Phenomenology and Religion: New Frontiers

rosa maria lupo

saturé or phénomène érotique^1 is given prominence not only because it
represents the heart of Marion’s phenomenological perspective, or
rather the final aim to which the whole development of his speculation
tends, more or less implicitly or explicitly.^2 Rather, this theme is of
great significance in itself, because it represents the frontier-space, the
limit, the middle course, the metaxý between philosophy and theology,
between the sphere of philosophical reason and the ambit of religious
faith.
In regard to the human possibility of talking of Him, God is in some
sense a place of convergence, an open place of the crossing of different
ways, of several perspectives and Weltanschauungen, of distinct and
dissimilar visions, of points of view that can also be in absolute
opposition. In this way the talking of God (in both meanings: in the
objective and in the subjective meaning) is the place of the opening of
the dialogue between philosophy and religion, between the forms of
philosophical rationality and the religious and theological dimension,
defining theology, here, as the rational systematization of the religious
experience of faith.
From ancient times and subsequently, the space of the divine, of
deity, has been considered in terms of a limit-zone, a frontier-field, in

1. Even if the concepts of phénomène saturé and phénomène érotique represent two
   different moments in Marion’s phenomenological path of thinking — the erotic
   phenomenon is an example of a saturated phenomenon, but not every saturated
   phenomenon is erotic — in reference to God, both forms of phenomenality imply
   the same movement, the same act of donation, which is the Revelation of God.
   Because God is an erotic phenomenon, He is a case of saturated phenomenon, but
   only because His constitution is that of a saturated phenomenon can he be grasped
   in His structure as erotic phenomenon. In any case, both expressions have an
   equivalent value, if they are referring to God, and, in saying one, the other is
   implied equally.


2. In Le phénomène érotique, which is one of his latest works (2003), Marion declares
   at the beginning of the book: “Ce livre m’a obsédé depuis la parution de L’idole
   et la distance, en 1977. Tous ceux que j’ai publiés ensuite portent la marque, explic-
   ite ou dissimulée de cette inquiétude. En particulier, les Prolégomènes à la charité ne
   furent publiés, en 1986, que pour témoigner que je ne renonçais pas � ce projet,
   bien que tardant � l’accomplir. Tous, surtout les trois derniers, furent autant de
   marches vers la question du phénomène érotique” (Jean-Luc Marion, Le phénomène
   érotique, Paris: Grasset, 2003, 22–23).