Holy war, Just war

Abstract

This reflection is guided by the reading which Walter Benjamin does of two controversial authors born in the nineteenth century: George Sorel and Carl Schmitt. We will seek, on one hand, to emphasize some aspects that unite them as decionism, the preponderance of the action and the demystification of the sphere of politics, and on the other hand, the aspects that approach their and those which deviate their from Benjamin. We will begin by examining the violence notion and the differentiation between violence and force by Sorel, and their meaning for political action. We will seek to expose also the denunciation of Carl Schmitt of all “significant concepts of the modern theory of the State” as “secularized theological concepts” (p.43). Then, we will go to Benjamin’s reading of the authors above, privileging the texts “Critique of Violence” and “Origin of German Tragic Drama” and under the light of them to reflect upon the meaning of holy war, just war. Our purpose is to examine the meaning of this “non violent” violence.