Desire in Ren Girard and Jesus [Hardcover]

William Newells book on Ren? Girard is must reading for anyone interested in this original thinker who has become increasingly important in psychological, philosophical, and theological circles.Desire in Ren? Girard and Jesus presents a comprehensive analysis of Ren? Girards work on the origins of culture and the depths of human desire. Girards hypothesis of mimesis discloses the lack of originality in human desire even as it offers a scientific method for handling religion after two centuries of its absence in the social scienceWilliam L. Newell presents a comprehensive analysis of Ren? Girards work on the origins of culture and the depths of human desire. Girard makes no claim toward a theory of religion, but he lays the groundwork for a postmodern theory of it. Girards desire concerns fallen humanity, those insanely imitating what they lacked, and his use of the Bible brings back into play the idea of the holy in secular academia. Newell challenges Girards interpretation of Jesuss Passion as non-sacrificial and he offers a close reading of Girards works on mimetic desire, scape-goating, and sacrifice, and Newell creates breakthrough theology on Jesus in the Excursus. Girard makes no claim to having a theory of religion, but he lays the groundwork for a postmodern theory of it, and in this book, Newell seeks to begin a theory of the end of the sacred and what will be in its place: the holy.Part IChapter 1: A Foundational MurderChapter 2: Ressentiment RedivivusChapter 3: Violence, Myth and the SacredChapter 4: Logos in Heraclitus and JohnChapter 5: Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the WorldChapter 6: Christs Passion: A Non-Sacrificial DeathPart IIChapter 7: Jesus Foundational EventExcursus: Jesus: a LifeConclusionWilliam Newell is professor of philosophy at Eastern Connecticut State University.