Derrida and Prayer (BA dissertation) (original) (raw)
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This dissertation explores the theological, philosophical and historical connections between pseudo-Dionysius (6th century Christian Theologian under pseudonym), and Jacques Derrida (contemporary French Philosopher influenced by phenomenology, structuralism and heideggerianism). They have in common a critical dialogue with Theology itself: “Theo-logy”, the possibility or impossibility to understand God and talk about godhead, but also to talk to a theistic God as such. Therefore, I consider that prayers – with their affective and spiritual functions, their expected or unexpected forms, and their ritualized or shifting borders – represent a revealing crux for both projects. It constitutes a strategic entry into dionysian mysticism and derridean texts, useful to link and to distinguish their ideas. First of all, both Denys and Derrida have strong logical reasons to consider that the Absolute is beyond thought, infinitely elusive or other. Secondly, both Denys and Derrida have reasons to believe that language and meaning are relative or shifting. These claims are likely to challenge the theological basis of prayers (systematic, dogmatic or simply epistemic), that Denys and Derrida radicalize through precise movements of language that a vague “negative” label doesn't exhaust. In both contexts, combining the conceptual paradox of an ever-escaping object of meaning with particular linguistic operations bears profound consequences on the possibility and forms of embodied theology (prayers, in that case). Following the Dionysian operations of a “crossing of names” and the Derridean “gestures of deconstruction” yields new forms and functions for prayer, towards a dynamic and neverending prayer to nowhere, nobody, or beyond, balancing the risks of mystical reunion, pure hope and adoration with those of silence, perplexity and madness. Is this prayer eventually more destructive than generative, or does it contain unique intentional promises? What are the limits of prayer when its address and contents are destabilized by radical theological and philosophical treatments? What forms of devotion or ethical responsibility does this new notion of prayer lead to? Without confusing the two, there is a common "family resemblance" shared by practical apophatic theology (Denys) and ethical a-theology (Derrida), or between Christian mystical prayers and postmodern agnostic hospitality. A heuristic concept of 'intentionality' can help navigate their prayers, and mediate between beliefs and attitudes, meaning and longing, identity and difference, engagement and silence. Although such considerations on prayer may seem speculative for both entrenched atheists and believers, they may produce concrete effects on practices. As for now, the central questions of prayer will have to change from “what name should I use to call on 'God', and what are the rules to follow?” to “what would it mean to address a deity as such, and how to perform the impossible?”. [This Master's Thesis is dedicated to Dr Michael Purcell (1956-2013), UnEd Divinity School, for his practice of hospitality towards foreign students and kind mentoring advice.]
This paper explores the philosophical ideas of Jacques Derrida and their application to theological hermeneutics, offering a deconstructive lens through which sacred texts and doctrines can be reimagined. It begins by outlining Derrida's intellectual biography and the core principles of deconstruction, such as différance and the critique of logocentrism, and demonstrates how these ideas challenge traditional approaches to interpretation. The discussion then examines how deconstruction enriches theological hermeneutics by embracing textual ambiguity, uncovering marginalized voices, and fostering interfaith and ethical dialogue. Despite critiques of Derrida's methods as promoting relativism or undermining theological certainty, this paper argues that deconstruction does not dismantle theology but deepens it, encouraging a dynamic, inclusive, and reflective engagement with faith. By applying Derrida's thought to doctrines, rituals, and contemporary movements like liberation theology, the paper highlights the transformative potential of deconstruction for modern theological scholarship. Through a multidisciplinary and multilingual approach, it seeks to provoke critical reflection and open new pathways for understanding the interplay between language, faith, and the sacred.
Phenomenology’s Rejects: Religion after Derrida’s Denegations
Open Theology, 2017
Religion, as well as any individuals’ volitionally chosen ‟worldview,” generally get conceived solely in affirmative terms of value. ‟Religion” has been conceptualized almost solely on the terms of axiology: as the experience of ‟the greatest” holiness (Otto), the purely valuable sacred (Eliade); the most ‟ultimate concern” (Tillich); the symbols accepted to order life (Geertz), or the binding of oneself to deep value (Müller). Yet there are limitations of such axiomatic thinking, limitations that can be exemplified through an interpretation of Derrida’s ‟globolatinization,” which he described as a system of thought that promotes a universalism of pseudo or petit-valuations, and punishes those resistant and inflexible to them in the name of toleration. This essay investigates what happens when this ‟axiomatic” register (i.e. a reduction to a set of values) gets displaced in order to conceptualize religion also in terms of the nonvaluable or ‟rejected.” Rejection entails the paradox ...
Religion as Response: Derrida's Responsibility to the Question of the Question
2016
fullest treatment of religion comes . In it he states, Of the origins and borders of the question as of the response. In this thesis I explore to and fro of question and response as a means for thinking through what is taking place in the event of religion. nd the way it engages with four thinkers who influence his exploration of religion as response: Heidegger, Kant, Levinas and Kierkegaard. The thesis reveals that, rather than approaching religion as a site to be excavated and examined as if we might get to its interests lie in the event of religion that would exceed thematisation. As such, he attempts a way to speak of religion without ever saying what religion is, for when it comes to religion everything tends to drop out of sight as soon as knowledge is framed in terms of mastery. For Derrida, knowledge is not opposed to faith, but rather something that is infused with faith as it participates in the fiduciary opening that performativity affords. This faith-filled reasoning ope...
Impossible God: Derrida's Theology (review)
2006
content and Russian religious thought. This is a particularly strange omission coming from someone who is a specialist precisely in Russian religious thought. A second puzzle is that Kornblatt queries why Jews would convert specifically to Russian Orthodoxy, with its antisemitism, rather than another form of Christianity—as if antisemitism were not something that historically existed to an equal, if not greater, degree in Protestantism and Catholicism (though perhaps antisemitism is stronger in Russian Orthodoxy than in other Christian confessions today). Finally, students of comparative religion might wish for a deeper engagement with the theoretical literature on conversions. Despite any shortcomings, however, the book provides provocative insights into the nature of religious versus ethnic identity and the fluidity of multiple identities in a postmodern world, as well as deepening our understanding of Soviet Jewry. The book will be of interest to a broad range of students and sch...
Augustine and Derrida: Negative Theology and the Im/Possibility of God
Saint Augustine of Hippo and Jacques Derrida use negative theology to approach the problems of the sign and language's inability to represent God or ontological truth. As a negative theologian, Augustine struggled with the paradox of speaking about an ineffable God, and contemporary understanding of negative theology (via negativa) is rooted in the writings of Pseudo-Dionysius, the philosopher and theologian of the 5 th and early 6 th century B.C.E. 1 In his De mystica theologia, Pseudo-Dionysius draws a distinction between kataphatic (positive) and apophatic (negative) theology. With kataphatic theology, one can reach an understanding of God through revelation and in the creatures/beings that exist in the world. Our language can reach this understanding, albeit a very limited one, by describing how God has manifested in the world. To "name" and speak of God through kataphatic language is not to reach the absolute truth of God's nature. The problem here, as Willemien Otten points out, is that, "since the conventional ways of naming God through his likeness with creation only heightened the asymmetrical nature of the relation between God and humanity, Dionysius begins precisely there where the deepest problems of human language lie, i.e., in the fundamental incongruity between the human linguistic apparatus and its divine object." 2 Language is inherently flawed in its ability to correctly represent truth/God through words/signs. Dionysius move away from kataphatic language is not a denial of the qualities afore attributed to God. Rather, he is saying that God transcends language; when I say that God is beautiful, I must also say that God is not beautiful in the way that a human is beautiful. But this negation must in turn be negated, in order to avoid letting the initial negation be a sufficient description of God. 3 There arises a dialectic between positive and negative statements. As Otten 1 Although Pseudo-Dionysius wrote nearly a century after Augustine's death, his systematic theology can certainly be applied to an analysis of Augustine. Also, seeds of Pseudo-Dionysius's ideas can be traced to earlier sources such as Plotinus and Origen. Thus, it is not inappropriate to locate Augustine within a tradition of via negativa. Paul
DERRIDA, DECONSTRUCTION AND MYSTICAL 'LANGUAGES OF UNSAYING'
Studies in Sprituality, 2006
This paper explores the relation between two very different ‘languages of unsaying’: the apophatic tradition of Christian mystical theology and the philosophy of deconstruction. Although they are produced within very different contexts, both discourses share a concern with the limits of language. Christian apophatic theologians begin from an awareness of the paradoxes involved in trying to speak of the transcendent and develop a complex form of writing which, in its very structure, preserves the intuition that God is unnameable and unknowable. Deconstruction begins from an awareness of an aporia between language and being and develops techniques for affirming this différance. Both discourses therefore perform a kind of ‘unsaying’.
The Marrano God: Abstraction, Messianicity, and Retreat in Derrida’s “Faith and Knowledge”
Article in "Religions", Special Issue: The Marrano Phenomenon: Jewish 'Hidden Tradition' and Modernity, 2019
This article conducts a close reading of Derrida’s 1994 essay, “Faith and Knowledge”, devoted to the analysis of what Hegel called ‘the religion of modern times’. The reference to Hegel’s “Glauben und Wissen” is crucial here, since my reading is meant to offer a supplement to Michael Naas’ commentary on “Faith and Knowledge”, Miracle and Machine, in which Naas states that he is not going to pursue the connection between Derrida and Hegel. It was, however, Hegel who defined the ‘modern religious sentiment’ in terms of the ‘religion of the death of God’, and this definition constitutes Derrida’s point of departure. Derrida agrees with Hegel’s diagnosis, but is also critical of its Protestant–Lutheran interpretation, which founds modern religiosity on the ‘memory of the Passion’, and attempts a different reading of the ‘death of God’ motif as the ‘divine retreat’, pointing to a non-normative ‘Marrano’ kind of faith that stakes on the alternative ‘memory of the Passover’. The apparent visibility of the ‘returning religion’ Derrida witnesses at the beginning of the 90s hides for him a new dimension of the ‘original faith’, which Derrida associates with the universal messianic justice and which he ascribes to the paradoxical position of the Marranos: the secret followers of the God ‘in retreat’.