Saint Paul

The Foundation of Universalism

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by Alain Badiou,

Translated by Ray Brassier

Stanford University Press

Due/Published July 2003, 128 pages, paper

ISBN 0804744718

Here, Alain Badiou proposes a startling reinterpretation of St. Paul. For Badiou, Paul is neither the venerable saint embalmed by Christian tradition, nor the venomous priest execrated by philosophers like Nietzsche: he is instead a profoundly original and still revolutionary thinker whose invention of Christianity weaves truth and subjectivity together in a way that continues to be relevant for us today.

Badiou argues that Paul delineates a new figure of the subject: the bearer of a universal truth that simultaneously shatters the strictures of Judaic Law and the conventions of the Greek Logos. Badiou shows that the Pauline figure of the subject still harbors a genuinely revolutionary potential today: the subject is that which refuses to submit to the order of the world as we know it and struggles for a new one instead.

Series: Cultural Memory in the Present

"This book is a daring and provocative confrontation of religion and secular practice, the aim of which is to recover the radical core of Paul's militant philosophical, or 'antiphilosophical,' project."--James I. Porter, University of Michigan

Review

The very existence of this book offers a series of contradictions: a nonreligious, one-time Maoist, contemporary French philosopher presents a bold assessment of an iconic figure of Christianity. Moreover, a figure often tied to “Christianity’s least open, most institutional aspects: the Church, moral discipline, social conservatism, [and] suspiciousness toward Jews.” However, Badiou presents an apostle whose belief in Christ and the resurrection paves the way for a new and revolutionary understanding of subjectivity. Badiou’s discussion of Pauline thought paves new ways of understanding the apostle and his relevance to contemporary discussions of subjectivity and universality. Equally compelling are Badiou’s close readings of the New Testament and his original discussions of theology and ethics. While past philosophers and thinkers, including Nietzsche and Hegel, have attacked Paul as a remnant of the established order, Badiou puts forth a Paul whose contemporary relevance is undeniable and unavoidable.