Horkos [oath] and the sacrament of language – The purloined letter

HTS Teologiese Studies/Theological Studies

 
 
Field Value
 
Title Horkos [oath] and the sacrament of language – The purloined letter
 
Creator Meylahn, Johann-Albrecht
 
Subject Philosophy; Theology Agamben; Lacan; Derrida; Language; Philosophy; Theology
Description The article will bring a reading of Agamben’s interpretation of horkos [oath] in the Sacrament of language, a reading of Derrida’s faith as the grammar of language, into conversation with Lacan’s interpretation of Poe’s ‘The purloined letter’ by taking into consideration the context of this reading: South Africa. South Africa is a multilingual context in the fullest sense of the word ‘multilingual’, and as such, it is faced with the dilemma of a corrupt postal system. The postal system is a metaphor for the system of communication where messages are sent and received. This postal system is corrupt as the sender and receiver of messages are not sacramentally bound by the same oath, and therefore the letters are doomed to be purloined. Derrida’s différance and the grammar of faith transcends the various languages and the various oaths as the quasi-transcendental condition for the sacrament of language, thereby opening a sacred space to encounter the inevitable corruption of the postal service.
 
Publisher AOSIS
 
Contributor
Date 2013-10-24
 
Type info:eu-repo/semantics/article info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion — —
Format text/html application/octet-stream text/xml application/pdf
Identifier 10.4102/hts.v69i1.2048
 
Source HTS Teologiese Studies / Theological Studies; Vol 69, No 1 (2013); 6 pages 2072-8050 0259-9422
 
Language eng
 
Relation
The following web links (URLs) may trigger a file download or direct you to an alternative webpage to gain access to a publication file format of the published article:

https://hts.org.za/index.php/hts/article/view/2048/3865 https://hts.org.za/index.php/hts/article/view/2048/3866 https://hts.org.za/index.php/hts/article/view/2048/3868 https://hts.org.za/index.php/hts/article/view/2048/3864
 
Coverage — — —
Rights Copyright (c) 2013 Johann-Albrecht Meylahn https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
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