Benjamin+ +Critique+of+Violence

8/13/2019 Benjamin+ +Critique+of+Violence

1/18

WALTER BE

A Gennall philosophel; iVa Iter became aile l1Iostalld cultllral theorists the twentieth century. He was born into all

ill Berlin, then studied philosophy in im r l 1 f W f l 11

and Bern.

criticism and translation.leddoctoral ;1, ,tnii ' l1

embarked ll a career of liteI'm),Goethe's Elective Affinities

r,-/it,r; more specifically, his unconvellfiol1a/

Drama trails.,an academic career were

rejected his dissertation.

the Nazis came to power in 1933 Germany for Paris.i l l 194 when the Nazis France. Headillg toward he illtended to

escape to the United States, but was CIIptured; on finding out that he would be turnedhe killed the Fmllco-Sprwish border.

ll art suggests /lot that art and social are il1extriCilble

but also that to the extent that social life is characterized technology and class, the

the to take politicn[ action cOl/sistellt with hisor her artistic ideals. nlis conviction later into a offascisllland allY stance.

His other works inclllde Illuminations trans., Reflections: Essays

Writings The Arcades

alld Understanding Brecht (English trans., His

emergent Soviet Union, written27, are recorded in the Moscow Diaries (English trans.,

a visit to Moscow i111926- 111e following essay s

Reflections.

W LTER BEN IN

The task of a of violence can be summarized as that of its

relation to law and For a cause however becomes violent in

the sense of the word only when it bears on moral issues. The sphere of

these issues is defined the concepts ofl w nd justice. With regard to the firstit is clear that the most l l V U ~ H Pwithin any system

\


2/18


3/18

antinomy would prove insoluble if the common assumption were

false if means on the one hand and just ends on the other were in

irreconcilable conflict. No insight into this problem could be

until the circular argument had been broken and

both of just ends and of justified means were established.

The realm of ends and therefore also the of a criterion of justnessis excluded for the time from this study. the central place is

to the of the of certain means that constitute

Principles of natural law cannot decide this question but can lead to

bottomless For if positive law is blind to the absoluteness of

natural law is equally so to the of means. n the other the

of law is basis at the outset of this

study because it undertakes a fundamental distinction between kinds of vio

lence independently of cases of their application. This distinction is between

historically so-called sanctioned and unsanctioned vi-

olence. If the considerations from this it cannot of course

mean that given forms of violence are classified in terms of whether they are

sanctioned or not. For in a critique of violence a criterion for the latter in

law cannot concern its uses but only its evaluation. The that

concerns us is what light is thrown on the nature of violence the fact thatsuch a criterion or distinction can be to it at all or in other what

of this distinction? That this distinction supplied positive law1S based on the nature of violence and by any

will soon enough be shown but at the same time light will be shed on thein which alone such a distinction can be made. To sum up: if the criterion

established

regard to its . ' U U H b ' must be criticized with

to its value. For this a standpoint outside legal philosO-but also outside natural law must be found. The extent to which it can

be furnished a historico-philosophical view oflaw will emerge.

The and illegitimate violenceis not obvious. The which a

distinction is drawn between violence used for and ends must be

it has already been indicated that law

demands of all violence a proof of its historicalconditions is declared sanctioned. Since the of legal

violence is most evident in a deliberate submission to its ends a

thetical distinction between kinds of violence must be based on the presence or

absence of a historical acknowledgment of its ends. Ends that lack such

may be called natural the other legal ends. The

27 W LTER BENJAMIN


4/18

be ost clearly traced

sake of the

pean conditions.

canlegal conditions. For the

of these, as far as the individual as is ISIhe not to admit the natural ends of such individuals in all those cases

in which such ends in a given situation, be violence.

This means: this legal tries to erect, in all areas where individual ends

be pursued by legal ends that can only be realized by

legal power. Indeed, it strives to limit by ends even those areas in which

natural ends are admitted in principle within wide like that of

education, as soon as these natural ends are with an excessive measureof violence, as in the laws to the limits of educational to

I t can be formulated as a maxim of present-day European

that all the natural ends of individuals must collide with legal ends if

or lesser degree of violence. contradiction between

this and the of self-defense will be resolved in what Prom this

As a

not; for then violence as such would not beut thaI directed to illegal ends. I t will be that a

cannot be maintained i f natural ends are

first this is a mereconsider the surprising possibility thai the law's interest in a monopoly of

violence vis-a-vis individuals is not the intention of

legal by that of preserving the law that violence, whennot in the hands of the threatens it not by the ends that it may pursue ut by

its mere existence outside the law. The same more if

one reflects how often the figure of the criminal, however repellent his

ends may have been, has aroused the secret admiration of the public. This

cannot result from his deed, ut from the violence to

witness. In this case, the violence of which

in all areas of activity to the individual appears really and

arouses even in defeat the ,,,nn.,tI',,, of the mass against law. By what funclion

violence can with reason seem so to and be so feared by it, mustbe evident where its even in the legal system, is

This is above all the case in the class r11O ''''>. in the form of the workers'

to strike. labor is apart from the state,

entitled to exercise violence. Against this view there

RITIQUE OF VIOLEN E 271


5/18

is the that an omission a UVU '_, , ' ' ' i , which a strike

is cannot be described as violence. Such a consideration doubtless madeit easier for a state poser to conceive the right to strike, once this was noavoidable. But its truth is not and therefore not unrestricted. I t is

true that the omission of an where it amounts simply to anonviolent, pure means. And as in the

view of the state, or the

a to exercise violence

exercised by the strikes

to strike conceded to labor is

rather, to escape from a violence

to this may occur

from time to time and involve only a "withdrawal" or "estrangement" from the

. The moment of violence, 1S introduced, in the

form of into such an omission, if it takes in the context of a

conscious readiness to resume the suspended action under certain circum

stances that either have whatever to do with this action or only super-

modify it. Understood in this way the to strike constitutes in the

view of which is opposed to that of the state, the right to use force in

attaining certain ends. The antithesis between the two emerges in

all its bitterness in face of a revolutionary strike. In this, labor will

to its right to strike, and the state will call this appeal an since the

to strike was not "so intended," and take emergency measures. For the stateretains the to declare that a simultaneous use of strike in all industries is

illegal, since theI n this differen ce

objective contradiction in the

violence whose ends, as natural ends, it sometimesbut in a crisis (the revolutionary general strike) confronts

everf ' C U . U VA J L ' - ' U

this may appear at first sight, even conduct theexercise of a right canviolent. More

VI',. , , P. < . under certain circumstances, be described as

then may be called violent if it

exerClses a in order to overthrow the system that has conferred it;

when it is nevertheless to be so described if it constitutes extortion inthe sense above. I t therefore reveals an contradiction in thelegal situation, but not a contradiction in the if under certain cir-

cumstances the law meets the as perpetrators of violence, with violence.

For in a strike the state fears above all else that function of violence which it is

the of this study to identify as the only secure foundation of its

. For if violence were, as first appears, the means to secure directly what-

ever happens to be it could fulfill its end as predatory violence. I t would

be entirely unsuitable as a basis or a modification to, stable condi-

tions. The strike that it can be so, that it is able to found and

7 W LTER BENJAMIN


6/18

legal however offended the sense of may find itselfI t will be objected that such a function of violence is fortuitous and

isolated. This can be rebutted by a consideration of military violence.

The of law rests on the same objective contradic-

tion in the legal situation as does that of strike that is to say, on the fact thatsanction violence whose ends remain for the sanctioners natural

and can therefore in a crisis come into conflict with their own or

natural ends. Admittedly, violence is in the first used di-

toward its ends. Yet it is very striking that even-or

conditions that know hardly the beginnings of

and even in cases where the victor has established

himself in invulnerable possession, a peace ceremony is necessary. In

deed, the word in the sense in which it is the correlative to the word

war (for there is also a different meaning, similarly and

political, the one used by Kant in of Eternal Peace ), denotes this a

priori, necessary of all other of every

victory. This sanction consists precisely in the new conditions as a

new law, quite of whether need de f cto any of theircontinuation. If, conclusions can be drawn from military as

being of all violence used for natural there isinherent in all such violence a H H u u a l l1 , character. We shall return later to the

of this insight. I t the above-mentioned of mod-

ern law to divest the individual, at least as a

that directed only to natural ends. In the

the law with the threat a newIJl

times. The state, ' -rur ,,,,,,.

even

criminal this violence confronts

a threat that even today, despite its

as it did in primeval

~ J n -it as lawmaking whenever external powersto concede them the to conduct and classes the right to strike.

If in the last war the of violence was the point for aof violence in at least one thing, that

violence is no longer exercised and tolerated violence wasnot to criticism for its lawmaking but was also

perhaps more for another of its functions. For a duality in the

function of violence is characteristic which could only come into

being Militarism is the compulsory, universal useof violence as a means to the ends of the state. This

has been scrutinized as closely as, or still more

violence itself. In it violence shows itself in a function quite different from its

application for natural ends. For the subordination of citizens to laws-

CRITIQUE O VIOLENCE 73


7/18

in the present case, to the law of general conscription is a legal end. f hat firstfunction of violence is called the function, this second will be called

lence that is not in from a effective

of it is far less easy than the declamations of pacifists and activists suggest.coincides with the of all legal violence that

or executive force and cannot be performed by any

lesser program. Nor, of course unless one is to achildish anarchism is it achieved any constraint

toward persons and Whatexcludes reflection on the moral and historical spheres, and thereby on

any meaning in

the fact that even the

tive, with its doubtless incontestable minimum

at all times you use both in your person and in the person of all othersas an and never as a means is in itself inadequate for such a

critique. (One might, rather, doubt whether the famous demand does not contain too little, that is whether it is to use, or allow to be oneself

or another in any as a means. Very good for such doubt couldbe For if conscious of its roots, will claim to

and promote the interest of mankind in the person of each incli-

viduaL I t sees this interest in the and of an order

by fate. While this view which claims to preserve law in its verycannot escape nevertheless all attacks that are made merely in thename of a formless freedom;' without being able to this higher order of

freedom, remain against it. And most impotent of all when, instead ofattacking the root and branch, laws

that the law of course, takes under the

resides in the fact that there iswhat belongs

and in

to its order. For law-preservingviolence is a threatening violence. And its threat is not intended as the deterrentthat uninformed liberal theorists it to be. A deterrent in the exact sense

would a that contradicts the nature of a threat and is not

attained by any law since there is of its arm. This makes itall the more like which depends on whether the criminal is

purpose of the of the threat will

There is a useful pointer to it in thethe validity of positive law has been called into question, has

7 4 W LTER BENJAMIN


8/18

more criticism than all others. However superficial the arguments

may in most cases have been, their motives were and are rooted in principle. Then l n ( ) T 1 Pn r s of these critics perhaps without knowing why and probably

that an attack on not measure,

notlaws,

butlaw itself in its For violence crowned by

IS

the of law then it may be readily supposed that where the highest vio-

lence, that over life and death, occurs in the legal the origins oflaw

with this is the fact that

even for such crimes ashe deathoffenses against to which it seems quite out of Its pur

pose is not to punish the infringement of law but to establish new law. For in theexercise of violence over life and death more than in any other act, law

reaffirms itself. But in this very violence rotten in law is

above all to a finer because the latter knows itself to beremote from conditions in which fate have shown itself in

such a sentence. Reason must, however, to approach such conditions all

the more resolutely, if it is to bring to a conclusion of both lawmak-

and violence.

In a far more unnatural combination than in the death in a kind of

mixture, these two forms of violence are in another institutionof the modern state, the police. this is violence for ends (in the rightof disposition), but with the simultaneous authority to decide these ends itself

within wide limits the right of decree). The ignominy of such an authority,

which is felt few because its ordinances suffice seldom for the

crudest acts, but are therefore allowed to rampage all the more in the

most vulnerable areas and thinkers, from whom the state is not pro-

law-this ignominy lies in the fact that in this the separationand violence is suspended. If the first is required to

prove its worth in to the restriction that it may not

set itself new ends. Police violence is U U ' ' ' ' I ~ ' ' ' ~ ' 'from both conditions. I t isfor its characteristic function is not the promulgation of laws but

the assertion of legal claims for any decree, and because it is at

the of these ends. The assertion that the ends of police violence are

identical or even connected to those of law is untrue.

the law of the really marks the

from impotence or because of the immanent connections within any legal

system, can no longer through the the empirical ends

that it desires at any to attain. Therefore the police intervene for security

reasons in countless cases where no clear when they arenot the citizen



9/18

as a bru tal encumbrance a life regulated by or simply

which aclmowledges in the determined

by place and time a category that it a claim to critical evalua

tion, a consideration of the police institution encounters nothing essential at all.

Its power is formless, like its nowhere all-pervasive, ghostly presence inthe life of civilized states. And the may, in particulars, ,> . ,,, -

appear the same, it cannot be denied that their is less r 1 ~ ' , , ~ +

where they represent, in absolute monarchy, the power of a ruler in which

legislative and executive supremacy are united, than in democracies where their

elevated by no such bears witness to the greatest conceivable(lege11er atJon of violence.

All violence as a means is either or W_ W p


10/18

feeling in every comr)romisc ClI. , IJ lJ lIl .o lIiLJlY, the

alienated as many minds from the ideal of a nonviolent resolution

conflicts as were attracted to it by the war. The pacifists are con

by the Bolsheviks and

a U l ~ ; I U ~ ~ l V H

cannot be concerned with parliamentarianism. For what parliament achieves in

vital affairs can only be those decrees that in their origin and outcome are

by violence.s any nonviolent resolution of conflict Without doubt. The rela-

persons are full of examples of this. Nonviolent IS

wherever a civilized outlook allows the means

and illegal means of every kind that are all the same violent may be

confronted with nonviolent ones as

p e a C ~ a b l l e l l e s s ,trust, and whatever else

subjective preconditions. Their objective manifestation, however, is determined

by the law the enormous scope of which cannot be discussed that un-

means are never those of direct, but always those of indirect solutions.

They therefore never to the resolution of conflict between manand man, but only to matters The of nonviolent

to goods. For thiseans opens up in the realm of human conflicts

reason technique in the broadest sense of the word is their most particular area.fu c o ~ ~ ~ a ~

exclusion of violence in

cant factor: thereis

no sanction for lying. on earthoriginally such a sanction. This makes clear that there is a sphere

human that is nonviolent to the extent that it is inaccessible to

violence: the proper of Only late and in a

peculiar process violence in the

on fraud. POl whereas the to its vic-

torious power, is content to defeat lawbreaking wherever it to show

itself and deception, itself no trace of power about it, was on the princi-ius ivile n W : t - unistlmenl in Roman and

confidence in its own

violence, no felt itself a match for that of all others. fear of the

latter and mistrust of itself indicate its declining vitality. I t begins to set itself

with the intention of sparing law-preserving violence more taxing man-

ifestatiol1s. I t turns to not out of moral considerations, but for

CRITIQUE O f VIOLENCE 77


11/18

fear of the violence that it might unleash in the defrauded party. Since such fear

conflicts with the violent nature of law derived from its origins, such ends arene> , ' , . , t , , , tp to the justified means oflaw. the of its

but also a diminution means. For, in fraud, lawrestricts the use of wholly nonviolent means because could produce reac-

tive violence. This tendency oflaw has also played a in the concession of the

right to strike, which contradicts the interests of the state. I t grants this right

because it forestalls violent actions the state is afraid to oppose. Did not

resort at once to and set fire to factories? To induce men to

reconcile their interests peacefully without involving the legal system, there is in

the apart from all virtues, one effective motive that often enough puts into

the most reluctant hands pure instead of violent means; i t is the fear of mutual

that threaten to arise from violent whatever the

be. Such motives are visible in countless cases of conflict

of interests between persons. I t is different when classes and nations are

in conflict, since the higher orders that threaten to overwhelm equally victor

and are hidden from the feelings of most, and from the

of almost alL Space does not here me to trace such orders and the

to which constitute the most

means. Vlfe can therefore only to pure means in

common interests

motive for apolitics as aUalU 5U

vate persons.

to those which govern peaceful intercourse between pri-

As class in them strike must under certain conditions be

seen as a pure means. Two different kinds the of

which have already been , -v. ' ' - ' ' ' ' ' ,

Sorel has the credit-from political, rather than consider-

ations-of having first distinguished them. He contrasts them as the politicaland the general strike. are also antithetical in their relation to

violence. Of the of the former he says: The of state

power is the basis of their in their the politi-

cians (viz. the moderate socialists) are already preparing the ground for a strong

centralized and disciplined power that will be impervious to criticism from the

opposition, capable and of issuing its mendacious decrees.

strike demonstrates how the state will lose none of its

how power is transferred from the to the how the

mass of producers will their masters, In contrast to this political

strike (which incidentally seems to have been summed up the abortive

German the general strike sets itself the sale task of

state power. I t nullifies all the consequences of every

possible social policy; its partisans see even the most popular reforms as bour-

7 8 W LTER BENJAMIN


12/18

strike clearly announces its indifference toward materialby its intention to abolish the state; the state

group, who in all their

While the first form

an external modification of

as a pure means, is nonviolent. For it takes placeH ~ V Vto resume work following external concessions and this or that

I U l l l \ J . l J ~ ,ut in the determination to resume only a

enforced the state, an that this

the revolution appears as a

either for the sociologists or for the elegant amateurs of

this deep, moral, and genuinely revolutionary con-

no on of its cata-

consequences, to brand such a strike as violent. ven if i t can

said that the modern economy, seen as a resembles much less athat stands idle when abandoned by its stoker than a beast that goes

as soon as its tamer turns his nevertheless the violence of an action, , ~ , ' ' ' 0 ' ' ' ' ' 'no more from its effects than from its from the

of its means. State power, which has eyes for opposes

this kind of strike for its alleged as distinct from

actually extortionate. The extent to whichof

the general strike as sllch is capableof

diminish-Sorel has with

contrast, ani i ; \ . J l l U O ~ " l J 1 J ,more immoral and cruder than the akin to a

de, is the strikeby doctors, such as several German cities have seen. In this

revealed at its most repellent an unscrupulous use of violence that is positively1 - ' ' ' . J l I ; ; ~ ~ l ' U l l ' ' lclass that for years, without the slightest at

secured death its prey:' and then at the first abandonedof its own free will. More clearly than in recent class struggles, the mea ns of

have developed in thousands of years of the history of

m l , r n 1 , < > T C in their transactions consist

modifications to legal systems. they entirely on the

logy of between persons, to resolve conflicts case case,

the names of their states, peacefully and without contracts. A delicate task



13/18

that is more robustly but a method of solution inis above that of the referee because it is beyond all

violence. Accordingly, like the intercourse of privateU i ~ n u ' ' ' ' ' ' ' ~has engendered its own forms and virtues, which were not

even though they have become so.all the forms of violence by both natural law and positive

problematic nature,

violence. every conceivable to

human not to of deliverance from the confines of all the world-

historical conditions of existence obtaining

lence is totally excluded in the

time the question of the truth of the basic

ends can be attained justified means,

if vio

H" C""'U"l1Y arises as to theby legal theory. I t is at the same

common to both

means used for just ends. How

would it if all the violence DO:5ed justified means,

and if at the same time a

different kind of violence came into view that certainly could be either the

or the unjustified means to those but was not related to them as

means at all but in some different way. This would throw light 011 the curious

ofa11lems to the possibility of

conclusive pronouncements on

it is never reason that decides on thet , ' t p_ ,n l1" ,< ,p r violence on the former and God on the latter. And

that is uncommon only because of the stubborn habit of

conceiving those

valid (which follows

ends as ends of a possible that is not only as generally

from the nature of justice), but also of

< l U l - , U V l h which, as could be contradicts the nature For

ends that for one situation are just, acceptable, and valid, are so for

no other no matter how similar it may be in other respects. The

nonmediate function of violence at issue here is illustrated by everyday

ence. As regards man, he is impel led anger, for PY,m1"n ip to the most visible

outbursts of a violence that is not related as a means to a n r p r f ) ; n r p end. I t is

not a means but a manifestation. Moreover, this violence has thoroughly

tive manifestations in which it can be to criticism. These are to befound, most l l S l 1 1 1 1 l 1 Uabove all in myth.

violence in its ~ r r ' n ( > n r ' ~form is a mere manifestation of the

Not a means to their a manifestation of their but first of all a

manifestation of their existence. The of Niobe contains an

of this. it appear that the action of Apollo and Artemis is

2 8 W LTER BENJAMIN


14/18

a But their violence establishes a law far more than it

for the of one already Niobe's arrogance calls down fate

itself not because her arrogance offends against the law but because it

challenges fate to a in which fate must triumph, and can bring to aHow little such divine violence was to the ancients the

in which

fate with courage,

it with varying fortunes, and is not left by the legend without hope of one

a new law to men. I t is really this hero and the legal violence of the

native to him that the tries to picture even now in admiring the

miscreant. Violence therefore bursts upon Niobe from the uIlcertain, ambig

uous of fate. I t is not actually destructive. it a cruel

to Niobe's children, it stops short of the life of theirleaves more guilty than before through the death of the children, both

mute bearer of and as a boundary stone on the frontier

If this immediate violence in manifestations

proves indeed identical to it reflects a prob-

lematic on lawmaking insofar as the latter was characterized

above, in the account of military violence, as a mediate violence. At the

same time this connection further to illuminate fate, which in all casesand to conclude in broad outline the critique of the

latter. For the function of violence in is in the sense that

lawmaking pursues as its with violence as the means, wh t is to be e8tab-

lished as law but at the moment of instatement does not dismiss Y H J ~ U . ,

at this very moment oflawmaking, i t specifically establishes as law not an

end but one and intimately bound to it, under

the title of power. Lawmaking is power making, to that extent, an immedi

ate manifestation of violence. is the of all divine end

power the of all mythical lawmaking.

An of the latter that has immense consequences is to be found in

constitutional law. For in this the establishing of frontiers, the task of

after all the wars of the age, is the of all

lawmaking violence. Here we see most clearly that power, more than the most

extravagant m is what is guaranteed all lawmaking violence.

Where frontiers are decided the is not simply annihilated; heis accorded even when the victor's in power is complete. And

these are, in a demonically way for both to

the treaty i t is the same line that may not be crossed. Here appears, in a

primitive form, the same mythical ambiguity of laws that may not be in-

to which Anatole France refers when he says, Poor and rich

CRITIQUE O VIOLENCE 2 8


15/18

are forbidden to spend the night under the I t also appears thatSorel touches not merely on a cultural-historical but also on a

truth in that in the all was the of the kings

or the nobles in short, of the and that, mut tis

so as as it exists. For from the point of view which alone can

guarantee law there is no equality, but at the most equally great violence. The

act of fixing frontiers, however, is also oflaw inanother Laws and unmarked frontiers at least in

unwritten laws. A man can unwittingly infringe upon them and thus

incur retribution. For each intervention of law that is provoked by an offense

against the unwritten and unknown law is called, in contradistinction to pun-

ishment, retribution. But however unluckily it may befall its vic-

its occurrence is in the of the not but fateitself once in its deliberate Hermann Cohen, in a brief

reflection on the ancients' of fate, has spoken of the inescapable

realization that it is fate's orders themselves that seem to cause and

this offense. To this of law even the modernof a law is not nr, , , , . , c r t>r.n

communities is to be understood as a rebellion against the spirit ofstatutes.

Far from inaugurating a purer

diate violence shows itself

the manifestation of imme-

identical with all and

the latter into of the

historical function, the destruction of which thus becomes

task of destruction poses again, in the last resort, the question of a pure immedi

ate violence that might be able to call a halt to mythical violence. Justas

in allGod opposes violence is confronted the divine. And

the latter constitutes its antithesis in all violence is lawmak

ing, divine violence is law-destroying; if the former sets boundaries, the latter

boundlessly destroys them; if mythical violence brings at once guilt and retribu-

tion, divine power only if the former the latter strikes; if the

the latter is lethal without blood. The of Niobe

maybe as an of this U U H ~ H 'on thecompany of Korah. I t strikes Levites, strikes them without warning,

without and does not stop short of annihilation. But in annihilating it

also and a connection between the lack of bloodshed and the

character of this violence is unmistakable. For blood is the of

mere life. The dissolution of violence stems, as cannot be shown in detail

here, from the of more natural which consigns the innocent,

8 WALTER BENJAMIN


16/18

and unhappy, to a retribution that expiates the of mere l ife and doubtless also purifies the not of guilt, but of law. For with mere lifethe rule of law over the living ceases. M , r th l r violence is bloody power overmere life for its own divine violence pure power over all life for the sake of

the living. The first demands sacrifice, the second accepts it.This divine power is attested not only by tradit ion but is also found

in present-day life in at least one sanctioned manifestation. The educativepower, which in its form stands outside the is one of its manifesta-

tions. These are not by miracles performed by God,but by the moment in them that strikes without bloodshed and,

by the absence of all lawmaking. To this extent it is to call thistoo, but it is so only with to goods,

and suchlike, never absolutely, with to the soul of theof such an extension of pure or divine power is sure to provoke,

today, the most violent and to be countered by the argu-ment that taken to its logical conclusion it confers on men even lethal power

one another. however, cannot be conceded. For the

I kill? meets its irreducible answer in the commandment Thou shalt not kill.

This commandment the deed, just as God was the deed.

But justas it

may not be fearof

that enforces obedience, theinjunction becomes inapplicable, incommensurable once the deed is accomplished. No of the deed can be derived from the commandment. Andso neither the divine nor ,the for this can beknown in advance. Those who base a condemnation of all violent killing of one

person by another on the commandment are therefore mistaken. I t exists not as

a criterion but as a for the actions or commu-nities who have to wrestle themselves the of it. Thus it

was understood which expressly the condemnation of

in self-defense. But those thinkers who take the opposed view refer to a

more distant theorem, 011 which possibly propose to base even the com

mandment itself. This is the doctrine of the of which they either

or limit to human life. Their argumen- A ' d l J + , ~ J H Uin an extreme case by the killing of the op-

pressor, runs as follows: I f I do not kill I shall never establish the world domin-

ion

profess that

existence itself. As

of the intelligent terrorist. . . . however,of existence stands

indeed ignoble, itshows the the reason for the commandment no in

what the deed does to the but in what it does to God and the doer. Thethat existence stands than a existence is false and

CRITIQUE O VIOLENCE 2 8 3


17/18

H H . L H U ' U O , if existence is to mean nothing other than mere life-and it has this

in the argument referred to. I t contains a mighty truth, if

Of life whose is readily analo-

to that of when are referred to two distinct spheres),

means the total condition that is man ; if the proposition is in-tended to mean that the nonexistence of man is more terrible than

the (admittedly subordinate) not-yet-attained condition of the just man. To this

ambiguity the above owes its plausibility. Man cannot, at

any be said to coincide with the mere life in no more than with any

other of his conditions and not even with the of his

person. However sacred man is that life in him that is identically present in

earthly life, death, and afterlife), there is no sacredness in his condition, in his

bodily life vulnerable to injury his fellow men. What, then, it

from the life of animals and And even if these were

could not be so by virtue only of being alive, in life I t might be well

worthwhile to track down the origin of the dogma of the sacredness of life

Perhaps, indeed it is relatively recent, the last mistaken attempt of the

weakened Western tradition to seek the saint it has lost in

of all commandments murder is no

counter because these are based on other ideas than the modernFinally, this idea of man's sacredness gives grounds for reflection that

what is here pronounced sacred was to ancient thought the

marked bearer of guilt: life itself.

The of violence is the of

this because only the idea of its

discriminating, and decisive approach to its temporal data. A gaze directed only

at what is close at hand can at most perceive a dialectical rising and falling in thelawmaking and law-preserving formations of violence. The law governing their

oscillation rests on the circumstance that all in its

weakens the violenceo n r 1 { , , , , of hostile counter-violence. (Various symptoms of this have

been referred to in the course of this study.) This lasts until either new forces or

those earlier triumph over the hitherto

found a new destined in its turn to of thismaintained mythical forms of on the of law with all the

forces on which it as they depend on it, finally therefore on the aboli

tion of state power, a new historical epoch is founded. If the rule of myth is

broken occasionally in the age is not so

remote that an attack on law is futile. But if the existence of violence

outside the as pure immediate V l n l P T l r P is this furnishes the proof

8 4 W LTER BENJAMIN


18/18

that revolutionary the highest manifestation of unalloyed violence byman is possible and by what means. Less possible and also less urgent for

U l l W J V < ; U violence has been realized in

will be recognizable as

effects because the expiatorypower of violence is not visible to men. Once all the eternal forms are

open to pure divine which myth bastardized with law I t may manifest

itself in a true war as in the divine of the multitude on aBut all mythical is

too is the law-preserving administrative violence that

serves it. Divine which is the sign and seal ut never the means of

sacred execution may be called violence.

CRITIQUE O VIOLENCE 8 5

Benjamin+ +Critique+of+Violence

Documents

Transcript of Benjamin+ +Critique+of+Violence