Future Christ: A Lesson in Heresy PDF
Preview Future Christ: A Lesson in Heresy
FUTURE CHRIST Also available from Continuum: Being and Event, Alain Badiou Conditions, Alain Badiou Infi nite Thought, Alain Badiou Logics of Worlds, Alain Badiou Theoretical Writings, Alain Badiou Theory of the Subject, Alain Badiou Cinema I, Gilles Deleuze Cinema II, Gilles Deleuze Dialogues II, Gilles Deleuze Difference and Repetition, Gilles Deleuze The Fold, Gilles Deleuze Foucault, Gilles Deleuze Francis Bacon, Gilles Deleuze Kant’s Critical Philosophy, Gilles Deleuze Logic of Sense, Gilles Deleuze Nietzsche and Philosophy, Gilles Deleuze Proust and Signs, Gilles Deleuze Ant-Oedipus, Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari A Thousand Plateaues, Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari Seeing the Invisible, Michel Henry Philosophies of Difference, François Laruelle Essay on Transcendental Philosophy, Salomon Maimon After Finitude, Quentin Meillassoux Time for Revolution, Antonio Negri Politics of Aesthetics, Jacques Rancière Of Habit, Félix Ravaisson The Five Senses, Michel Serres Art and Fear, Paul Virilio Negative Horizon, Paul Virilio FUTURE CHRIST A Lesson in Heresy François Laruelle Translated by Anthony Paul Smith Continuum International Publishing Group The Tower Building 80 Maiden Lane 11 York Road Suite 704 London SE1 7NX New York, NY 10038 www.continuumbooks.com Originally published in French as Le Christ futur © Exils Éditeur, 2002. All rights reserved. This authorized English language translation from the French edition © the Continuum International Publishing Group, 2010 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN: HB: 978-1-4411-1833-2 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Laruelle, François. [Christ future. English] Future Christ : a lesson in heresy / François Laruelle ; translated by Anthony Paul Smith. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-4411-1833-2 1. Jesus Christ–History of doctrines. 2. Heresy. I. Title. BT1315.3.L3713 2010 232'.8–dc22 2010019822 Typeset by Newgen Imaging Systems Pvt Ltd, Chennai, India Printed and bound in India by Replika Press Pvt Ltd ‘Who were we, what have we become? Where are we, whence are we being thrown? From whither do we hasten, from what are we redeemed?’ Theodotus, Excerpta Ex Theodoto, §78* * Translation modifi ed to fi t the French translation. Clement of Alexandria (2006), Extraits de Théodote, trans. François Sagnard, O.P. (Paris: Éditions de Cerf). This page intentionally left blank Contents The Triptych: Author’s Foreword ix The Philosopher and the Heretic: Translator’s Introduction xi Glossary xxvi 1 Future Christianity 1 2 Introducing Philosophy to Heresy 31 3 The Past Foreclosed to Memory 73 4 Persecution and Revelation 92 5 The Last Prophet or Man-Messiah 113 6 Toward Non-Christian Science 126 Other works by François Laruelle 147 Index 149 vii This page intentionally left blank The Triptych: Author’s Foreword The Triptych is a set of three autonomous works, coordinated by the material of their themes and objects and unifi ed by their practice of thought. The fi rst panel (Future Christ: A Lesson in Heresy) is a heretical introduction to the two others. The central panel is a mystical one (Théorèmes mystiques). Lastly, an erotic conclusion (Principia amoris, la science des amants) groups or closes the altarpiece.1 The style of these works is mainly but not uniquely philosophico- religious. The fi rst in particular is a manifesto on the ‘heretic question’ likened to the themes of the Shoah, according to its memory and forgetting, to history and the vanquished of history, persecution, etc. All come under a style I call ‘theory’ characterized by axioms and theorems known as ‘transcendentals’. They experimentally shuffl e around material from Christianity, gnosis, mysticism, erotic poetry, and lastly from philosophy. On the one hand they are distinguished from classic ‘philosophy of Christianity’ projects by method and object. They are treated in order to fashion the theory out of a fi eld of phenom- ena each time reduced to some fundamental elements, Christianity and gnosis for the fi rst, Christian mysticism for the second, and lastly amorous unions for the third. On the other hand they establish new real-life conditions, the same as the theoretical ones, which also has within it already a whiff of ‘belief’, ‘mysticism’, and ‘lover’, as it still is ‘philosophy’, and that which these terms mean for her. This being the univocal theoretical schema that structures both this set of works and non-philosophy, a minimal glossary of non-philosophy is offered at the beginning as a glossary raisonné rather than an alphabetical dictionary. The two main diffi culties to surmount are, ix
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