sheep and goats, good and evil, will not be corrected by silence about evil any more than by sentimentalism that sweeps all distinctions in human behavior under the rug of bourgeois niceness; it will only be changed and deepened by an anthropology that recognizes both the call to obedience and the need for forgiveness even where those ordinarily regarded as ‘good’ are concerned.2
It is my conviction that mimetic theory provides the key to the understanding of our human nature that is being encountered in the bible. The cultural dynamic of centralized power has set in motion human rivalry and violence which we must be “saved from” for human life to continue on this planet. It is my hope that the following readings and commentary speak to the violence, fear, and oppression prevalent in our world, and provide some illustrations as to how biblical texts can nurture in us a living Word and a viable salvation story for our time.
If there is a principal guiding my selection of texts I would say it is the passages of scripture that stand out to me as being lost in the polarity of the present culture. I avoid subheadings for the texts because I do not want to frame the reading of the text in any other way than a sense for the dynamics of mimetic theory. I chose the word “salvation” in my title because fundamentalism has stalled our culture in a senseless debate between evolution and creationism, never getting us out of the first article of the creed—never moving us beyond the issue of creation to the event of salvation. Girard is centered in a reading of scripture from the cross of Jesus Christ—the central drama of our salvation.
1. Dawkins, The God Delusion, 191–207.
2. Hall, Waiting for Gospel, 14.
Acknowledgments
Through encountering the work of René Girard I have grown in an understanding and an appreciation as to how the life and example of other people have become part of my own engagement with scripture. By their passion for teaching scripture, its historical/cultural context, its languages, and its relationship to so many other disciplines, I have been nurtured and mentored as an educator and pastor.
I want to acknowledge the following people: Rita Burns, Tom Suriano, Dan DiDomizio, Gary Boelhower, Joan Leonard, Loretta Dornisch, David McCarthy, Fran Leap, James Bailey, Nate Frambach, Ann Fritschel, Norma Cook Everist, David Lull, Shannon Jung, Ray Martin, Craig Nessan, Duane Larson, Elizabeth Leeper, James Nieman, Dan Olson, May Burt Persaud, Winston Persaud, Duane Priebe, Gwen Sayler, Thomas Schattauer, and Bill Weiblin.
Thank you to my wife, Kathy O’Brien Froemming, for her love, perseverance, and patience for being with me on my journey in ministry. Thank you to our daughter, Caitlin, and son, Brian, for conversations, feedback, and encouragement to write.
Thank you to Craig Nessan, James Alison, Duane Larson, and Douglas John Hall for reading my work and providing valuable feedback.
Thank you to George Carlson, my ordaining bishop, who gathered his first call pastors to read Douglas John Hall.
Thank you to the communities of Christ Lutheran Church, Lancaster, Wisconsin, and St. Paul Lutheran Church, Potosi, Wisconsin, who have supported me in my ministry.
I give a special thank you to long-time friends Sam and Arlene Jackson, and Gloria Krueger who have supported my journey in ministry.
Rev David R. Froemming
1 Samuel 8
1 When Samuel became old, he made his sons judges over Israel . . . 3 Yet his sons did not follow in his ways, but turned aside after gain; they took bribes and perverted justice. 4 Then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah, 5 and said to him, “You are old and your sons do not follow in your ways; appoint for us, then, a king to govern us, like other nations.” 6 But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, “Give us a king to govern us.” Samuel prayed to the LORD 7 and the LORD said to Samuel, “Listen to the voice of the people in all that they say to you; for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them. 8 Just as they have done to me, from the day I brought them up out of Egypt to this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so also they are doing to you. 9 Now then, listen to their voice; only—you shall solemnly warn them, and show them the ways of the king who shall reign over them.” 10 So Samuel reported all the words of the LORD to the people who were asking him for a king. 11 He said, “These will be the ways of the king who will reign over you: he will take your sons and appoint them to his chariots and to be his horsemen, and to run before his chariots; 12 and he will appoint for himself commanders of thousands and commanders of fifties, and some to plow his ground and to reap his harvest, and to make his implements of war and the equipment of his chariots. 13 He will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks and bakers. 14 He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive orchards and give them to his courtiers. 15 He will take one-tenth of your grain and of your vineyards and give it to his officers and his courtiers. 16 He will take your male and female slaves, and the best of your cattle and donkeys, and put them to his work. 17 He will take one-tenth of your flocks, and you shall be his slaves. 18 And in that day you will cry out because of your king, whom you have chosen for yourselves; but the LORD will not answer you in that day.” 19 But the people refused to listen to the voice of Samuel; they said, “No! but we are determined to have a king over us, 20 so that we also may be like other nations, and that our king may govern us and go out before us and fight our battles.”
I begin with the above story from 1 Samuel 8 because it illustrates the human nature of copying the actions of one another. No matter what Samuel tells the Israelites concerning the trials and tribulations of having a king, the Israelites want a king “so that they may be like other nations.” René Girard refers to this trait in humans with the Greek word mimesis, which means “to mimic.” Mimesis, copying, is the basis of all life forms, yet even more so in humans.1 In his book The Selfish Gene, Richard Dawkins notes that genes for mimicry are favored in natural selection.2 Girard states that it is the increase in the ability to imitate one another that led to the development of the brain for homo sapiens—humans.3
While our human ability to imitate one another is the basis for all of our learning and development, it also contains the root of our conflict, which begins in opposing individuals or parties desiring to imitate the same thing, thus bringing about rivalry. The above reading from Samuel makes this connection as Samuel illustrates how having a king will lead them into wars with their neighbors. The king will make their sons and daughters into slaves, and take their crops and livestock from them (verses 12–17). Samuel has recalled the very events that led the Israelites to being slaves into Egypt, and yet they insist on having a king.
That we copy others makes us radically social beings much more than individuals. All our inventiveness and all our works of creative beauty comes through mimesis. Yet at the same time, nothing more than our ability to imitate lends to our being more combative and more violent than all other mammals.4 In fact the only other species besides humans who conduct warfare and slavery are social insects such as ants.5 This paradox takes me to a saying from Martin Luther, namely that human beings are simultaneously saints and sinners.6
It is my conviction that the stories in the bible reveal the human capacity for violence and that this violence is ultimately not from God, but rather the gods fashioned by the people that are representations (idols) of their own doing. For too long now, the biblical accounts have been mistaken to be just more stories of primitive mythology. René Girard charges this is because we do not know how to decipher the documents we do possess.