Annual Meeting Papers

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From the Individual Subject to a Subjected Individual: Levinas and Egological Psychologies

David M. Goodman, Ph.D., Harvard Medical School
Adriana Marcelli, B.A., Regis College

Draft only: please do not cite without permission.

Abstract

The “individual subject” as most fundamentally a bearer of rights and singular has been a staple of modern philosophies and psychologies. A wealth of discourse has been developed to promote and reflect this self-orientation. The works of Emmanuel Levinas call the primacy of this discourse into question and label it as “egology.” In this presentation, Levinas’ thought is used to describe his prescribed shift from a discourse of the “individual subject” to an “ethically subjected individual.” First, Levinas’ understanding of the individual subject is considered by engaging his critique of conatus essendi (“right to existence”) and considering his ethical depiction of the revelatory and responsibility-laden “uniqueness” of the individual. Second, the presenters illustrate some of the egological proclivities of modern psychological theories and practices. The presentation concludes with some creative questioning about how contemporary psychologies might recognize and incorporate Levinas’ radical thoughts about the ethically subjected individual.Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, consectetur adipisicing elit, cupidatat non proident. Eu fugiat nulla pariatur.

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The subject—the famous subject resting upon itself—is unseated by the other [autrui], by a wordless but for which I cannot deny my responsibility. The position of the subject is already his deposition. To be me (and not I [Moi]) is not perseverance in one’s being, but the substitution of the hostage expiating to the limit for the persecution it suffered… For it is only then that we witness… a dereification of the subject, and the desubstantialization of the condition, or noncondition, which qualifies the subjection of the subject. (Levinas, 2000, p. 181)

A core piece of Levinas’ critique of the Western self is his rejection of the individual subject as founded in being (existence) and a bearer of rights. Levinas is highly critical of the individual subject in its egoist form. Levinas stands in fundamental opposition to the Cartesian subject, its Lockean derivative, and the psychological permutations that have followed in their wake. The individual subject—as epitomized in Husserl and Heidegger—is “imperialistic” (Levinas, 1998b, p. 112), falsely sovereign, and violently egoistic. Huskinson (2002) writes,

 the Cartesian subject sees itself as subject by reference to the non-self. Levinas adapts the Cartesian argument to show that the ego is not primary but is dependent on the Other (the Self) for its constitution. Levinas thus wants to undermine the ontological authority of Western thought which is essentially an egology that asserts the primacy of the ego, the Same, the subject or Being. In Western philosophy the infinite Other is acknowledged only in order to be suppressed or possessed by the ego, it thus claims that the totality of the ego is without flaw and is all-encompassing, and that the subject receives nothing and learns nothing that it does not know or cannot possess. (p. 444)

Along with other Jewish thinkers such as Martin Buber, Franz Rosenzweig, and Abraham Heschel, Levinas “reject[s] the model of the self that has been preeminent at least since the time of Descartes, one that gives primacy to autonomy and autarchy, that is, to self-consciousness, self-reliance, and self-direction” (Oppenheim, 2006, p. 26-27). Levinas’ critique follows a line of numerous negative appraisals of the Cartesian “disengaged” cogito over the last two centuries. From Hegel’s master-slave dialectic to MacIntyre’s Dependent Rational Animals, there have been many camps that have been critical of the monadic person seemingly central to the Enlightenment project.

However, Levinas engages the project of critiquing the Cartesian cogito in a unique way, with the question of holiness, goodness, and ethics put first. Levinas wants to place goodness before being when defining the self. Burggraeve (2007) writes that “The basic constant in all of Levinas’ writings remains from beginning to end his search for the idea of a Good beyond being” (p. 37). Levinas did not want to situate human identity in social contract, a generic nature, or existence. For Levinas, “Being” is a sameness from which an escape is needed. He sought, in this discussion, that which is “otherwise than being” or “beyond essence.”

Levinas’ work severs the link between general categories and human identity. It undoes the abasement of modernist paradigms that locates the individual in a system, a genus (Levinas, 1969, 1998b). It lifts the individual up beyond the essentialist categories of being. Yet, it is not for the sake of further freeing the individual from constraints or romanticizing the notion of selfhood. Rather, it is for the sake of restoring an ethical transcendence. The self is most fully a self not when it is “rational,” “normal”, or approximating essentialist depictions of the human person. Instead, from the perspective of ethical transcendence, the self is most fully itself when it is lived in ethical relation to the Other (Cohen, 2002). As Heschel (1963) writes,

Here is a basic difference between the Greek and the biblical conception of man. To the Greek mind, man is above all a rational being; rationality makes him compatible with the cosmos. To the biblical mind, man is above all a commanded being, a being of whom demands may be made. The central problem is not: What is being? but rather: What is required of me? (p. 107)

 The self within Levinas’ work is an ethically-constituted self. Its psyche is understood as “moral attention” (Cohen, 2002, p. 50). Aronowicz writes that “for [Levinas] the primary sense of subjectivity is not a private universe, a sealed interiority, but an unparalleled attention, a response to what is outside, the most outside of which is the other human being” (Levinas, 1994, p. xxi). From this perspective, the “psyche is not first a cognitive entity, or even a dynamical structure, but rather a moral event” (Gantt and Williams, 2002, p. 6). Humanity does not consist of uniquely constituted selves with complex constellations of characteristics. That would be, for Levinas, merely a reified version that totalizes persons into forms of being. Instead, Levinas maintains that the self is only a self “insofar as the self is for-the-other” (Cohen, 2002, p. 42). The self is a moral exchange, ethical interchange, and substitution for another. The self does not return to itself, but is completely caught up in the Other (Robbins, 1991).

In the following presentation, we explore Levinas’ notion of radical responsibility for the Other and how this bears on our understanding of the individual subject.  In particular, Levinas’ ethics is considered by engaging his critique of the conatus essendi and considering his understanding of the “uniqueness” of the individual.

“Conatus Amandi” Rather Than “Conatus Essendi”

Throughout his writings, Levinas makes reference to conatus essendi as a foil for his understanding of an ethically-constituted self. Conatus essendi was a phrase coined by Spinoza, making reference to the very value of existence. According to this perspective, the existence of a being inheres within it a right to existence. Existence begs for, defends, and has a right to its own perseverance. Existence, itself an inert and abstract subject, somehow confers rights upon its subject. The ontological existence of a being, then, becomes a centralizing component of selfhood. The political, social, economic, and epistemological rights attributed to the atomic, human subject (Cushman, 1995; Taylor, 1989) can be understood to be a derivation of this understanding of existence.

Levinas views the Western ego as functioning fundamentally from an ontological position and argues for an alternate metaphysics. Though Levinas does not deny the crushing power of mortality and death upon human consciousness, he calls for an ethically-constituted consciousness wherein the other’s death takes precedence over one’s own, creating a “forgetting of death” (Levinas, 1998b, p. 141). This was a “fundamental difference” between Levinas and Heidegger (ethical vs. ontological, respectively). Levinas (2004) states, “Whereas for Heidegger, death is my death, for me it is the other’s death…Heidegger defines Dasein in almost Darwinian fashion as ‘a being which is concerned for its own being…as that of mineness” (p. 77). For Levinas, this “mineness” must be abdicated in the presence of the vulnerable other. The trace of the Divine is a transcendent reminder that reframes and de-centers our immanent engrossments. “Subjectivity… obligated with regard to the neighbor, is the breaking point where essence is exceeded by the infinite” (Levinas, 1998b, p. 12)

The Other is a threat to my existence in as much as my existence is prized as primary. And, the Other is a threat inasmuch as I conceive of the other as a competitor for existence and a powerful contender that brushes up against my rights. These are basic assumptions behind social contract theories that undergird Western society and that filter into constructs of the self.

However, Levinas asserts a different picture of the human person. Putnam (2002) writes that “in contrast to what Levinas sees as the Enlightenment radiant image of the human essence,” he stresses the “vulnerability of the other” (p. 45, original italics). Instead of questioning how the individual is usurping my rights, Levinas imposes the question of how I am usurping the rights of the Other. How is my space in this world taking away from the space of another? More concretely, how do the clothes that I wear or the coffee that I drink (i.e., my enjoyment) fall on the shoulders of others (e.g., sweatshops, coercive trade agreements)? How does my “place under the sun” rob someone else of their place? This is the origin of what Levinas refers to the as “guilt.” Existence does not offer rights, it requires persons to perpetually recognize and account for their potential violence toward others. The self must be forever apologetic (Levinas, 1969).

Levinas’ concept of asymmetry is helpful here. Whereas the ego works to take precedence over the Other, thinkers such as Martin Buber (1958) argued that there must be a mutuality between persons (a mutual recognition). Levinas critiques Buber for not being radical enough. Not only does he suggest that the Other’s needs be recognized as equal to my own, but more so that the Other’s needs are more important than my own. There is an asymmetrical requirement made upon the self. Levinas (1985) writes, “It is the exigency of holiness. At no time can one say: I have done all my duty” (p. 105). This is what leads Levinas (1969) to argue that there is a “surplus of my duties over my rights” (p. 159). That is, the Other is weak and vulnerable which requires me to forego and relinquish my rights in his or her presence. The Other’s hunger, fear, nakedness, and death are of greater importance than my own. Cohen (2002) states that in Levinas’ thought, “Responsibility for the other cuts deeper than egoism’s for-itself” (Cohen, 2002, p. 42). This, for Levinas, is the source of “human rights,” not some ontologically derived or essence-based quality of being (Burggraeve, 2007, p. 185). The individual is subjected to the Other.

Levinas’ Jewish heritage can be seen here.  The face of the Other is not to be understood in terms of comprehendible or generalizable qualities, but rather as the widow, orphan, and stranger described in Hebrew Scriptures. The face of the Other is first a command and request from a vulnerable and fragile stranger. The Other is both the poorest of the poor, in his or her destitution, and the most glorious of all, coming to us from transcendent height (Levinas, 1969, p. 215). Malka (2006) expresses this as follows, “Levinas reclaims an old Jewish optics that sees the fragile face of the Other and, simply by seeing it, stands infinitely in its debt. Vulnerability as such is reclaimed as the source of all prescription…(p. xxii). Instead of understanding the other as an equal member of the same genus, Levinas views the other as a stranger, widow, or orphan. There is an inherent vulnerability in the face of the Other. And it is this vulnerability that inverts the egoist fantasies and realities of the self. Levinas (2007) writes,

There is the possibility of a responsibility for the alterity of the other person, for the stranger without domicile or words with which to converse, for the material conditions of one who is hungry or thirsty, for the nakedness of the defenseless mortal. Where is the person who would not come toward me in that essential misery, whatever countenance they may put on? The other, the one separated from me, outside the community: the face of the person who asks, a face that is already a request… In that weakness there is the commandment of a God or an authority, and, despite all they say, there is a renouncing of the force of constraint. And from that moment forth, in this self persevering in being, there emerges mercy and the overturning of beings’ tautology of pure ‘being qua being.’ (p. 119)

Being, and its pulls for self-preservation and rightfulness, is made less primary in the presence of the Other’s needs. Levinas (2007) expresses that “being’s fundamental obstinacy in being, the priority of the conatus essendi, is put into question in the love of one’s neighbor and the stranger” (p. xx). He goes on to state that conatus essendi is interrupted by the Other’s face which commands, “Thou shalt not kill” and “Thou shalt love thy neighbor.” This is staunchly disparate from the mentality that states that the other is “none of my business.” Levinas recognizes the radicality of this claim within Western thought when he states, “This is an odd recommendation for an existence summoned to live at all costs” (p. 119).

The beginning of wisdom and holiness is to be found in conatus amandi; an evocation of love wherein the Other is loved through a recognition of and attention to his or her needs. Levinas (1998a) writes that love breaks “the equilibrium of the equanimous soul. A putting into question within me of the natural position of the subject, of the perseverance of the I—of its morally serene perseverance—in its being; a putting into question of its conatus essendi, of its existential insistence” (p. 168).

Love involves putting the other before the self, allowing the Other to interrupt the narcissistic processes inherent in ego function, and mourning the loss of sovereignty. It involves carrying the weight of the other’s existence, not a preoccupation with one’s own. Levinas (2000) writes, “Suffering the weight of the other man, the ‘me’ [moi] is called to uniqueness by responsibility” (p. 176). It is a matter of being subject to…

Uniqueness in Responsibility

     Definitions of selfhood derived from the immanent order are distillations of generalized principles. Persons become constellations of attributes and qualities. In Western thought, a person’s uniqueness is derived from the distinctive conglomerate of attributes and the unique history of experiences that he or she has accumulated. In this sense, the individual subject possesses his or her own identity.

This means of defining the subject has come under massive attack from postmodern thinkers such as Foucault and Derrida (to name only two). The validity of the “individual subject” and “ontological individualism” has been increasingly called into question (Bellah, et al, 1985; Burston and Frie, 2006, Gantt and Williams, 2002, Gergen, 2000, 2001; Stern, 2003). Derek George (in press) writes that two tragic deaths took place in the postmodern turn, the death of God and the death of the subject.

 Levinas functions as an alternative to the skepticism of much of postmodernism where the individual subject is dismembered and left for dead. Levinas’ critique against the modern self is just as trenchant as that of Derrida and Foucault, but does not leave the reader in the flailing abyss of non-meaning. Levinas proscribes the modern self as it currently stands, a radically self-reflexive self that functions idolatrously in its relationship to others.

The grandeur of modern antihumanism—which is truly beyond its own rationale—consists in making a clear space for the hostage-subjectivity by sweeping away the notion of the person. Antihumanism is right insofar as humanism is not human enough. In fact, only the humanism of the other man is human. (Levinas, 2000, p. 182)

However, he affirms the individuality of each person and separateness from one another (Levinas, 1969). He gives due reverence to the uniqueness that each person holds, however, with a twist.

For Levinas, the unique constellation of features that each person holds is not, in and of itself, the basis of value, worth, and humanity. Rationality, meaning-making, will, and choice are not the determinants of the self. These things, and the very fact of existence, do not provide the value that entitles us to “rights.” Conatus essendi is not operative. The self is not valued as a bearer of rights and unique unto itself.

Rather, the self is valued as a respondent to the needs of the other. “My uniqueness lies in the responsibility I display for the Other” (Levinas, 1990, p. 26). It is the distinct qualities of my history and response-abilities to the Other whom I encounter that bestow uniqueness upon me. I am uniquely “equipped” to meet the Other’s needs. The uniquely constellated self is a self that is singularly able to respond to the needs of another in a particular way. The self is “ethical singularity” (Bloechl, 2000). Each self is able to hear and respond to the needs of another in a way that another cannot. Each self bears a unique revelation of the Divine for the Other (and vice versa). Levinas (1989) writes, “But this desire for the non-desirable, this responsibility for the neighbour, this substitution as a hostage, is the subjectivity and uniqueness of a subject” (p. 112). For Levinas, uniqueness is equated with being “chosen” and “elected” to responsibility for the other. He states, “This summons to responsibility destroys the formulas of generality by which my knowledge (savoir) or acquaintance (connaissance) of the other man re-presents him to me as my fellow man. In the face of the other man I am inescapably responsible and consequently the unique and chosen one” (p. 84).

     The contrast between a uniquely responsible self (demanded self) and the modern self is stark. The modern self begins with the self and ends with itself. The journey along the way is through the universalizing and ultimately abasing generalities through which one comes to understand him or herself. It is an idolatrous circuitry in that the self begins with itself and ends with a truncated ego, “for-itself.” The subjected individual or demanded self, on the other hand, begins with the ego —need, self-preservation, etc.—and is broken free in proximity to the face of the other. The demanded self cannot return to itself, it is in perpetual exile—away from complacency and identity—and entering into moral covenant. Levinas (2001) states,

The human I is not a unity closed upon itself, like the uniqueness of the atom, but rather an opening, that of responsibility, which is the true beginning of the human and of spirituality. In the call which the face of the other man addresses to me, I grasp in an immediate fashion the graces of love: spirituality, the lived experience of authentic humanity. (p. 182)

For Levinas, cognitive faculties and adaptive function cannot be definitive of selfhood. Levinas does not deny the faculties of perception and “consciousness of…” When one looks at a rock or the ocean, perceptual categories dictate what is being seen, how it is being fit into prior experience, and how to assimilate or accommodate this information in terms of categories of being and presence. Levinas is not arguing against this. Instead, he is arguing that this does not extend into the interhuman. In the presence of the Other, while in proximity to the face of the Other, these faculties are shown to fundamentally lack. There is an interruption of objectivity and horizonality in the Other’s excess. One’s history no longer adequately accounts for one’s “experience” of the other. Moreover, it is no longer even an experience, it is an epiphany. Subjectivity is the reversing of the tide, a being subject to instead of merely a subject. The other—bearing the trace of the divine—de-nucleates and de-phases my facilities and ultimately and primordially calls me forth. It is no longer subject relating to object, nor even a subject relating to a subject. Instead it is the asymmetrical process wherein the ego fissures in the presence of the Other. It is a psyche being born into a demanded and ethically constituted self. Levinas (1998b) poignantly expresses this as follows:

The psyche involved in intentionality does not lie in consciousness of…, its power to thematize, or in the ‘truth of Being,’ which is discovered in it through different significations of the said. The psyche is the form of a peculiar dephasing, a loosening up or unclamping of identity: the same prevented from coinciding with itself, at odds, torn up from its rest, between sleep and insomnia, panting, shivering. It is not an abdication of the same, now alienated and slave to the other, but an abnegation of oneself fully responsible for the other. This identity is brought out by responsibility and is at the service of the other. In the form of responsibility, the psyche in the soul is the other in me, a malady of identity, both accused and self, the same for the other, the same by the other. (p. 68-69)

The subjected individual is defined by its moral shape—a life lived toward the outside, sacrificing one’s identity for the sake of the Other. This “moral shape” enables the self to hear the call of the other and does not deny it through detachment, indifference, and self-aggrandizement. It is a self that is given as a gift to others, living in perpetual hospitality and welcome to the Other. It is a self that does not live in the illusion of its own mastery, a constituting of reality and the other. Rather, it is constituted by and dephased by the Other. Goodness is not inside; it is made possible by the outward shape of our lived self. Goodness is not detached rationality, it is the lived and dialogical condition by which rationality is made just. Goodness is not an individual phenomenon, it is always to the service of the Other. Relationship is the very condition wherein goodness can take place. Without the Other, holiness is not possible. Heschel (1963) captures this idea in the following quote:

A person is he of whom demands can be made, who has the capacity to respond to what is required, not only to satisfy his needs and desires. Only a human being is said to be responsible. Responsibility is not something man imputes to himself; he is a self by virtue of his capacity for responsibility, and he would cease to be a self if he were to be deprived of responsibility. (p. 106)

Levinas affirms the individuality of each person, but displaces the individual from its status as primary within Western thought. The individual is no longer the constituting, authoring source of reality. It is not that which relates to others through a detached reason, “windows closed and doors shut” (Levinas, 1969, p. 173). Rather, the self is for the Other, an identity lived outward that is then given back as a gift from the Other (Marion, 2006; See also Horner, 2001). The self is a lived love, a sacrifice (Temimut) (Levinas, 1994). Against a philosophical monopoly that esteems the individual as the bearer of autonomous reasoning faculties, master of his or her inward kingdom, and manifesting universal and naturalistic principles, Levinas expresses something truly other. 

Levinas seeks to define the self anew, within the freedom of responsibilities and the wisdom of love. It might be better said that Levinas hopes to renew a definition of selfhood, wherein a Hebraic depiction of the subject is a guiding source. He hopes to show that “the nonidentity of the self has higher priority, is more important, is better, than the complacency of identity” (Cohen, 2002, p. 48). Levinas (1998b) suggests that there is a “plot larger than the apperception of the self” (p. 76). He states, “I am trying to show that man’s ethical relation to the other is ultimately prior to his ontological relation to himself (egology) or to the totality of things which we call the world” (Levinas, 2004, p. 72).

Egological Psychologies

Levinas accuses Western philosophy (the Greek academy) of being an “egology” and it is argued here that modern psychologies are the same. The dominant language of these psychologies are, in the sense used by Levinas, “Greek.” Contemporary psychologies’ roots lie in Hellenic thought (Faulconer & Williams, 1990). In his thought, Western egology is derivative of Greek language and conceptualizing. It is an obsession with being, an idolizing of the immanent order, and the illusory safety of self-mastery and meaning-making. The Cartesian cogito, the Lockean “punctual” self (Taylor, 1989), and the Kantian transcendental ego (all of which serve as the basis of our modern psychological paradigms) are each forms of detached rationality and the disengaged subject that are continuations of a long lineage of Greek rationality. They represent a radicalizing of the self-reflexivity of which Levinas was so critical. They epitomize a version of the self oriented for-itself (Dueck & Goodman, 2007), a self fallen prey to the temptation of temptation.

Modern psychologies have little to work with beyond the cultural status quo and the natural order. As such, a discourse which places the ego and its function at the center of selfhood is at home within the Western context. The psychological self is a well-boundaried, “buffered self” (Taylor, 2007) whose rights and needs are perpetually active. It is self-constituting and at home in itself (Levinas, 1998b). Dueck and Parsons (2007) write,

While much contemporary psychology assumes the self to be autonomous, unencumbered, and individual (Cushman, 1995), Levinas recognizes this self pejoratively as the Cartesian ego that functions in a mode of unrestricted freedom. The Other is there for the ego: the Other gives the sensory experience of pleasure and pain. When the ego reduces the Other to sameness, the Other becomes an extension of the self. The ego is the ‘melting pot’ of otherness. (p. 275)

Levinas charges this “masterfully bounded self” (Cushman, 1995), the child of Western philosophy, as being a bulwark of imperialistic practices, definitively without ethical cognizance, and without a Desire for what is beyond, behind, and instead of itself.

This egoism is the preponderant state of the modern self, unable to move from interiority into the outside, toward the other. Kunz (2006) puts it in the following words, this self is “caught in the flat and boring isolation of his own ataractic existence, a tranquilized undisturbance” (p. 7). It is a life stuck in the circuitry of its own history, without a means of escape. In front of the other, it is still not in his or her presence. In the physiognomy before it, it does not see the Other’s face. While being close, this self is not in proximity to the other. It is severely detached and cannot find its way to hear the other as truly Other. Instead, this self hears the sameness of itself in the other’s voice instead of hearing the Other’s voice in its own. The Other has little constitutional capacity. Intimacy is alien even in the presence of eros (Williams and Gantt, 1998). Without an openness or exposure—an orientation toward the other—the self remains oriented toward itself, trapped in the modern prison of individual consciousness. It is a solipsistic consciousness that is deaf to what is outside of itself.

The Western subject, propagated in a variety of forms in psychological theory does not appear to provide a means of escape from itself (no transcendence). Rather, its language of fulfillment, adaptation, and ego function/boundaries, in their common use, further reifies and facilitates this way of being (Harrington, 2002, Kunz, 1998). This language feeds into constructs of the self that are definitively egoist, leaving the needs of the Other outside of the purview of human identity. The self is defined without reference to the Other. Modern psychologies often teach a language to navigate contemporary society without need of calling its practices into question (Cushman, 1995; Prilleltensky, 1994). Kunz (1998) writes, “While the philosophical presupposition that the self is the center of the self has been the firm foundation of psychology, it has encouraged an egocentrism that sabotages itself” (p. xix). Contemporary forms of the individual subject are examples of the “cancerous individualism” of which many social critiques have been written (Bellah, et al, 1985, Rieff, 1987, 2006).

Many psychologists who are using Levinas’ work challenge this version of the individual subject (and the derivative models of psychopathology that emerge from it) by attempting to show how morally-laden human suffering is (Gantt and Williams, 2002). Psychotherapy, within this emerging conversation, is less interested in empirical validation and symptom reduction (Clegg and Slife, 2005) and is more concerned with an image of persons trapped within themselves, seeking escape and responsibility for the Other (Alford, 2007; Atterton, 2007; Cohen, 2002, 2005; Kunz, 1998; Marcus, 2007; Williams, 2007; Williams and Gantt, 1998). Williams (2007) writes, “For those who seek therapy because of the heavy burden of self-creation and a poignant sense of nothingness, or for those who are lonely even in the midst of unbridled autonomy, a Levinasian account of life, relationships, and infinity whispers of hope and wholeness. These are to be found not by concentrating ourselves inward, but outward” (p. 695). Cohen’s (2005) description of suicidality from within a Levinasian frame is illustrative of this point. He states,

Instead of conceiving suicidal inclinations as the desire of a desperate soul to escape from life, one rather should think of these inclinations as the ultimate expression of the failure to find an escape from self-absorption. That is to say, the potential suicide is he or she who has not found a ‘way out,’ has not found an escape, lacks the humane and humanizing experience of transcendence, despairs, and gives up all hope of ever finding one… The therapeutic response to such feelings of entrapment, and to all the conscious psychic distortions that come with these feelings, would be to re-connect the individual to a genuine inter-subjective life, life with others. (p. 111)

For Levinas, “The subject exists, but not in isolation, only in relationship to others” and furthermore “Levinas… is not looking for comfort. He is looking for an exit. My infinite responsibility to the infinitely other allows me to participate, in as much as humans are able to participate, in transcendence, understood as leaving the burden of my being behind as I devote myself to others” (Alford, 2007, p. 540). Following on this point, Marcus (2007) states that “Pathology can be conceptualized as those habits of mind, heart, and behavior that impede the movement of transcendence toward otherwise than being, toward living a life characterized by love and justice for the Other before oneself” (p. 521).

Might therapy be a means of helping individuals and society-as-a-whole witness how they protect themselves from exposure and proximity to the Other? Might therapy provide a context wherein persons can dismantle their “defenses against the ethical encounter with our neighbor” (Santner, 2001, p. 128). Our deafness to the Other must be revealed. “The individual must not allow the world of things, and his own desires and needs, to objectify and shield him from the other. Responsibility is to be present for the other” (Oppenheim, 2006, p. 166). This could be a restoration of seeing the face of the Other again and hearing its Divine call, “Thou shalt not kill.” Therapy could be a location where one learns to hear not just one’s own voice, but the revelation gifted from the trace of the Divine. The questions are: how do we as psychotherapists introduce to our clients the counter-cultural approach of emptying themselves of their natural impulses toward self-preservation, self-regard, self-interest, and self-assertion? If it is the face of the Other that ruptures the sameness of our client’s egos, then how can we restore a non-totalizing vision of this face? How do we overcome a cultural narrative that deafens us to Others and that is a blind co-extension of the natural proclivities of our self-interested egos?

Possibly, in relationship to a therapist, the client can learn a way of letting go of oneself and laying one’s life down for his or her neighbor, of seeing in the face of the Other that which trumps, overwhelms, and calls toward a freedom that only can come from responsibilities. This is a freedom alien to a culture that revolves around the heroism of each individual.

Conclusion

The reason for the recovery of commandment is not simply our current social crisis, but rather the recognition of the true character of human existence in the face of this Other who does indeed command. A true self is a self under command. Thus I suggest that attention to biblical processes of the self is crucial if we are to find a way alternative to the increasingly dysfunctional and destructive modes…that are so powerful all around us. (Brueggemann, 1999, p . 23)

This way of being, a detached consciousness that is immune to the call of the Other, is the self out of which we live at present. It is partly the product of a Western philosophy that subscribes to a picture of self-authored reality (e.g., Sartre), preoccupation with one’s own death and its implications for a lived life (e.g., Heidegger), and naturalistic and functionalistic explanatory frameworks. It is the story of the self that we tell ourselves, reflected in psychological practices, and which deafens us to any moral demandedness in our self-definition and experience. The self out of which we live is a self that is defined and lived in such a way as to blind us to that which is behind and beyond mere constructions, the ethical call of the Other. In Western history, there has been a meta-retreat from ethics through our constructs. Our very constitution, our lived self, has lost from its horizon of meaning the capacity to hear the primordial call to be responsible for the Other, our brother or sister.

This is a metalinguistic challenge to the dominant epistemologies, methods, and constructs within many modern psychologies and their healing technologies and norms propagated in general culture. When applied to clinical psychology, it suggests that mental health is not merely the re-alignment of misaligned cognitions, shoring up of one’s ego strength/boundaries, or reconditioning of a client toward greater adaptability for the sake of reduced symptomatology or increased normality. However, these models of psychotherapeutic treatment are the logical conclusion of naturalistic, immanent, and reason-based constructs of the self. From these modern perspectives on the human person, health and pathology are located in the mechanisms and universal functions incarnate within each individual. Sameness of being allows the therapist to conceptualize the client from recognizable characteristics, symptom clusters, and a pre-assessed understanding of what a healthy person looks like. These dominant models of psychotherapy reflect and encourage “fulfillment” models of human health in which autonomy, rationality, freedom, and functionality are espoused as the litmus test of psychological health.

The work of Levinas suggests that the “complacency of identity” and the proper functioning of the natural is a truncated and myopic depiction of the human self (Cohen, 2002, p. 48).  The subjected self begins with obligation and responsibility. Levinas (2004) states,

the freedom of the subject is not the highest or primary value. The heteronomy of our response to the human other, or to God as the absolutely Other, precedes the autonomy of our subjective freedom. As soon as I acknowledge that it is ‘I’ who am responsible, I accept that my freedom is anteceded by an obligation to the other. Ethics defines subjectivity as this heteronymous responsibility in contrast to autonomous freedom. (p. 78-79)

The subjected self does not shore up its walls, ensure its rights, and function unto itself. For Levinas, “The road from mental illness to mental health is not to create from a shattered ego a fortress ego, but to regain one’s obligations, one’s responsibilities to and for the other” (Cohen, 2002, p. 48). The subjected self is a self whose very constitution is its openness to being taken hostage by the Other. This self is susceptible to the

madness and insomnia of being ruptured by the face of the Other (Levinas, 1998b). “The subject—the famous subject resting upon itself—is unseated by the other (autrui), by a wordless exigency or accusation, and one to which I cannot respond with words, but for which I cannot deny my responsibility” (Levinas, 2000, p. 181). It is a self that is de-centered in its being (Sayre, 2005) and can experience the trace of God in the face of the Other. The subjected self can stare into the face of alterity and not self-protect with the thematizing, totalizing, and violent constrictions of ontological being. It is a self that sacrifices his or her illusions of sovereignty and comforts of identity for the goodness of the Other’s needs. This self can still hear the whisper of the Other asking not to be murdered, and responds with “Here I am” (Levinas and Robbins, 2001, p. 215-216).
Psychotherapy, coming from this radical subjection, is a process that “calls me into question” (Levinas, 1989, p. 83), de-centers one’s sense of self (Sayre, 2005), and moves an individual increasingly toward an openness to the mystery and surprise of the other. It is a process of self-emptying or kenosis in which a person increasingly releases his or her sedimentary layers of identity, control, and consciousness for the sake of exposure to the Other. Being exposed to the needs of the Other and being utterly accused lays the groundwork from which subjectivity and consciousness emerge. However, this is a subjectivity and consciousness born out of an ethical encounter, not a “true self” buried within or a re-integration of the ego free from “conditions of worth.” It is a subjectivity and consciousness that recognizes obedience as being more fundamental than autonomy and individuation, passivity as being more primary than rationality and agency, and ethical responsibility as being of greater concern than functionality.

Levinas (2004) hoped to take advantage of a “golden opportunity for Western philosophy to open itself to the dimension of otherness and transcendence beyond Being” (p. 79). Likewise, the work of a clinical psychologist is an incredible opportunity to assist patients in opening themselves up to a dimension of otherness and transcendence beyond the sameness of their own being. Therapy, instead of being a means of restoring persons to the cultural status quo (Cushman, 1995), might be better understood as a process wherein persons redefine their personal freedom (Dueck and Parson, 2007); becoming less concerned about autonomy and rationality and more concerned with being ethically subject to others.

NOTES