On Vengeance
Among the political emotions, vengeance may be the most terrible of them all.
On the one hand, vengeance is different than justice. It authorizes those who act in its name to do all sorts of things that they would normally not feel themselves authorized or entitled to do. Vengeance has an extraordinarily permissive licensing structure, freeing the vengeful from any and all restraints.
On the other hand, as any reading of The Oresteia will show, vengeance contains a strict and stern element of obligation, even injunction: Whatever else you may do, you are not authorized or allowed not to take vengeance. To not avenge—to forgive or acquit, to do anything that might break the link between the iniquitous past and the promised future—is to dishonor, to forget, the dead. To not avenge is the equivalent of committing a second crime, a second murder. Vengeance, in other words, is not simply a passion that sweeps you up and sleighs you off to action. It requires and builds on an elaborated structure of moral duty.
This is why Orestes is so tormented by the question of forgiving his mother, who killed his father. He cannot see not killing her as entailing anything but a forgetting of his father. This is also one of the reasons that Hannah Arendt thought that forgiveness was less a Christian virtue or sappy sentiment than a genuinely political act, breaking the repetitive cycles of vengeance and violence, allowing for the creation of something new.
One of the reasons I think we’re in an especially dangerous moment right now is because the spirit of vengeance out there is so strong. The last time I sensed this so potently in the culture was after 9/11. I can only hope that the much maligned decline in our attention spans kicks in and does its magic work soon.
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7 Comments
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Jack Turner
Thanks Corey for drawing our attention again and again to the parallels between this time and the repressive period after 9/11.
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concerned
I have only dim memories of the post 9/11 period, as I was 33 weeks pregnant on 9/11 and worked across the street from the WTC for a small firm that provided exchange software integral to the functioning of the markets. As much of a parade of hateful incompetents as that administration was, I don’t remember feeling personally, existentially threatened for such an extended period as I do now, nor did I think anyone was serious about killing Americans or creating a white, hetero Christian theocracy as I do now.
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Seekonk
I never looked into revenge until 10/7 and its aftermath, and I was surprised that ethicists accept its validity.
But (from Wiki): “While ancient systems allowed private vengeance, a key development in common law was the move from personal retribution to state-sponsored punishment and compensation for victims.” Civilized society reserves a monopoly on violence to government and forbids revenge by private actors.
If we had a functioning system of international law, both the Hamas actors of 10/7 and the Israeli actors since 10/7 would be subject to legal discipline. The USA veto power in the UN allows this catastrophe to continue.
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To clarify, Israel’s claim to jurisdiction over Palestine and Palestinians is dubious at best; and in the international context, Israel is subordinate to international law, like a private actor is to national law.
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marcel proust
I was about to make a similar point, that The Oresteia is set in a society that lacks a government which is presumed to have a monopoly on violence. This is also true of organized crime families, including contemporary urban gangs in their interactions with each other. In the context in which they function, one can see a positive role for vengeance in creating and keeping order. In the context in which most of us live & hope to continue living, vengeance contributes to disorder not order. While the initial act may have begun the breakdown of order, “The avenger isn’t there to create disorder; the avenger is there to preserve disorder.” (with appropriate apologies to Da Mare, the late great Richard J. Daley)
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Ramesh
There is another dynamic present in the West which is tied to its economic system and this dynamic has been steadily growing over the decades. A state of mindlessness and reduced competencies that is systemic. And this is absent in other countries with different economic systems. Everyone thinks I am crazy for mentioning this but this is so apparent in these late stages of finance capitalism with ever increasing insatiable greed which in turn brings this mindlessness.
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When I first read the original post, I assumed that it referred to vengeance in the context of Israel-Gaza. I now understand it to refer to the murder of Charlie Kirk, where our right-wing government is both using state power and encouraging private actors to get vengeance.