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Violence and the Sacred

In: English and Literature

Submitted By melhornjack
Words 343
Pages 2
Rene Girard explains in his book “Violence and the Sacred” the connection between sacrifice and the gruesome violence behind it. Girard waters it down to the basic fact that once violence is introduced into a society it can never be fully diminished. One act of violence calls for revenge, which will also then call for revenge, which acts as an endless vicious cycle. Understanding this, Gerard explains that sacrifice is a communal outlet of violence. “The function of sacrifice is to quell violence within the community and to prevent conflicts from erupting.” (pg. 14)
Girard furthers his argument by providing a counter-point in the example of modern day society, where we no longer use sacrifice to keep violence in check, and supplies an answer immediately. Instead of sacrifice we have implemented a judicial system. This judicial system “serves to deflect the menace of vengeance.” (pg. 15)
Religion also is a tool that is used to keep violence in check, and therefor Girard explains it to be a leading reason that sacrifice and religion are connected, “It postulates a strange mixture of violence and nonviolence.” (pg. 20) In other words it entertains the sinful nature of humans in a saintly way making it acceptable in human discourse.
These traits of sacrifice are heavily displayed in the case of Oedipus. There are many situations where instead of wide spread violence breaking out, there is a redirect of communal support against one being. This is easily seen in the rejection of Oedipus, instead of everybody turning against one another in blame for the horrible deeds that took place, everybody blamed Oedipus and cast him out of Thebes. Another occurrence in this pattern is that of Oedipus’ sons. They open the doors for much internal violence within their nation but instead of everybody fighting their neighbors, they chose a common enemy. That is either one brother or the other. In “Oedipus Tyrannus” there is a connecting theme to Girard’s “Violence and the Sacred” in that violence against one will often prevent violence against the many.

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