Ricoeur

Periodically I receive a little magazine, Tableau, sent to escapees from the Division of the Humanities at the University of Chicago. The Fall 2005/Winter 2006 issue reminded me that Wayne Booth had died and informed me that Paul Ricoeur had passed on as well. At least, I don’t remember reading Ricoeur’s obituary in the Times, as I did Booth’s.

If I have read any Ricoeur, it would have been at the behest of my friend Tom F.–H., who most likely had shoved one of great man’s papers at me during one of our frequent leisurely coffee breaks at the Newberry Library. It was my first job after leaving the university— “collating” rare editions of English literature before they were photographed for microfiche publication. Aside from reading a few first editions in the Rare Book Room and learning what “foxing” is, the coffee breaks were the highlight of the job. Tom’s wife worked for the university’s continuing education division, and somehow or other she and Tom had dealings with Ricoeur (who taught at the U of C from 1971 to 1991). Tom was nuts for the guy.

If I have read Ricoeur, I have certainly forgotten it. Reading the titles of his books in the obit, I wonder why I never gave him a shot:

• The Living Metaphor (1975)
• Time and Narrative (3 vols, 1983–1985)
• Oneself as Another (1990)
• Tolerance between Intolerance and the Intolerable (1996)
• What Makes Us Think (1998)
• Memory, History, Forgetting (2000)

So tempting … Well, it’s never too late.

But here’s the point. A colleague of his, André LaCocque, was quoted:

One of the most penetrating statements of Paul Ricoeur says, “Justice proceeds by conceptual reduction; love proceeds by poetic amplification.” Justice and love summarize, in my mind, the man Ricoeur.

We chewed that one over, Laura and I, one morning before I pedaled off to work. What does it mean? Of course it’s out of context, but still—there’s something there. It made sense to me: justice seems to require that we make distinctions and hierarchies, while love seeks to dissolve differences and create the sense of the One. Laura wondered whether love must precede justice. Today everyone is obsessed with justice, she said. Without love, there is no justice. (I think she said that, or something like it.)

This made me think of a section in The Brothers Karamazov (the reader may wish to be excused at this point). The first time I read the book, I slogged through that part. The next few times, I ran past it, knowing what great stuff lay ahead (murder, mayhem, the Grand Inquisitor …). The last time, however, I paid a bit of attention to it.

In chapter 5 of Book II (Part I), two of the brothers (Alyosha and Ivan) and their father are killing time in Father Zosima’s cell, waiting for Dmitry to show up so they could discuss their family feud and seek advice. Father Joseph, the librarian, had learned that Ivan was the author of a journal article on the question of a theoretical ecclesiastical-civil court, and was pleased to discuss the topic with him.

The question is not entirely theoretical in some countries today, and there is a chance that Iraq will have something of the sort, when all is said in done. I’m not an expert in Islamic justice, so I don’t know what role love might play in it. Love was certainly an integral part of the system Ivan had argued for (ironically or not), at least in Zosima’s rendering of it—the Church acts as a “tender, loving mother.” This question sent me off looking for information on Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s views on the kind of judicial system is best suited for Russia (I had recalled the accusations that he wanted to institute a “theocracy,” but it seems the charges may have been exaggerated). I wondered if Solzhenitsyn’s blueprint would look at all like Ivan Karamazov’s.

To an American eye, such schemes are risky. Much of our governance is based on the assumption that human beings are subject to both inadvertant error and selfish cupidity. In performing our official duties we can certainly exhibit disinterested competence, even perform a noble deed or two, but shitty acts are not beyond us, either. So we built (and build) structures of words—laws and regulations—and things—penalties and prisons, and we’ve added mechanisms for redress, because mistakes will be made. There doesn’t seem to be an ounce of love in it. But does it work well enough? Is it the best we can hope for? Maybe, but no one in their right mind would want to be drawn into it. Every once in a while, a lawsuit will accomplish something great, for an individual or for society. More often than not, despite all its fine distinctions and subtle argumentation, it’s a rather blunt instrument.

But when we talk about “justice,” that can’t be all we mean by it—codices and incarceration. Justice is more than the judicial system, isn’t it? In The Brothers Karamazov, Dmitry ended up being convicted of a crime he didn’t commit, yet he felt justice was done; and his brother Ivan went off his cork over the question of whether he shared in the guilt of his father’s murder.

Maybe I’ll track down Paul Ricoeur’s 1996 opus. Tableau said it’s about justice, and I obviously need some help.