Dionysian biopolitics : Karl Kerényi's concept of indestructible life

摘要

Scholar of religion Karl Kerényi’s last book, Dionysos, is a grand attempt atreinterpreting ζωη (zoe), the Greek concept of indestructible life, which he distinguishes fromβίος (bios), finite life. In Kerényi’s view, the meaning and sensual experience of zoe wasexpressed in its richest form in the Cretan beginnings of the cult of Dionysos. The majorcharacteristics of this cult, as Kerényi describes, were beyond the cultural, political, andsexual limits of the Christian interpretations of life and nature. Searching for modernanalogies to zoe, Kerényi explains the idea in relation to molecular biology’s minimumdefinition of life. Despite the fact that Kerényi’s book contains only minor references tocontemporary philosophy, the philosophical consequences of his interpretations of Dionysosare not only radical but outline a notion of biopolitics far in advance of the mid- to late 20thcenturydevelopment of it. By the affirmation of indestructible life and animality, Kerényiproposes a new humanism that moves beyond the limits of Kantian anthropology and alsotakes a radically different perspective to that of Heidegger’s philosophy of being, orAgamben’s notion of biopolitics. According to Kerényi’s investigations, since this alternativehumanism, which is based on the radical recognition of the individuality and diversity of lifeforms, was once possible in an earlier stage of human culture, it is possible to reanimate it inorder to shape anew how zoe is understood and therefore lived. Our relation to nature canthereby undergo a Dionysian transvaluation and assign us new responsibilities as well asopen up a new trajectory for the 21st-century human.