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Oedipus, Philosopher
A Stanford University Press classic.
- GenresPhilosophyTheory
244 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1990
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October 18, 2016Fethi Benslama señala cómo este pasaje indica que el islam sabe lo que nuestro universo occidental niega: el hecho de que el incesto no está prohibido, sino que es inherentemente imposible (cuando uno llega finalmente a la madre desnuda, ella se deshace como un espectro maligno). Benslama se refiere aquí a Oedipe philosophe, de Jean-Joseph Goux, donde demuestra cómo el mito de Edipo, lejos de ser universal, el subyacente mito originario, es una excepción respecto a otros mitos, un mito occidental, cuya característica básica es precisamente que «detrás de la prohibición, lo imposible se retrae a sí mismo»: la propia prohibición se interpreta como una indicación de que el incesto es posible. Desde la posición estándar de la sabiduría del sentido común, Edipo es una aberración occidental, una confusión del objeto óntico con el vacío ontológico; es un cortocircuito que ciega, la elevación de un objeto óntico a un Absoluto ontológico allí donde el objetivo debería ser distanciarlos, ver la vanidad de todos los objetos. Aquí, sin embargo, habría que permanecer fieles a la tradición «edípica» occidental: desde luego, todo objeto de deseo es un ilusorio señuelo; desde luego, la plena jouissance del incesto no solo está prohibida, sino que en sí misma es imposible; sin embargo, es aquí donde habría que reivindicar por completo la afirmación lacaniana de que les non-dupes errent. Incluso si el objeto de deseo es un ilusorio señuelo, hay algo real en esta ilusión: el objeto de deseo es vano en su naturaleza positiva, pero el lugar que ocupa no lo es, el lugar de lo Real. Por esta razón hay más verdad en la fidelidad incondicional al deseo de uno mismo que en una resignada comprensión de la vanidad de los esfuerzos propios.
Viviendo en el Final de los Tiempos Pág.85
Viviendo en el Final de los Tiempos Pág.85
March 10, 2025
Goux’s (1993) book sits within the French/Belgian tradition of scholarship of the 1990s and early 2000s, which includes such thinkers as Marcel Detienne and Jean-Pierre Vernant – all scholars blending the inter-extra academic disciplines of history, anthropology, classicism (philology), mythology, philosophy, and psychology. Indeed, I believe Vernant first wrote critically about Freud’s misreading of the Oedipal myth (“Oedipus Without the Complex”) in 1972.
Goux’s Oedipus, Philosopher goes far beyond just analyzing and critiquing the innerworkings of the Oedipus myth, because what he offers is a sprawling study that in essence traces the origins of Greek philosophy (rational thought/perspective) as it emerges from the Greeks’ overcoming of mythology (sacred insight/aspective). The development of this historical event is analyzed to its subsequent culmination in the Modern era, occurring principally in the “philosophical” thought of Descartes (cogito) and then Nietzsche (Übermensch).
The main “psychoanalytic” argument is grounded in comparative mythology and establishes a mono-myth type, a synoptic archetype for “royal initiation,” which amounts to a three-phased rite-of-passage (separation, transition, and assimilation/liberation), , which the author convincingly argues has been excised in the Modern era – we exist, and persist, in the liminal or second phase of the initiation, unlike the ancient Greeks, who were much more in tune with the mysterious, primordial, or shall we say, “holy” aspects of their Being-in-the-world of “physis.”
In brief the three phases are linked to the experience of the sacred, warfare, and fertility/procreation and the synoptic mythical texts that are organized around this tripartite initiation schema are: The myths of Jason, Bellerophon, and Perseus – all of whom destroy, through bloody, agonistic contest, a shadowy female-monster figure, who must be defeated to experience “desire” directed toward a female figure other than the mother.
Oedipus shatters this archaic mythological structure, so the case of Oedipus is (and Sophocles was well-aware of this!) an aberration, a profane enactment of the (synoptic) initiation ritual that sharply separates Oedipus off from the heroes of the past – for he engages the Sphinx using only his intellect (Theoria/Logos) – sans assistance from the gods - and is hence the first “auto-didact” or “humanist” philosopher; the connection to the sacred, to mythos, is sacrificed and such actions are profaned – this is Oedipus’ tragic sin or hamartia. This separation from the sacred, as represented in the Oedipus tragedy, is also the formulation of the “unconscious.”
The bulk of the book takes up this historical event and analyzes its deleterious influence on modernity, e.g., danger looms when secular humanism “deifies” human reason. Through its unfounded and misguided belief in the establishment of a human-constructed utopia by means of “progress,” philosophy engages in hubris and hence the possibility exists of suffering the fate that the chorus has anticipated in Sophocles’ tragedy – basically stressing the radical limitations (finitude, propensity to err) that reside at the heart of the human condition. Ultimately, one of the accomplishments of the book is to open the vista for us to reconsider the role of the “transcendent” in our lives and to radically rethink the archaic Delphic maxim “Gnōthi Sauton” (“Know Thyself”).
Goux, like Heidegger, places Nietzsche at the end of the “philosophical” (shall we say, Western metaphysical) tradition, but I’d question aspects of such a reading, for it is possible – perhaps food for thought – to read Nietzsche in terms that relate to the tripartite structure of the hero’s journey. For in Nietzsche’s philosophy, we encounter and hence might return to: (1) a sense of the sacred and profane – Nature, Chaos, Dionysus; (2) an understating of and demand for warfare – self-overcoming as polemos; and (3) fertility/sexuality – the need for the soul’s rebirth (natality).
To reiterate, the book contains a sprawling analysis that can be approached and engaged from a variety of perspectives and related fields of study. Throughout, Goux makes compelling and convincing arguments for his claims, and many of them are startling and eye-opening – indeed, the book reads, as one reviewer observed, like a mystery or thriller!
High praise also goes to Catherine Porter’s translation from the French to English. There is a consistency to the “voice” present and the book’s content, although undoubtedly dense and challenging, is presented in flowing and inviting language.
I highly recommend this book to all interested in Greek mythology and history, philosophy, and psychology. NB: Readers of Claude Lévi-Strauss and Joseph Campbell will love this study.
Dr. James M. Magrini
Former: Philosophy/College of DuPage
For my essay on Detienne, Heidegger, and Archaic Truth (Alētheia) see:
https://www.academia.edu/102230513/PO...
Goux’s Oedipus, Philosopher goes far beyond just analyzing and critiquing the innerworkings of the Oedipus myth, because what he offers is a sprawling study that in essence traces the origins of Greek philosophy (rational thought/perspective) as it emerges from the Greeks’ overcoming of mythology (sacred insight/aspective). The development of this historical event is analyzed to its subsequent culmination in the Modern era, occurring principally in the “philosophical” thought of Descartes (cogito) and then Nietzsche (Übermensch).
The main “psychoanalytic” argument is grounded in comparative mythology and establishes a mono-myth type, a synoptic archetype for “royal initiation,” which amounts to a three-phased rite-of-passage (separation, transition, and assimilation/liberation), , which the author convincingly argues has been excised in the Modern era – we exist, and persist, in the liminal or second phase of the initiation, unlike the ancient Greeks, who were much more in tune with the mysterious, primordial, or shall we say, “holy” aspects of their Being-in-the-world of “physis.”
In brief the three phases are linked to the experience of the sacred, warfare, and fertility/procreation and the synoptic mythical texts that are organized around this tripartite initiation schema are: The myths of Jason, Bellerophon, and Perseus – all of whom destroy, through bloody, agonistic contest, a shadowy female-monster figure, who must be defeated to experience “desire” directed toward a female figure other than the mother.
Oedipus shatters this archaic mythological structure, so the case of Oedipus is (and Sophocles was well-aware of this!) an aberration, a profane enactment of the (synoptic) initiation ritual that sharply separates Oedipus off from the heroes of the past – for he engages the Sphinx using only his intellect (Theoria/Logos) – sans assistance from the gods - and is hence the first “auto-didact” or “humanist” philosopher; the connection to the sacred, to mythos, is sacrificed and such actions are profaned – this is Oedipus’ tragic sin or hamartia. This separation from the sacred, as represented in the Oedipus tragedy, is also the formulation of the “unconscious.”
The bulk of the book takes up this historical event and analyzes its deleterious influence on modernity, e.g., danger looms when secular humanism “deifies” human reason. Through its unfounded and misguided belief in the establishment of a human-constructed utopia by means of “progress,” philosophy engages in hubris and hence the possibility exists of suffering the fate that the chorus has anticipated in Sophocles’ tragedy – basically stressing the radical limitations (finitude, propensity to err) that reside at the heart of the human condition. Ultimately, one of the accomplishments of the book is to open the vista for us to reconsider the role of the “transcendent” in our lives and to radically rethink the archaic Delphic maxim “Gnōthi Sauton” (“Know Thyself”).
Goux, like Heidegger, places Nietzsche at the end of the “philosophical” (shall we say, Western metaphysical) tradition, but I’d question aspects of such a reading, for it is possible – perhaps food for thought – to read Nietzsche in terms that relate to the tripartite structure of the hero’s journey. For in Nietzsche’s philosophy, we encounter and hence might return to: (1) a sense of the sacred and profane – Nature, Chaos, Dionysus; (2) an understating of and demand for warfare – self-overcoming as polemos; and (3) fertility/sexuality – the need for the soul’s rebirth (natality).
To reiterate, the book contains a sprawling analysis that can be approached and engaged from a variety of perspectives and related fields of study. Throughout, Goux makes compelling and convincing arguments for his claims, and many of them are startling and eye-opening – indeed, the book reads, as one reviewer observed, like a mystery or thriller!
High praise also goes to Catherine Porter’s translation from the French to English. There is a consistency to the “voice” present and the book’s content, although undoubtedly dense and challenging, is presented in flowing and inviting language.
I highly recommend this book to all interested in Greek mythology and history, philosophy, and psychology. NB: Readers of Claude Lévi-Strauss and Joseph Campbell will love this study.
Dr. James M. Magrini
Former: Philosophy/College of DuPage
For my essay on Detienne, Heidegger, and Archaic Truth (Alētheia) see:
https://www.academia.edu/102230513/PO...
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews