Table Of ContentDivine
violence
WALTER BENJAMIN AND THE ESCHATOLOGY OF SOVEREIGNTY
JAMES R. MARTEL
Divine Violence
Divine Violence looks at the question of political theology and its connection to
sovereignty. It argues that the practice of sovereignty refl ects a Christian
eschatology, one that proves very hard to overcome even by left thinkers such
as Arendt and Derrida, who are very critical of it. These authors fall into a trap
described by Carl Schmitt whereby one is given a (false) choice between
anarchy and sovereignty, both of which are bound within – and return us to
– the same eschatological envelope. In D ivine Violence, the author argues that
Benjamin supplies the correct political theology to help these thinkers. He
shows how to avoid trying to get rid of sovereignty (the ‘anarchist move’ that
Schmitt tells us forces us to ‘decide against the decision’) and instead to seek
to de-center and dislocate sovereignty so that its mythological function is
disturbed. He does this with the aid of divine violence, a messianic force that
comes into the world to undo its own mythology, leaving nothing in its wake.
Such a move clears the myths of sovereignty away, turning us to our own
responsibility in the process. In that way, the author argues, Benjamin
succeeds in producing an anarchism that is not bound by Schmitt’s trap but
which is sustained even while we remain dazzled by the myths of sovereignty
that structure our world.
Divine Violence will be of interest to students of political theory, to those
with an interest in political theology, philosophy and deconstruction, and to
those who are interested in thinking about some of the dilemmas that the
‘left’ fi nds itself in today.
James R. Martel is a professor of Political Theory at San Francisco State
University. His research areas include early modern and contemporary polit-
ical thought. Recent books by the author include T extual Conspiracies: Walter
Benjamin, Idolatry and Political Theory (University of Michigan Press, forth-
coming, 2011) and S ubverting the Leviathan: Reading Thomas Hobbes as a Radical
Democrat (Columbia, 2007).
Divine Violence
Walter Benjamin and the Eschatology
of Sovereignty
James R. Martel
First published 2012
by Routledge
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Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
by Routledge
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A GlassHouse Book
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2012 James R. Martel
The right of James R. Martel to be identifi ed as author of this work
has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
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explanation without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Martel, James R.
Divine violence : Walter Benjamin and the eschatology of
sovereignty/James R. Martel.
p. cm.
“A GlassHouse Book.”
Includes bibliographical references.
1. Benjamin, Walter, 1892-1940. 2. Sovereignty. I. Title.
B3209.B584M37 2012
193--dc22 2011012431
ISBN: 978–0–415–67345–7 (hbk)
ISBN: 978–0–203–80326–4 (ebk)
Typeset in Garamond
by Refi neCatch Limited, Bungay, Suffolk
Contents
Acknowledgments vi
Introduction: divine violence and political fetishism 1
PART I
Sovereign temporalities 17
1 The political theology of sovereignty 19
2 In the maw of sovereignty 31
3 Walter Benjamin’s dissipated eschatology 47
PART II
Politics in its own distinction 67
4 Waiting for justice 69
5 Forgiveness, judgment and sovereign decision 99
6 Sovereignty de-centered: the Hebrew Republic 115
Conclusion: the anarchist hypothesis 131
Bibliography 151
Index 155
Acknowledgments
T his book would not have happened without the help of my editor, Colin
Perrin. We talked about the book many years ago and, even while I was
working on another book (also on Benjamin), I continuously worked on this
one, keeping our conversation in mind. Thanks to the anonymous reviewers
for GlassHouse Books for their excellent suggestions. Thanks also to Melanie
Fortmann-Brown for being a delightful follow-up editor at Routledge.
Several other people were particularly helpful in the process of writing this
book. Peter Fitzpatrick helped connect me with Colin in the fi rst place and
has been a great sounding board and critic. Austin Sarat, and the Association
for the Study of Law, Culture and the Humanities that he helped to found,
have also been instrumental in keeping up my interest in sovereignty. Austin
has always been a great supporter and friend. Kate Gordy and the other
members of my reading group, Keally McBride, Sarah Burgess and Darien
Shanske, helped refi ne my argument. Kate is the one who came up with the
fountain analogy that I found so helpful in Chapter 1. Nasser Hussain was, as
always, indispensible for my thinking process (among other things). David
Bates also helped hugely; one conversation that we had in particular really
helped me to form the central argument of this book. Other readers, friends
and colleagues that gave advice include Vicky Kahn, Aaron Belkin, Marianne
Constable, Jodi Dean, Angelika von Wahl, Bonnie Honig, Jackie Stevens,
and Jane Bennett, among many others. Thanks are also due to Joel Kassiola
and San Francisco State University for giving me a sabbatical that helped me
to complete the work on this book, as well as the department of rhetoric at
UC Berkeley, which allowed me to work as a visiting scholar, giving me
access to Berkeley’s library and on-line resources in addition to those
from SFSU.
I presented part of my fi nal chapter (on ‘the Hebrew Republic’) at a meeting
of the International Hobbes Association (concurrent with the American
Philosophy Association annual meeting), where the comments were extremely
helpful. Thanks to Martin Bertman and Rosamond Rhodes for helping to
place me on that panel. Thanks also to Edwin Curley for his own observations
and comments from that meeting.
Acknowledgments vii
M any chapters in this book had an earlier incarnation as papers in other
publications, whose editors I want to thank for their input and support
(permissions will follow at the end of this acknowledgment). Austin Sarat and
Peter Fitzpatrick were both extremely helpful in the formation of Chapters 1
and 2. George Pavlich and Charles Barbour were very helpful for my writing
of Chapter 3. David Bates and Dan Edelstein were critical for my writing of
Chapter 4. Alexander Keller Hirsch was very helpful for my writing of
Chapter 5. Many thanks to all of you. Thanks also to Nina Ackerberg and
Laura Webb for their assistance with the cover image.
F inally, my family and their support are essential and deeply appreciated:
thanks to my husband, Carlos, my children Jacques and Rocio, my co-parents
Nina and Kathryn, the ‘uncles’ Elic and Mark. Thanks also to my father,
Ralph, my mother, Huguette, my brother, Django, sister-in-law, Shalini and
wonderful new nephew, Shaan.
P ermissions: bits of the introduction and parts of Chapters 1 and 2 contain
pieces of an essay entitled ‘Can there be Politics without Sovereignty? Arendt,
Derrida and the Question of Sovereign Inevitability’, published in a special
issue entitled ‘Why Sovereignty?’ of L aw, Culture and the Humanities 6(2) June
2010. An earlier form of Chapter 3 was published as ‘Walter Benjamin and
the eschatology of sovereignty’ in Charles Barbour and George Pavlich (eds)
(2009) A fter Sovereignty: On the Question of Political Beginnings, New York:
Taylor and Francis. An earlier form of Chapter 4 appeared as ‘Waiting for
Justice’ in a special issue on sovereignty in Republics of Letters, 2, no. 2, July,
2011. An earlier form of Chapter 5 appeared as ‘Can Human Beings Forgive?
Ethics and Agonism in the Face of Divine Violence’, a chapter in Alexander
Keller Hirsch (ed.) (forthcoming, 2011) Theorizing Post Confl ict Reconciliation:
Agonism, Restitution and Repair , Routledge. All are published with permission.
Introduction
Divine violence and political fetishism
A s I am writing this (a moment that no doubt will have been superseded by
many other moments by the time this book comes to print) Egypt is being
swept by a wave of popular activism; things are happening so quickly that the
‘opposition’ has been scrambling to get ahead of this movement it is suppos-
edly leading. This is one of those rare moments described by Hannah Arendt
in O n Revolution when politics is not simply an idea about government and
command (which, in her view, is not actually political at all) but is a way of
life, a collective experience of power. What had once seemed impossible, the
overthrow of the decades-long authoritarian rule of Hosni Mubarak, suddenly
became a reality (thus conforming to what Alain Badiou would call a ‘singu-
larity’, something whose possibility does not come out of existing conditions,
but occurs all on its own, self-actualizing its own possibility in the moment). 1
The act of one person, Muhammad Bouazizi – a poor Tunisian fruit vendor
who set himself on fi re in public after being humiliated by a local fruit
inspector and having his complaints dismissed by government offi cials –
spread a confl agration, fi rst in Tunisia itself and then to Egypt, then to Bahrain
and Libya, and much of the rest of the Arab world, and, hopefully, elsewhere.
T his moment is fi lled with endless possibility. The great powers of the
world are watching nervously. This could be the end of an era of authoritar-
ianism in the Arab world, the harbinger of a new more accountable form of
government (or not – other outcomes are possible too, hence the nervousness
of Europe and the US). One thing that is not in question however is that
sooner or later this revolutionary moment will end, and things will be
‘righted’. Whether the ensuing regime is Islamist, moderate, good, bad
or indifferent, Egypt will return to a ‘normal’ state, that is to say, a state of
sovereignty.
S overeignty is so much a part of the fabric of ordinary political life (or what
passes for that life, anyway) that we rarely, if ever, question what it is or what
it means for us. Although we speak of ‘failed states’, places like Somalia that
exist in a state of ‘anarchy’, in fact there is no place in the world that is inno-
cent of sovereignty. Even Somalia is not in fact ‘lawless’, but is governed by a
mixture of the Shabab – the Islamic radicals in the south – a weak,
Description:Divine Violence looks at the question of political theology and its connection to sovereignty. It argues that the practice of sovereignty reflects a Christian eschatology, one that proves very hard to overcome even by left thinkers, such as Arendt and Derrida, who are very critical of it. These auth
