Dialnet-LevinasOnJustificationOfViolence-3978752

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NMERO 9 | ENERO - JUNIO 2012 | ISSN: 0718-655X

Revista

Plyade

DOSSIERHz C V

Francisco Prez y Presentacin del dossier Horizontes contemporneos de la violenciaMiriam Jerade

ARTCULOS

Pedro Moscoso y Imgenes de la violencia y el terror de la guerra: la gubernamentalidadAndrs Tello meditica de lo ominoso

Miriam Jerade Dana La guerra en Freud. Entre la hipersosticacin y una violencia arcaica

Marc Crpon Y nadie de aqu sabe quin soy. La voz de los emigrantes: Hannah Arendt,Winfried Georg Sebald, Georges Perec (Bilinge)Et personne ici ne sait qui je seus. La voix des emigrants: Hannah Arendt,Winfried Georg Sebald, Georges Perec (Bilingue)

Valeria Campos Eric Weil: miedo de la violencia y la promesa de la losofa

Petar Bojani Lvinas on Justication of Violence

ARTCULOS LIBRES

Andrea Torrano y Economa de la violencia y guras de la excepcin. Soberana y biopoltica.Natalia Lorio

Robert Oprisko The Rebel as Sovereign: The Political Theology of Dignity

Enrica Lisciani Petrini Hacia el sujeto impersonal

Nadinne Canto El lugar de la cultura en la va chilena al socialismo. Notas sobre el proyectoesttico de la Unidad Popular

Ev

Oscar Godoy La teora democrtica de Aristteles(Entrevistado por Diego Sazo)


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REVISTA PLYADE 9/ ISSN: 0718-655X / ENERO - JUNIO 2012 / PP. 89-100

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Lv Juf fV*

P B**Uvy f Bg

A B S T R A C T

This article deals with the concept of violence as developed by Lvinas. On the one hand,

I deal with violence understood as the encounter with the other, mainly as the basis for aneconomy of violence. On the other hand, I examine the relationship of three dynamics ofviolence: a) a third partys violence; b) my own violence, i.e. Lvinas violence; c) violenceby the State as a reaction to the rst kind of violence. Once that relationship is explicated, Iwill try to explore violence against violence, by echoing Lvinas well-known hesitationabout a right to violence. I will nally tackle what has been called the aertaste ofviolence, cet arrire-got de violence. In order to analyze this reminder of violenceas much as to include the question of third-parties in Lvinas, I will deal with questionsthat spread out of phenomenology through a loyal and resistant reading of Husserl.

Ky w: Emmanuel Lvinas, Dynamics of Violence, Other, State, Phenomenology.

Lv uf v

El presente ensayo aborda la nocin de violencia desarrollada por Lvinas. Por un lado,aborda la violencia en el encuentro con el otro y, principalmente, como fundamentode una economa de la violencia. Por otro lado, analiza la relacin entre tres dinmicasde la violencia: primero, la violencia del tercero; segundo, mi propia violencia, o laviolencia de Lvinas; y, tercero, la violencia que ejerce el Estado como respuesta a laprimera. Planteado lo anterior, el ensayo interrogar la violencia contra la violencia,

haciendo eco de la clebre duda (hesitation) de Lvinas sobre el derecho a la violencia.* Paper received on November 3th, 2011 and accepted on February 12th, 2012. An earlier version ofthis essay was presented at the colloque: Levinas : Reconhecimento e Hospitalidade on 27-28

october 2009, in the Univerzita Lisabon, CECL in Lisbon.** Petar Bojani has a doctors degree from the Universit Paris X Nanterre. His thesis wasdirected by Jacques Derrida, Jean-Luc Nancy and tienne Balibar. Currently he is a professorand researcher at The Center for Modern Thought at the University of Aberdeen, Scotland.He is director of the Institute for Philosophy and Social Theory at the University of Belgrade,Serbia. He is researcher at The Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities in London, England. Heis the author of Friend and Enemy. Carl Schmi and Jacques Derrida (Novi Sad: Stetovi, 1995) andViolence. The Reason of State and the Figures of Sovereignty (Belgrade: IFDT-Filip Visnjic, 2007).E-Mail: [email protected]


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Finalmente, el ensayo reexiona sobre el gusto de violencia que permanece en laboca, cet arrire-got de violence. Para analizar este resto de sabor a violenciae introducir la cuestin del tercero en Lvinas, el texto abordar preguntas quetienen origen en la fenomenologa, en una lectura de el y de resistencia de Husserl.

P v: Emmanuel Lvinas, dinmicas de la violencia, Otro, Estado,fenomenologa.

I will aempt, in English and with frequent citations of Lvinas in French,to explain the connection between violence (someones violence) and myown or Lvinass or the States violence as a response to the initial violence(Violence against Violence) and, nally, the violence which remains in the

mouth, throat, aertaste [got] or in disgust [degot]: cet arrire-got deviolence1, or un quelconque arrire-got de dgot [a kind of aertaste ofdisgust]2.

Before I go on and cite Lvinass fragments, and before I begin thinkingabout the third (third party [tiers]), about politics and the State in Lvinas,about the institution, about the legitimacy of violence, necessary violence,or about ethical necessity (these are all Lvinass terms, which he usesquite infrequently), I must insist on several diculties. There are three ofthem, they are all Lvinass and all three call into question any hospitality

and openness towards the other, towards the others violence or towardsviolenceof theprochain. All these three diculties (or Lvinass dilemmas)have their beginning in phenomenology, in Lvinass simultaneous devotionand resistance to Husserl.

The rst diculty is with the denition of violence. It seems to methat Lvinass rst explanation of what violence is does not allow thepossibility to determine the extreme violence or destructive violence3.Conversely, Lvinas gives the illusion that the others advantage is innite,

1 Emmanuel Lvinas, Textes messianiques, in Dicile libert. Essais sur le judasme (Paris:

Albin Michel, 1963), 109.2 Emmanuel Lvinas, De Dieu qui vient lide (Paris: Vrin, 1982), 66; Emmanuel Lvinas, OfGod who comes to Mind (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998), 193.3 The term the absolute other (in 1957, Lvinas says that this term belongs to Jankelevich;

but it is also Hegels term) never has a negative connotation; when, in certain places, Lvinasuses the word enemy or hostility, he is solely aempting to nd a gure which is theabsolute other and which cannot be assimilated: Lennemi ou le Dieu sur lequel je ne peuxpouvoir et qui ne fait pas partie de mon monde, reste encore en relation avec moi et me permetde vouloir, mais dun vouloir qui nest pas goste, dun vouloir qui se coule dans lessence dudsir dont le centre de gravitation ne concide pas avec le moi du besoin, dun dsir qui est pourAutrui. In Emmanuel Lvinas, Totalit et Inni (La Haye, Boston, Londres: Martinus Nho,1961), 212f. Lvinas probably never consulted Husserls E manuscripts from 1934. (Hostilityis the total negation of another being in its complete living activity [Feindscha ist die totaleNegation des anderen Seins in allen seinen Lebensbettigungen], E III 8, S. 12).


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that the acceptance of the other is unconditional and that the hospitalityis absolute and limitless. In four of his main texts from the early 1950s,Lvinas speaks about violence as partial negation (Ngation partielle qui estviolence)4 murder as total negation is already, in 1951, diluted by Lvinass

constant repetition that in the presence of the others face [visage] orwhen face to face with the other, it is impossible to kill5. Apart fromLvinass above mentioned denitions of violence being visibly inuencedby Eric Weil6, Lvinas constructs three new ideas: the rst being that [E]stviolente toute action o lon agit comme si on tait seul agir [] ([] estviolente, par consquent, aussi toute action que nous subissons sans en tre entous points les collaborateurs)7. Two years later, Lvinas changes and addsto this formulation : Laction violente ne consiste pas se trouver en rapportavec lAutre; cest prcisment celle o on est comme si on tait seul8. And he

demonstrates that seemingly, violence comes from outside and that inprinciple it does not exist between two people; the third idea is found inone of his most complicated and important works, the 1954 text Le Moi etla Totalit, where it is nally discovered that the source of true violence isoutside socit intime or socit de lamour (socit close, couple, entre-deux) inune veritable socitwhich refers to le tiers (le troisime homme,une troisime voie, le tu veritable, une multiplicit de tiers)9. However,Lvinas completely takes away the sacred aura from the space violence andinjustice occupy, characterizing it as a space for things and goods, materialbodies and money let us not forget that the idea of justice is for Lvinasabove all economic: la justice conomique10; only just reparations throughmoney can bring an end to the history of human violence, says Lvinas11.Furthermore, despite implying the existence of une blessure relle, it seemsthat the third (party) is not the subject of violence. Lvinas repeatedlyspeaks in the rst person, about I who can damage the third and cause

4 Emmanuel Lvinas, Lontologie est-elle fondamentale (1951), Entre nous (Paris: Grasset,1991), 20.5 Ibid., 21. Lvinas rst mentions visage in a series of lectures he gave in 1946-1947, andwhich were published in 1948 in Le temps et autre.

6 Lvinas mentions Weils book Logique de la philosophie (1951) in a text titled Ethique etesprit (1951) and speaks of its importance in understanding violence in opposition to discourse,cf. Emmanuel Lvinas, Dicile libert. Essais sur le judasme, (Paris: Albin Michel, 1963), 17f.7 Ibid, 20: Violence is consequently also any action which we endure without at everypoint collaborating in it. Emmanuel Lvinas, Dicult Freedom. Essays on Judaism (London: TheAthlone Press, 1990), 6.8 Emmanuel Lvinas, Libert et commandement (Paris: Fata morgana, 1994), 43f.9 Emmanuel Lvinas, Le Moi et la Totalit, Revue de Mtaphysique et de Morale 4 (1954), 358(again published in Entre nous (Paris: Grasset, 1991), 23-48). Its curious that Jacques Derridaomits analyzing Lvinass text in Violence and Metaphysics.10 Ibid., 356. Conversely, Derrida repeatedly talks about right, about lexigence de la justicecomme droit, in the book Adieu. Cf. Jacques Derrida, Adieu Emmanuel Lvinas (Paris: Galile,

1997), 190.11 Emmanuel Lvinas, Le Moi et la Totalit, 372f.


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him harm12. It is I who brings violence, I damages; not the other or thethird.

This leads us to Lvinass second diculty: who is the subject of violenceand who tolerates it? Who is violent? I (the Same), the other or a third

person (third party)? Proche orprochain? Or the State? Or God? Who shouldbe defended, who should defend who, who is bringing harm to who? Dontthe foundations of all these questions, which Lvinas continuously repeatsand re-formulates an innite number of times, contain the rst questionsabout the constitution of the subject and about the limits of intersubjectivity?On the other hand, how is violence lessened or how is violence erased? Ifpardon and vengeance cannot break the cercle infernal de la violence ([] lemal engendre le mal et le pardon linni lencourage13), what is le? Perhapsit is necessary and somewhat acceptable, at this time, to shake-up even the

basic foundations of Lvinass texts: dont the histories of great crimes andmurders tell us that the face [visage] does not stop crime (on the contrary),and that the reasons for the existence of violence can perhaps be explainedwith the absence of others? Perhaps violence is possible because the other(or third) is not present?

The third diculty is methodological and probably the most complex.What is necessary is to systematically and carefully explain how Lvinasunderstands the institution and what instituer means to him. Thispreliminary task should again show Lvinass proximity to and distancefrom Husserl14, but also something much more important. When Lvinas, in1977, writes about the tiers, about justice, about my relation to autrui (whichistoujours la relation avec le tiers), he says the following:

[] il faut comparer, peser, penser, il faut faire lajustice, source de la thorie. Toute la rcuprationdes Institutions et de la thorie elle-mme de laphilosophie et de la phnomnologie: expliciterlapparatre se fait selon moi, partir du tiers15.

12 Ibid., 365.13 Ibid., 373. Le mal engendre le mal et le pardon linni lencourage. In this text, Lvinas

puts forward a hypothesis concerning justice which can bring an end to violence. I repeat,Lvinas does not, yet, strictly connect justice with the state or rights. In fact Lvinas rarely usesthe word right (law) even later in his life. The problem of breaking the chain of violence, inthe bookAutrement qutre ou au-del de lessence (La Haye, Boston, Londres : Kluwer Academic,1974), is solved by a call for patience.14 Here I am referring to Lvinass understanding of Husserls terms to institute, toprimallyinstitute [stien, urstien], as well as to Husserls rst readers and translators in France whowrote about the institution (Merleau-Ponty, Ricoeur, Lyotard). Paradoxically, the responsibilityfor concealing the uniqueness of these words is borne by Emmanuel Lvinas, who translates theword Urstiung in Cartesian Meditations (1929) in two ways. In 38, Lvinas and Gabrielle Peier(Alexandre Koyr examined this translation) translate Urstiung as formation premire, and inthe famous 50, as cration premire. Edmund Husserl,Mditations Cartsiennes. Introduction la phnomnologie (Paris: Vrin, 1992), 135, 181.15 Lvinas, De Dieu qui vient lide, 132.


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It is necessary to closely follow Lvinass numerous aempts andvariations of this sentence, in order (for him) to be able to explain theconnection between philosophy and institution, that is the State16. Alreadyin 1953, Lvinas writes:

Concevoir et raliser lordre humain, cest instituerun Etat juste, qui est, par consquent, la possibilitde surmonter les obstacles qui menacent la libert.Cest le seul moyen de la prserver de la tyrannie17.

In 1982, Lvinas continues:

[] il y a un accord possible entre thique etEtat. LEtat juste sortira des justes et des saints

plutt que de la propagande et de la prdication

18

.

Philosophy (or theory, or phenomenology) should bring justice intoInstitutions or into the State. Immediately I would pose two questions here:is philosophy responsible for the regulation of violence (resisting evil byforce, the legitimacy of violence, the justication of violence, ncessitthique, thiquement ncessaire) and does philosophy make violence justor justiable? Does philosophy introduce elements of justice into violenceor into war? This question nds its source in Lvinass famous insistence(in Totalit et Inni) that Western philosophy produced war and that it isstructured like war (an unjust and criminal war, of course).

The second question is especially problematic: how does Lvinassphilosophy repair (provide justice to) Institutions (the State) or perhapsa World State, laws, etc? This question assumes that we have answers toanother series of questions: how do we read and translate Lvinas today?How do we write about him? Can and in what way does Lvinass theoryfunction in the Anglo-Saxon space and in Israel, in new discussionsconcerning the ethics of war, concerning self-defense and the defense of thecivilian population, concerning the immunity of civilians (noncombatants),

concerning permissible killing, concerning asymmetrical war, etc.?

16 Les institutions et lEtat lui-mme peuvent tre retrouvs partir du tiers intervenant dansla relation de proximit. Peut-on dduire les institutions partir de la dnition de lhomme loup pour lhomme plutt quotage de lautre homme? Quelle dirence y a-t-il entre desinstitutions naissant dune limitation de la violence ou bien naissant dune limitation de laresponsabilit ? Au moins celle-ci : dans le second cas, on peut se rvolter contre les institutionsau nom mme de ce qui leur a donn naissance. Emmanuel Lvinas, Dieu, la mort et le temps(Paris : Grasset, 1993), 211f. Cf. Lvinas,Autrement qutre ou au-del de lessence, 248, 251, 256, 263;Lvinas, Totalit et inni, 276, 282, 284.17 Lvinas, Libert et commandement, 39.18 Emmanuel Lvinas, Philosophie, Justice et Amour, in Entre nous (Paris: Grasset, 1991),

139. Il y faut des institutions qui arbitrent et une autorit politique qui la soutienne. La justice exige etfonde lEtat, in Emmanuel Lvinas, De lUnicit, in Entre nous (Paris: Grasset, 1991), 216.


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If I were to aempt to sketch a short answer to this great questionregarding Lvinass intervention in existing institutions or in an idealfuture institution (nally always present in the philosophical gesture), Imust begin with the inerasable trace of violence. Lvinas, in the 1950s, in

several messianic texts and comments (published much later, in 1963), forthe rst time discusses in detail the violence of others (evil ones) and thepossibility of a just violence, and he does this completely in harmony withla justice conomique from 1954. He investigates several fragments fromthe Talmud and the coming of the third (the other, the closest, the Messiah)comme une personne qui vient mere miraculeusement n aux violences quirgissent ce monde19. Apart from the end of violence and political repression[n de la violence et de loppression politique]20 in the messianic epoch, Lvinasespecially fears whether the Messiah will bring an end to poverty and social

violence. Here are these unforgeable words:La n des violences politiques se spare-t-elle de lan des violences sociales? Schmouel annonce-t-il leparadis des capitalistes : plus de guerre, plus de servicemilitaire, plus dantismitisme ; mais on ne touche pasaux comptes en banque et le problme social reste sanssolution ? Un texte parallle car il y a beaucoup detextes parallles dans le Talmud nindique-t-il pas lesraisons allgues par Schmouel en faveur de sa thse : Ilny a entre lpoque messianique et ce monde-ci dautre

dirence que la n de la violence et de loppressionpolitique, car il est dit dans la Bible (Deut. 15. 11): Lepauvre ne disparatra pas de la terre (Berachoth, 34 b)21.

This problem creates an entirely new complication, namely: how willviolence and injustice be erased? Lvinas continues:

Parce quau moment messianique il faut quil sacrieles mchants aux bons. Parce que dans lacte justeil y a encore une violence qui fait sourir. Mmelorsque lacte est raisonnable, lorsque lacte est juste,il comporte une violence. [] Voil aussi pourquoilengagement ncessaire est si dicile au juif, voilpourquoi le juif ne peut pas sengager sans se dsengageraussitt, voil pourquoi il lui reste toujours cet arrire-got de violence, mme quand il sengage pour unecause juste ; jamais le juif ne peut partir en guerre les

19 Lvinas, Dicile libert. Essais sur le judasme, 83.20 The English translation omits these words. Lvinas, Dicult Freedom. Essays on Judaism, 61.21 Lvinas, Dicile libert. Essais sur le judasme, 86f. In a text concerning Judaism andrevolution from 1969, Lvinas again goes back to just violence (violence which ends all or any

future violence), necessary violence against evil and Dieu des armes, cf. Emmanuel Lvinas,Du sacr au saint (Paris: Minuit, 1977), 45.


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drapeaux dploys, et aux accents triomphants desmusiques militaires et avec la bndiction dune Eglise22.

Lvinas rst changes his perspective and stops dening the violent

act as such. A just or correct act (rational as well) contains violenceprobably because it brings pain and suering to the other (the evil, unjust,one). However, this violence cannot be erased by justice or rationality.But, similarly, violence cannot be hidden or forgoen by the State, thecommunity or a marching column, or by the church or religion. The biertaste (aertaste) in ones mouth or the remaining violence in the throat(in another place Lvinas talks about Abrahams arrire-got de cendre etpoussire23) is the precondition for true proof that violence did exist (andthat it has yet to occur) and that there will always be eternal responsibilityfor it. Only this remnant of violence which is found a priori in Lvinass everytestimony and which best explains his discourse concerning responsibilityfor the other, can lead us to an examination of violence perpetrated by theother against the third or the third against the other. But, I must once againrepeat that with Lvinas cet arrire-got de violence absolutely eliminatesmy discourse or my testimony concerning violence commied against me.This is Lvinass great innovation.

I would now like to mention several sentences from a very famousinterview with Lvinas of September 28, 198224. The State of Israel is alsomentioned in this interview, as is the Jew and the violence which the other

commits against the third and the third against the other.Before and aer this interview, and certainly in harmony with the

diculty of constituting a just State of Israel, Lvinas begins to speak aboutmy legitimate resistance to violence. In 1977, Lvinas says:

22 Ibid, 108f. Cet arrire-got de violence does not exist in the English translation. Because atthe messianic moment He must sacrice the wicked to the good. Because in the just act thereis still a violence that causes suering. Even when the act is reasonable, when the act is just,it entails violence [] This is also why the necessary commitment is so dicult for the Jew;this is why the Jew cannot commit himself without also disengaging himself, even when hecommits himself to a just cause; the Jew can never march o to war with banners unfurled, to the

triumphal strains of military music and with the Churchs blessing. Lvinas, Dicult Freedom.Essays on Judaism, 79f.23 Emmanuel Lvinas, Nouvelles lectures talmudiques (Paris: Minuit, 1996), 92.24 Cf. Emmanuel Lvinas, Isral: thique et politique, entretiens avec S. Malka (avec AlainFinkielkraut), Les Nouveaux Cahiers 71 (1983): 1-8. In the past few years this interview has beenheavily criticized in England and the United States. Cf. The well-known asco of Lvinas,in Organs without Bodies, Slavoj Zizek (London: Routledge, 2003), 106. The interview has beentranslated into English as Ethics and Politics, in The Lvinas Reader, ed. Sean Hand (London:Basil Blackwell, 1989). As an introduction to this translation, the genesis of an incident whichoccurred on September 15 is explained (on page 288). An incident during which Christiansoldiers massacred several hundred people in the Sabra and Chatila Palestinian camps with nointervention on the part of the Israel Defence Forces. At rst Begin refused to set up a judicial

enquiry, commenting in the New York Times on 26 September that Goyim kill goyim, and theyimmediately come to hang the Jews.


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Ma rsistance commence lorsque le mal quil me fait(autrui), est fait un tiers qui est mon prochain. Cestle tiers, qui est la source de la justice, et par l de larpression justie ; cest la violence subie par le tiers quijustie que lon arrte de violence la violence de lautre25.

In an October 1982 interview (on the 3rd and 8th of October), inPhilosophie, Justice et Amour, Lvinas adjusts and changes thisperspective:

Quand je parle de Justice, jintroduis lide de la lueavec le mal, je me spare de lide de la non-rsistanceau mal. Si lautodfense fait problme, le bourreau estcelui qui menace le prochain et, dans ce sens, appelle laviolence et na plus de Visage. [] Ici souvre donc toute

la problmatique du bourreau : partir de la justice etla dfense de lautre homme, mon prochain, et pas dutout partir de la menace qui me concerne. [] Il y aune certaine mesure de la violence ncessaire partirde la justice []. Il y a une part de violence dans lEtat,mais qui peut comporter la justice. Cela ne veut pas direquil ne faut pas lviter, dans la mesure du possible ;tout ce qui la remplace dans la vie entre les Etats, toutce quon peut laisser la ngociation, la parole, estabsolument essentiel, mais on ne peut pas dire quilny ait aucune violence qui ne soit lgitime. [] Autrui

vous concerne mme lorsquun tiers lui fait du mal, etpar consquent vous tes l devant la ncessit de lajustice et dune certaine violence. Le tiers nest pas l paraccident. En un certain sens, tous les autres sont prsentsdans le visage dautrui. [] Orant ma joue celui quifrappe Mais je suis responsable de la perscutiondes prochains. Si jappartiens un peuple, ce peuple etmes proches sont aussi mes prochains. Ils ont droit la dfense comme ceux qui ne sont pas mes proches26.

Another one of Lvinass variations of this idea can be found in the1985 interview, Violence du Visage:

La violence est originellement justie comme ladfense de lautre, du prochain (ft-il mon parent oumon peuple!), mais est violence pour quelquun27.

25 Lvinas, De Dieu qui vient lide, 134.26 Lvinas, Philosophie, Justice et Amour, 123-25.27 Emmanuel Lvinas, Violence du Visage, inAltrit et transcendance (Paris : Fata morgana,1995), 173. It seems that prochain (the other in a moral sense [au sens moral du terme], asLvinas says), appears for the rst time in the text Langage et proximit in 1967. Lvinas

capitalizes the word le prochain. In the introduction to the book Lau-del du verset: Lectures etdiscours talmudiques (Paris, Minuit, 1982), wrien in September 1981, Lvinas speaks about my


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Nowhere does Lvinas explicitly discuss the dierence betweenprochain andproche. This is perhaps whyproche is in the beginning translatedinto English as kin and as someone who is near to me (prochain is alwaysneighbor). However, le proche is one who is closer to me than le prochain

(le proche can be my friend and can certainly be of a dierent nationality).Lvinas says so implicitly. I will repeat several suggestions by Lvinaswhich can certainly be a precondition for a future text concerning Lvinassgreatest problem, auto-defense. Can or must one, but also when and who,defend themselves from the other (from the third, from the State)?

All these suggestions are overshadowed by the transformation of my(Lvinass) fear of hurting the third from 1954 and my fear for the innocentfrom 1969, into my fear for the other [la crainte pour autrui]28 from 1983 (theyears are completely arbitrary). Therefore, only much later does Lvinas

introduce the possibility that the other or the third can commit violence andhis answer is quite explicit: I am responsible for this, I must use violenceand protect the other, and I must die for the other and sacrice myself forthe other.

Two innovations: in contrast to Heidegger, my concern is always aconcern for the other; in contrast to Hobbes, the necessary existence of a justState (the instance of a protector) is a consequence of my fear for the life andsecurity of the other29.

Lvinass proposals: (a) Lvinas gives the same name neighbor[prochain] to both the one who is my other and my third [tiers]; (b) leproche has no privileged position in relation to one who is not my proche(both have the right to defense [droit la dfense]); (c) to have the right todefense [avoir ledroit la dfense] is a dual formulation: to have the rightto defend myself or to have the right for someone else to defend me? (d)the privileged position of le proche in relation to le prochain -only le prochehas the right to defense [avoir ledroit la dfense] is denitely erased byLvinas because sometimes the other aacks the third, and sometimes the

people and my family, who also, like strangers, demand justice and protection (they are the

others, near to me and my neighbors [autres, proches et prochains]).28 Emmanuel Lvinas, La conscience non intentionnelle (1983), in Entre nous (Paris: Grasset,1991), 13.29 Il signie un Etat au sens complet du terme, un Etat avec une arme et des armes, une armequi puisse avoir une signication dissuasive, et sil le faut dfensive. Sa ncessit est thique: cest eneet, une vieille ide thique qui commande prcisment de dfendre nos prochains. Mon peuple et mesproches, ce sont encore mes prochains. On dfend le prochain quand on dfend le peuple juif; chaque juif enparticulier dfend le prochain quand il dfend le peuple juif. It signies a State in the fullest sense ofthe term, the State with an army and arms, an army which can have a deterrent and if necessarya defensive signicance. Its necessity is ethical indeed; its an old ethical idea which commandsus precisely to defend our neighbours. My people and my kin are still my neighbours. Whenyou defend the Jewish people, you defend your neighbour; and every Jew in particulars defends

his neighbour when he defends the Jewish people. Lvinas, Isral: thique et politique, 4;Lvinas Ethics and Politics, 292.


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third aacks the other. Therefore, myproche can be violent towards the onewho is only myprochain.

In the September 28, 1982 interview, following the civilian(noncombatant) massacre, Lvinas repeats the idea of violence which never

has the same direction. This is Lvinass game of personal pronouns thatbegins with violence which we [nous] or me [moi] suer, but denitelyends with the suering of the others [autres] and with my responsibility.

Je ne crois pas du tout que la responsabilit ait des limites,que la responsabilit en moi ait des limites. Le moi, jele rpte, nest jamais quie envers autrui. Mais je pense,et il faut aussi le dire, que tous ceux qui nous aaquentdune manire si hargneuse ny ont pas droit et que, parconsquent, il y a certainement ct de ce sentiment de

responsabilit illimite une place pour une dfense, caril ne sagit pas toujours de moi mais de mes prochesqui sont mes prochains. A cee dfense je donne le nomde politique, mais de politique thiquement ncessaire.A ct de lthique, il y a place pour la politique30.

However, the others [autres] who should be defended, are the sameothers who someone else must defend themselves from.

Ma dnition de lautre est tout fait dirente. Lautre,cest le prochain, pas ncessairement le proche, mais le

proche aussi. Et dans ce sens-l, tant pour lautre, voustes pour le prochain. Mais si votre prochain aaque unautre prochain ou est injuste avec lui, que pouvez-vousfaire ? L, laltrit prend un autre caractre, l, danslaltrit peut apparatre un ennemi, ou du moins l sepose le problme de savoir qui a raison et qui a tort, quiest juste et qui est injuste. Il y a des gens qui ont tort 31.

30 I dont at all believe that there are limits to responsibility, that there are limits to

responsibility in myself. My self, I repeat, is never absolved from responsibility towards theOther. But I think we should also say that all those who aack us with such venom have noright to do so, and that consequently, along with this feeling of unbounded responsibility, thereis certainly a place for a defence, for it is not always a question of me, but of those close tome, who are also my neighbours. Id call such a defence a politics, but a politics thats ethicallynecessary. Alongside ethics, there is a place for politics. Lvinas, Isral: thique et politique,3; Lvinas Ethics and Politics, 291f.31 My denition of the other is completely dierent. The other is the neighbour, who isnot necessarily kin, but who can be. And in that sense, if youre for the other, youre for theneighbour. But if your neighbour aacks another neighbour or treats him unjustly, what can youdo? Then alterity takes on another character, in alterity we can nd an enemy, or at least thenwe are faced with the problem of knowing who is right and who is wrong, who is just and who

is unjust. There are people who are wrong. Lvinas, Isral: thique et politique, 5; LvinasEthics and Politics, 294.


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PETAR BOJANI

Mais si VOTRE prochain aaque un autre prochain ou est injuste avec lui,que pouvez-vous faire ? Is not the origin of Lvinass question, his concern andhis hesitation, already found in this explanation : voil pourquoi le juif ne peutpas sengager sans se dsengager aussitt, voil pourquoi il lui reste toujours cet

arrire-got de violence, mme quand il sengage pour une cause juste

Rf

Lvinas, Emmanuel. Le Moi et la Totalit. Revue de Mtaphysique et deMorale 4 (1954): 353-373. Republished in Entre nous. Paris: Grasset,1991.

Lvinas, Emmanuel. Totalit et Inni. La Haye, Boston, Londres: MartinusNho, 1961.

Lvinas, Emmanuel. Textes messianiques. En Dicile libert. Essais sur lejudasme. Paris: Albin Michel, 1963.

Lvinas, Emmanuel. Dicile libert. Essais sur le judasme. Paris: Albin Michel,1963.

Lvinas, Emmanuel. Autrement qutre ou au-del de lessence. La Haye,Boston, Londres: Kluwer Academic, 1974.

Lvinas, Emmanuel. Du sacr au saint. Paris: Minuit, 1977.

Lvinas, Emmanuel. De Dieu qui vient lide. Paris: Vrin, 1982.Lvinas, Emmanuel. Isral: thique et politique, entretiens avec S. Malka

(avec Alain Finkielkraut). Les Nouveaux Cahiers 71 (1983) : 1-8.Lvinas, Emmanuel. Ethics and Politics. In The Lvinas Reader, edited by

Sean Hand. London: Basil Blackwell, 1989.

Lvinas, Emmanuel. Dicult Freedom. Essays on Judaism. London: TheAthlone Press, 1990.

Lvinas, Emmanuel. Lontologie est-elle fondamentale [1951]. In Entrenous. Paris: Grasset, 1991.

Lvinas, Emmanuel. Philosophie, Justice et Amour. In Entre nous. Paris:Grasset, 1991.

Lvinas, Emmanuel. De lUnicit. In Entre nous. Paris: Grasset, 1991.Lvinas, Emmanuel. Dieu, la mort et le temps. Paris: Grasset, 1993.Lvinas, Emmanuel. Libert et commandement. Paris: Fata morgana, 1994.Lvinas, Emmanuel. Violence du Visage. InAltrit et transcendance. Paris:

Fata morgana, 1995.Lvinas, Emmanuel. Nouvelles lectures talmudiques. Paris: Minuit, 1996.Lvinas, Emmanuel. Of God who comes to Mind. Stanford: Stanford University

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Husserl, Edmund.Mditations Cartsiennes. Introduction la phnomnologie.Paris: Vrin, 1992.

Derrida, Jacques.Adieu Emmanuel Lvinas. Paris: Galile, 1997.

Zizek, Slavoj. Organs without Bodies. London: Routledge, 2003.

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