THE WAR OF MONOTHEISM: ON THE
INABILITY OF CIVILIZATION TO EXPAND:
THE WEST BATTLES AGAINST ITSELF
TRANSLATED BY MIRKO M. HALL
Jean-Luc Nancy
All political, economic, moral, and diplomatic commentaries
on the war in Iraq have been given and are known. Therefore, I would
like to concentrate on the concept that establishes the horizon of this
war—a war that is occurring in all possible forms, whether or not
military deployments are openly going on in Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine,
or elsewhere. This concept is that of a “war of civilizations.”
Even though this thesis has been discussed and painstakingly investigated
in books and articles, it continues to correspond more or
less to the image of an idea determined by public opinion. This thesis
is at once true and false. It is correct insofar as there is a permanent
war, in the widest sense of the word, between two key concepts that
relate to the hegemony of the Western world. This permanent war
succeeds the so-called ColdWar. It reveals how the one and onlyWestern
world Wnds itself in a continuous state of inner war that, since the
all-out conXict of 1914, is no longer the old war of sovereign states.
Almost a century ago, the epoch passed in which the world was
subjected to the myriad relationships of “Powers” that long since
ordered it. Out of this world, there developed a generalizable inner
chaos, which proceeded to dissolve the balances of power while at
the same time tending to annihilate their differences as Western
within the processes of their own globalization.
This condition prohibits one from speaking of a “war of civilizations,”
as if Western civilization confronts some other Arabic-Oriental
one. This process has already begun within the inner realm ofWestern
civilization. After having created a situation within itself that destabilizes
the different parts of old Europe, civilization tears itself apart.
On one hand, it produces the American superpower, and on the other
hand, the serious identity crisis of Europe. Here, civilization undeniably
brings to light the contradiction between its claim for a rationalmoral
universality (i.e., in science and democracy) and the glaring
injustice of the situations created through its own hegemony.
Of course, the ruling classes or castes of formerly colonized countries
have taken every measure to ensure that colonial revenues are
secured to their advantage. At the same time, and because of technological
and economic changes, they have also added new revenues
(especially from oil). Consequently, this increases the occurrences
of injustice and of economic and cultural difference, which give rise
to oligarchies, clans, and MaWa-like powers. These potentates injure
their own people by upholding a belief in a supposed (self-)autonomy,
which in fact only hides their autocracy.
Even this very phenomenon reveals the inability of Western
civilization to do otherwise, i.e., to dialectically mediate between its
hegemony, on the one hand, and its ideals or norms, on the other—all
of which culminates in an increasing inability to expand. In truth,
then, such a civilization reveals its inability to expand as civilization.
It expands (only) its own implosion. Likewise, one could say, in a farfetched
analogy, that the chaos and inner unrest of the Roman Empire
in the pax romana had spread the seeds of disintegration and conXict.
Nothing is more symptomatic of this state of affairs than the concept
of religion. From one side, a caricature of Islam suddenly arises in
which the most trivial features of the most narrow and naïve aspects
of this tradition (which developed throughout the entire history of
the Mediterranean area) are ossiWed in a tetanus-like rigidity. From
the other side, the conWdence in a no less naïve morality wants to
answer this state of affairs by giving support to the motto “in God
we trust”—which is necessary for freedom to rule. Here, “sameness”
confronts the “same.” Without doubt, it is not in the least surprising
that one Wnds the oldest of the three Gods of monotheism involved in
the debate that, in connection with Israel, materializes all the selfdestructive
events of this situation. Monotheism represents the unity
and the internal contradiction of this civilization in battle against
itself.
THE WAR OF MONOTHEISM 105
Monotheism represents this schizophrenia well, because it carries
this condition as a faculty within itself—even when monotheism
must be able to simultaneously evoke its own self-questioning. This
power is the demand for universality, which necessarily accompanies
the will to power and to normalization—as long as this demand does
not lead back to its deepest truth, this truth being none other than
that the universal cannot be given in the form of a presence. When
the “one and only God” is given as present (in a name, doctrine,
or power), then God is in the same moment neither “the one and
only” nor “God.” This is especially noteworthy because every great
thought in monotheism’s different traditions has already shown this.
The great mystics, theologians, and philosophers have all shared, at
the very least, this truth, i.e., the truth about the truth, that one can
neither represent nor assimilate it.
Even this truth stands in contradiction to every claim that identi-
Wes an instance of universality. As soon as such a claim is made, it
also supports the war. And, this claim is inevitably made when
one attempts to identify the universal. The ambiguity of our entire
civilization lies between the urge to this identiWcation and the knowledge
of its radical impossibility. The only point on which this
ambivalence dissolves itself is where the universal represents itself in
the anonymous form of a general equivalency, i.e., in the monetary
form of value, to use Marx’s terms. In monotheism’s war, “value” is
inherent insofar as war has no tangible value except for its own
endless reproduction. War takes place almost exactly at that point
where the thought of Marx regarding revolution is possible, if not
absolutely necessary, i.e., exactly where the abstraction of value is
inverted.
One might say that I go considerably far in my speculation about
the threatening realities of war. But I am convinced that this war
is the fate of a civilization on the verge of its limits.War can only end
in the transformation of civilization. This can have three forms: either
in the shifting of the poles of civilization (with other poles possibly
appearing in Asia, Africa, and Latin America) or in the intensiWcation
of identity-related, nationalist, ethnic, regional, or clan phenomena in
the entire European-Mediterranean world. (This second form can
accompany the Wrst as its dark side and like a shipwreck of the past.)
Or, this very same world can create a new kind of relationship to
106 JEAN-LUC NANCY
value, the Absolute, or the Truth, a kind that would succeed in taking
note of the collapse of all concepts of value—of people, reason, the
Law, science, God, history, and so on—and grasp anew the theme of
the universal. In order that this process ceases to confront itself, there
is only one solution, that it becomes “other” than itself.
Note
This essay originally appeared in Frankfurter Rundschau (January 30, 2003
THE WAR OF MONOTHEISM: ON THE
INABILITY OF CIVILIZATION TO EXPAND:
THE WEST BATTLES AGAINST ITSELF
TRANSLATED BY MIRKO M. HALL
Jean-Luc Nancy
All political, economic, moral, and diplomatic commentaries
on the war in Iraq have been given and are known. Therefore, I would
like to concentrate on the concept that establishes the horizon of this
war—a war that is occurring in all possible forms, whether or not
military deployments are openly going on in Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine,
or elsewhere. This concept is that of a “war of civilizations.”
Even though this thesis has been discussed and painstakingly investigated
in books and articles, it continues to correspond more or
less to the image of an idea determined by public opinion. This thesis
is at once true and false. It is correct insofar as there is a permanent
war, in the widest sense of the word, between two key concepts that
relate to the hegemony of the Western world. This permanent war
succeeds the so-called ColdWar. It reveals how the one and onlyWestern
world Wnds itself in a continuous state of inner war that, since the
all-out conXict of 1914, is no longer the old war of sovereign states.
Almost a century ago, the epoch passed in which the world was
subjected to the myriad relationships of “Powers” that long since
ordered it. Out of this world, there developed a generalizable inner
chaos, which proceeded to dissolve the balances of power while at
the same time tending to annihilate their differences as Western
within the processes of their own globalization.
This condition prohibits one from speaking of a “war of civilizations,”
as if Western civilization confronts some other Arabic-Oriental
one. This process has already begun within the inner realm ofWestern
civilization. After having created a situation within itself that destabilizes
the different parts of old Europe, civilization tears itself apart.
On one hand, it produces the American superpower, and on the other
hand, the serious identity crisis of Europe. Here, civilization undeniably
brings to light the contradiction between its claim for a rationalmoral
universality (i.e., in science and democracy) and the glaring
injustice of the situations created through its own hegemony.
Of course, the ruling classes or castes of formerly colonized countries
have taken every measure to ensure that colonial revenues are
secured to their advantage. At the same time, and because of technological
and economic changes, they have also added new revenues
(especially from oil). Consequently, this increases the occurrences
of injustice and of economic and cultural difference, which give rise
to oligarchies, clans, and MaWa-like powers. These potentates injure
their own people by upholding a belief in a supposed (self-)autonomy,
which in fact only hides their autocracy.
Even this very phenomenon reveals the inability of Western
civilization to do otherwise, i.e., to dialectically mediate between its
hegemony, on the one hand, and its ideals or norms, on the other—all
of which culminates in an increasing inability to expand. In truth,
then, such a civilization reveals its inability to expand as civilization.
It expands (only) its own implosion. Likewise, one could say, in a farfetched
analogy, that the chaos and inner unrest of the Roman Empire
in the pax romana had spread the seeds of disintegration and conXict.
Nothing is more symptomatic of this state of affairs than the concept
of religion. From one side, a caricature of Islam suddenly arises in
which the most trivial features of the most narrow and naïve aspects
of this tradition (which developed throughout the entire history of
the Mediterranean area) are ossiWed in a tetanus-like rigidity. From
the other side, the conWdence in a no less naïve morality wants to
answer this state of affairs by giving support to the motto “in God
we trust”—which is necessary for freedom to rule. Here, “sameness”
confronts the “same.” Without doubt, it is not in the least surprising
that one Wnds the oldest of the three Gods of monotheism involved in
the debate that, in connection with Israel, materializes all the selfdestructive
events of this situation. Monotheism represents the unity
and the internal contradiction of this civilization in battle against
itself.
THE WAR OF MONOTHEISM 105
Monotheism represents this schizophrenia well, because it carries
this condition as a faculty within itself—even when monotheism
must be able to simultaneously evoke its own self-questioning. This
power is the demand for universality, which necessarily accompanies
the will to power and to normalization—as long as this demand does
not lead back to its deepest truth, this truth being none other than
that the universal cannot be given in the form of a presence. When
the “one and only God” is given as present (in a name, doctrine,
or power), then God is in the same moment neither “the one and
only” nor “God.” This is especially noteworthy because every great
thought in monotheism’s different traditions has already shown this.
The great mystics, theologians, and philosophers have all shared, at
the very least, this truth, i.e., the truth about the truth, that one can
neither represent nor assimilate it.
Even this truth stands in contradiction to every claim that identi-
Wes an instance of universality. As soon as such a claim is made, it
also supports the war. And, this claim is inevitably made when
one attempts to identify the universal. The ambiguity of our entire
civilization lies between the urge to this identiWcation and the knowledge
of its radical impossibility. The only point on which this
ambivalence dissolves itself is where the universal represents itself in
the anonymous form of a general equivalency, i.e., in the monetary
form of value, to use Marx’s terms. In monotheism’s war, “value” is
inherent insofar as war has no tangible value except for its own
endless reproduction. War takes place almost exactly at that point
where the thought of Marx regarding revolution is possible, if not
absolutely necessary, i.e., exactly where the abstraction of value is
inverted.
One might say that I go considerably far in my speculation about
the threatening realities of war. But I am convinced that this war
is the fate of a civilization on the verge of its limits.War can only end
in the transformation of civilization. This can have three forms: either
in the shifting of the poles of civilization (with other poles possibly
appearing in Asia, Africa, and Latin America) or in the intensiWcation
of identity-related, nationalist, ethnic, regional, or clan phenomena in
the entire European-Mediterranean world. (This second form can
accompany the Wrst as its dark side and like a shipwreck of the past.)
Or, this very same world can create a new kind of relationship to
106 JEAN-LUC NANCY
value, the Absolute, or the Truth, a kind that would succeed in taking
note of the collapse of all concepts of value—of people, reason, the
Law, science, God, history, and so on—and grasp anew the theme of
the universal. In order that this process ceases to confront itself, there
is only one solution, that it becomes “other” than itself.
Note
This essay originally appeared in Frankfurter Rundschau (January 30, 2003
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