Dorothee Sölle - Wikipedia

Dorothee Sölle - Wikipedia:

Dorothee Sölle

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Dorothee Sölle
Sölle (left) in 1981
Born	Dorothee Nipperdey 30 September 1929 Cologne, Prussia, Germany
Died	27 April 2003 (aged 73) Göppingen, Baden-Württemberg, Germany
Other names	Dorothee Steffensky-Sölle
Spouse(s)	Dietrich Sölle ​ ​ (m. 1954; div. 1964)​ Fulbert Steffensky [de] ​ ​ (m. 1969)​
Academic background
Alma mater	University of Cologne
Thesis	Studies in the Structures of Bonaventura's Vigils[a][2]
Influences	Dietrich Bonhoeffer[3] Martin Buber[4] Rudolf Bultmann[5] Meister Eckhart[6] Friedrich Gogarten[5] G. W. F. Hegel[7] Martin Luther[8]
Academic work
Discipline	Theology
Sub-discipline	Political theology[11]
School or tradition	Christian socialism[9] feminist theology[10] liberation theology[10] Lutheranism[8]
Institutions	Union Theological Seminary
Notable ideas	Christofascism
Influenced	Mary Grey[12] Beverly Wildung Harrison[13] Carter Heyward[14] Adam Kotsko[15]

Dorothee Steffensky-Sölle (née Nipperdey, 1929–2003), known as Dorothee Sölle, was a German liberation theologian who coined the term "Christofascism".^{[16][17][verification needed]} She was born in Cologne and died at a conference in Göppingen.

Contents

• 1Life and career
• 2Sölle's theological thinking
• 3Publications
• 4Texts in music
• 5See also
• 6Notes
• 7References
  • 7.1Footnotes
  • 7.2Bibliography
• 8Further reading

Life and career[edit source]

Sölle was born Dorothee Nipperdey on 30 September 1929 in Cologne, Germany.^[2] Her father was Professor of labour law Hans Carl Nipperdey, who would later become the first president of the West-German Federal Labour Court from 1954 to 1963. Sölle studied theology, philosophy, and literature at the University of Cologne,^[18] earning a doctorate with a thesis on the connections between theology and poetry.^[2] She taught briefly in Aachen before returning to Cologne as a university lecturer. She became active in politics, speaking out against the Vietnam War, the arms race of the Cold War, and injustices in the developing world. Notably, from 1968 to 1972 she organized the Politisches Nachtgebet [de] (political night-prayers) in the Antoniterkirche (Cologne).

Union Theological Seminary, New York

Between 1975 and 1987, she spent six months a year at Union Theological Seminary in New York City, where she was a professor of systematic theology.^[19] Although she never held a professorship in Germany,^{[citation needed]} she received an honorary professorship from the University of Hamburg in 1994.^[20]

She wrote a large number of books, including Theology for Skeptics: Reflections on God (1968), The Silent Cry: Mysticism and Resistance (1997), and her autobiography Against the Wind: Memoir of a Radical Christian (1999).^[6] In Beyond Mere Obedience: Reflections on a Christian Ethic for the Future she coined the term Christofascist to describe fundamentalists. 

Perhaps her best-known work in English was^{[citation needed]} Suffering, which offers a critique of "Christian masochism" and "Christian sadism".^[21] Sölle's critique is against the assumption that God is all-powerful and the cause of suffering; humans thus suffer for some greater purpose. Instead, God suffers and is powerless alongside us. Humans are to struggle together against oppression, sexism, antisemitism, and other forms of authoritarianism.^{[22][page needed]}

Sölle was married twice and had four children.^[2] First, in 1954 she married the artist Dietrich Sölle, with whom she had three children before divorcing in 1964.^[2] In 1969, she married^[23] the former Benedictine priest Fulbert Steffensky [de], with whom she had her fourth child^[2] and with whom she organized the Politisches Nachtgebet.^[24] The historian Thomas Nipperdey was her brother.^[25]

Sölle died of a heart attack at a conference in Göppingen on 27 April 2003.^[26] She was buried on the Friedhof Nienstedten in Hamburg.

Sölle's theological thinking

"I believe in God/ who created the world not ready made/ like a thing that must forever stay what it is/ who does not govern according to eternal laws/ that have perpetual validity/ nor according to natural orders/ of poor and rich,/ experts and ignoramuses,/ people who dominate and people subjected./ I believe in God/ who desires the counter-argument of the living/ and the alteration of every condition/ through our work/ through our politics." 

(ET, from Meditationen & Gebrauchstexte. Gedichte. Berlin 1969, ISBN 978-3-87352-016-5)

The idea of a God who was "in heaven in all its glory" while Auschwitz was organized was "unbearable" for Sölle. God has to be protected against such simplifications. For some people^[who?] Sölle was a kind of prophet of Christianity, who abolished the separation of theological science and practice of life, while for others^[who?] she was a heretic,^{[citation needed]} whose theories couldn't be united with the traditional understanding of God, and her ideas were therefore rejected as a theological cynicism.^{[citation needed]}

Some of Sölle's provocative statements:

• "Vietnam is Golgotha."^{[This quote needs a citation]}
• "The Third World is a permanent Auschwitz."^{[This quote needs a citation]}
• "Every theological statement must be a political statement as well." (Against the Wind: Memoir of a Radical Christian (1999))
• "God has no hands except from our hands." (famous remark by Teresa of Ávila which Sölle frequently quoted)
• "We should eat more at the Eucharist and we should pray more when eating."^{[This quote needs a citation]}

Publications[edit source]

• Sölle, Dorothee (1967). Christ the Representative: An Essay in Theology After the 'Death of God'. London: SCM Press.
• ——— (1970). Beyond Mere Obedience: Reflections on a Christian Ethic for the Future. Minneapolis: Augsburg.
• ——— (1974). Political Theology. Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press. ISBN 0-8006-1065-2.
• ——— (1975). Suffering. Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press. ISBN 0-8006-0419-9.
• ——— (1978). Death by Bread Alone: Texts and Reflections on Religious Experience. Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press. ISBN 0-8006-0514-4.
• ——— (1981). Choosing Life. Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press. ISBN 0-8006-0667-1.
• ——— (1983). Of war and Love. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books. ISBN 0-88344-350-3.
• ——— (1983). The Arms Race Kills Even Without War. Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press. ISBN 0-8006-1701-0.
• ——— (1984). The Strength of the Weak: Toward a Christian Feminist Identity. Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press. ISBN 0-664-24623-0.
• ———; Cloyes, Shirley A. (1984). To Work and to Love: A Theology of Creation. Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press. ISBN 0-8006-1782-7.
• ———; Beyers Naudé, C. F. (1986). Hope for Faith: A Conversation. Geneva: WCC Publications. ISBN 2-8254-0860-3.
• ——— (1990). The Window of Vulnerability: A Political Spirituality. Minneapolis: Fortress Press. ISBN 0-8006-2432-7.
• ——— (1990). Thinking About God: An Introduction to Theology. London: SCM Press. ISBN 0-334-02476-5.
• ——— (1993). On Earth as in Heaven: A Liberation Spirituality of Sharing. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press. ISBN 0-664-25494-2.
• ——— (1993). Stations of the Cross: A Latin American Pilgrimage. Minneapolis: Fortress Press. ISBN 0-8006-2688-5.
• ——— (1995). Theology for Skeptics: Reflections on God. Minneapolis: Fortress Press. ISBN 0-8006-2788-1.
• ——— (1999). Against the Wind: Memoir of a Radical Christian. Minneapolis: Fortress Press. ISBN 0-8006-3079-3.
• ——— (2001). The Silent Cry: Mysticism and Resistance. Minneapolis: Fortress Press. ISBN 0-8006-3266-4.
• ——— (2007). The Mystery of Death. Translated by Lukens-Rumscheidt, Nancy; Lukens-Rumscheidt, Martin. Minneapolis: Fortress Press.

For publications in German language see de:Dorothee Sölle#Literatur

Texts in music[edit source]

• The musician Sergio Pinto converted Sölle's poems Credo für die Erde and Ich dein Baum, into musical compositions which were published by Verlag in 2008 under the title entwurf. The CD recording was performed by the band Grupo Sal.^[27]
• The composer Ludger Stühlmeyer converted Sölle's poems Kreuzigen and Atem Gottes hauch mich an into musical compositions as well. The vocal and organ arrangements were commissioned by a circle of friends of the Evangelische Akademie Tutzing; the work was first performed in April 2013 and included a reading by Ursula Baltz-Otto during a commemoration of the 10th anniversary of the death of Dorothee Sölle.

See also[edit source]

• Johann Baptist Metz

Notes[edit source]

1. ^ Original title: Untersuchungen zur Struktur der Nachtwachen von Bonaventura.^[1]

References[edit source]

Footnotes[edit source]

1. ^ Sölle 1999b, p. 35.
2. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c d e f} Coleman 2013, p. 518.
3. ^ Rumscheidt 2016, p. 172.
4. ^ Pinnock 2003b, p. 129.
5. ^ Jump up to:^a b Pinnock 2003a, p. 2.
6. ^ Jump up to:^a b Coleman 2013, p. 519.
7. ^ Bieler 2003, p. 59; Neumann 2014, p. 118.
8. ^ Jump up to:^a b Faramelli, Norman (1 April 2016). ""Flashback Friday" on Dorothee Sölle: Political Theologian par Excellence". Religious Socialism. DSA Religion and Socialism Commission. Retrieved 22 December 2018.
9. ^ Pinnock 2018, p. 371; Sölle 1999a, p. 49.
10. ^ Jump up to:^a b Loewen 2016, p. ii.
11. ^ Matteson 2018, p. 20.
12. ^ Grey 2005, p. 343.
13. ^ Harrison 2004, p. 147.
14. ^ Grey 2005, p. 350.
15. ^ Kotsko, Adam (26 April 2009). "Narrative CV: Adam Kotsko". An und für sich. Retrieved 17 August 2018.
16. ^ Hall 2000, p. 412; Sölle 1970.
17. ^ Pinnock 2003c: "... of establishing a dubious moral superiority to justify organized violence on a massive scale, a perversion of Christianity she called Christofascism."
18. ^ Anselm Weyer: Liturgie von links. Dorothee Sölle und das Politische Nachtgebet in der Antoniterkirche. Herausgegeben für die Evangelische Gemeinde Köln von Markus Herzberg und Annette Scholl. Greven Verlag, Köln 2016, S. 15 ISBN 978-3-7743-0670-7.
19. ^ Coleman 2013, p. 519; Mynatt 2004, p. 368.
20. ^ Hollstein 2007, p. 105.
21. ^ Heyward 2003, p. 233.
22. ^ Pinnock 2003c.
23. ^ Anselm Weyer: Liturgie von links. Dorothee Sölle und das Politische Nachtgebet in der Antoniterkirche. Herausgegeben für die Evangelische Gemeinde Köln von Markus Herzberg und Annette Scholl. Greven Verlag, Köln 2016, S. 16f. ISBN 978-3-7743-0670-7.
24. ^ Anselm Weyer: Liturgie von links. Dorothee Sölle und das Politische Nachtgebet in der Antoniterkirche. Herausgegeben für die Evangelische Gemeinde Köln von Markus Herzberg und Annette Scholl. Greven Verlag, Köln 2016, S. 9 ISBN 978-3-7743-0670-7.
25. ^ "Dorothee Sölle". Die Zeit (in German). Hamburg. 30 April 2003. Retrieved 22 December 2018.
26. ^ Mynatt 2004, p. 368; Ring 2005, p. 8511.
27. ^ Dorothee Sölle auf der Website von Grupo Sal (in German) Archived 2 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine

Bibliography[edit source]

• Bieler, Andrea (2003). "The Language of Prayer Between Truth Telling and Mysticism". In Pinnock, Sarah K. (ed.). The Theology of Dorothee Soelle. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: Trinity Press International. pp. 55–70. ISBN 978-1-56338-404-2.
• Coleman, Mary E. (2013). "Dorothee Sölle (1929–2003)". In Markham, Ian S. (ed.). The Student's Companion to the Theologians. Chichester, England: Wiley-Blackwell. pp. 518–521. doi:10.1002/9781118427170.ch74. ISBN 978-1-118-47258-3.
• Grey, Mary (2005). "Diversity, Harmony and in the End, Justice: Remembering Dorothee Soelle". Feminist Theology. 13 (3): 343–357. doi:10.1177/0966735005054916. ISSN 1745-5189. S2CID 155047837.
• Hall, Douglas John (2000). "Confessing Christ in a Post‐Christendom Context". The Ecumenical Review. 52 (3): 410–417. doi:10.1111/j.1758-6623.2000.tb00048.x. ISSN 1758-6623.
• Harrison, Beverly Wildung (2004). "Working with Protestant Traditions: Feminist Transformations". Justice in the Making: Feminist Social Ethics. By Harrison, Beverly Wildung. Bounds, Elizabeth M.; Brubaker, Pamela K.; Hicks, Jane E.; Legge, Marilyn J.; Peters, Rebecca Todd; West, Traci C. (eds.). Interviewed by Legge, Marilyn J. Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Press. pp. 145–152. ISBN 978-0-664-22774-6.
• Heyward, Carter (2003). "Crossing Over: Dorothee Soelle and the Transcendence of God". The Theology of Dorothee Soelle. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: Trinity Press International. pp. 221ff. ISBN 978-1-56338-404-2.
• Hollstein, Thorsten (2007). Die Verfassung als "Allgemeiner Teil": Privatrechtsmethode und Privatrechtskonzeption bei Hans Carl Nipperdey (1895–1968). Beiträge zur Rechtsgeschichte des 20. Jahrhunderts (in German). 51. Tübingen, Baden-Württemberg: Mohr Siebeck. ISBN 978-3-16-149080-4. ISSN 0934-0955.
• Loewen, Margreta Susanne Guenther (2016). Making Peace with the Cross: A Mennonite-Feminist Exploration of Dorothee Sölle and J. Denny Weaver on Nonviolence, Atonement, and Redemption (PhD thesis). Toronto: University of Toronto. hdl:1807/75526. OCLC 1036287373.
• Matteson, Dannis M. (2018). "'Hope Requires Participants': Dorothee Sölle's Warning and Task for Political Theology in the Trump Era". New Theology Review. 30 (2): 20–30. ISSN 0896-4297.
• Mynatt, Jenai A., ed. (2004). Contemporary Authors. 219. Farmington Hills, Michigan: Gale. ISBN 978-0-7876-6699-6. ISSN 0010-7468.
• Neumann, Katja Lisa Elena (2014). Gendering Liberation: "Deprivatising" Women's Subjectivity in the Prayer-Poetry of Dorothee Sölle (PhD thesis). Stirling, Scotland: University of Stirling. hdl:1893/21172.
• Pinnock, Sarah K. (2003a). "Introduction". In Pinnock, Sarah K. (ed.). The Theology of Dorothee Soelle. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: Trinity Press International. pp. 1–15. ISBN 978-1-56338-404-2.
•  ———  (2003b). "A Postmodern Response to Suffering After Auschwitz". The Theology of Dorothee Soelle. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: Trinity Press International. pp. 129–144. ISBN 978-1-56338-404-2.
•  ——— , ed. (2003c). The Theology of Dorothee Soelle. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: Trinity Press International. ISBN 978-1-56338-404-2.
•  ———  (2018). "Dorothee Soelle". In Rodkey, Christopher D.; Miller, Jordan E. (eds.). The Palgrave Handbook of Radical Theology. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 367–380. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-96595-6_22. ISBN 978-3-319-96595-6.
• Ring, Nancy C. (2005). "Sölle, Dorothee". In Jones, Lindsay (ed.). Encyclopedia of Religion. 12(2nd ed.). Detroit, Michigan: Macmillan Reference USA. pp. 8511–8512. ISBN 978-0-02-865997-8.
• Rumscheidt, H. Martin (2016). "Dorothee Soelle: Variations on Themes by Dietrich Bonhoeffer". In Kirkpatrick, Matthew D. (ed.). Engaging Bonhoeffer: The Impact and Influence of Bonhoeffer's Life and Thought. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Fortress Press. pp. 169–186. ISBN 978-1-5064-1037-1.
• Sölle, Dorothee (1970). Beyond Mere Obedience: Reflections on a Christian Ethic for the Future. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Augsburg Publishing House.
•  ———  (1999a). Against the Wind: Memoir of a Radical Christian. Translated by Rumscheidt, Barbara; Rumscheidt, Martin. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Fortress Press. ISBN 978-1-4514-0706-8.
•  ———  (1999b). "Was ist Theopoesie?". In Szagun, Anna-Katharina (ed.). Erfahrungsräume: Theologische Beiträge zur kulturellen Erneuerung (in German). Münster, North Rhine-Westphalia: LIT Verlag. pp. 31–35. ISBN 978-3-8258-4142-3.

Further reading[edit source]

• Wind, Renate (2012). Dorothee Soelle: Mystic and Rebel; The Biography. Translated by Lukens, Nancy; Rumscheidt, Martin. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Fortress Press. ISBN 978-0-8006-9808-9.
  
  ========
  
  
  
  Suffering  by Sölle, Dorothee; Sölle, Dorothee. Suffering
  
  
  Publication date 1988Topics Suffering
• Publisher Philadelphia : Fortress PressCollection 
• inlibrary; printdisabled; internetarchivebooks; china
• Digitizing sponsor Kahle/Austin Foundation
• Contributor Internet ArchiveLanguage engger; German
  https://archive.org/details/suffering00soll/page/n7/mode/2up
  
  

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Suffering

by
Dorothee Sölle (Foreword)
4.11 · Rating details · 116 ratings · 13 reviews
"A valuable contribution to the literature of theology and ethics, combining in a fascinating way biblical, theological, pastoral, and socioethical themes. . . The study is of immense value because it identifies the modern idolatry that views suffering as absurd and devoid of meaning. . . The book is a marvelous exercise in cultural self-analysis that is preliminary to any meaningful exorcism and redirection." --Kenneth Vaux Theology Today "Passionate, imaginative, learned, literary, pithy, and at every point searching, Suffering is a notable achievement, not least because it pricks the heart and conscience, making the reader share in the deep experience of suffering that lies behind its writing." --James A. Carpenter Anglican Theological Review (less)

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Paperback, 188 pages
Published January 1st 1975 by Augsburg Fortress Publishing (first published 1973)
Original Title
Leiden
ISBN
0800618130 (ISBN13: 9780800618131)
Edition Language
English

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Jan 03, 2014Carter West rated it it was amazing
Anyone who by experience or imagination has come up against the bitter reality of suffering and the issues it raises for a belief in God will take to this book like a desert wanderer to an oasis. Sölle will never throw an ameliorative veil over a harsh fact; neither will she fail to walk beside you all the way through your examination of the great questions she raises under the shadow of Jesus' cross. Her responses may startle and disturb, but they ring true to our experience of loneliness, trial, and groundless hope. She confronts the conventions that name God as the author of our sufferings to punish, teach, or test us, and dares to call them what they are: sadism. She looks for the Holy One, not on the heights of theism, but within existential presence, and finds comfort there. Her reply to sufferers brings solace enough, for it is lasting: "Where no help is possible [Christ] appears not as the superior helper but only as the one who walks with those beyond help." Her theme of presence hearkens to psychiatrist and Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl's emphasis on meaning. Both truths are inalienable: like the love of God, we can be separated from neither.

In this short book, Sölle does not connect her thought to prevailing theological edifices - nor does she need to. As it stands, her suggestiveness brings urgency to persistent questions: Is God more person or process? Is God's power supernatural or something deep within all things? How should we approach the mythological elements in Scripture, particularly the emphasis on miracles? I find myself wanting to search out Rudolf Bultmann's work to see if Sölle's might stand in conversation with that renegade old Lutheran. Interestingly enough, Sölle consistently allies herself with mysticism, notably Eckhart and Tauler, as life immersed in personal engagement with the holy, an alternate stream of tradition eroding the pretensions of Christendom. That thorny modern mystic Simone Weil figures large also, all the way through. A cloud of witnesses! Sölle seeds that cloud thoroughly and truth rains down, filling the bowls of the oppressed and the afflicted.
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Dec 15, 2020Ryan Ward rated it it was amazing
Moving and profound meditation on the meaning of suffering. At times almost unbearable in its evocation of compassion for those who suffer for seemingly no reason in the world. Sölle has gifted earnest seekers a way into understanding how suffering as an active act of solidarity and love instead of a passive acceptance of pain and injustice can transform minds and hearts and move the world closer to a full realization of true humanity and communion. She eviscerates the Christian understanding of suffering and the consequent ideas of the nature of God and Christ that have evolved as a result, in the end rejecting traditional Christian orthodoxy in favor of a mysticism that incorporates God into humanity's progress towards a realization of complete love and communion on earth, rather than as a distant personification of omnipotence and power under whose inscrutable will we must submit. This one will remain with me for a long time. (less)
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Dec 23, 2020Deborah Brunt rated it it was amazing
An outstandingly beautiful examination of suffering, both that which is chosen for the sake of justice, and the unjust suffering unchosen, unbidden which befalls humanity, one individual life at a time.

Soelle moves us through phases of suffering, from silence, incapacity to comprehend, repression through to an ability to grieve and lament and give voice to the suffering. She rejects the championing of the meaning of suffering for a higher purpose, but demonstrates that conscious suffering can lead us to solidarity with others who suffer, using Jesus' farewell address, and his words and actions during his passion for justice, which led him inevitably to the cross.

She beautifully expresses the idea of us participating in suffering with others, and of us being the hope of a future world, of living now as though the end of suffering is possible and has come. (less)
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Feb 21, 2016Brenda Funk rated it really liked it
I loved this book, nevertheless I had difficulty in following some of the very philosophical argument. Will have to read it again to fully comprehend what I have read.
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Aug 16, 2014Jason rated it really liked it
Stimulating, provocative, quirky, critical, and alert - good ingredients for theology.
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Dec 22, 2020Luke Hillier rated it really liked it
Shelves: academic-religion, christianity, theology
Having grown up in the shadow of the Holocaust, suffering seems to sit at the center of all of Soelle's work. She is driven by a need to bear witness to it and to articulate a theology that affirms God does the same, as well as one that refuses to allow for apathy or resignation in the face of it. There is a complexity to Soelle's argument here that could make it read as incohesive (I'm also not entirely sure the translation is the best it could be). At the heart of her sense of suffering is the call to accept reality as it currently stands, suffering and all. She embraces mystic sensibilities in this way, trying to embrace the whole of life rather than run from or deny any particular part of it. However, crucially, she rejects what she calls "Christian masochism" that says suffering should be perceived at the hands of a God who must use it to better us. She also even more passionately denounces the idea that suffering related to systemic injustice should be bowed to, and in fact much of her argument hinges on the idea of mobilization against just that. For Soelle, "acceptance" does not imply passivity but awareness, a clear-eyed knowing of what reality actually entails for the purpose of most effectively changing it, and knowing it needs changed in the first place. She presumes that suffering makes one stronger and more alert to injustice, but only when it is accepted. If one tries to deny their own suffering, she describes them as "mute" and suggests lamentation as the pathway from such silence into transformative speech seeking change.

Although she refutes classical theist theodices and I don't know if she'd agree with me, I definitely see this book as an embrace of process theodicy. She doesn't engage in Whiteheadian metaphysics but instead emphasizes Jesus's cosuffering nature as it climaxed on the cross to ground her claims that God does not stop suffering because God can't, and instead suffers with others in a way that offers dignity and strength. The strength of a martyr is one of the more compelling ideas that she develops here, and I am curious of more formal engagement has occurred between Soelle's ideas of suffering and womanist theologians rejection of "redemptive suffering." I think Soelle lives at the border of that concept, as her sentiments seem to be descriptive rather than prescriptive. She writes that "The cross is reality," not to encourage everyone to seek it out but to acknowledge that the charge for Christians is to stop the crucifying powers of our time and pursue compassionate solidarity with those still being hanged on crosses.

If it sounds a bit grim...well, I don't know what else you'd expect from a book with this title, however she also makes a few notes on the importance of joy amid resistance, which is made possible because acceptance of suffering is not just that, but rather an embrace of the whole of reality, a love for all of life. This is the thread of paradox that also runs through the work; hope is found in a God who is hopeless to save, transformation comes from those most desperately in need of transformation with the least means to achieve it. She writes that "there is no alien sorrow" –– we are all interconnected in a mystical solidarity and the acceptance of reality leads one into fuller awareness of that. This results in deeper and deeper sorrow, heartbreak, and devastation but also wider and wider love, resilience, and commitment. And amid it all, God is there among all who suffering, imbuing the strength to endure. It is a great book, though one that feels a bit less polished than her later work. There were elements that felt clunky, confusing, or redundant at times, but that is only a minor knock. (less)
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Jul 10, 2020Bobbi Salkeld rated it really liked it
I love her, but I'm not sure I love this translation. (less)
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Oct 01, 2020Ian Janssen rated it liked it
Shelves: 2020-reading-list
For my review, please see https://www.facebook.com/notes/ian-ja...
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Jan 06, 2014Micah added it
Very dense. Concentrated. Has very systematic moments, some of which are incisive and some of which are terrible (ill-fated infatuation with North Vietnam). Best theological treatment of extreme suffering I've ever read. (less)
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Dec 31, 2012Paul Charles rated it really liked it
Worth the read if you've ever wondered why the theodicies may not be the best way to help people who've experienced extreme suffering. Well thought through examples and pertinent suggestions that should help anyone involved in pastoral work. (less)

Top reviews from the United States

J.M.H.

1.0 out of 5 stars Deep...really deep

Reviewed in the United States on September 17, 2010

Not light reading and not for a developing or mind. You must be firm in your faith to get through and frankly I see no value in this book for faithful answers to suffering. Perhaps a good read for those in that deep world of philosophy, but for a common peasant like me, didnt like it.

3 people found this helpful

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JJ

2.0 out of 5 stars Obscurantism with litle existential comfort...

Reviewed in the United States on January 11, 2016

If you cannot communicate something clearly, then there is a possibility that you do not understand the issues involved... If you are a seeker looking to find answers to your personal suffering, especially as it relates to faith in an omnipotent and omnibenevolent deity, then look elsewhere.

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Human, Inhuman, Posthuman | Hyperobjects, Hyposubjects and Solidarity in the Anthropocene: Anthropocenes Interview with Timothy Morton and Dominic Boyer | Anthropocenes – Human, Inhuman, Posthuman





INTERVIEW
Hyperobjects, Hyposubjects and Solidarity in the Anthropocene: Anthropocenes Interview with Timothy Morton and Dominic Boyer

Author: Anthropocenes – Human, Inhuman, Posthuman ( )

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Abstract

On behalf of Anthropocenes journal, David Chandler interviewed Timothy Morton and Dominic Boyer in advance of the publication of their book Hyposubjects, under review with Open Humanities Press.

The authors were asked to consider whether the anthropocene is used too much as a ‘short cut’ restraining thought; regarding the evolution of hyposubjects; about speculative realism and object-oriented ontology (OOO) and the role of withdrawal in their approach to hyperobjects.

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Keywords: speculative realism, human, object-orientated ontology, Anthropocene, hyperobjects, hyposubjects

How to Cite:

Human, Inhuman, Posthuman A., (2020) “Hyperobjects, Hyposubjects and Solidarity in the Anthropocene: Anthropocenes Interview with Timothy Morton and Dominic Boyer”, Anthropocenes – Human, Inhuman, Posthuman 1(1). p.10. doi: https://doi.org/10.16997/ahip.5

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On behalf of Anthropocenes journal, David Chandler interviewed Timothy Morton1 and Dominic Boyer2 in advance of the publication of their book Hyposubjects, under review with Open Humanities Press.3

Anthropocences:

This interview forms part of the first issue of the Anthropocenes journal, so maybe it would be useful to start with how important you both feel the conceptualisation of the Anthropocene has been to shaking up more traditional academic approaches? Many readers may be unsure how a geological claim of human impact on the Earth relates to concerns of climate change and species extinction and to the popularisation of alternative philosophical and conceptual approaches. The Anthropocene seems to be doing a lot of work in bringing everything together, or is it perhaps used too much as a short cut, limiting our thinking?Timothy Morton and Dominic Boyer:

A concept is only ever as good as the care with which it is put into the world. The very strictly scientific definition of Anthropcocene (which too many non-science scholars flat-out ignore) is, ‘There is a layer of human-made materials at the top of Earth’s crust. This layer began around 10,000 BCE, has significant markers during the time of European colonialism (early seventeenth century) and the start of fossil fuel burning (1784) and accelerates in 1945.’ Period. Science could have called it Jellyfish Surprise for all it cares about the implications of the name.

‘Anthropocene’ can be (and certainly has been) used in all manner of universalizing transcendent ways that reinscribe a general category of Human Being. That ‘we’re all in the same boat because we’ve all been very bad’ Anthropocene concept is pernicious not only because it re-writes history but also because it offers both global liberal elites and national populist elites an alibi for further programs of dispossession and domination in order to save ‘Humans’ from themselves. For us, we agree with our friend Claire Colebrook4 when she writes that recognition of the Anthropocene ought to prompt the ‘return of difference.’ There have been a variety of phase-shifts within the Anthropocene trajectory: the agrilogistics of human settlement was one, the spread of apocalyptic desert monotheisms was another, the colonization of the planet by European empires was still another. All predate and inform the petrocultural accelerationism of the mid 20th century that is usually stipulated as the chief Anthropocene vector. We talk about all these things in Hyposubjects as a way of approaching the Anthropocene in a more differentiated way.

A:

Could you say something about the evolution of your thinking of hyposubjects and the broader project of which this is a part? We like the 2016 phase that ‘hyposubjects are the native species of the Anthropocene’, could you unpack that a little – is all agency that of hyposubjects or is it explicitly contrasting with the hypersubject of the modern episteme?TM and DB:

Our motivating intuition is that the time of hypersubjects is ending because of the hyperobjective conditions they’ve created. At some level the hypersubjects are aware of their doom and they are beginning to panic about it. They are gathering hysterically behind the most grotesque exemplars of their kind—the Donald Trumps and Jair Bolsonaros—as though some angry old white lunatic or another will save them. It won’t. The earth is turning away from certain forms of life as Beth Povinelli5 likes to say. And, conversely, it is turning toward others. That’s where the hyposubjects come in. But one thing you’re not going to find in our project is a theory of hyposubjects. For the most part, we’re simply bystanders to the process of hyposubjects coming into their own in the multiphasic landscape of hyperobjects. We have some thoughts about hyposubjects’ potentiality and we share them but we’ll leave it to the hyposubjects to theorize their agency (if that’s something they’re interested in doing). Maybe they’d rather just remake their world instead. What Vaneigem6 wrote during the heyday of Situationism seems apt for the XR generation too: ‘You’re fucking around with us? Not for long!’A:

Could you say a little about your conceptual journeys? How does the development of your thinking relate to some key figures and perhaps to the more formal theorising of Speculative Realism7 and Object-Oriented Ontology (OOO)8?TM and 

DB:

Well, part of the motivation to write the book was a basic wish to curtail some of the narcissistic self-attack that seems so prevalent on the left. One of us is a deconstructive OOO kind of a thinker, the other isn’t, though we are both very inclined towards left theory of all kinds. Timothy Morton didn’t ever think he was going to use the word subject in anything at all! But as was pointed out in our answer about the Anthropocene, it’s not so much what a concept is but how you use it that counts.

Why can’t we all just get along? Solidarities have been eroded when they need to be forged and reforged, right now. If we humans can’t do it amongst ourselves, we won’t be forging any with polar bears and coral. The narcissism of small differences is why it’s so hard to see that there’s more in common between me and a $30,000 per year person and a $400,000 per year person, than there is between all of us and a $65,000,000 a year person. It’s hard to visualize such a difference in scale, which is what power is counting on.

One consequence of this is that we wrote the book like it was a Virginia Woolf novel. We use the first person singular (unlike, say, Deleuze and Guattari9), so there are sentences like: ‘I like hedgehogs. I don’t.’ We think this makes a point. We also have a rule that in five years’ time two other people have to rewrite Hyposubjects: the book as videogame. It’s a way to make some hyposubjects, for a kickoff.

A:

How do hyperobjects10 fit in with OOO? Are all objects hyperobjects?

TM and DB:

Yeah why not? A hyperobject is a relational thing. To an electron, a biro is a hyperobject.

A:

What is the role of withdrawal in your approach to hyperobjects, and indeed in the Anthropocene? One gets a sense that perhaps the Anthropocene is the time of revelation and rejoining rather than withdrawal, as the unintended consequences, the excluded relations and externalities return with a vengeance. Could you say a little more about this relation between withdrawal and appearance?

TM and DB:

It’s a common and understandable mistake to visualize something when you hear the word ‘withdraw.’ What you visualize is something shrinking back or disappearing. That’s not what the word means. What the word means is that no matter how you try to access a thing, all you ever get is thing data. It’s basic contemporary philosophy, on which Foucault, Butler, Irigaray, Derrida11 … are all based.

Think about it. When you bite a banana you obtain a banana bite. When you lick a banana you get a banana lick. When you think about a banana you get a banana thought. When you draw the banana you get a banana drawing. When the banana becomes sentient and goes on Oprah and starts to talk—‘I found myself in a paragraph about bananas by the authors of Hyposubjects … it was a traumatic self-awakening …’—all you have is banana interview. Even the banana themselves can’t fully access the banana banana. And since licking is just as good or just as bad as thinking at accessing the banana banana, snails and hurricanes are just as good or as bad as humans and there’s nothing special about humans at all. Note that this doesn’t mean that hurricanes have the same rights as humans or whatever. It’s a terrifically freeing way of thinking, politically. It means you’re free to make the kinds of political affiliations you want to make, without recourse to metaphysics. You don’t have to prove that lemurs have a self-concept or that angel fish are smart in order to forge solidarities with them. Let’s get on with it!

It’s all about appearing. Hyperobjects tell you something true about any old objects. You can think them, but you can’t quite point to all of them, not because you can’t know them, but because you can. Hyperobjects are so, so in our faces, so part of our DNA and our bloodstream, not sitting behind glass in some aestheticized ‘over yonder,’ that we can’t quite point to them. It’s not that withdraw means become distant. Withdrawal is just one word you can use for an unspeakable intimacy. You don’t have to use that word in particular to concur with OOO, if it freaks you out.

We have loads of data about things that affect us as deeply as hyperobjects. So do flocks of geese and frogspawn—everything is affected by oil corporations, for example. All lifeforms contain some Teflon.

Notes

1. Timothy Morton is Rita Shea Guffey Chair in English at Rice University, Texas and author of Being Ecological (London: Penguin, 2018) and Humankind: Solidarity with Nonhuman People (London: Verso, 2017). See also blog. [^]
2. Dominic Boyer is Professor of Anthropology, Rice University, Texas. [^]
3. Hyposubjects: Politics of the Ecological Emergency (Human Language Edition). Under revision. Open Humanities Press. [^]
4. Professor of Philosophy, and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, Penn State College of the Liberal Arts. On the ‘return of difference’ see C. Colebrook ‘We Have Always Been Post-Anthropocene: The Anthropocene Counterfactual’ in Anthropocene Feminism edited by Richard Grusin (Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 2017), pp. 1–20. [^]
5. Elizabeth A. Povinelli, Franz Boas Professor of Anthropology, Columbia University in the City of New York. See E. Povinelli Geontologies: A Requiem to Late Liberalism (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2016). [^]
6. Raoul Vaneigem (1934–) author of The Revolution of Everyday Life (New York and London: Left Bank Books and Rebel Press, 1983 [1967]); see chapter 25, available at https://libcom.org/library/revlife26. [^]
7. A philosophical movement dating back to a conference held at Goldsmiths College, University of London, April 2007. [^]
8. Considered a subset of speculative realism initially propounded by (amongst others) Graham Harman and Levy Bryant. [^]
9. Gilles Deleuze (1925–1995) and Pierre-Félix Guattari (1930–1992). [^]
10. See Timothy Morton, Hyperobjects: Philosophy and Ecology After the End of the World (Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 2013). [^]
11. Michel Foucault (1926–1984); Judith Butler (1956–); Luce Irigaray (1930–); Jacques Derrida (1930–2004). [^]

Competing Interests

The authors have no competing interests to declare.