I See Satan Fall Like Lightning QUOTES

21 " The account thus shows once again the omnipotence of mimetic contagion. What motivates Pilate, as he hands Jesus over, is the fear of a riot. He demonstrates "political skill," as they say. This is true, no doubt, but why does political skill almost always consist of giving in to violent contagion? "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

22 " The commandment that prohibits desiring the goods of one's neighbor attempts to resolve the number one problem of every human community: internal violence. "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

23 " What Jesus invites us to imitate is his own desire, the spirit that directs him toward the goal on which his intention is fixed: to resemble God the Father as much as possible. "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

24 " He exclaims, "Happy is the one not scandalized by me." There will be throughout Christian history a tendency of Christians themselves to choose Jesus as an alternative scandal, that is, a tendency to lose themselves and merge into the mob of persecutors. For St. Paul, consequently, the Cross is the scandal par excellence. I would observe that the symbolism of the traditional cross, the crossing of the two branches, renders visible the internal contradiction of the scandal. The "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

25 " Toujours et partout on peut résumer la situation initiale en termes d'une crise qui fait peser sur la communauté et son système culturel une menace de destruction totale. Cette crise est presque toujours résolue par la violence. "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

26 " 2. "Mimetic doubles" refers to the situation in which rivals become so obsessed with each other that they mirror each other's emotions and actions. The doubles are alike but they mistakenly see a great difference between them. Mimetic doubles are quite dangerous to one another and to others and can be quite self-destructive. —Trans. "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

27 " The high priest Caiaphas alludes to this mechanism when he says, "It is better that one man die and that the whole nation not perish." The four accounts of the Crucifix-ion thus enable us to witness the unfolding of the working of the single victim mechanism. The sequence of events, as I have already said, resembles numerous analogous phenomena whose director and producer is Satan. The "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

28 " The powers and principalities want to be “revolutionary” now, and they reproach Christianity for not defending victims with enough ardor. In Christian history they see nothing but persecutions, acts of oppression, inquisitions. This other totalitarianism presents itself as the liberator of humanity. In trying to usurp the place of Christ, the powers imitate him in the way a mimetic rival imitates his model in order to defeat him. They denounce the Christian concern for victims as hypocritical and a pale imitation of the authentic crusade against oppression and persecution for which they would carry the banner "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

29 " The road on which Satan starts us is broad and easy; it is the superhighway of mimetic crisis. But then suddenly there appears an unexpected obstacle between us and the object of our desire, and to our consternation, just when we thought we had left Satan far behind us, it is he, or one of his surrogates, who shows up to block the route. This is the first of many transformations of Satan: the seducer of the beginnings is transformed quickly into a forbidding adversary, an opponent more serious than all the prohibitions not yet transgressed. The secret of Satan's troublesome transformation is easy to discover. The second Satan is the conversion of the mimetic model into a rival, and this process, which was described in chapter 1, brings about scandals. Because our models suggest their own desires to us, they inevitably oppose the resulting desire. Once prohibitions are transgressed, another kind of obstacle rises up that is more tenacious still, though it is concealed at first by the very protection the prohibitions offer, as long as they are respected. "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

30 " Saving the adulterous woman from being stoned, as Jesus does, means that he prevents the violent contagion from getting started. Another contagion in the reverse direction is set off, however, a contagion of nonviolence. From the moment the first individual gives up stoning the adulterous woman, he becomes a model who is imitated more and more until finally all the group, guided by Jesus, abandons its plan to stone the woman. Our two texts are as opposed to one another as possible in spirit, and yet they resemble each other since they are two examples of mimetic escalation. Their independent origin makes this resemblance very significant. The texts help us better understand the dynamic of crowds that must be defined, not primarily by violence or by nonviolence, but by imitation, by contagious imitation. The fact that Jesus' saying continues to play a metaphorical role universally understood in a world where ritual stoning no longer exists suggests that mimetic contagion remains as powerful today as in the past, though in forms now usually less violent. The symbolism of the first stone is still understandable because the mimetic definition of collective behavior remains just as valid now as it was two thousand years ago, even if the physical act of stoning is no longer practiced. In order to suggest the tremendous role of violent contagion in human culture, Jesus does not resort to the abstract terms that we can hardly do without: imitation, contagion, mimesis, etc. The first stone suffices. This unique saying permits him to point to the true principle not only of ancient stonings but of all crowd phenomena, ancient and modern.5 "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

31 " For the first time in human history the divine and collective violence are separated from one another. The Bible rejects the gods created by sacralized violence. "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

32 " Let us not confuse true enlightenment with the idolatry of the here and now. "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

33 " Father, forgive them because they don't know what they are doing” (23:34). Here, as with all the sayings of Jesus, it is crucial to avoid emptying what he says of its basic sense by reducing it to a rhetorical formula, to a kind of sentimental exaggeration, for example. We should always take Jesus at his word. He expresses the powerlessness of those caught up in the mimetic snowballing process to see what moves and compels them. Persecutors think they are doing good, the right thing; they believe they are working for justice and truth; they believe they are saving their community. "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

34 " In a society that has fallen prey to anarchy the voracious appetite for persecution feeds on victims indiscriminately, as long as they are weak and vulnerable. The least pretext is enough. No one really cares about the guilt or innocence of the victim. "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

35 " it's a bad idea to condemn Holy Scripture hastily. When we feel like dismissing Scripture, we should watch out. Perhaps we are not, at that moment, up to what our task requires. "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

36 " Jesus transcends the Law, but in the Law's own sense and direction. He does this by appealing to the most humane aspect of the legal prescription, the aspect most foreign to the contagion of violence, which is the obligation of the two accusers to throw the first two stones. The Law deprives the accusers of a mimetic model. Once "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

37 " If Jesus returned their looks, these angry men would not see his look as it really is but would transform it into a mirror of their own anger. Their own challenge, their own provocation, is what they would read in the look of Jesus, no matter how peaceable it really is, and they would feel provoked in return. The confrontation could no longer be avoided and would bring about what Jesus is trying to prevent, the stoning of the victim. Jesus avoids thus even the shadow of provocation. When "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

38 " The Cross is the equivalent of the Ephesus stoning. To say that Jesus identifies himself with all victims is to say that he identifies himself not only with the adulterous woman or the Suffering Servant but also with the beggar of Ephesus. Jesus is this poor wretch of a beggar. —————————————————— "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

39 " THE TENTH COMMANDMENT signals a revolution and prepares the way for it. This revolution comes to fruition in the New Testament. If Jesus never speaks in terms of prohibitions and always in terms of models and imitation, it is because he draws out the full consequences of the lesson offered by the tenth commandment. It is not due to inflated self-love that he asks us to imitate him; it is to turn us away from mimetic rivalries. "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

40 " Many people believe they are faithful to Jesus, and yet they address superficial reproaches to the Gospels. This shows that they remain subject to mimetic rivalries and their violent one-upmanship. If we don't see that the choice is inevitable between the two supreme models, God and the devil, then we have already chosen the devil and his mimetic violence. Our "

― René Girard , I See Satan Fall Like Lightning