In the book of Exodus, God commands Moses to lead the nation of Israel out of slavery in Egypt. They flee into the desert, where they camp near Mount Sinai. God descends on the trembling mountain in fire, covering it in billowing smoke. God summons Moses, and on Mount Sinai God gives him the Ten Commandments.
The Ten Commandments include basic instructions for handling other people. Murder, adultery, theft, and false witness are prohibited. The social theorist René Girard points out that the final commandment differs from those that precede it in addressing not our actions but our desires.
You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor. (Exodus 20:17 NIV)
Girard argues that the tenth commandment addresses an aspect of our desire that generates the behaviors prohibited in the commandments that precede it. We want what we see our neighbors having or even what we see our neighbors wanting. Such “mimetic” desire creates competition and conflict.
If the Decalogue devotes its final commandment to prohibiting desire for whatever belongs to the neighbor, it is because it lucidly recognizes in that desire the key to the violence prohibited in the four commandments that precede it. If we ceased to desire the goods of our neighbor, we would never commit murder or adultery or theft or false witness. If we respected the tenth commandment, the four commandments that precede it would be superfluous.1
Girard errs in claiming that the wrongs addressed in the Ten Commandments are always caused by mimetic desire. Mimetic desire can cause us to harm others, but not all harmful desire is mimetic. When Jesus is asked about the greatest commandment, he explains that all of the commandments, including the one against coveting, depend on two more general commandments about attitude.
You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets. (Matthew 22:37 – 40 ESV)
However, mimetic desire does shape our attitudes. In designating two commandments addressing attitude as the greatest commandments, Jesus prioritizes nurturing proper attitudes. The Bible describes several spiritual disciplines through which attitudes can be reformed, including prayer, ritual, and meditation. If our desires can reflect what we see in others as Girard describes, then we can also improve our attitudes by choosing who we see. Socializing can also be a spiritual discipline.
The social transmission of attitudes is often described in the Bible using the metaphor of yeast. Modern bread is typically leavened using baker’s yeast. When the Bible was written, bread was leavened using sourdough culture. Unlike baker’s yeast, sourdough culture reproduces well in dough. A dollop of sourdough culture can reproduce until it permeates enough dough to feed a multitude.
In the same way that sourdough culture can reproduce in dough, attitudes can reproduce in communities. We can harness the social transmission of attitudes by joining communities with the attitudes to which we aspire. In the book of Hebrews, Christians are encouraged to aid one another by meeting together.
…let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another…. (Hebrews 10:24 – 25 NIV)
However, harmful as well as helpful attitudes can spread through communities. For this reason, Paul urges the church in Corinth to expel anyone whose behavior is inconsistent with their profession of Christianity.
Don’t you know that a little yeast leavens the whole batch of dough? Get rid of the old yeast…. you must not associate with anyone who claims to be a brother or sister but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or slanderer, a drunkard or swindler…. “Expel the wicked person from among you.” (1 Corinthians 5:6 – 13 NIV)
The social transmission of attitudes not only provides a means of reshaping ourselves but also a means of reshaping others. If we can achieve the appropriate attitudes ourselves, those attitudes will spread through our communities. In the Bible, the lives of the people of God are described as testimonies. For example, Jesus teaches,
You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven. (Matt. 5:14 – 16 NIV)
Girard is right that the tenth commandment addresses mimetic desire and that mimetic desire can create conflict. However, mimetic desire is not always harmful. Mimetic desire can be harnessed to reform our attitudes and the attitudes of others.
Meeting together is, like other spiritual disciplines, fundamental to the practice of Christianity. Christians are instructed to meet together but also instructed to exercise caution about the character of those they meet. Because attitudes spread through communities, we can improve our attitudes by joining good communities, and we can improve our communities by modelling good attitudes. Members form communities, and communities shape members.
- René Girard, I See Satan Fall Like Lightning (Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Books, 2001), 11 – 12.