The Secret That is Withheld
One of my favorite hybrid philosopher/theologians, John Caputo, has been on my mind lately. Mostly because he has been making the rounds on some of my favorite podcasts and has been the subject on some frequently read blogs. One case in point is this profound interview courtesy of Callid Keefe-Perry and HBC.
After I listened to the interview I was reminded of how passionately Caputo talks about Derrida, and how he would describe Derrida as “rightly passing for an atheist.” Caputo’s fascination with Derrida is infectious, and I love this idea. Here is a passage from Caputo’s book Philosophy and Theology is which he discusses this concept:
Why not simply say “I am an atheist”? Because that would be to arrest the play; it would have the self-assured ring of reductionism, the bluntness of nineteenth-century positivism, representing what Derrida once called “atheistic theology,” by which he meant dogmatic atheism (he was using “theology” as a bad word, as a name for dogmatism). On the contrary, he thinks, what we call the “I” is implicated in a kind of conflict, of competing voices that give each other no rest, so that there is always an atheist within me who contests my professions of belief, just as there is always a believer within me who contests my professions of unbelief. That is why he says the name of God is the name of a secret that is withheld form him. Still, he “rightly passes” for an atheist–by the standards of the local pastor or rabbi. That is what others say about him, and that is right enough. But do not let saying that harden over into a dogma (not letting our beliefs and practices harden over into pure presence is a lot of what “deconstruction” means). Notice the Socratic ring to what Derrida is saying here and its similarity to Kierkegaard, when Kierkegaard says that he would never pretend to be a Christian, but at most professes trying to become one. Might it be that the best formula available to believers who are sensitive to the complex and multiple forces that are astir within us, as we all should be, is to claim that tat most they “rightly pass” for a believer? Is this not an excellent formula for whatever we believe or do not believe?
Poster design by Jan Lenica
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