Living substance conquers the frenzy of destruction only in the ecstasy of procreation.
Walter BenjaminRead
If mythic violence is lawmaking, divine violence is law-destroying; if the former sets boundaries, the latter boundlessly destroys them; if mythic violence brings at once guilt and retribution, divine power only expiates; if the former threatens, the latter strikes; if the former is bloody, the latter is lethal without spilling blood
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote contrasts two forms of violence: mythic violence that establishes laws and boundaries, and divine violence that dismantles them.
Walter Benjamin's quote explores the dichotomy between mythic and divine violence. Mythic violence represents a societal force that creates laws and norms, leading to guilt and punishment, while divine violence is portrayed as a liberating force that transcends those laws and boundaries. The former is restrictive and often violent, whereas the latter is transformative and radical, exemplifying a profound shift in understanding justice and power.
Themes
ViolenceLawMythDivineLiberationTransformation
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion on the nature of justice in a philosophy class.
More from Walter Benjamin
All quotes →The illiterate of the future will not be the man who cannot read the alphabet, but the one who cannot take a photograph.
Walter BenjaminRead
Writers are really people who write books not because they are poor, but because they are dissatisfied with the books which they could buy but do not like.
Walter BenjaminRead
Nothing is poorer than a truth expressed as it was thought. Committed to writing in such cases, it is not even a bad photograph. Truth wants to be startled abruptly, at one stroke, from her self-immersion, whether by uproar, music or cries for help.
Walter BenjaminRead
I am unpacking my library. Yes I am. The books are not yet on the shelves, not yet touched by the mild boredom of order.
Walter BenjaminRead
How many cities have revealed themselves to me in the marches I undertook in the pursuit of books!
Walter BenjaminRead
Similar quotes
Pride and curiosity are the two scourges of our souls. The latter prompts us to poke our noses into everything, and the former forbids us to leave anything unresolved and undecided.
Michel De MontaigneRead
For the Lord touched all parts of creation, and freed and undeceived them all from every deceit.
Athanasius Of AlexandriaRead
A man may build himself a throne of bayonets, but he cannot sit on it.
William Ralph IngeRead
After everything that's happened, how can the world still be so beautiful? Because it is.
Margaret AtwoodRead
I believe the moral losses of expediency always far outweigh the temporary gains.
Wendell WillkieRead
An understanding of Sor Juana's work must include an understanding of the prohibitions her work confronts. Her speech leads us to what cannot be said, what cannot be said to an orthodoxy, the orthodoxy to a tribunal, and the tribunal to a sentence.
Octavio PazRead