The Triumph of the Cross
Original text published in “Essais - l’Homme et la Cité - Volume II”
Translated from French by the author
“In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”
John 16 : 33
Easter is the time when Christians celebrate the Ressurection of Christ that comes afer the trial of the Passion and His suffering on the Cross. Reduced to its religious dimension, the philosophical and anthropological meaning of these events often escapes non-believers as well as some Christians themselves.
This lack of understanding of the deep meaning of the death of Christ is even more regrettable because, in many respects, men and believers of the 21st century have access to a key that their ancestors lacked. This key is the theory of philosopher René Girard on “mimetic violence” and “scapegoating”.
To summarize: René Girard explains that, since the beginning of time, mankind has been prisoner of the logic of mimetic desire, i.e. imitating the desire of our fellow man. Rivalry being contagious, the imitation process triggers an “arms race” that always ends with a “mimetic crisis” that can only be resolved through violence and the sacrifice of a victim, the “scapeogat” against which the whole community will unite.
Through this framework, René Girard reveals things “hidden since the foundation of the world”, i.e. the repetition of cycles of mimetic violence, often connected to the doppelgänger trope (twins) or the sacrifice of a sanctified authority figure (God/King), that always end up with the ritual killing of a scapegoat. This logic is to be found in most of the founding myths : Caïn and Abel, Romulus and Remus and, closest to us, the beheading of King Louis XVI whose death in 1793 opened a catastrophic cycle of mimetic violence for France and its people.
As René Girard explains, two things are key to understanding this process. First, the cycle of mimetic violence is fully created and controlled by Satan. The devil needs mimetic violence because it is through that process that he rules over the world by creating “scandals” (mimetic rivalry) that open the cycle and then, the sacrifice that closes it. For Girard, Satan symbolises the mimetic process as a whole and Christ tells it Himself when, in the Gospel of Mark (3, 22-30), He says that “By the prince of demons he is driving out demons”.
Second, the Hebrews were the first people to perceive the satanic nature of mimetic violence as many parts of the Old Testament such as the sacrifice of Isaac, the suffering of Job or the betrayal of Joseph by his brothers suggest, for the first time in history, that the scapegoat might be an innocent victim after all.
If this idea is already “planted” in the Old Testament, only the coming of Christ and the account of His life and teachings given by the Gospel will allow mankind to escape the vicious circle.
First, as René Girard explains, it begins with the good old cycle of mimetic violence through the death and sacrifice of John the Baptist, which acts as a reminder but also a “ dress rehearsal” of what will happen with Christ Himself. Once this chapter is complete, mankind will be taken to the next stage of the cycle through this defining moment of the history of the world that is the Passion of Christ.
At first, everything happens as it always does : Satan has created the scandal and the crowd has united against Christ who perfectly plays the part of the scapegoat, this “king of the jews” who is going to be offered as sacrifice. Because they fear a riot or the violence of the mob, each person that could have prevented the crucifixion lets the process go through : Pontius Pilate tries to offer another scapegoat, Barrabas, but gives in to the pressure of the mob ; the apostle Peter disavows his master because he fears for his own life ; even the impenitent thief, himself crucified, mocks and insults Christ. As for Jesus, determined to fulfill what is written in the Scriptures, He understands perfectly that he is the victim of the satanic cycle of satanic mimetic violence : “Lord, forgive them for they know not what they do.”
In the end, it is finished. Christ has died on the Cross and the whole sacrificial process fuelled by mimetic violence has been completed. Once more, Satan seems to have won.
But then, something incredible happens, something unique in history. By willingly accepting to sacrifice Himself on the Cross, Christ has revealed to the world for all eternity the truth of mimetic violence and the shameful sacrifice of the innocent scapegoat. Satan thinks he has won but he actually finds himself nailed to the cross as the mimetic cycle that he controls is revealed to the whole world before being told through the Gospel ! Before the Passion of Christ, the episode of the adulterous woman (John 8:1-11) proves that Christ had fully understood the logic of mimetic violence and how to break the cycle. ( By getting down and writing on the ground, Jesus does not fuel mimetic rivalry, then by asking “the one without sin to cast the first stone”, He breaks with the “mob rule” and asks each man to face his own morality. Where Satan wants indifferentiation and “group-think”, Christ differentiates).
By playing the part of the scapegoat and thus making the process and cycle of mimetic violence visible to all, Christ sacrificied himself to redeem mankind and offer us a chance to escape Satan’s trap.
If we understand the concept of “scapegoat” and find it familiar as well as repugnant, it is because Christianity has taught us to see it and because we have been living for centuries in societies shaped by the Christian ethos ! As a symbol, the Cross is there to remind us that the sacrifice has been done once and for all, so there is no need to repeat it, just as the Eucharist allows us to partake in the consumption of the body of the victim (For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed, John 6 : 55).
Thus, as René Girard claims, the Gospel is a science of God (theology) as well as a science of Man (anthropology). Thanks to the sacrifice of Christ and its transmission through the Gospel, mankind has been saved and made aware of the cycle of mimetic violence that, for millenia, it had been subjected to.
At Easter, Christians celebrate the victory of Christ over death but also over the cycle of mimetic violence symbolized by Satan and the work of Girard helps us better understand the genius of Christianity but also the danger that dechristianization or the return of pagan religions and rituals pose to mankind.
A society that rejects Christ is doomed to reopen the cycle of mimetic violence that had been shut down by the death of Christ on the Cross. In such a society, Satan may again freely create scandals, fuel mimetic rivalry through the fiction of equality that turns “man against man” and thus open a new cycle that will require the sacrifice of innocent victims to restore harmony and appease the Gods. When a society stops being Christian, it is only a matter of time before it resumes the practice of human sacrifices.
At Easter, Christians celebrate the victory of Christ over death but those who do not share that belief may also give thanks for He who sacrificed himself to show us the evil nature of the cycle of mimetic violence and all these things “hidden since the foundation of the world”.
To go further:
I see Satan fall like lightning, René Girard
Violence and the Sacred, René Girard
The Scapegoat, René Girard
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