“All the Rest Is Commentary …”: Being for the Other as the Way to Break the Sacrificial Logic

Abstract

Feminist criticism recognises two rival sacrifices in the Western philosophical- theological tradition: the motherly sacrifice of childbirth and the near-sacrifice of Isaac (the so-called Akedah; Gen 22). In this paper, I investigate both sacrifices as a self-emptying and transformative process that aims to offer oneself in the place of the other. The argument proceeds in three steps: first, I present the self-sacrifice of childbirth as the moment of identity split and the “being for the other”; second, I interpret Gen 22 as a self-sacrifice (“Here I am”; Gen 22:1c) which calls to responsibility as a possible route to non-sacrificial relations; finally, I question the essentialism that accompanies the Akedah and childbirth in order to liberate both from gender stereotypes and to present them as two different forms of self-sacrifice which seek to break the sacrificial logic of our Western society.