Politics, Experience, and the Languages of Holiness

Abstract

Abstract During the last half century, the category of holiness fell into disrepair although there are recent signs of its revitalization with the Pope’s apostolic exhortation on holiness, Gaudete et Exultate and attention being paid to the category in political philosophy (the work of Agamben and Esposito) and sociology (the work of Hans Joas). In this context, this article argues for the philosophical justification of linking holiness with prepredicative experience as it shows itself through hermeneutical phenomenology, grounded in bio-sociology, but which cannot be isolated from the particular languages of its articulation. Holiness comes into view through the languages of holiness, which in the broadest sense, include human act, and comportment toward world. This involves a discussion about holiness itself being located either in prepolitical experience or being inseparable from political and legal discourse. Of relevance here is also a philosophical discussion of holiness in relation to metaphysical realism.