The Messianic Idea, the Time of Capital and the Everyday

Large, William ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0447-5364 (2009) The Messianic Idea, the Time of Capital and the Everyday. Journal for Cultural Research, 13 (3-4). pp. 267-279. doi:10.1080/14797580903101177

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Abstract

Why should anyone bother with religious ideas? Are they not the most outmoded, reactionary and useless forms of expression? Not if they make us see reality in a different way. What we are faced with in these dangerous times is a complete and total global catastrophe. Capitalism turns away from this disaster (of which it is the cause) by promising an endless future of the same. Only a time which breaks with this time can truly prevent it from happening. We are faced with three futures: the future of the disaster, which is the reality of capitalism; the future of progress, which is the fantasy of capital; and that future which interrupts this fatal double of the real and the fantastical. Such a future is the messianic. Messianism should be clearly distinguished from any kind of millenarianism. It does not seek the “end of times”, a world beyond or behind the world, but the transformation of the present by the hidden possibilities of the everyday.

Item Type:	Article
Article Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	REF2014 Submission
Subjects:	B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BL Religion H Social Sciences > H Social Sciences (General)
Divisions:	Schools and Research Institutes > School of Arts, Culture and Environment
Research Priority Areas:	Culture, Continuity, and Transformation
Depositing User:	Anne Pengelly
Date Deposited:	14 Sep 2015 14:10
Last Modified:	29 Oct 2025 09:15
URI:	https://eprints.glos.ac.uk/id/eprint/2597

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