The Religion (without Religion) of the Living (without Life): Re-reading Derrida’s “Faith and Knowledge”

Abstract

This article offers a reading of Jacques Derrida’s account of “religion” and “life” in his seminal essay “Faith and Knowledge.” Applying Derrida’s aporetic structure of “X without X” to his remarks on religion and life in “Faith and Knowledge,” this article suggests that underlying Derrida’s endeavor to “think religion abstractly” is a radical re-conception not only of religion as “religion without religion” but moreover a re-imagination of life as “life without life” that breaks away from the traditional metaphysical understandings of life and religion.

Keywords

• derrida
• religion
• life
• survival
• abstraction
• “faith and knowledge”