Some people seem to be able to trot out their complete doctoral thesis outline at an early stage.
This is not me. My work seems to be more evolutionary... I am try not to lose my nerve over this of course! The worst moments are when someone asks you 'so, what is your thesis on?' and nothing much coherent or convincing comes out of your mouth. Arghh!
However: here is an attempt to get my thoughts together at this stage, almost a third of the way through (!). Please feel free to chip in your two cents worth, and please excuse the academic-ese:
What kind of self is a Christian martyr? This dissertation seeks to explore and expound Christian identity via the motif of martyrdom. Martyrdom is the possibility latent in the Christian identity, for all Christians are called to the ‘witness’ or ‘testimony’ (martyrion) that might result in bloody martyrdom.[1] As Balthasar writes:
…this does not mean that every single Christian must suffer bloody martyrdom, but he must consider the entire case as the external representation of the inner reality out of which he lives.[2]
Christian baptism is a symbol of the offering of the old self over to death which is what every Christian does as an identification with Jesus Christ. It is a kind of proto-martyrdom, with its act of testimony to Christ and renunciation of the world, the flesh and the devil.[3] The martyr ‘externally represents’ the church’s way of understanding both the world and the situatedness of the self in that world. It is an understanding which the martyr shows is not merely theoretical, for in the act of offering of the body to its own destruction it is revealed as concrete. At the point of the sword, the testimony of the martyr to another reality intersects – fatally – with the material world. An analysis of martyrdom thus suggests itself as a way to understand Christian identity, both on its own terms and in comparison with alternatives.
However, we must surely be aware of how dissonant this witness is with non-theological conceptions of human meaning and purpose. Part of this dissonance lies in the inevitable association of martyrdom with the spectacle of horrendous religious violence that is the signs of our times. As the suicide bomber shows, the line between killing and dying for a cause is all too thin: to the secular mind the two are barely distinguishable as species of insanity.[4] The association of martyrdom with fanaticism, religious violence and the spectacle of suffering complicates discussion about the meaning of martyrdom as a self-narration. It is a problematic and contested discourse – perhaps supremely so. How might a discourse characterized by the notion of the ‘authentic’ self (for example) accommodate the possibility of self-abnegation to the kind and degree that the martyr demonstrates? Martyrdom – even the possibility of martyrdom – seems to be the enemy of human potential. True, it may be freely determined (though only as a form of suicide), but it is given away too cheaply; it has too little regard for the ties of family and friends; it is too committed to a notion of ‘truth’ which has fallen into disrepair...
In order to elucidate martyrdom as a way of seeing the self, this study makes use of T.S. Eliot’s martyrological drama Murder in the Cathedral (1935) as a lens by which to focus the theme. In the instance of Eliot’s literary creation Thomas we are given an imaginative reflection on martyrdom in the Christian tradition as a whole.
[1] See e.g. Mt 10:18f.
[2] Hans Urs von Balthasar, The Moment of Christian Witness, Communio Books (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1994), p. 22
[3] Origen makes the connection between the baptismal promises and the test of martyrdom explicit in his Exhortation to Martyrdom. Origen, An Exhortation to Martyrdom; Prayer; First Principles, Book Iv; Prologue to the Commentary on 'the Song of Songs'; Homily Xxvii on 'Numbers', trans. Rowan A. Greer, The Classics of Western Spirituality. (London: S.P.C.K, 1979), iii.17, p. 157-8
[4] As Salman Rushdie puts it:: ‘Only fanatics go looking for martyrdom.’ Salman Rushdie, Step across This Line: Collected Non-Fiction 1992-2002 (London: Vintage, 2003), p. 240
14 comments:
I wonder if you judge "secular mind" a bit to harshly here... Think of all the "martyrs" in popular cinema - people dying for a huge variation of "higher causes" from family members to country to freedom or some such notion.
Also, are you familiar with the three-fold notion of baptism among the anabaptists?
Good like with your thesis!
It's making sense to me - consider your project handled. At least for now. From my experience, such moments of clarity come and go. And then you hand it in... :-)
AJC made an interesting comment today about how Hauerwas jumps too quickly onto the 'fatalistic martyr' bandwagon. He suggested that while there is a place for standing firm to the (violent) end, this stance of opposition is something of a last resort: there are many other potential stances towards the world available in the Christian repetoir, including for instance: relaxed enjoyment of good creation, subversion through a salty word/act, confrontation, retreat. Anyway, just wondered if you've talked to him about your project at all.
Hey Patrik: hit me with those threefold anabaptists!
AJC is being very O'Donovanian in that respect. I haven't spoken to AJC yet! Martyrdom is the extreme possiblitiy latent in the christian life... but it is not quite its beginning. Hauerwas does seem to imagine that we are all living in this early church scenario without any intervening history...
I sympathise: my dissertation kept changing direction every 9 months or so (since I kept discovering new things that changed my mind!). And then, when it was finally finished, I spent a few frantic weeks re-writing half of it!
O'Donovan calls martyrdom "the focal point of a conflict engaged through every variety of endurance." (Desire of the Nations, p.178-9).
Does "focal point" mean "paradigm"?
Don't know how popular it'll make your "YOU" book though.
Hey MJ,
Does Jesus qualify as being a martyr? (And we follow his example ...)
What made you want to do your doctorate o this topic?
Elizabeth's Bookshop on King St, Newtown currently has this quote from Albert Camus on its famous little chalkboard:
There are causes worth dying for, but none worth killing for.
Can't see Camus protecting his oil :-)
No, focal point doesn't mean paradigm I don't think... it means more like 'the point of departure which reveals the inner differences between the two ways of looking at the world'
Karen: Jesus is in one sense a martyr. He applies the language of witness and testimony (of the Father) to himself in John's gospel. Yet, while his life and death is the paradigm for Christian martyrdom, Christians have traditionally called Stephen the first martyr... emphasising the witness to CHRIST in the act of martyrdom.
Karen's raised a good question about Jesus and martyrdom. Obviously it all depends on how you define "martyrdom". But historically speaking, there seem to be good reasons to think that, in anticipating his own fate, Jesus would have interpreted his death in continuity with the Maccabean martyrs. This would have meant interpreting his death as a kind of eschatological martyrdom on behalf of Israel.
The Daniel stories provide a strong background for Jesus too. Whatever continuity with the Maccabean martyrs there might have been it is important to emphasise the differences too: he is not a warrior king...at least, not obviously.
This is kinda crucial for the whole Christian conception of martyrdom
(P Knight)
I think it bloody marvellous (and I use the word "bloody" advisedly...). I really see what you were getting at, what caught your imagination to do this, and it really will throw the challenge of christian living and christian differentiation from the world into wonderfully acute focus.
I do agree with what Patrick seemed to be saying, that the problem of 911 etc. must be handled carefully... you can't ignore it obviously, but it threatens to destabilise the whole thing and take over, and compete with the comparison of martyrdom with the modern idea of self, rather than contribute to it.
This part of it is exciting to me, because it puts you in sweet place where you can talk with devastating implications for what the ideology of liberalism etc. means and is doing without striking a hurt, carping (even fuddy duddy) kind of tone.
The entire tone is positive, not defensive. I have sympathised, of course with your frustration at the likes of Mike Carlton, and that strain of your scholarly explorations, but I have thought it would be a struggle to articulate anything that didn't have elements of a whinge or a rallying cry for like minded people... there's already way too much preaching to the converted going on in this digital age. But this allows you to slot the legitimate lessons from that stream of observations into a sharp and appropriately positive discourse about christian life.
Yes, suddenly (for me at least, maybe I'm just slow) so many threads of the past months come together... (my brain is not very evolutionary... I tend to jump to the end, then work backwards if forced, so I almost can't imagine this kind of process resulting in clarity) yet presto, there it is: I for one am stunned!)
Mr No-Authority authorises you to proceed!
well, Paul: I am bouyed by your comments!
I agree wholeheartedly with you about defensiveness: here is perhaps an opportunity to surmount the defensiveness that we are famous for. The 9.11 and inter-faith stuff is kinda interesting, but could prove to be a suicide bomber in disguise...
You no doubt are already familiar with Bonhoeffer's depiction of 'guilty martyrs' in a sermon preached in 1933:
"[T]he blood of martyrs might once again be demanded, but this blood, if we really have the courage and loyalty to shed it, will not be innocent, shining like that of the first witnesses for the faith. On our blood lies heavy guilt, the guilt of the unprofitable servant who is cast into outer darkness." (cited by Bethge, "Turning Points in Bonhoeffer's Life and Thought," in Bonhoeffer in a World Come of Age, Peter Vorkink, editor, 1968)
Yes: hmm. It is of course prescient of his own situation, too... as Craig Slane points out.
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