Whose Community? Which Interpretation?

By Merold Westphal

Thesis: Westphal, following James K. A. Smith's The Fall of Interpretation, argues that we should not seek a "pure stream" reading of the Bible that bypasses the act of interpretation. This position of seeking and *im*mediate reading of the text has precendents in Plato0 when he said the philosopher apprehends the purely intelligible structures (Phaedo 66e) In other words, our reading of the Bible is mediated to us by our hermeneutical filters, be they cultural, linguistic, philosophical, or whatever. 

In less abstract talk: have you ever seen the advertisement for a particular translation claiming, "No interpretation needed"? Westphal argues against such naivete. This should not alarm Reformed folks. Did Van Til not say that there are no brute facts but all facts are already pre-interpreted by God? 

Musing: Is Van Til a right-wing deconstructionist?

Westphal then examines recent moves in philosophical hermeneutics from the Romantics to Schlieirmacher to Wolterstorff.

But What About the Radical French Postmodernists?

So far Reformed readers will have no problem with the above narrative. The problem comes with the French trio (Derrida, Foucault, and someone else) who assert, so it is said, "The death of the author." 

But maybe they aren't saying exactly that (mind you, I have my own questions about Derrida). 

Even the French trio doesn’t think the author is truly dead. “To deny that the author is the unilateral source of a text’s meaning is not to deny that the author plays an important role” (58). Westphal explains, “For our French trio, the finitude of the author in relation to the text is expressed in a double relativity. In the first place, human authors ‘create meaning’ only relative to the language available to them...this language shapes and conditions their thought in ways of which they are unaware and over which they do not preside” (59). 

To say it yet another way: “The author is not a godlike, infinite creator of meaning” (65). Humans are finite and our sub-creations (what Milbank would call mythopoesis) are always within the realm of the finite and conditioned.

This is fully in line with Reformed anthropology. 

Westphal then comes to the heart of his project: Hans Georg Gadamer. We must affirm tradition, but in line with our anthropology, we must affirm the "finitude" of our tradition. 

Gadamer's fundamental thesis about tradition is “belonging.” p. 70. Tradition plays a double-role. It gives us a place to stand and it is is plural. We do not belong to a single, universal tradition. “All interpretation is relative to traditions that have formed the perspectives and presuppositions that guide it” (71).

“To be historically means that knowledge of oneself can never be complete” (Gadamer, Truth and Method, 301-302). 

Westphal then offers several theses on reading tradition and being read by tradition:

Alterity Thesis. Tradition as other. Tradition will set before us what it has already done within us.

Authority Thesis. We acknowledge tradition as a “sub-authority” over us. “My conscience is a grounded opacity that allows a richly mediated knowledge of its object” (Westphal 74). 

Fallibility Thesis. Question of critique: “How can we distinguish the true prejudices--by which we understand--from the false prejudices (by which we misunderstand” (75). Tradition must be open to this critique. Even worse, the difference between true and false is not always either/or but a matter of degree. Here is where Anchoretic traditions fail mortally.

What the French Should have said

Authorial intent is important in understanding a text, but only to a degree. Authors themselves are wirkungsgeschichtliches Bewusstein, historically effected consciousness. They don’t have absolute self-transperancy either. Westphal has an interesting suggestion: “there is a power at work in finite authorial creation--for Gadamer, tradition--of whose agency and effects the author is never fully aware” (81). 

Conclusion and Evaluation

In terms of philosophical analysis the work is first-rate. Westphal may be the only Continental-school philosophy who can write clearly. Unfortunately, Westphal moves to analysis--and since that deals with the church, theology. Here the book suffers from ambiguity or simply wrongness. 

Westphal suggests we should follow Gadamer in seeing Truth Beyond [Scientific] Method. I have no problem with that, but aside from references to beautiful art and literature, I am not exactly sure what he wants me to do.

Westphal offers an interesting paradigm for understand difference in the church. He highlights the debate between political liberalism (classical liberalism in society) and communitarianism (Alasdair MacIntyre). Political liberalism affirms difference but in the midst of an overlapping sphere of agreement among the parties involved. Of course, this is valuable for the church: we will disagree at times, and even traditions (Rome, EO) that pretend to be uniform have to own up to that. Ironically, though, it is rather strange to find a postmodern writer affirming classical liberalism, which is a child of the Enlightenment. 

Westphal realizes that and admits the communitarian model is probably better for the church (but he rejects it for the state).

The book ends with a hopeful suggestion taken from the Roman-Lutheran Joint Declaration on Justification. The theology behind such a move is atrocious and one is disappointed that Westphal ended a fine book on so weak a note.

Book Review: jacques derrida--live theory

Smith, James K. A., jacques derrida: live theory.  Bloomsbury Academic.



I accidentally wrote two reviews of this book.   I stand by both of them, but in many ways they represent two different approaches to Smith's project.  The first

Jamie Smith succeeds in what he sets out to do: make Derrida accessible. I've been a critically sympathetic reader of Smith for almost a decade, so some of this was familiar territory. He clears away a lot of misconceptions about Derrida:

*Deconstruction is not a method (9ff). Each deconstructive event remains singular. It is not something we do. It happens in the middle voice. Ca se deconstruit. It happens within texts because of the texts.


*Smith suggests “alterity” is the lens through which we interpret Derrida (13). Deconstructionism is a response to the “other.” Sees “reference” as language’s relation to the “other” of language (14). Derrida suggests a fundamental link between alterity and Judaism (15).

Smith takes us on a journey from Plato to Judaism to Something New Today. Continuing our theme of "alterity," we see Word-Things as Phenomenology's Other.

** In the Beginning was the Word**

“The world of signs--whether graphemes and phonemes--is a world of sensuous phenomena that activate and depend on the body” (17). The West treated language as a means to larger metaphysical questions. Language was always considered ‘mundane.’ And so enters Husserl. Our Western preconceptions thought that Language was governed by temporality. It was Always associated with “passing away.” Therefore, philosophy sought to ground knowledge in something more stable than language--ideas.

Husserl then Advances Plato’s thought that ideas have a history. Knowledge grows into a projected horizon. Suggests that ideas receive objectivity through “language.” Derrida’s contention has been that language in general is affected by mediation. “What the logocentric condition took to be a contamination is its original condition” (43). What was thought to be confined to writing is in fact true of all language: mediation, signifiers, culture.

Arche-Writing is a synonym for differance

JD explains differance in terms of alterity. The primacy of mediation and spacing is to make room for what Derrida calls “il n’y a pas de hors-texte.” There is no aspect of our experience that escapes the play of signifiers. The subject is a function of language. He is a speaking-subject. “The subject’s self-consciousness is constituted by a relation to an outside, to a community of others which grants language. The subject is constituted by the Other” (45). Instead of a metaphysics of presence we have an ontology of quasi-trace

That is the first half of the book and the essence of JD's philosophy. In the second half Smith takes us on a tour of Derrida's teaching controversies, French politics, and other items. This book is highly recommended as a entry point for Derrida's thought.

The Earlier Review

James K. A. Smith has given us probably the best intro to Derrida from an Evangelical perspective. It is remarkably clear, brief, and fair. While Smith doesn't offer anything like a full-orbed critique of Derrida, he shows us why Derrida is important for Evangelicals. I will end with my own critique of Smith and Derrida.

Americans love to hate deconstructionism--and not simply Christians. Much of the Anglo-American philosophical academy hates Derrida. Smith, by contrast, neatly clears up misconceptions. Smith "demythologizes" deconstructionism for us:

• It is not merely negative (10). There is a “double movement of dismantling with a view to rebuilding.”
• Deconstruction is not a master name (10). other possible synonyms are valid: ecriture, trace, differance, supplement, hymen, pharmakon, margin, etc.
• Deconstruction is not a nihilism (11). “not an enclosure in nothingness, but an openness towards the other.” He is not a relativist. Relativism is referring to the absolute and denying it.

Alterity

Smith suggests “alterity” is the lens through which we interpret Derrida (13). Deconstructionism is a response to the “other.” Sees “reference” as language’s relation to the “other” of language (14). Derrida's metaphysical target is Platonism--and by that he means largely the Western philosophical tradition. "Greek" metaphysics--at least in its Platonic conclusion--sought sameness, reducing reality to the One. There was always the attempt to get to the "pure stream," or "pure thought." Voice was prized over writing, because voice suggested immediate "presence" (key word for Derrida). Writing, by contrast, was material and seemed a slave to embodiment.

Derrida's project shows that there is no pure stream. "Pure thought" has always been supplemented by arche-writing. This does not mean, as some of Derrida's critics think, that Derrida thinks writing came before language. Rather, thought and language are always "mediated" to us. All idealities are bound idealities. The contamination of writing goes all the way down (24). Language is the very condition (incarnation?) for philosophy to assert itself.

Per Levinas Western philosophy privileged “the Same,” the sphere of knowing where Subject assimilates all that is other (31). That which is absent is that which is other--it is that which cannot appear to the subject (and hence be assimilated).

Ethics and Politics
Here is where Derrida's project (and Smith's comments) are weakest. My main problem with Derrida is not "deconstruction," for we have already shown that deconstruction is really not that different. Consistent with his thesis, Smith shows that Derrida's concern for "the Other" must allow for the other to visit our countries; thus, immigration. 

How do we respond to this? Smith takes a few potshots at conservatives but really doesn't get to the heart of the argument. I do not doubt that a biblical, much less philosophical case can be made for a sane immigration policy. My concern is that not every "immigrant" is a poverty-pressed refugee. A Frenchman like Derrida should know this. Muslims have routinely torched Paris and London (and in the latter are eating British officers' organs).

Ironically, and this is my critique, Derrida and Smith are privileging some concepts and texts while ignoring others. Is this not a similar reduction to sameness? 

Was Derrida a Communist?

To this answer we can give a firm "maybe" or "not really." That Derrida's ideas lend themselves to various Marxisms is true, yet Derrida routinely distanced himself from Marxist excesses and in later interviews he realized that "capitalism" was more nuanced than many post-Marxists realized.

Conclusion

Smith helpfully contrasts Derrida with later interpreters of Derrida. I particularly found his exposition of Slavoj Zizek illuminating. He points out that Zizek rejects Derrida at the key point: Zizek champions a unity of sameness. That Zizek is a Hegelian Marxist should not surprise us.

Derrida strikes back

Whether the exegesis for or against Jesus's kingdom power existing today holds, it seems the more pertinent question is whether kingdom power can exist outside of the "closed canon."  Do miracles happen? Yes, but not today because the canon is closed.  Do demons exist?  Yeah, but only in Scripture--not today, for the canon is closed.

(P1) The miraculous exists only within the Bible.

Of course, this raises some problematic questions for God.  Does God exist within the Bible or also in real life?  Of course, in real life.  The more level-headed cessationists, not wanting to quench the Holy Spirit, will modify the claim:

(P1*) The miraculous exists only within the Bible but God can do what he wants.

What they don't realize is this is the rawest form of postmodernism imaginable:

(P2) Il n'y a pas de horse-text.  ~Jacques Derrida