A Positive Contagion: John Babak Ebrahimian’s How Violence Works: An Introduction to René Girard’s Mimetic Theory – Manuel Marrero
February 2, 2026
I don’t say much anymore. I’d rather collect the witness and testimony of God’s unregenerate children. The sweet spoils of infinite study are mine. Flânering, overcorrecting west of you, knifed and integrated by meekness. I carry Rome in my pocket. I run a quiet little press and a quiet little bookshop, and write freewheeling, monologic book reviews. I’m here to do God’s will, that’s it. A book is an inordinate attachment. I only want to do God’s work. Use me Lord.
Forty days later Christmas is over. And we close the seal of the nativity cycle as we approach Lent and Passion. Love that never costs us anything has never been purified. Stare down the barrel and choose the essential monotony of life. There is no escaping mimetic desire. Cyclical violence is relentless. The protagonist of the future with the end of history mandate wants nothing less than all that heaven allows. The steward class is asleep in Christ. Our agony is acute, our peace is your will. There’s a crisis of undifferentiation. Mimetic rivalries. Friction without form. When differences disappear, violence appears everywhere. Equality intensifies. Peace, harmony, and symmetry are gone.
Pedagogy is here for the unwashed masses, readable by any age group. At its best How Violence Works does for Girard what Zizek did for Lacan, renders him approachable and gets you to think surface-level Girardianly about things through films and pop culture. It only scratches the surface but the collegian can dig deeper. We can be the first American saints, technically. We may find our fellow communicants and cultivate beatitude and beatific vision. The floor is disappearing and there is no safe future otherwise. Do God’s work and he’ll make from your rib anything you need. Regulated emotions. Nail you to a final cause. My victimage is counted among hermeneuts and Marian antiphons so let’s co-curate the end of history we have the mandate and are good. It’s about saving.
See, it’s an “exegesis in progress,” and non-participation is a “romantic lie,” and truth is crowing through free will. It is choosing to be legion, descendants of grace for virgin Israel, faithful remnant, vessel, Daughter Zion, Ark, lightbearer, “vertical transcendence” to slay the great dragon, with a surgical day of reckoning, words to enlighten and bless and infuse with contemplation from high pulpits, the professorial, avuncular charm of the beleaguered hermeneut Ebrahimian carrying Girard’s torch for a decade, saying Nothing before God. Of the estranged communicant and the parable of the sheep. Eyes wide shut. Decompensation is the aging, gaunt face of death, tissue and muscle loss, it’s a metabolic ordeal and resurrection, heart of gold, the face looks sharper, hollower, or drawn, cachexia, the Son of Man’s victimage, eyelashes in your blood, the emaciated use cold water for stains, guard this gift. Be clean of heart with custody of thine eyes. This is why we govern desires and seal gifts of holiness from the accuser. God is the summit of a person’s desires and creativity.
I walk this path others can’t follow. It’s lonely to have faith, to follow God if God speaks to you. You can’t explain it. He breaks his greatest prophets. Joseph as a slave and in prison, John’s martyrdom by witness, Moses refugee in the wilderness for forty years. David as an outcast. Paul. Jesus. If God uses you, you’ll be isolated, tested in trials by fire, endure so much suffering until you are dead to the opinions of others and dead to yourselves. Most Christians will detest you too. Most churches will spurn you. The world will mock you. Your family may not tolerate you. It’s intense. Do not retaliate. Vengeance belongs to God.
God wants to be with you.
I am not a religious moderate. People have secrets they can’t live with. I have no secrets. Baptized by fire. We’re not supposed to use technology to contravene or undermine the natural order.
I would never do that for love. Stop in the most holy name of Jesus.
Love is a promise. It carries risk and gravitas. We were created. Endorsed but ordered. Girard is bleak and terrifying when you realize mimetic desire underpins violence so elegantly. It’s cyclical, not a straight line, not growth. Healthy life is eternity. Outside of time, not bound by time.