Walter Benjamin On Divine Violence

9/27/2016
Walter Benjamin on Divine Violence
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Walter Benjamin on Divine
Violence
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ByJoshua Abraham Kopin

Divine violence, an idea set out in Walter Benjamins early essay Critique of Violence, is violence undertaken
by a sovereign individual, a strike at power, an attempt at the dissolution of the law in favor of justice, a
decision that reaf rms the sovereignty of the self against the coercive violence of the law. In order to
understand the category of divine violence, it is critical to understand the other kinds of violence that
Benjamin discusses in the essay.
First, Benjamin suggests that the states interest in the monopoly on violence is the preservation of the law,
distinct from the goal of preserving a particular legal system. As he says violence, when not in the hands of
the law, threatens [the law] not by the ends it may pursue but by its mere existence outside the law. This
violence is law-making. It makes its own law, its own order, and therefore is restricted by the state, except
in the particular circumstances of war and striking workers.
Violence that is utilized by the state, in contrast, is law-preserving. Law-preserving violence is the
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appearance of the law-making violence that initiated a legal system in that systems present, harnessed to
ensure its continued existence. Benjamin says that both kinds of violence law-making and law-preserving
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are manifest in police power, which is law-making because its

characteristic function is not the promulgation of laws, but the
assertion of legal claims for any decree, and law-preserving
because it is at the disposal of those ends. Both these forms of
legal violence are problematic but necessary. There is no
resolution of human con ict without them.
There is, however, a kind of violence that appears to exist outside
of the legal sphere. Benjamin calls this mythic violence, and it is
the assertion of the existence of the gods (writ broadly,
understood as something like the powerful), and of the power of
their law. The challenge that is responded to with mythic violence
is not the challenge to the state as such, but instead a challenge
put to fate, understood here as something like that which must
happen. Mythic violence, then, is the response to law-making
violence, also understood as power-making violence and
boundary-making violence. Power inevitably responds to such
Walter Benjamin in Paris in 1939.
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challenges with a demonstration of itself.
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Walter Benjamin at work.
Divine violence stands in contrast to mythico-legal violence, which justi es its means in the end of its own
perpetuation. Divine violence is law-destroying. It is justice intervening against legal and mythic violence in
favor of the sacredness of the human, which is limited by the latter to its material condition, its mere life. In
defending the sacredness of the human, divine violence also protects end-in-itselfness, the fact of vibrant
humanity, the ability to make choices for ourselves, to make the law for ourselves, and ultimately our ability
to reveal the world through language, sociality, and observation. In this way, divine violence is not literally of
Godalthough it certainly resembles Gods violence. Instead, it protects what is sacred about humanity
against the coercive force of unjust law. Slovenian theorist Slavoj Zizek sees Benjamins divine violence as
accruing, perhaps in the superstructure, to be released in response to the pent up sufferings of millions.
This violence is therefore that which is in excess of bare, lawful life, lashing out at that which restrains it.
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Even
so, divineFILMS
violence
serves no means;
if it were
to express itself
in revolution,
kind of
political, social, or cultural change, it would be law-making violence instead.
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Law, then, in Benjamins understanding, is speci cally unjust. Legality only serves as state means and ends
of preserving power.
You may also like these articles in our Social Theory series:
Ben Weiss explains Slavojieks theory of Violence
Jing Zhai on Jacques Derrida and Deconstruction
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Juan Carlos de Orellana discusses Gramsci on Hegemony
Michel Lee explainsLouis Althusser ideas on Interpellation, and the Ideological State Apparatus
Katherine Maddox onRanajit Guhas ideas about hegemony
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Walter Benjamin On Divine Violence

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9/27/2016

Walter Benjamin on Divine Violence

Search the site ...

NOT EVEN PAST

ByJoshua Abraham Kopin

Walter Benjamin on Divine Violence

are manifest in police power, which is law-making because its

Walter Benjamin in Paris in 1939.

FILMS & MEDIA

challenges with a demonstration of itself.

THE PUBLIC HISTORIAN

Walter Benjamin on Divine Violence

Walter Benjamin at work.

Walter Benjamin on Divine Violence

THE PUBLIC HISTORIAN

Sanctuary Austin: 1980s and Today

FILMS & MEDIA

THE PUBLIC HISTORIAN

Walter Benjamin on Divine Violence

April 20, 2016

More from The Public Historian

Americans Against the City, By

September 26, 2016

FILMS & MEDIA

THE PUBLIC HISTORIAN

Walter Benjamin on Divine Violence

FILMS & MEDIA

Chan is Missing (1982)

June 21, 2016

More Films & Media

History Revealed in a Very Small Place

FILMS & MEDIA

THE PUBLIC HISTORIAN

Walter Benjamin on Divine Violence

June 21, 2016

More from Texas

IN THE TRENCHES BY PIERRE MINAULT

20th Century African American History Asia

digital history Early Modern Europe

gender High School Students

FILMS & MEDIA

NOT EVEN PAST is produced by

THE PUBLIC HISTORIAN

history History of Science India Islam

Latin America Mexico Not Even Past

Walter Benjamin on Divine Violence

Transnational Twentieth Century History

History USSR Watch

Womens History world history World War II

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Your email address

To help us prevent spam submissions, please type the text

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