seamless. The divine works actively in our daily world, and it is highly corporeal.
This means that theology is also deeply anchored to our physical world, and not
only concerns the spirit.
several lines of heresy
Heresy, from the Greek Haireomai “choose”, is widely seen as a struggle about the
right for interpretation and control within an institutionalized belief system or
religious community. The choice the heretic strives for is between forms of inter-
pretation, and the freedom to interpret. Throughout the ages the free interpreta-
tion of faith has been labelled as heretical and has continuously been targeted as an
unlawful desecration and a godless practice of blasphemy, depending on how much
the interpretation differs from the canon within the faith, and perhaps more im-
portant, how it alters the power relations within the belief system. Often heresy has
been violently suppressed, within Christianity the best known of which is probably
through the medieval Inquisition. However, heresies exist in other religions, and in
many cases religious strife turns into violent bloodshed as the opposing sides ally
with conflicting political powers. The 30-year war raging Europe during the 17th
century is perhaps the most violent and best-known example.
Indeed the concept of heresy is often used to render someone as “evil” or having
malicious intent, or even promoting violence or terror, as we have come to hear so
much of in these last decades, but it is not this aspect of heresy I am after here. I
have focused instead on the “good” practice or liberation and of how heresy rene-
gotiates power. Of course, this distinction is hard to make clear, especially since
many heretic movements have their own leaders and heresiarchs that immediately
recreate new hierarchies, replacing the one they have just escaped.
The most common use of the concept of heresy is that it is a theological or religious
opinion held to be in opposition of contradiction to the main doctrine of the
church, creed, dogma, codex or the orthodox faith (ortho- “right” + doxa “think-
ing/language”). It is also an opinion or doctrine in variance with the generally ac-
cepted or authoritative interpretation.
Historically heresy has been a label on various movements of faith, especially in the
Middle Ages with Catharism, Bogomilism, and Gnosticism proving notable exam-
ples. These religious disputes also carried political dimensions, always mixing her-
esy with revolutionary tendencies, from Justin, Jan Hus and the Levellers, to Mar-
tin Luther King and Steven Biko (Bradstock & Rowland 2002). Heresy has also
been popularly studied from the perspective of political anarchism. For example,
the heretic Movement of the Free Spirit, brilliantly analyzed by historian Norman
Cohn (1957), caused situationist Raoul Vaneigem’s (1998) and culture critic Greil
Marcus’ (1990) to draw parallels with more recent proto-anarchist communities in
Europe, such as Dada, Surrealism, Situationism and the Punks.
Liberation Theology in Latin America grew out of the social struggles and socialist
discourse of the 1960’s, and its connection to the various Marxist guerrilla move-
ments in the region has not been unproblematic. Even by using a mainly non-vio-
lent rhetoric, the movement has been stained by the long lasting conflict and
bloodshed of the region. Also today, much of its historical materialism, Marxist
activism, and revolutionary argumentation has damaged its reputation as a demo-
cratic and ideologically free social grassroots movement. Also the Marxist discur-
sive toolbox as used by the guerrillas has thus lost much of its political impact since