Beyond Contagion of Violence: Passionate Love and Empathy in the Thought of René Girard and Max Scheler

Abstract

In his last book René Girard depicts apocalypse as disclosure of mimetic violence that is world-ending. He claims that in times of violent pandemic we are not called to fight for this world, but follow Christ in his withdrawal from the world. However, such an assertion creates serious theoretical and practical issues for the effort to heal interhuman relations from the virus of mimetic hostility. I argue for the importance of restoring a foundational distinction between passionate love and acquisitive mimetic desire from the forgotten regions of Girard’s oeuvre. With Max Scheler’s interpretation of Stendhal’s concept of l’amour passion, I explore in each thinker a fundamental insight about possibilities of transforming violent contagion through empathy and loving commitment to the world. I conclude that respective “passive” and “active” approaches to the contagion of mimetic rivalry and violence are necessary and equally valuable.