Drawing out Leviathan

A Minor Victory but a Major Defeat

Canst thou draw out leviathan with an hook? or his tongue with a cord which thou lettest down?

Canst thou put an hook into his nose? or bore his jaw through with a thorn?

Will he make many supplications unto thee? will he speak soft words unto thee?

Will he make a covenant with thee? wilt thou take him for a servant for ever?

Wilt thou play with him as with a bird? or wilt thou bind him for thy maidens?

Shall the companions make a banquet of him? shall they part him among the merchants?

Canst thou fill his skin with barbed irons? or his head with fish spears?

Lay thine hand upon him, remember the battle, do no more.

Behold, the hope of him is in vain: shall not one be cast down even at the sight of him?

None is so fierce that dare stir him up: who then is able to stand before me?

The Book of Job 41:1-10

What exactly is Leviathan in the Bible? A great beast, perhaps a dragon, sea serpent, or whale. As God tells Job here, by way of demonstrating the impossibility of knowing or mastering His creation, it confounds human understanding and strength. It’s a symbol of the overwhelming power and incomprehensibility of the divine, terrifying and paralyzing to behold. That’s why Thomas Hobbes used it for the title of his principal work of political theory, which recommends an all-seeing, omnipotent state with an absolutist sovereign. Behold, the hope of him is in vain: shall not one be cast down even at the sight of him? Hobbes’s state is to be so imposing that one would be cast down even at the sight of it. He warns of disorder “when there is no visible Power to keep them in awe.” The famous frontispiece of Leviathan shows the imposing sovereign figure rising above and dominating the commonwealth. If you look closely at the figure, it is made up of hundreds of men facing the sovereign’s image; we can imagine they are in awe and terror of the sovereign. It is this idea of sovereignty that this regime is trying to foist upon us, but it must be remembered that it is, in large part, an image, a spectacle, or a simulacrum, as Jamelle Bouie writes:

The administration-produced imagery in Washington is, then, a projection of sorts — a representation of what the president wants reality to be, drawn from its idea of what authoritarianism looks like. The banners and the troops — not to mention the strangely sycophantic cabinet meetings and news conferences — are a secondhand reproduction of the strongman aesthetic of other strongman states. It is as if the administration is building a simulacrum of authoritarianism, albeit one meant to bring the real thing into being. No, the United States is not a totalitarian state led by a sovereign Donald Trump — a continental Trump Organization backed by the world’s largest nuclear arsenal — but his favored imagery reflects his desire to live in this fantasy.

The same can be said for the fearsome spectacle of the recent funeral, with its fascioid aesthetics and thundering speeches. But the point of Leviathan in the Bible is that it is not anything man can hope to control or master; It is not the state, or the ruler, or a movement: it transcends all of them; it is nature, history, and ultimately, God himself. The real Leviathan in America is our democratic society, a giant and terrifying beast that endlessly resists capture. It is the public that is incomprehensible and fearsome to the would-be rulers, not the other way around. They must make great efforts to make themselves look intimidating, but if the country decides not to be intimidated, Trump and his gang are powerless.

It seems strange to say, but the return of Jimmy Kimmel to the air is a great defeat for this regime. The victories will look anticlimactic and make those who made a lot of noise feel sheepish. You shouldn’t feel ashamed; the administration should be. They openly screamed and cried for his removal, and it failed. It showed the limits of their power. One should take heart in it, although there are many more battles to come. Cynics will scoff that it was a pecuniary decision; likely so, but if the incentives are in disobeying rather than obeying, we may yet be saved. This episode shows not only the limited power of the administration but also of its central base of power: the thugs of the online right. They also wish to appear to speak for the people, to embody directly popular demands and discontents, but they are not the people; ultimately, they are a rabble, a mob that can be summoned up but that can’t hope to apply its power to the society at large. Civil society must recognize them as a fraction, not the whole of the public. As terrible as they act, they are also not Leviathan. Musk captured Twitter to deliberately create a distorted image of the public, but it deceives its creators, too: they think it is America, but it’s not, it’s just their simulated America. Don’t grant them more power than they have.

In the Jewish mystical tradition, Leviathan, whose eyes and scales give off a supernatural light, is a symbol of enlightenment. At the end of days, God will kill Leviathan, and the righteous will feast on his flesh. In the Babylonian Talmud, it is written, “In the future, the Holy One, Blessed be He, will make a feast for the righteous from the flesh of Leviathan.” Only then will humanity understand the purpose of creation.

Anyway, Shona Tova — Happy New Year.