SOPHIA (2011) 50:677692 DOI 10.

1007/s11841-011-0263-3

The Created Ego in Levinas Totality and Infinity

April D. Capili

Published online: 3 August 2011 # Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011

Abstract There are two seemingly opposed descriptions of the subject in Totality and Infinity: the separate and autonomous I and the self that is ready to respond to the Other s suffering and need. This paper points out that there is in fact another way Levinas speaks of the subject, which reinforces and reconciles the other two accounts. Throughout his first major work, Levinas explains how the ego is allowed to emerge as such by the Other who constantly confronts it. At certain points in that work Levinas comes to describe the self as a creature given to itself by another. The notion of the created ego allows for both freedom and responsibility as Levinas understands the creature as capable of thinking critically, becoming an independent individual, and turning to the Other in responsibility. Keywords Levinas . Creaturehood . Subjectivity . Autonomy . Responsibility . The Other It is well-known that from his earliest thematic work On Escape to his later magnum opus Otherwise than Being, Levinas has engaged questions relating to subjectivity and identity. Though it may appear that only Otherwise than Being focuses on the selfhood of the subject as always already subjected to responsibility for the Other, while the first great work Totality and Infinity may be considered as concerned primarily with the epiphany of the Other s face and speaking (Peperzak 1997: 75), it should be remembered that Levinas himself speaks of the latter as a defense of subjectivity that is founded in the idea of infinity (1999: 26). We know that prior to the descriptions of the self-revelation of the face of the radically Other, the experience par excellence that challenges the I to re-orient its existence, Levinas provides an account of the emergence of the separate and autonomous I. Words like the Same, separate ego, psychism, etc., are terms in Totality and Infinity that refer to
A. D. Capili (*) Higher Institute of Philosophy at the Catholic University of Leuven, Heilige-geeststraat 6/106, 3000 Leuven, Belgium e-mail: april.capili@hiw.kuleuven.be

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or at least have something to do with the subject. These are terms meant to convey the separateness, autonomy, and the tendency of the subject to reduce every other to itself. Yet, we know too that central to Levinas thinking is the Is encounter with the face of the Other that puts the existence and egoism of the I into question and calls it to responsibility. It may appear then on the surface that there is a disjunction between the ego that arises as separate and autonomous, and the self that is awakened to its responsibility for the Other. For Levinas, these two are of course one and the same selfhowever, it remains to be clarified how it is possible for a free, separate subject that is initially and for the most part concerned only about its own being to renounce its egoism and respond to the Other s appeal. In our view, this question can be appropriately answered by pointing to and explaining another way of referring to the subject, an alternative characterization of the subject found in different places in Levinas first major work. Along with the above-mentioned words (the Same, psychism, etc.), Levinas likewise speaks of the self as a creature or as created in Totality and Infinity. We hold that this is neither a slip nor an inconsistency on the part of Levinas, but is rather a characterization of the human person that dovetails with and supports his other descriptions of the self and actually makes sense of them. Our aim here is to show that what Levinas means by these terms includes the understanding of the self both as totally new and autonomous, and as originally open and related. This will enable us to understand how the ego he describes as tending to become self-enclosed in the course of its life of enjoyment and its efforts to establish a human abode, nonetheless remains susceptible to the appeal of the Other s face. The sense of newness, openness, and relatedness borne by these terms accounts for the possibility of the free individuals turn to the Other in responsibility. Arriving at an understanding of what Levinas means by the Is creature-status requires the following steps: (1) first, we will say a brief word about Levinas efforts to secure the distinctness of the I from Being, which reveal both Levinas genuine concern for subjectivity and his insight that the separateness and autonomy of the I are necessary for any ethical relation. (2) Then we will point out that the idea of an original openness, relatedness, and indebtedness to another is constantly suggested by Levinas throughout Totality and Infinity, specially in Levinas descriptions of the emergence and life of the free and separate ego. While impersonal non-Is play a role in the Is coming to be as such, it is ultimately the human other s presence that allows the I to become separate, autonomous, and creative. (3) Third, we will explain the Other s role in the self s journey towards subjectivity. Levinas explains this in Totality and Infinity by way of reflecting on language. We will see too that this is discussed by Levinas in another text in terms of the possibility of the thinking I. (4) Finally, we will show that the confrontation with the face of the other insinuates another relation in which the I is originally involved, one that the encounter and relation with the human Other mirrors and suggests. The face reminds me of my non-primacy and my creature-status. Levinas elaborates the idea of the self s being creature in three ways: (1) in terms of knowledge and self-critique; (2) as one who has been given the space to emerge as a free individual; (3) and in terms of the always present capacity to become moral. All of these points suggest a self that can no longer claim sovereignty or total self-sufficiency. What is conveyed is an understanding of the self that is preceded by, related to, and allowed to be itself, by

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another. It is hoped that after these considerations, we would have understood that in speaking of the I as a creature Levinas is not merely adding a name to those others he uses in Totality and Infinity, but that by speaking of the I in this manner, he is able to give us a realistic and convincing picture of ourselves.

Levinas on Subjectivity from On Escape to Totality and Infinity One of the main tasks Levinas has embarked upon from his first thematic work On Escape, through Existence and Existents and Time and the Other, to his first major work Totality and Infinity, has been the articulation of a view of the self that ensures its ipseity, independence, and distinction from Being, and more strongly in the book of 1961, its autonomy and separateness. In On Escape, Levinas describes the nauseating experience of the fact of pure being also as the experience of being riveted to oneself. In this work, Levinas already evokes the self s experience of a certain uneasiness, and so a certain exigency to escape pure being and thus also to flee from itself (2003: 52, 67). The picture of being Levinas paints becomes more burdensome and threatening in Existence and Existents and Time and the Other, where Levinas speaks of the anonymous there is that strips the I submerged in it of its individuality, autonomy, personality, its interiority or private existence (1988, 53). But more importantly, in both books, Levinas accounts for the emergence of the I through the process of hypostasis or the self-positing of an entity out of the impersonal act of being (1988: 83). He sees the subject as consciousness arising out of an auto-positioning in the present, something achieved by attaching itself to a base and thereby distinguishing itself from being in general. In the process of autopositioning the self gains mastery over being, which becomes one of the Is attributes. The I as consciousness, as private existence, comes to be, by withdrawing itself from pure being and positing itself in the present. The Is feat of distinguishing itself from the impersonal il y a, signaled in On Escape and developed in Existence and Existents and Time and the Other, is described in even stronger terms in Totality and Infinity while the notion of anonymous being is pushed to a more peripheral place (Anckaert 2006: 30). Levinas speaks there of the Is separation and autonomy from totality, world history, mythical gods, and, more basically, from the milieu in which it first finds itself. Levinas describes how the self distances itself from everything else and how it concretely accomplishes and maintains its ipseity despite the unavoidable encounters with so many non-Is. It is an account of how, though the world is perhaps the Is first other, the I nonetheless comes to be at home in it and strives to achieve and maintain separation, autonomy, sovereignty therein. The subject is described no longer merely as striving to become distinct from pure being but as a sovereign ego able to accomplish its separation from and establish its dominion over everything else.

The Separate and Autonomous I Though the starting point of Levinas thinking in Totality and Infinity is no longer the fact of being or the there is, Levinas retains the idea from his earlier works that it is

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the I itself that works toward interiority, separation, and autonomy. Levinas shows us that the ego finds itself in a milieu surrounded by various non-Is. But it comes to be itself, that is, it becomes a separate, autonomous, and sovereign I only by living from or on things, the fruits of the earth, so many terrestrial delights. I relate to things primarily neither in terms of representation (Husserl) or utility (Heidegger), but in the manner of a care-less and egoist enjoyment. I live on/from food, water, wine, my work, etc. Insofar as I need these things, I am really dependent on them. Yet, paradoxically, Levinas points out that it is through this initial dependence that the I achieves the feat of separation and interiority, and thus becomes autonomous. He says thus: Subjectivity originates in the independence and sovereignty of enjoyment (1999: 114). Though I need things and depend on them, through enjoyment, I am able to master, possess, horde, and manipulate all these nonabsolute others. Thanks to the fruits of the earth and all the terrestrial delights that nourish me and give me pleasure, I come to emerge not only as an I distinct from things, but an I that is more importantly, separate, free, and sovereign. The ego accomplishes this by gaining distance from the world and the things therein. Concretely, the distance that is translated into time to think, reflect, plan better or more efficient ways of maintaining mastery, and securing my enjoyment is gained through the establishment of the home. The home is the Is protection against the threats that the elemental brings, the base from which the ego can launch strategies to tame the world and thereby ensure its future enjoyment. More importantly, it allows for the crystallization of the Is private existence, what Levinas calls psychism or interiority. The I accomplishes its own feat of separation. It becomes separate and autonomous through the enjoyment of things, the establishment of its home,1 its world-transforming work, the transformation of things into possessions and movables, and through thinking and representation. From his earliest works Levinas has always been suspicious of any participation or communion in which the subject merges into others and loses its identity (Peperzak 1993: 4849). Levinas maintains this position in Totality and Infinity where he insists on the separation of the I. The separate I is at home with itself, sovereign within its self-established economy. It is self-sufficient, self-enclosed, self-concerned, self-satisfied; in its egoist enjoyment, though the I can be said to temporarily forget itself in its turn towards enjoyable things, it becomes entirely deaf to the Other, outside of all communication and all refusal to communicatewithout ears, like a hungry stomach (Levinas 1999: 134). But even early on, Levinas saw that such an I, what he calls an adult existent or an atheist ego that is free from communion and participation, is necessary in the metaphysical relation. Alterity is possible only starting from me, (1999: 40) says Levinas, emphasizing thus that this encounter is one between two freedoms. The recognition of alterity and the fulfillment of responsibility necessitate an adult, separate, and autonomous I. Only such an I can enter into a genuine relation with the Other.
1 For an appreciation of Levinas view of the home or the dwelling, see Harris (1995), p. 433444. Harris discusses two understandings of home, one drawn from the New Testament and the other from Levinas. Harris emphasizes that Levinas ethics, which calls for the free opening of the egos home so as to welcome the destitute Other, can be a corrective to an other-worldly spirituality that may be putting more attention on the world to come or to a homecoming in another life or realm.

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The Other in the Is Soujourn We glimpsed above that in the early works Levinas not only expressed the exigency to escape being, but also conceived of the I as being able to withdraw from the anonymous il y a as it posits itself as a substantive. In our brief consideration of some claims in Totality and Infinity we pointed out that the I gains autonomy and separation through its initial dependent and needy enjoyment of things. This is how De Boer reads Totality and Infinity, as he argues that ontologically, the self is not constituted by the Other, since the self, so to speak, creates itself through enjoyment and use of non-Is wrested from the elemental. What can, however, be said is that ethically speaking, the Other, in calling the I out of its egocentrism, gives the self a new beginning or a fresh start (1997: 31). But we wish to point out here that the presence of the Other indeed allows not only for the rebirth of the I in ethics, but also for the very ipseity of the self. Although there is some truth in saying that it is the I that accomplishes its own feat of separation, Levinas also holds that the Other plays an indispensable role in the Is selfconstitution as a separate and autonomous entity. While the social or ethical relation necessitates a separated being or ego, it is true too that the Is emergence is conditioned by something apart from the I itself. Levinas tells us that the light of the face is necessary for separation (1999: 151). Let us first remark that Levinas seems to have depicted the Is enjoyment and life in economy as one of total isolation. Yet, in the same pages where the Is enjoyment and establishment of economy are described, we also read that the Other is always already present in the Is various activities. As Levinas himself admits, the way he rendered his account of enjoyment tends to present an abstraction while in fact man has already the idea of infinity, that is, lives in society and represents things to himself (1999: 139). The establishment of my dwelling, my economy, and all forms of labor already presuppose or involve the presence of the Other. At every point of the egos odyssey of separation, the nascent self meets not only things it can reduce to itself, but also the irreducible Other whose call in a sense constitutes the I. Labor implies the revelation of the face of the Other. Work involves tools that I borrow, inherit, or share with others; thus, it already requires discourse and consequently the height of the other irreducible to the same (Levinas 1999: 117). Even the claim to any possession presupposes the presence of other proprietors with whom I can exchange goods and who validate my claim over my property. Thus the possession of things issues in a discourse (Levinas 1999: 162). We noted above that the enclosed and private space that is the home makes the private life of the ego possible. The dwelling to which the self retreats and recollects himself is already a human abode. The home is characterized by familiarity and intimacy, thanks to the presence of what Levinas calls the feminine (not necessarily the feminine sex) who is the welcoming one par excellence (1999: 157) and whose gentleness spreads over the face of things (1999: 155). The familiarity of the abode presupposes intimacy with someone. The interiority and recollection of the self are made possible by and happens already in a human world, where the self is already welcomed by the Other. We see then that while an autonomous and egoist self is required by the ethical relation, it is the peaceable welcome first indicated in the feminine face that allows for the separation of the ego in the dwelling. Inhabitation

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and the intimacy of the dwelling which make the separation of the human being possible thus imply a first revelation of the Other (Levinas 1999: 151). The presence of the Other is not only evident in the engagements of the I in the world; as Levinas likewise points out, it is the light of the face or its original call that enables the I to withdraw from things and thus arise from the enjoyment of them (1999: 170171). The Is meeting with the feminine in the home is only a first encounter with another.2 Levinas tells us that it is through the confrontation with the absolutely Other, met as the stranger, the widow, and the orphan, who criticizes the Is economy and freedom that first allows it to achieve distance both from itself and from the things it possesses and enjoys. In short, the original encounter with the radically Other makes it possible for the I to eventually achieve separation and autonomy.

Language and the Other It is the Other, who first speaks to me, who allows me to gain distance from myself, and thus gives me time and distance to break with the medium in which I am immersed, to recollect myself, to represent things to myself, and thus also to possess things and to transform the world through laborin short, the Other who addresses me makes it possible for me to emerge as a separate individual able to work, own, and represent things to itself. Over and above enjoymentwith dwelling, possession, the making commona discourse about the world takes form. Appropriation and representation add a new event to enjoyment. They are founded on language as a relation among men (Levinas 1999: 139). Note that language here is to be understood not merely as a system of signs or an instrument of communication. For Levinas it is primarily the Other s appeal. In first addressing me the Other gives me to myself. That I am able to speak implies that I belong to a language community. More particularly it means that I received language from the Other who has first spoken to me. The active capacity of speaking implies the receptiveness involved in a more original listening to another. Marion, who follows Levinas on many points, echoes this insight in his discussion of the evenemental phenomenon of ones birth: I will speak not only by means of having [repeatedly] intuited in silence, but specially after having heard others speak. Language is first listened to, and only then is it uttered (2002: 44). In speaking to me the Other does not only give me words, for she in fact teaches me and offers me the world as thematized and still thematizable (Levinas 1999: 92). In being addressed, I am welcomed not only to one language community, but also to a world of things and shared meanings. Another s speaking to me enables me in turn to thematize the world and give to the Other, for as Levinas remarks, to make things into themes is to offer the world to the Other in speech (1999: 209). Reflection on our capacity to speak thus reveals that one belongs to a world that is not simply ones own to be possessed and enjoyed, but that is shared with and in fact received from the Other. I employ words in referring to and speaking of things. But to speak of
2

For a discussion of the significance of the feminine for the entry of the I into ethics, see Catherine Chaliers essay in Robert Bernasconi and Simon Critchley (1991).

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things is to make of them a theme, which is in an important sense to give things or objects to the Other. Yet my capacity for speech and thematization presupposes the more original giving, address, or signification of the Other. Levinas stresses that this giving of the I to the Other in conversation is preceded by a more original address, giving, signification, or openness: But it is from the welcoming of the infinity of the other that it [the subject] receives the freedom with regard to itself that this dispossession [giving to the other] requires (1999: 210). In being addressed by the Other, I am allowed to see the world beyond the perspective of my egoist enjoyment, thereby enabling me not only to disengage myself from my enjoyment and economy, but also gain distance from myself. The distance both from myself and from things that thought, representation, the founding of the home, work, labor, and possession require are given me by the Other who welcomes me and speaks to me. It is then ultimately the Other who grants me the distance required in achieving autonomy and separation. I become a separate, autonomous, and creative individual thanks to another s giving me to myself. Autonomy is made possible by heteronomy. In an earlier essay, Levinas also traces the very root of the structure of the existence of the ego to the primordial relation of the I with the other. The thinking I (and thus also the I that is able to establish his dwelling, transform the world through his labor, and secure its future survival, enjoyment, and flourishing) arises thanks to its encounter with something that it cannot reduce to itself. As Davis explains: Alterity constitutes the grounds which make separation possible; the self exists because the Other is irreconcilable with it. Otherwise, both self and other would be parts of a greater whole or totality which would invade and invalidate their separateness (1996: 44). The thinking ego emerges thanks to an encounter with something that it cannot treat merely as a function of its interiority, that is, like things and forces that it experiences as co-substantial with it, as exclusively answering to the vital self s needs. That the ego belongs to the totality and yet remains separate from it presupposes that it has become self-conscious, that it has come to recognize its particularity. Such self-consciousness in turn presupposes that it has come into contact with that which it cannot assimilate to itself, that which remains exterior to it (Levinas 1987b: 27). Levinas says further that Thought begins with the possibility of conceiving a freedom external to my own. Conceiving of a freedom external to my own is the first thought. It marks my very presence in the world. The world of perception manifests a face: things affect us as possessed by the other (1987: 28). Thought or the thinking individual therefore emerges thanks to the contact with the human other.

A Given Self The self then that Levinas offers us in Totality and Infinity is not one that posits itself in isolation from others, as though it has always been a solitary and sovereign ego certain only of itself, but rather a self that comes to be itself and comes to understand itself first by having reference to the Other. I am an autonomous and separate I by virtue of the Other s call or thanks to the revelation of the infinite in the face of the Other. While on this point Levinas goes against Husserl, whose monadic transcendental ego is certain of itself first and then constitutes for itself within its

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primordial sphere of ownness the Other as an alter ego,3 Levinas finds in Descartes third meditation the formal structure of the relation with infinity that he sees is concretized in the relation with the Other (Levinas 1987a: 53). The certainty of the Cartesian cogito of its own existence is conditioned by a prior and more original awareness of the presence of the Idea of Infinity in consciousness. Such an awareness of infinity gives the subject a point of view exterior to itself from which it can apprehend itself (Levinas 1999: 210), and thus allows it to become aware of its own finitude and createdness. Levinas remarks that Descartes uncovered a relation that involves an otherness that cannot be brought back to immanence, an alterity that nevertheless does not do violence to interioritya receptivity without passivity, a relation between freedoms (1999: 211). In other words, Levinas sees that Descartes provides us a model of subjectivity that cannot be its own ground but is rather founded on something else, an idea of the I as a creature given to itself by another. As we will see in a while, it is this fact of my non-primacy and my givenness to myself that I am challenged to recognize as I find myself confronted by the Others face. While it is true that my having been given to myself, like the Other, is in a sense initially invisible to me, this in no way lessens its significance. The fact of having been given to myself can be understood as an event or happening that I neither saw nor could have foreseen, much less cause to happen again. What Marion says about birth can be said too of what the Others first address gives rise to: birth is an event that happens to mewhile there was no I to speak of at its occurrenceand in occurring, it gives me to myself. What Marion says regarding what he calls saturated phenomena and the self applies here too: the ego receives itself from what it receives (2002: 43). Thanks to the light of the face, the ego can turn up as an individual that is autonomous and separate. Like birth, the encounter with the Other is an event in Marions sense of the term, for in the words Marion uses to speak of an evenemental phenomenon, it affects me more radically than any other, since it alone determines me, defines my ego, even produces it (2002: 42). Though it accomplishes its own feat of separation through the enjoyment of things, the I cannot be causa sui. Birth and the encounter with the Other attest to the Is non-primacy. That the I is conditioned by something other than itself has been shown above by pointing out that it is the light of the face that enables it to separate itself absolutely from things that it possesses and enjoys. The confrontation with the Other s face points to a truly original openness, relatedness, and givenness, which, though not readily evident in the present where the I is autonomous, possibly selfenclosed, and conscious of itself as its own ground, come to light nevertheless. One could say that in the light of the human other s face, another primordial relation
3

For Husserl, it is in empathy that I come to be aware of another ego apart from myself. The other ego is understood as an intentional modification of my awareness of myself as constituted in my sphere of ownness and as an ego governing my body. There is a transfer of sense from my apprehension of my body as animate to the alien body that enters my perceptual field and which is anticipatively grasped as having the same sense. To recognize another body as a lived body, that is, to transfer the objective sense of my animated body constituted in my primordial sphere to that of the other, requires this seeing of the similarity (apart from and beyond physical appearance) that obtains between my own lived body here and another alien body. The similarity serve[s] as the motivational basis for the analogizing apprehension of that body as another animate organism. In this manner, when I see another body that is like my own, I suppose that it too is constituted within a sphere of ownness distinct from my own and is governed by another ego. See Husserl (1960: 111).

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shines through. Like Descartes who through reflection on his own consciousness and its relation to the Idea of the Infinite eventually refers to the egos being creature (1998: 82), Levinas too comes to speak of the self as a creature in Totality and Infinity. This is not a superfluous description, but rather one that reinforces and harmonizes the understanding of self as separate and autonomous, and the notion of a given and responsible self. The self as created, Levinas tells us, is able to critically think back to that which made it possible, has been given the space to become itself independently, and can always turn towards the Other in responsibility.

The Self Critical of its Condition The separation of the ego is so radical that it is possible for it to forget its having been allowed to emerge as such by others as it gains the power to determine the surroundings that nourish and sustain it. Levinas tells us that this oblivion of the Other attests to the separation and autonomy of the emergent subject: And this possibility of forgetting the transcendence of the Otherof banishing with impunity all hospitality (that is, all language) from ones home, banishing the transcendental relation that alone permits the I to shut itself up in itselfevinces the absolute truth, the radicalism of separation (1999: 172173). Such a self is atheistnot in the sense of an individual proclaiming the non-existence of God, for the term here indicates a situation prior to both affirmation and negation of the Divines existencebut in the sense not only of breaking with participation in God, gods, or being that engulfs the individual, but also of the possibility of exercising ones autonomy and living outside of God, at home with oneself; one is an I, an egoism (Levinas 1999: 58). It is only eventually, through critical reflection, that the I can come to recognize that it is notand it can never beits own ground. Confronted by the face of the Other, I am made to recognize and acknowledge the arbitrariness of my freedom and the injustice of my existence: the nude and questioning face allows me to become critical of myself. For Levinas, the capacity to be critical of oneself is the very essence of knowing. Objective and universal knowledge is possible only because of self-critical knowledge, which in turn, presupposes the appeal of the face of the Other who challenges me to justify my existence. As Levinas says, existence for itself is not the ultimate meaning of knowing, but rather the putting back into question of the self, the turning back to what is prior to oneself, in the presence of the Other (1999: 88). Being critical of myself, I may see then that my freedom is not self-grounding; I can thus trace back to the very conditions of my autonomy. As an I, I can not only master my earthly milieu and thereby secure my happy existence, I can also look for the ultimate justification of my existence. Through critical knowing, I can go behind my condition and try to reach that which has gone before and determines that very condition. Only a self that is separate and atheist can be critical of itself; but only one who is born, rises to autonomy, and is originally open to the Other, in short, a creature, is capable of self-critique in its search for the principle of its freedom. Levinas remarks that the capacity to go from ones current situation back to what makes that situation possible describes the status of the creature, in which the uncertainty of freedom and its recourse to justification are bound up (1999: 86). The

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separated ego required in the ethical relation is the self that masters its condition in enjoyment, lives outside of all participation in establishing its economy, autonomously reduces non-selves through labor, possession, and representation, and can critically go back to the conditions of its conditiona creature. Separation and atheism, these negative notions, are produced by positive events. To be I, atheist, at home with oneself, separated, happy, createdthese are synonyms (Levinas 1999: 148).

Separate and Totally New The self is certainly not causa sui. It is neither its own creator nor does it find the ultimate signification of its existence in itself. If it were its own cause and if it were entirely self-sufficient, perhaps relation with anything outside itself would be impossible. Levinas remarks that to think of either the Same or the Other as causes of themselves and not creatures would be to remove from them all receptivity and all activity, shut them up each in its own interiority (1999: 221). They would then be windowless monads, totally self-enclosed and thus incapable of receiving anything from and of taking up responsibility for the Other. (Yet even the Leibnizian monad, self-enclosed and sufficient unto itself, doorless and windowless in relation to other finite monads, retains a certain relatedness to an other apart from and greater than itself.4) But no one acts in a manner totally cut off from others, since we affect and are affected by others. Moreover, as we have shown above, in its sojourn toward separation, autonomy, and sovereignty, the I comes into contact with various non-Is: the elements and things in the world, the il y a, the feminine in the dwelling, colaborers, and other owners. More importantly, we have pointed out that the face of the Other that criticizes my unjust economy and egoist existence enables me to break away from my enjoyment and brings me out of my being at home with myself. The Other s call, which reminds me of the inescapable and original metaphysical relation with the truly transcendent, is constitutive of the self s ipseity and autonomy. But it seems that in the thinking of Levinas, the atheist self s irreducible relation with the Other human person calls to mind one more original and inescapable bond. Levinas has shown us that what is first and foremost marvelous about the I is its rise from dependence on things and its capacity to independently exist, speak, think
4 Leibniz speaks of the monad as a complete being the nature of which is to have a notion so complete that it is sufficient to contain and to allow us to deduce from it all the predicates of the subject to which this notion is attributed (Discourse on Metaphysics 8). A single monad is that which exists by itself, independent of everything else save God: in rigorous metaphysical truth, there is no external cause acting on us except God alone, and he alone communicates himself to us immediately in virtue of our continual dependence. (Discourse on Metaphysics 28) Each monad is windowless (Monadology 7) and as such can be affected by nothing from without. The life of a monad is the unfolding of accidents enfolded within it since the moment of creation. The actions of one monad are to be understood merely as expressing more perfectly the sufficient reason of another that undergoes these actions. Each substance is self-enclosed, needs nothing, and is relation-less. Since nothing can penetrate it, it could not be affected by any other creature. All quoted passages are from G.W. Leibniz, Philosophical Essays, eds. and trans. Roger Ariew and Daniel Garber (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing, 1989). Though he conceived of the idea of the monads openness to its creator, perhaps Leibniz failed to see that such an original openness allows for genuine relations with other individuals.

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for itself, establish its home, gain mastery over its sustaining surroundings, and eventually to be critical of itself and come to grips with the question of its principle and origin. In the passage quoted in the last section above, Levinas applies the word created to the human person described as capable of such accomplishments. Levinas, interestingly, also remarks that It is certainly a great glory for the creator to have set up a being capable of atheism, a being which, without having been causa sui, has an independent view and word and is at home with itself (1999: 5859). Let us stress here that by creation Levinas means creation out of nothing. The idea of creatio ex nihilo bequeathed to us by the Judeo-Christian tradition means that the universe was made neither out of pre-existing matter nor out of the substance of God. The Biblical idea of creation breaks with ancient myths that recount how a god or several gods reshaped some pre-existing matter and thus formed the known world and it asserts that the universe and all things living and non-living therein were brought to existence out of nothing by the act of God. In the context of Levinass thinking in Totality and Infinity, to say that the human person is a creature means that the I is neither something derived from a prior existence or matter nor from the substance or personhood of another. Recourse to the notion of creation out of nothing emphasizes a crucial element in Levinas understanding of the human person, that is, that the I itself achieves separation and autonomy and is irreducible to any totality or system. Levinas admits that understanding the person as created out of nothing necessitates its being dependent on another. But such a dependence does not translate into some sort of bondage or being an element of a system; the human person is not merely one part of a totality that becomes separated and thus no longer functions on its own. The created I is other than that which gives it to itself. Levinas insists that what is essential to created existence is its separation with regard to the Infinite (1999: 105). He stresses too that the Is very dependence on another is the ground of its independence or its ability to become itself and maintain its identity (1999: 104105). It is because of an original dependence that independence becomes possible; autonomy arises through an antecedent heteronomy. This interplay of dependence and independence can perhaps become clearer if we recall that in a certain sense we were given to ourselves by persons who immediately preceded us, namely our parents. Not only did we come to exist through the decision of these two individuals, we came to achieve autonomy and we acquired at least part of our own identity because of our initial dependence on them. The notion of creation Levinas employs offers us a way out of the Eleatic understanding of being, since it allows for plurality in existence. In order to understand how plurality in being is possible and so as to ensure the newness and the freedom of the I,5 Levinas refers to the Cabbalistic idea of divine contraction, where Infinity allows for the existence and freedom of that which is finite.6 The infinite withdraws or limits itself so as to provide space for the turning up of the finite creature. The basic insight here is expressed by Hartman who, in speaking of human freedom and other implications of the creation narratives, explains that God limits His power to us to permit human development within the context of freedom (2000:
Two essential things that Richard Cohen notes characterizes man as a creature in Levinas thinking. See Cohen (1994), p. 216217. 6 For a basic explanation of this idea, see Ponce (1973), p.79-81.
5

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3435). The creature is given the space to emerge as a separate and free individual. This contraction can be compared to the self-limitation exercised by parents, who to a certain extent keep themselves from meddling in the affairs of their child, allowing the latter to grow and develop through his or her own free decision making. Levinas sees also in paternity this interplay of dependence and independence. Though it can be said that I, the parent, live in and through my child, he or she remains Other than me; though in a sense my child came from me, he or she will be living a life that is no longer mine, possibly following paths different from those I took. The relation between parent and child is a relation between freedoms, similar to the relation made possible by creation. Levinas remarks thus that The great force of the idea of creation such as it was contributed by monotheism is that this creation is ex nihilo . . . [T]he separated and created being is thereby not simply issued forth from the father, but is absolutely other than him (1999: 63). Being creature means that one is not an individual by virtue of being culled from something or somebody already existing, but by virtue of separation and the crystallization of ones interiority, accomplishments made possible by the withdrawal of infinity. Though certainly indebted to the father when it comes to certain traits and dispositions, the child remains different, separate, and has her own existence. She is able to freely define herself as another human individual. Because of radical separation, she who is created out of nothing has her own destiny; her birth and death have meaning apart from that which comes from history or any totality. The I that is created or given to itself is given space to accomplish psychism or to achieve its own inner life and the interiority of the self establishes an order apart from that of history. This independent will can assert itself and even establish ever-new starting points in history. As De Boer points out, Creation out of nothing means that man is absolutely other, absolutely new (1997: 39), and as such is outside every system and is the source of fresh beginnings. According to Levinas, the separation achieved by the subject is so radical that the self, in being so engrossed in its own concern of ensuring the continuity of its comfortable existence, can forget that which has given it to itself and thus suppose that it is its own ground or condition of possibility. To return to our illustration, the child can stand before her parents as an independent and separate other who can question, disagree with, and even renounce them as persons who provided the space for her to be. Thus, as it turns out, the notion of creation points to a relation between two terms that are separate and are irreducible to each other; it is an idea that leads us to a relation between terms that are absolute, in the sense of being able to absolve themselves from the relationship. We have said that the ego that emerges is an atheistic self, different and separate from God, capable of renouncing the Infinite or forgetting its provenance. However, the sovereign egos freedom is questioned, its place and security unsettled, by the Other s face. The Other appears not as a thing or a theme, but as that which measures me. Just as the Cartesian cogitos finitude and imperfection are highlighted thanks to the awareness of the Idea of the Infinite or of Gods perfection, Levinas sees that For me to feel myself to be unjust I must measure myself against the infinite (1987: 58). Before the face of the Other, the self can recognize its own existence as murderous and usurpatory. The first experience of conscience is freedoms discovery of its injustice. The movement of freedom coming to an awareness of its injustice and becoming moral consists in a restless questioning

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of itself. The face of the Other awakens the Is conscience and reveals the never effaced possibility of welcoming of the Other into its home. The face of the Other appeals to my responsibility and consecrates my freedom as responsibility and gift of self (Levinas 1999: 208). I, as separated creature, can become critical of myself and seek justification for my freedom and existence.

Created Freedom Can Always Become Moral In the process of self-identification through the reduction of the other to the same and in the course of achieving separation and autonomy, the ego tends to become self-enclosed, entirely deaf to the Other, outside of all communication and all refusal to communicatewithout ears, like a hungry stomach (Levinas 1999: 134). Apart from this, because it was not there when it received itself from another and perhaps since it gains separation through its own efforts, the ego forgets the original relation and may regard itself as its own principle and condition. It can, like the Cartesian ego cogito, not only doubt everything external to and other than it, and also look upon itself, its freedom, or existence as the first certaintyto the point of supposing that it autonomously produces the things that it knows. But let us not forget that even Descartes recognized that such certainty and self-awareness is preceded by something else that simultaneously inhabits and escapes consciousness. In his Meditations, Descartes makes the observation that the perception of the infinite is somehow prior in me to the perception of the finite, that is, my perception of God is prior to my perception of myself (1998: 76).7 The cogito comes to a certain self-understanding through an antecedent awareness of the presence of the Idea of the Infinite, an idea that exceeds consciousness and that the latter could not have autonomously produced. Levinas thus says in reference to Descartes that the idea of infinity gives the ego a point of view exterior to itself from which it can apprehend itself (1999: 210) and allows it to glimpse its non-primacy, finitude, and createdness. In a similar manner, the Other, who comes from on high and resists my force, moves me to see that my freedom is arbitrary and that my existence is colonizing. In the presence of the Other, against whom I am moved to measure myself, I discover in shame the violence and injustice of my existence (Levinas 1987a: 58). The resistance of the face of the Other does not annul my freedom, but invests and justifies it. The I, which exists for itself, has the initial tendency, rooted in a nave will to live, to dominate the non-I and to reduce the latter to itselfand according to Levinas, This imperialism of the same is the whole essence of freedom (1999: 87). Yet, before the face, the ego is unable to exercise its powers. I still possess powers to harm and kill, but the face of the Other outlaws murder. In this situation, the Other who comes from on high imposes himself as a moral exigency upon the freedom of the same. The face of the Other puts my autonomy into question. The I that is self-enclosed in its egoist enjoyment is disturbed by the face of the Other; as its freedom is put into question and as its conscience is awakened, it is
7

See also Levinas 1987a: 58.

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challenged to recognize the Other s alterity and is called to respond to the Other s plea. Before the Other, the I is in a way reminded of its original openness and relatedness, its givenness to itself. The face-to-face encounter is a moral experience because one is given therein the choice of either maintaining oneself through ones murderous and usurpatory ways or deciding to re-orient ones existence in favor of the welfare of the Other, economically responding to her appeal by employing all the resources of its egoism (Levinas 1999: 216). We have described the I as created out of nothing, as being capable of placing itself beyond all communion and participation, and as the source of new meanings and starting points. But we have also explained that being created means being capable of becoming critical of oneself, of attempting to trace back to what makes one possible. We are now then in a position to understand that despite its being separated and capable of shutting itself up against the very appeal that has roused it (Levinas 1999: 216), the I nonetheless remains able to recognize the Other s call. Let us note that Levinas says too in one of his exegetical works (that already echoes some of the insights in his later writings): In this forgetfulness [of the original alliance with the Good] egoism is born. But egoism is neither first nor ultimate (1990b: 50). While the I tends to become oblivious to all exteriority and to that which has anteriorly made it possible, Levinas insists that In the separated being the door to the outside must hence be at the same time open and closed (1999: 148). Though it can indeed shut itself up in its own dwelling, the possibility for the home to open to the Other is as essential to the essence of the home as closed door and windows (Levinas 1999: 173). It is as though the original contact with the other or the Is having been given to itself has ensured that the created I will always be open to alterity even though it tends to become self-enclosed. Apart from the human creatures capacity to achieve its own separation, Levinas remarks too that what we can find truly marvelous about creation is that it results in a being capable of receiving a revelation, learning that it is created, and putting itself in question. The miracle of creation lies in creating a moral being (1999: 89). Its original (or as Levinas puts it in his later work, preoriginal) and irrevocable having been given to itself by heteronomy marks the I as originally open and related, and as one who can hear and recognize the appeal at the moment of the confrontation with the Other.

Conclusion Among Levinas constant concerns is the meaning of subjectivity. We have seen that Levinas attributes to the ego the feat of achieving separation and autonomy from the earliest to his first major work, where it is claimed that this self-constitution is only possible thanks to the Other s presence. The fact that the Other confronts the ego allows the latter to gain distance from itself and the things around it, and is thus able to see itself as distinct and particular. The light of the face makes separation possible and thus allows the nascent self to think, speak, build a home, work, and possess things. Separation is so radical that the autonomous ego may tend to forget this indebtedness to heteronomy, the fact that it was given to itself by another. Yet, Levinas insists that the I, when confronted by the face of the Other, hears and can respond positively to the latter s plea and command. We have tried to explain in this

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paper that acknowledging and answering the Other s call remains possible for the I because of its irrevocable and original relatedness and openness. One is reminded of this in the face to face situation, where one is put into question, made to realize ones non-primacy, and challenged to take up ones responsibility. We have seen and explained that Levinas applies the term creature to the self that achieves separation and autonomy and which at the same time is able to make itself available to the Other s in the latter s suffering and needs. We have sought to clarify what Levinas means when he speaks of the I as creature. We have shown that the created human being can become critical of himself, realize his non-primacy, and reflect on his origin; he accomplishes the feat of separation as he enjoys and masters those things around him; and though he tends to become self-enclosed in the process of establishing his economy, he remains able to recognize the ethical summons of the Other. We have hopefully shown that the idea of being creature gives us a faithful picture of ourselves as this idea reinforces and reconciles both the Is achievement of separation and freedom and its never effaced capacity to go out of itself and give itself to the Other. Confronted by Other s face, I am given the opportunity to respond freely and thereby acknowledge an inescapable relatedness, an incontrovertible openness, and an undeniable responsibility for the Other. I can respond to the call of the face and fulfill its infinite responsibility, and thereby become more of itself since in fulfilling my responsibility for the Other that I am brought to my final reality (Levinas 1999: 178)or as Levinas would stress in his later work, what is decisive about the human creature is not so much libertythough its separation and autonomy have to be safeguarded as its received responsibility prior to all initiative (Levinas 1990: 171). Levinas also says elsewhere that, It is the responsibility for the creature that constitutes the self. Responsibility for the creature, for that which the ego had not been the author (1996: 94). These quotations underscore the non-primacy of the ego: it cannot be its own ground and it has to answer for other human individuals who are apart from itself and whose existence is not grounded on its own. On the other hand, they likewise indicate a decisive equivalence for Levinas: to be oneself is to be responsible; subjectivity is responsibility (1981: 123). Understanding ourselves as creatures gives us basic yet profound insights into who we are and what we ought to do. Indeed, to paraphrase a remark of Levinas, the narrative and the idea of creation are necessary for the self-understanding and the life of the just man (1987: 58). Levinas understanding of subjectivity as creature lets us see that we who emerge as autonomous, separate, and self-concerned remain open to that which is totally apart, other, and exterior. We therefore constantly bear the possibility of becoming moral and thus more human.

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