The Omnibus Homo Sacer

by Giorgio Agamben

  in that of prayer—act on the gods in a more or less effective manner. If this is

  true, the hypothesis of a primacy of glorification over glory should be considered

  in a new light. Perhaps glorification is not only that which best fits the glory of

  God but is itself, as effective rite, what produces glory; and if glory is the very

  substance of God and the true sense of his economy, then it depends upon glo-

  rification in an essential manner and, therefore, has good reason to demand it

  through reproaches and injunctions.

  א In peremptorily advancing his idea of the theurgical character of prayer, Mauss was

  taking up an idea that Émile Durkheim—with whom he enjoyed close intellectual and

  familial relations—had put forward in his Elementary Forms of Religious Life. Durkheim writes:

  It is necessary, then, to refrain from believing, with Smith, that the cult was insti-

  tuted only for the benefit of men and that the gods have no use for it. They still

  need it as much as their faithful do. No doubt, the men could not live without

  gods; but on the other hand, the gods would die if they were not worshipped.

  Thus the purpose of the cult is not only to bring the profane into the commu-

  nion with sacred beings but also to keep the sacred beings alive, to remake and

  regenerate them perpetually. (Durkheim, p. 350)

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  HOMO SACER II, 4

  8.17. The idea that there is a close relationship between human behaviors—in

  particular oral rites—and the glory of God is present in rabbinical literature as

  well as in the Kabbalah. Charles Mopsik dedicated to this theme an exemplary

  study whose subtitle is significant: Les rites qui font Dieu (The Rites That Make

  God) (1993). That the Kabbalah contained theurgical elements was well known;

  Mopsik, however, demonstrates through the analysis of an extraordinary quan-

  tity of texts not only that it is one of its absolutely central motifs but also that

  analogous themes are already clearly present in early rabbinical literature. Along-

  side texts that repeat the by now familiar principle that observance of worship

  “neither helps nor harms God,” as we have seen through the discussion of the

  Christian tradition, one also finds numerous testimonies that point decisively

  in the opposite direction. Already in the Midrash on Lamentations we can read

  that “when the Israelites carry out the will of the blessed Saint, whoever he may

  be, they strengthen the force of the Power above, as it is written, ‘let the power

  of my lord be great’ (Numbers 14:17). And when they do not carry out the will

  of the Saint, may he be blessed, they weaken the strength from above and, in this

  way, they also walk without strength before he who persecutes them” (in Mopsik,

  p. 53). According to other rabbinical sources, prayers and laudations have the

  remarkable power of crowning YHVH with a regal diadem that the angel San-

  dalphon weaves for him by invoking his name in what appears to be a veritable

  coronation ceremony, in which God, as the Midrash states, “forces himself to

  receive a crown from his servants.” But Mopsik is able to demonstrate with ease

  that YHVH’s very regality seems to depend in some way on the prayers of the

  just (ibid., p. 58).

  In the Kabbalah, this theurgical conception attains its full stature. A direct

  relationship between worship and glory, identified with the sefirah Malkut (the

  Kingdom), is at the center of the thinking of Shem Tov ibn Shem Tov as much as

  of Meir ibn Gabbai, a Spanish kabbalist who dedicated his principal work to this

  relationship, The Book of Sacred Worship (1531). Shem Tov, taking up again the

  Midrash on Lamentations, argues that ritual practices provoke an “overflowing”

  of the celestial world onto the terrestrial:

  The forms of the lower world in fact have their root in the superior reality, because

  man is an upside-down tree, the roots of which are in the air. If man is united

  with the Glory of the Name and sanctifies himself and concentrates, he will be

  able to bring about the overflowing into the higher glory, in the same way as

  when one lights a fire or a lamp to illuminate the home. But if man neglects to

  worship the divine and despairs of it, this causes the reabsorbtion of the divine

  light that was shining on the lower beings. (In Mopsik, p. 260)

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  579

  For his part, Ibn Gabbai, forcing a rabbinical expression that means “for the

  needs of the temple,” announces a veritable theurgical theorem in the form:

  “Worship is ‘a need of the one who is Highest’” (ibid., p. 365). Adopting a bold

  musical metaphor, the relationship of worship and glory is compared to that of

  two musical instruments tuned by the same tuning fork, “so that, through the

  vibration of a chord in one of them, we bring about a corresponding vibration

  in the other” (ibid., p. 367).

  In the great texts of the medieval Kabbalah, the statement of the theurgical

  character of worship turns on the interpretation of Psalms 119:126, in which the

  verse that can mean “it is time for thee, Lord, to work” is interpreted as though

  it meant “it is time to make God” (Mopsik, p. 371). In the face of the extreme

  consequences of such an exegesis, scholars have asked how it is possible that such

  a radical thesis, which implies that man was, ultimately, “the creator of the cre-

  ator”—or at least he who sustains his being and perpetually “fixes” him—could

  have emerged within a religion that never stopped denouncing the vanity of

  the pagan gods, created by men. And yet, in the tripartite form of “making the

  Name,” “making the Saturday,” and “making God,” such a thesis is formulated

  beyond any doubt in the cabalists of Gerona and in the Zohar as much as in the

  Kabbalah after the expulsion from Spain: “He who observes a commandment

  below, affirms it and makes it above” (Azriel of Gerona in Mopsik, p. 558).

  To make, here, does not necessarily mean to create ex novo: the idea is, rather,

  that without ritual practices, the divine pleroma loses its strength and decays;

  that God, in other words, needs to be continually restored and repaired by the

  pity of men, in the same way that he is weakened by their impiety. On the basis

  of the close link between worship and glory that we have already observed, the

  cabalists speak in this sense of a “restoration of glory.”

  Carrying out commandments below, one carries them out above, and their arche-

  type awakens so as to restore the superior Glory [ . . . ] It is a case of the restoration of Glory, the secret of the glorious Name [ . . . ] The right below awakens the

  right above and together they restore and make the superior Glory and augment

  and intensify his energy [ . . . ] (Gabbai in Mopsik, p. 602)

  This conception is so solid, diffuse, and coherent that, at the end of his investiga-

  tion, Mopsik, evoking Durkheim’s thesis on the divine need of worship, discreetly

  suggests that he might have been influenced by the Kabbalah: “Durkheim, who

  was the son of a rabbi, began his studies at the Rabbinical School in Paris. Let us

  leave to the historians of sociology the task of drawing conclusions from this, if

  it is right to do so” (Mopsik, p
. 648).

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  HOMO SACER II, 4

  8.18. It was not our intention to formulate hypotheses on the theurgic ori-

  gins of the doxologies and acclamations, nor was it to announce scientific my-

  thologems on the genesis of glory. As we have seen, sociologists, anthropologists,

  and historians of religion have, in part, already effectively confronted this prob-

  lem. For us the task is rather to try, once again, to understand the functioning

  of the governmental machine, whose bipolar structure we have tried to define

  in the course of our investigation and which was the reason for the archaeol-

  ogy of glory that we have sketched out. The analysis of the theology of glory

  is only the shadow that our inquiry into the structure of power casts over the

  past. That doxologies and acclamations are, in the final instance, concerned with

  producing and augmenting glory is, of course, something that interests us. It is

  not necessary to share Schmitt’s thesis on secularization in order to affirm that

  political problems become more intelligible and clear if they are related to theo-

  logical paradigms. On the contrary, we have tried to show that this comes about

  because doxologies and acclamations in some sense constitute a threshold of

  indifference between politics and theology. Just as liturgical doxologies produce

  and strengthen God’s glory, so the profane acclamations are not an ornament of

  political power but found and justify it. And just as the immanent trinity and

  economic trinity, theologia and oikonomia constitute, within the providential paradigm, a bipolar machine from whose distinction and correlation stems the

  government of the world, so Kingdom and Government constitute the two ele-

  ments or faces of the same machine of power.

  However, beyond merely registering this correspondence, our interest lies in

  understanding its operation. In what way does liturgy “make” power? And if the

  governmental machine is twofold (Kingdom and Government), what function

  does glory play within it? For sociologists and anthropologists it always remains

  possible to turn to magic as the sphere that, bordering upon rationality and im-

  mediately preceding it, allows one to explain that which we do not understand

  about the society in which we live as ultimately a magical survival. We do not be-

  lieve in the magical power of acclamations and of liturgy, and we are convinced

  that not even theologians or emperors really believed in it. If glory is so impor-

  tant in theology it is, above all, because it allows one to bring together within

  the governmental machine immanent trinity and economic trinity, the being of

  God and his praxis, Kingdom and Government. By defining the Kingdom and

  the essence, it also determines the sense of the economy and of Government.

  It allows, that is, for us to bridge that fracture between theology and economy

  that the doctrine of the trinity has never been able to completely resolve and for

  which only the dazzling figure of glory is able to provide a possible conciliation.

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  8.19. In Christian liturgy, amen is the acclamation par excellence. Already

  in the biblical usage of this term, which belongs to the semantic sphere of sta-

  bility and fidelity, it is used as the acclamation of consensus or in response to

  a doxology ( berakhah) and, later, in the synagogue, as the response to a bene-

  diction. This anaphoric function of amen, which must always refer to a word

  that precedes it—which, typically, must not be enunciated by the one who says

  amen—is essential. The enunciation of this acclamation was so important in

  Judaism that in the Talmud (b Tractate Shabbat, 119b) one finds the phrase:

  “He who answers amen with all his strength opens the doors of paradise for

  himself.” Paul’s frequent use of the word at the end of a doxology (Romans 1:25:

  “Blessed for ever. Amen”) is perfectly coherent with this tradition, which we

  find in the most ancient Christian liturgy, particularly in the acclamation at the

  end of the prayer of the Eucharist ( omnes respondent: amen). After what we have

  seen regarding the particular relation that unites glory with the divine essence,

  we will not be surprised that in the Talmud, to the question “What does amen

  mean?” (b Tractate Shabbat, 119b) one may reply “God, the faithful king” ( el

  melek ne’eman); and that an analogous identification of divinity and acclama-

  tion can be found in Revelation 3:14 where Christ is defined as “the Amen, the

  true witness” ( ho Amēn, ho martys ho pistos).

  It is interesting to follow the story of the translation of this term—or rather,

  of its nontranslation into Greek and Latin. The Septuagint, which frequently ren-

  ders it as genoito (let it be) and sometimes with alēthōs (truly), frequently leaves it untranslated (as in Nehemiah 8:6: “And all the people answered, Amen”).

  The New Testament limits itself to transcribing it into Greek letters, although

  in some passages alēthōs and nai appear to presuppose an amēn. On the other hand, the Latin translations of the Old Testament, following the genoito of the

  Septuagint, render amen as fiat.

  Augustine, on more than one occasion, poses the problem of the appro-

  priateness of translating the term into Latin. He is aware of the quasijuridical

  value of the acclamation, which significantly he compares to some institutions

  of Roman law (“Fratres mei, amen vestrum subscriptio vestra est, consensio

  vestra est, adstipulatio vestra est”: “My brothers, your amen is your signature

  [ firma], your consensus, your agreement as guarantors to a contract”: Augus-

  tine, Sermons, fragment 3). In the small treatise on translation contained in De doctrina christiana, he distinguishes the two terms amen and halleluiah, which are not translated but could be, from interjections such as hosanna and racha, which, since they express a feeling rather than a concept, “are said to be untranslatable into another tongue” (Augustine, On Christian Doctrine, Book 2,

  582

  HOMO SACER II, 4

  Chapter 11, §16, p. 641). He notes, however, that the term amen has remained

  untranslated “propter sanctiorem auctoritatem,” on account of the more sacred

  authority that attaches to it (ibid.) (“authority,” another term that derives from

  the lexicon of law). And in relation to the doxologies, Isidore takes up Augus-

  tine’s observation, stating that “it is not permitted for Greek, Latin, or barbarian

  to translate these two words, alleluia and amen, wholly into their own language”

  (Isidore, The Etymologies, 6, 19–20, p. 147).

  The constant tendency to transform acclamations that, originally, may even

  have been spontaneous, into ritual formulae is present in profane liturgies just

  as much as it is in religious ones. It goes hand in hand with a desemanticization

  of the terms through which the acclamations are expressed; like the amen, they

  are often intentionally left in the original language. Numerous testimonies reveal

  how, already in the fourth century, the faithful appeared to understand amen as

  a simple formula that marked the end of a prayer and not as an acclamation that

  answers to a doxology.

  As in the case of every acclamation, its effect and function are more im-

  portant than t
he comprehension of its meaning. The audience who, today, in

  a French or American concert hall cry out “bravo,” might not know its precise

  meaning or the grammar of the Italian term (not varying it even if it is said of a

  woman or to more than one person), but they know perfectly well the effect that

  the acclamation must produce. It rewards the actor or virtuoso and obliges him

  to return to the stage. Those who know about show business go so far as to claim

  that actors need applause in the same way that one needs nourishment. This

  means that, in the sphere of doxologies and acclamations, the semantic aspect

  of language is deactivated and appears for a moment as an empty rotation; and,

  yet, it is precisely this empty turning that supplies it with its peculiar, almost

  magical, efficacy: that of producing glory.

  א It has often been noted that in the Gospels Jesus uses amen in a way that has no parallel in the Old Testament nor in rabbinical literature; he uses it not as a liturgical response but instead at the beginning of his statements, in expressions of the form: Amēn amēn legō ymin [ . . . ] (in the Vulgate: Amen amen dico vobis). It is possible to glimpse in this particular use something like a self-conscious messianic transformation of acclamation into affirmation, of the doxology that approves and repeats into a position that, at

  least in appearance, innovates and transgresses.

  8.20. Among the manuscripts that Mauss left unfinished at the time of his

  death, there is a study of the notion of nourishment ( anna) in the Brahmana,

  the theological part of the Veda. Among the notions—at once “curiously ab-

  THE KINGDOM AND THE GLORY

  583

  stract and surprisingly coarse” (Mauss, Manuscript, p. 1)—invented by the Brah-

  mins of the Vedic era, “nourishment” is one of the most primitive. Already in

  the Rig-Veda one of the aims of sacrifice is to obtain nourishment, the juice and

  strength that food contains; and among the gods, there are two whose principal

  attribute is that of nourishing themselves: “Agni, the god of fire, who is nour-

  ished by the combustible, and Indra, the god who drinks soma, who is nourished

  by the sacrifice of this ambrosia ( amrita), this essence of immortality” (ibid.,

  pp. 3–4). But it is in the Brahmana that the doctrine of nourishment attains