible the character of Satan becomes. Is it because the very form of the satanic is transformed in the process of its exposure? Indeed, it is the exposure of evil that defeats it. The principalities and powers would not have crucified the Lord if they knew what was happening (1 Cor. 2:8). The very principles on which our societies were founded, the powers by which they rule, would be unveiled in this event. When Jesus says, “I see Satan fall like lightning” (Luke 10:18), it can be interpreted as: I see the mythical personification of evil exposed as the very earthly process of accusation.

The original symbol that birthed our concepts of gods, of ourselves, and of sacrifice—the symbol that made symbolic thought itself possible—will be reinterpreted and radically subvert human meaning. In the Gospel stories, history repeats in the sequence of events in which conflict intensifies as the Jewish nation fights for its survival, and Rome relies on its trusted method of violence to rule. These tensions eventually resolve as all rivals melt together into a united voice of condemnation.

In this dramatic scene, Jesus becomes the chosen scapegoat. He enters into the heart of our myth by becoming the victim and from there, he exposes the myth. The true God does not participate in our cycles of violence but calls us to transcend them. This God does not justify our violence but suffers it. This God does not demand violence, but in the midst of suffering, offers forgiveness. Jesus strips the principalities and powers bare—the principles by which we have governed and exercised power in human communities have been founded upon a lie. Light finally shines on the practice of sacrifice in this event of the perfect sacrifice, and the truth it reveals brings an end to the justification of violent sacrifice.[26]

In Girard’s thought, scapegoating violence served as the first pattern of formative events that shaped the environment in which we could create meaning. It shaped our understanding, our language, and our experience of ourselves, others, and God. Inherent in the very origin of this framework we find blind-spots, misunderstandings, and a limitation to the meanings we could create. The justification of violence forms part of the fabric of this framework of misinterpretation.

Christ’s exposure of these “principalities and powers”^[27] opens the possibility of a new language. Christ transforms the very structures by which we create meaning. He does this by taking us back to the original event that demanded our attention and so formed human consciousness—the body of the victim. But in Jesus, this crucified victim, rather than seeking revenge, forgives.^[28] The resurrection proves the innocence of the victim and the guilt of the perpetrators, yet beyond this, the invitation to receive forgiveness becomes an invitation to transcend the cycles of violence and the old framework of meaning-making. We are offered a new, more expansive, and more honest framework of language. In this framework we find no forceful control; rather, it is love’s vision of beauty that has a persuasive influence on the trajectory of our narratives. This resonates with Whitehead’s thought that history has a trajectory that reduces violence and favors persuasive power:

The history of ideas is a history of mistakes. But through all mistakes it is also the history of the gradual purification of conduct. When there is progress in the development of favourable order, we find conduct protected from relapse into brutalization by the increasing agency of ideas consciously entertained. In this way Plato is justified in his saying. The creation of the world—that is to say, the world of civilized order—is the victory of persuasion over force.^[29]

We continue to see these ideas developed further in the New Testament theology and reported events. The Apostle Paul’s conversion, for instance, finds its basis on the revelation of his participation in the persecutory process.[30] Being part of the cycles of violence distorts our vision of both others and ourselves, whether we be victims or perpetrators of violence.

Theological Possibilities

The gods born from violence are nothing more than projections of those who perpetrate violence; idols that reflect the misunderstandings of humanity in its infancy, grasping for meaning. The popular concept of God, as an entity that has absolute power and controls world events, loses its persuasiveness in the light of these anthropological revelations. Such a god simply does not exist in Girardian anthropology. Instead, an alternative vision of God emerges. This God does not control but patiently works in the background, present in every moment, opening new possibilities of meaning. Even when humanity misunderstood events, sinking to the depths of violence, this God has drawn the story forward, not by external force, but by the persistent influence of the divine vision of beauty and goodness.

The story reaches a crescendo in the event of Jesus where God is unveiled as the one who suffers our violence rather than the one justifying it. This progression in the story leads to a type of conversion. The Bible does not explicitly state what we should believe concerning God. Rather its central aim is to expose the violent origin of our meaning-making capacities and at the same time offer us a new basis for creating meaning. It is this new possibility, this radical transformation of the very structure of meaning, that points to the nature of God. We can find in these stories a profound affirmation of a God who is open; a God who invites us to realize greater beauty and greater meaning; a God who uses persuasion rather than force.

---

^[1]. “Mimesis meant that hominids could repeat a movement or action, which sounds simple enough. However, this is exactly what is not found in other mammals, especially if you are looking for intentional action, such as practicing throwing.” Vern Neufeld Redekop and Thomas Ryba, eds., René Girard and Creative Mimesis. (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2016), 54.

^[2]. Jesuit Theologian Raymund Schwager, one of Girard’s interlocutors about theology, presents a number of scenarios in which he demonstrates how the intensity and complexity of relationship could have evolved. See Raymund Schwager, S. J., Banished From Eden: Original Sin and Evolutionary Theory in the Drama of Salvation. (Leominster, Herefordshire, UK: Gracewing, 2006,) 95.

^[3]. For a history of the idea see David Dawson, Flesh Becomes Word: A Lexicography of the Scapegoat or, the History of an Idea. (East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 2013).

^[4]. Girard, René. I See Satan Fall Like Lightning. (Orbis Books, 2012,) 88.

^[5]. “Chimpanzees and a few other animals are capable of symbolic thought, but they are not very good at it. It is not an exercise that comes to them easily or spontaneously. Extensive sustained training is required before these animals can learn to use but a few symbols in a highly artificial ‘prepared’ environment that has been created precisely for that purpose. Humans, on the other hand, do it spontaneously; ‘naturally’ one would say.” Alison, The Palgrave Handbook of Mimetic Theory and Religion, 15.

^[6]. The philosopher Paul Dumouchel observes: “Girard’s elegant and original solution is to start from an undefined, exceedingly significant single symbol, which signifies precisely through the excess of significations that it contains.” Alison, The Palgrave Handbook of Mimetic Theory and Religion, 17.

^[7]. See Scott R. Garrels, Mimesis and Science: Empirical Research on Imitation and the Mimetic Theory of Culture and Religion. (East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 2011).

^[8]. Girard, Things Hidden since the Foundation of the World, 94.

^[9]. A misunderstanding of mimesis often gives birth to a belief in magic. For instance: “Early anthropologists perceived something of the religious character of mimesis and spoke of imitative magic; for instance, many primitives guard against having clippings of their hair or nails fall into the hands of potential adversaries.” Girard, Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World, 14.

^[10]. Girard, Evolution and Conversion, 48.

^[11]. “There are two possible views of ritual. On the one hand, the Enlightenment view for which religion is superstition and if ritual is everywhere, it’s because cunning and avid priests impose their abracadabras on the good people. On the other hand, if we simply consider that the clergy cannot really precede the invention of culture, then religion must come first and far from being a derisory farce, it appears as the origin of the whole culture. And humanity is the child of religion.” Alison, The Palgrave Handbook of Mimetic Theory and Religion, 80.

^[12]. “According to mimetic theory, myths are narratives of those violent crises, rites are repetitions of the behaviors that brought the crisis to an end, and taboos are attempts to prevent crises by prohibiting behaviors that might have incited them.” (Ibid., 320.)

^[13]. “We can hypothetically assume that several prehistoric groups did not survive precisely because they didn’t find a way to cope with the mimetic crisis; their mimetic rivalries didn’t find a victim who polarized their rage, saving them from self-destruction. We could even conceive of groups that solved one or two crises through the founding murder but failed to re-enact it ritually, developing a durable religious system, and therefore succumbing to the next crisis. What I have said is that the threshold of culture is related to the scapegoat mechanism, and that the first known institutions are closely related to its deliberate and planned re-enactment.…The old question of the anteriority of myth over ritual, or ritual over myth, is solved: ritual is the deliberate reproduction of the mechanism; myth is the narrative (inevitably distorted) of its origins.” Girard, Evolution and Conversion, 113.

^[14]. Girard, René. Things Hidden since the Foundation of the World, 83.

^[15]. “For Girard, religion came into existence as an inter-individual, social solution to the problem of ubiquitous rivalry and violence in human groups.” Alison, The Palgrave Handbook of Mimetic Theory and Religion, 58.

^[16]. Girard, Evolution and Conversion, 70.

^[17]. Girard, I See Satan Fall Like Lightning, 95.

^[18]. Girard, Evolution and Conversion, 141.

^[19]. “For the moment it is possible to say in short order that it is exactly the semiotic shift that Girard presents which makes the whole thing work. It is precisely as a semiotic reversal of the sacred that the biblical reading is introduced. And thus, the very existence of the shift—its textual and semiotic dynamic—‘creates’ the meaning of a nonviolent divine.” Anthony Bartlett, Theology Beyond Metaphysics: Transformative Semiotics of René Girard. (Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2020), 49.

^[20]. Girard, I See Satan Fall Like Lightning, 107.

^[21]. Ibid., 108-109.

^[22]. Girard, I See Satan Fall Like Lightning, 137.

^[23]. See the section “The Gospel Revelation of the Founding Murder,” Things Hidden since the Foundation of the World, 158.

^[24]. Girard, Evolution and Conversion, 157.

^[25]. “Religion performs an essential service for the community. But the religion is of course based on a lie, namely the supposed guilt of the victim.” Michael Kirwan, In Girard and Theology. (London: T & T Clark, 2009), 67.

^[26]. Michael Kirwin notes that Girard’s seismic impact on the theory of atonement derives from his devastating suspicion and critique of sacrifice. Girard later accepted that there is a place for sacrifice language in a radically subverted form. See Kirwan, Michael and Sheelah T. Hidden, eds., Mimesis and Atonement: René Girard and the Doctrine of Salvation. (London: Bloomsbury Academic 2018), 115. See also: Mark S. Heim, Saved from Sacrifice: A Theology of the Cross. (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2008).

^[27]. See Ephesians 3:10 and 1 Corinthians 2:8.

^[28]. See Acts 2:29-39.

^[29]. Whitehead, Adventures of Ideas, 25.

^[30]. “The question Paul hears is crucial: ‘Saul, why do you persecute me?’ (Acts 22.7). This is the fundamental question. Christian conversion is our discovery that we are persecutors without knowing it. All participation in the scapegoat phenomenon is the same sin of the persecution of Christ. And all human beings commit this sin.” (Girard, Evolution and Conversion, 142).

---

This article is an adaptation from a chapter in “Processing Mimetic Reality”

---