David L. Weddle
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- September 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780814764916
- eISBN:
- 9780814762813
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9780814764916.003.0002
- Subject:
- Religion, Religious Studies
This chapter identifies elements that are common to sacrificial practices and events: signification of transcendence that requires discipline or denial of natural desires to point to what is beyond ...
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This chapter identifies elements that are common to sacrificial practices and events: signification of transcendence that requires discipline or denial of natural desires to point to what is beyond nature; suspense of offering without assurance of its intended outcome, illustrated in Pascal’s wager and Kierkegaard’s leap of faith; conditionality of the gift as a result of its qualifications, ritual performance, and contingent reciprocity of the sacred recipient; self-sacrifice through partial identification with what is offered (what Marcel Mauss called the “intermingling” of persons and things in sacrifice). This chapter offers a tentative definition of sacrifice as a costly act of self-giving, in denial of natural inclinations, that is offered in suspense, under conditions that threaten failure, for the purpose of establishing a relation with transcendent reality. This definition is developed in light of Kathryn McClymond’s proposal of “polythetic classification” of sacrifice.Less
This chapter identifies elements that are common to sacrificial practices and events: signification of transcendence that requires discipline or denial of natural desires to point to what is beyond nature; suspense of offering without assurance of its intended outcome, illustrated in Pascal’s wager and Kierkegaard’s leap of faith; conditionality of the gift as a result of its qualifications, ritual performance, and contingent reciprocity of the sacred recipient; self-sacrifice through partial identification with what is offered (what Marcel Mauss called the “intermingling” of persons and things in sacrifice). This chapter offers a tentative definition of sacrifice as a costly act of self-giving, in denial of natural inclinations, that is offered in suspense, under conditions that threaten failure, for the purpose of establishing a relation with transcendent reality. This definition is developed in light of Kathryn McClymond’s proposal of “polythetic classification” of sacrifice.
