This may be the best thing written about many of the subjects involved.
http://www.lacan.com/zizarchives.htmTo many a Western historian of religion, Islam is a problem ? how could it have emerged after Christianity, the religion to end all religions? Its very geographic place belies the clich? on Orientalism: much more than belonging to the Orient, the location of Islam makes it a fatal obstacle to the true union of the East and the West ? the point made exemplarily by Claude Levi-Strauss:
Today, it is behind Islam that I contemplate India; the India of Buddha, prior to Muhammad who ? for me as a European and because I am European ? arises between our reflection and the teachings which are closest to it /?/ the hands of the East and the West, predestined to be joined, were kept apart by it. /.../
The West should return to the sources of its torn condition: by way of interposing itself between Buddhism and Christianity, Islam islamized us when, in the course of the Crusades, the West let itself be caught in the opposition to it and thus started to resemble it, instead of delivering itself ? in the case of the inexistence of Islam ? to the slow osmosis with Buddhism which would christianize us even more, in a sense which would have been all the more Christian insofar as we were to mount beyond Christianity itself. It is then that the West has lost its chance to remain woman. [1]
This passage from the last pages of Tristes tropiques articulates the dream of a direct communication and reconciliation between West and East, Christianity and Buddhism, male and female principles. Like a harmonious sexual relationship, this direct contact would have been a chance for Europe to become feminine. Islam served as the screen interposing itself between the two, preventing the rise of a harmonious hermaphroditic world civilization ? with its interposition, the West lost its last chance to ?remain woman.? (As we shall soon see, what this view fails to note is how Islam itself is grounded on a disavowed femininity, trying to get rid of the umbilical cord that links it to the feminine.) Islam thus functions as what Freud called Liebesstoerer: the intruder/obstacle of the harmonious sexual relationship. This harmonious relationship, of course, would have been the one under the predominance of femininity: the male West would have rejoined the feminine East and thus ?remain woman,? locate itself within femininity.
Fran?ois Regnault defined Jews as our objet a - but are here not Muslims this a-sexual ?partial object?? We usually speak of the Jewish-Christian civilization ? perhaps, the time has come, especially with regard to the Middle East conflict, to talk about the Jewish-Muslim civilization as an axis opposed to Christianity. (Recall a surprising sign of this deeper solidarity: after Freud published his Moses booklet in 1938 depriving Jews of their founding figure, the most ferocious reactions to it came from the Muslim intellectuals in Egypt!) Was Hegel not already on the trace of it with his insight into the speculative identity of Judaism and Islam? According to a commonplace, Judaism (like Islam) is a ?pure? monotheism, while Christianity, with its Trinity, is a compromise with polytheism; Hegel even designates Islam as THE ?religion of sublimity? at its purest, as the universalization of the Jewish monotheism:
In Mohammedanism the limited principle of the Jews is expanded into universality and thereby overcome. Here, God is no longer, as with the Asiatics, contemplated as existent in immediately sensuous mode but is apprehended as the one infinite sublime Power beyond all the multiplicity of the world. Mohammedanism is, therefore, in the strictest sense of the world, the religion of sublimity. [2]
This, perhaps, explains why there is so much anti-Semitism in Islam: because of the extreme proximity of the two religions. In Hegelese, what Islam encounters in Judaism is ITSELF in its ?oppositional determination,? in the mode of particularity. The difference between Judaism and Islam is thus ultimately not substantial, but purely formal: they are the SAME religion in a different formal mode (in the sense in which Spinoza claims that the real dog and the idea of a dog are substantially one and the same thing, just in a different mode).[3] - Against this, one should argue that it is Judaism which is an ?abstract negation? of polytheism and, as such, still haunted by it (there is a whole series of clues pointing in this direction: ?Jehovah? is a plural substantive; in one of his commandments, God prohibits Jews to celebrate other gods ?in front of me,? not when outside of his gaze; etc.), while Christianity is the only true monotheism, since it includes self-differentiation into the One ? its lesson is that, in order to have truly a One, you need THREE.
So what is Islam, this disturbing excess that represents East for the West and West for the East? In his La psychanalyse a l?epreuve de l?Islam, Fethi Benslama [4] provides a systematic search for the ?archive? of Islam, for its obscene secret mythical support which ne cesse pas de ne pas s?ecrire and as such sustains the explicit dogma. Is, for example, the story of Hagar not Islam?s ?archive,? relating to Islam?s explicit teaching in the same way the Jewish secret tradition of Moses relates to explicit teachings of Judaism? In his discussion of the Freudian figure of Moses, Eric Santner introduces the key distinction between symbolic history (the set of explicit mythical narratives and ideologico-ethical prescriptions that constitute the tradition of a community, what Hegel would have called its "ethical substance") and its obscene Other, the unacknowledgeable "spectral," fantasmatic secret history that effectively sustains the explicit symbolic tradition, but has to remain foreclosed if it is to be operative. [5] What Freud endeavors to reconstitute in his Moses book (the story of the murder of Moses, etc.) is such a spectral history that haunts the space of Jewish religious tradition. One becomes a full member of a community not simply by identifying with its explicit symbolic tradition, but only when one also assumes the spectral dimension that sustains this tradition, the undead ghosts that haunt the living, the secret history of traumatic fantasies transmitted "between the lines," through the lacks and distortions of the explicit symbolic tradition. Judaism's stubborn attachment to the unacknowledged violent founding gesture that haunts the public legal order as its spectral supplement, enabled the Jews to persist and survive for thousands of years without land and common institutional tradition: they refused to give up their ghost, to cut off the link to their secret, disavowed tradition. The paradox of Judaism is that it maintains fidelity to the founding violent Event precisely by NOT confessing, symbolizing it: this "repressed" status of the Event is what gives Judaism its unprecedented vitality.
Which, then, is the repressed Event which gives vitality to Islam? The key is provided by the reply to another question: how does Islam, the third Religion of the Book, fit into this series? Judaism is the religion of genealogy, of succession of generations; when, in Christianity, the Son dies on the Cross, this means that the Father also dies (as Hegel was fully aware) ? the patriarchal genealogical order as such dies, the Holy Spirit does not fit the family series, it introduces a post-paternal/familial community. In contrast to both Judaism and Christianity, the two other religions of the book, Islam excludes God from the domain of the paternal logic: Allah is not a father, not even a symbolic one ? God is one, he is neither born nor does he give birth to creatures. There is no place for a Holy Family in Islam. This is why Islam emphasizes so much the fact that Muhammed himself was an orphan; this is why, in Islam, God intervenes precisely at the moments of the suspension, withdrawal, failure, ?black-out,? of the paternal function (when the mother or the child are abandoned or ignored by the biological father). What this means is that God remains thoroughly in the domain of impossible-Real: he is the impossible-Real outside father, so that there is a ?genealogical desert between man and God?(320). This was the problem with Islam for Freud, since his entire theory of religion is based on the parallel of God with father. More importantly even, this inscribes politics into the very heart of Islam, since the ?genealogical desert? renders impossible to ground a community in the structures of parenthood or other blood-links: ?the desert between God and Father is the place where the political institutes itself?(320). With Islam, it is no longer possible to ground a community in the mode of Totem and Taboo, through the murder of the father and the ensuing guilt as bringing brothers together ? thence Islam?s unexpected actuality.
In contrast to Judaism and Islam, in which the sacrifice of the son is prevented in the last moment (angel intervenes to Abraham), only Christianity opts for the actual sacrifice (killing) of the son. (268) This is why, although Islam recognizes the Bible as a sacred text, it has to deny this fact: in Islam, Jesus did not really die on the Cross: the Jews ?said (in boast), ?We killed Christ Jesus the son of Mary, the Messenger of Allah?; but they killed him not, nor crucified him, but so it was made to appear to them?(4.157). There is effectively in Islam a consistent anti-sacrificial logic: in the Quran version of Isaac?s sacrifice, Abraham?s decision to kill his son is read not as the ultimate indication of his willingness to do the God?s will, but as a consequence of Abraham?s wrong interpretation of his dream: when the angel prevents the act, his message is that Abraham got it wrong, that God did not really want him to do it.(275)
Insofar as, in Islam, God is an impossible-Real, this works both ways with regard to sacrifice: it can work against sacrifice (there is no symbolic economy of exchange between the believers and Gods, God is the pure One of Beyond), but also in favour of sacrifice, when the divine Real turns into the superego figure of ?obscure gods who demand continuous blood?(Lacan-XI). Islam seems to oscillate between these two extremes, with the obscene sacrificial logic culminating in its redescription of the story of Abel and Cain ? here is how Quran reports on ?the truth of the story of the two sons of Adam. Behold! they each presented a sacrifice (to Allah): It was accepted from one, but not from the other. Said the latter: ?Be sure I will slay thee.? ?Surely,? said the former, ?Allah doth accept of the sacrifice of those who are righteous. If thou dost stretch thy hand against me, to slay me, it is not for me to stretch my hand against thee to slay thee: for I do fear Allah, the cherisher of the worlds. For me, I intend to let thee draw on thyself my sin as well as thine, for thou wilt be among the companions of the fire, and that is the reward of those who do wrong.?
The (selfish) soul of the other led him to the murder of his brother: he murdered him, and became (himself) one of the lost ones.? (5:27-30)
So it is not only Cain who wants the killing: Abel himself actively participates in this desire, provoking Cain to do it, so that he (Abel) would get rid of his own sins also. Benslama is right to discern here traces of an ?ideal hatred,? different from the imaginary hatred of the aggressivity towards one?s double (289): the victim itself actively desires the crime whose victim it will be, so that, as a martyr, it will enter Paradise, sending the perpetrator to burn in hell. From today?s perspective, one is tempted to play with the anachronistic speculation on how the ?terrorist? logic of the martyr?s wish to die is already here, in Quran ? although, of course, one has to locate the problem in the context of modernization. The problem of Islamic world is, as is well known, that, since it was exposed to Western modernization abruptly, without a proper time to ?work through? the trauma of its impact, to construct a symbolic-fictional space/screen for it, the only possible reactions to this impact were either a superficial modernization, an imitated modernization destined to fail (Iran Shah regime), or, in the failure of the proper symbolic space of fictions, a direct recourse to the violent Real, an outright war between Islam Truth and Western Lie, with no space for symbolic mediation. In this ?fundamentalist? solution (a modern phenomenon with no direct links to Muslim traditions), the divine dimension reasserts itself in its superego-Real, as a murderous explosion of sacrifical violence to pay off the obscene superego divinity.
A further key distinction between Judaism (together with its Christian continuation) and Islam is that, as we can see in the case of Abraham?s two sons, Judaism chooses Abraham as the symbolic father, i.e., the phallic solution of the paternal symbolic authority, of the official symbolic lineage, discarding the second woman, enacting a ?phallic appropriation of the impossible?(153). Islam, on the contrary, opts for the lineage of Hagar, for Abraham as the biological father, maintaining the distance between father and God, retaining God in the domain of the Impossible.(149) [6]
Both Judaism and Islam repress their founding gestures ? how? As the story of Abraham and his two sons with two different women shows, in both Judaism and Islam, father can become father, assume the paternal function, only through the mediation of another woman. Freud?s hypothesis is that the repression in Judaism concerns the fact that Abraham was a foreigner (an Egyptian), not a Jew ? it is the founding paternal figure, the one who brings revelation and establishes the covenant with God, that has to come from the outside. With Islam, the repression concerns a woman (Hagar, the Egyptian slave who gave to Abraham his first son): although Abraham and Ishmail (the progenitor of all Arabs, according to the myth) are mentioned dozens of times in Quran, Hagar is unmentioned, erased from the official history. As such, however, she continues to haunt Islam, her traces surviving in rituals, like the obligation of the pilgrims to Mecca to run six times between the two hills Safa and Marwah, a kind of neurotic repetition/reenactment of Hagar?s desperate search for water for her son in the desert. - Here is, in Genesis, the story of Abraham?s two sons, this key umbilical link between Judaism and Islam ? first, the Birth of Ishmael:
Now Sarai, Abram?s wife, had not given birth to any children, but she had an Egyptian servant named Hagar. So Sarai said to Abram, ?Since the Lord has prevented me from having children, have sexual relations with my servant. Perhaps I can have a family by her.? Abram did what Sarai told him.
So after Abram had lived in Canaan for ten years, Sarai, Abram?s wife, gave Hagar, her Egyptian servant, to her husband to be his wife. He had sexual relations with Hagar, and she became pregnant. Once Hagar realized she was pregnant, she despised Sarai. Then Sarai said to Abram, ?You have brought this wrong on me! I allowed my servant to have sexual relations with you, but when she realized that she was pregnant, she despised me. May the Lord judge between you and me!?
Abram said to Sarai, ?Since your servant is under your authority, do to her whatever you think best.? Then Sarai treated Hagar harshly, so she ran away from Sarai. The Lord?s angel found Hagar near a spring of water in the desert ? the spring that is along the road to Shur. He said, ?Hagar, servant of Sarai, where have you come from, and where are you going?? She replied, ?I?m running away from my mistress, Sarai.?
Then the Lord?s angel said to her, ?Return to your mistress and submit to her authority. I will greatly multiply your descendants,? the Lord?s angel added, ?so that they will be too numerous to count.? Then the Lord?s angel said to her,
lsquo;You are now pregnant and are about to give birth to a son. You are to name him Ishmael, for the Lord has heard your painful groans. He will be a wild donkey of a man. He will be hostile to everyone, and everyone will be hostile to him. He will live away from his brothers.?
So Hagar named the Lord who spoke to her, ?You are the God who sees me,? for she said, ?Here I have seen the one who sees me!? That is why the well was called Beer Lahai Roi. (It is located between Kadesh and Bered.)
So Hagar gave birth to Abram?s son, whom Abram named Ishmael. ?(16:1-16:15)
After the miraculous birth of Isaac, whose immaculate conception seems to point forward to Christ (Good ? visited Sarah? and made her pregnant), when the child was old enough to be weaned, Abraham prepared a great feast:
But Sarah noticed the son of Hagar the Egyptian ? the son whom Hagar had borne to Abraham ? mocking. So she said to Abraham, ?Banish that slave woman and her son, for the son of that slave woman will not be an heir along with my son Isaac!?
Sarah?s demand displeased Abraham greatly because Ishmael was his son. But God said to Abraham, ?Do not be upset about the boy or your slave wife. Do all that Sarah is telling you because through Isaac your descendants will be counted. But I will also make the son of the slave wife into a great nation, for he is your descendant too.?
Early in the morning Abraham took some food and a skin of water and gave them to Hagar. He put them on her shoulders, gave her the child, and sent her away. So she went wandering aimlessly through the wilderness of Beer Sheba. When the water in the skin was gone, she shoved the child under one of the shrubs. Then she went and sat down by herself across from him at quite a distance, about a bowshot away; for she thought, ?I refuse to watch the child die.? So she sat across from him and wept uncontrollably.
But God heard the boy?s voice. The angel of God called to Hagar from heaven and asked her, ?What is the matter, Hagar? Don?t be afraid, for God has heard the boy?s voice right where he is crying. Get up! Help the boy up and hold him by the hand, for I will make him into a great nation.? Then God enabled Hagar to see a well of water. She went over and filled the skin with water, and then gave the boy a drink.?(21:10-21:19)
Tell me, you who want to be under the law, do you not understand the law? For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by the slave woman and the other by the free woman. But one, the son by the slave woman, was born by natural descent, while the other, the son by the free woman, was born through the promise. These things may be treated as an allegory, for these women represent two covenants. One is from Mount Sinai bearing children for slavery; this is Hagar. Now Hagar represents Mount Sinai in Arabia and corresponds to the present Jerusalem, for she is in slavery with her children. But the Jerusalem above is free, and she is our mother. For it is written:
?Rejoice, O barren woman who does not bear children; break forth and shout, you who have no birth pains, because the children of the desolate woman are more numerous than those of the woman who has a husband.?
But you, brothers and sisters, are children of the promise like Isaac. But just as at that time the one born by natural descent persecuted the one born according to the Spirit, so it is now. But what does the scripture say? ?Throw out the slave woman and her son, for the son of the slave woman will not share the inheritance with the son? of the free woman. Therefore, brothers and sisters, we are not children of the slave woman but of the free woman.?(4:21-4:31)
Topic: Zizek - Glance into the Archives of Islam