Being on the Brink of the Future: Jacques Derrida and Poetics of Waiting

Abstract

Religious anticipations are generally manifested in the form of a messianic promise or an apocalyptic warning in a vision of impending judgment. The majority of the so-called secular philosophies mirror this kind of religious prognosis as well, sometimes resulting in a utopic or dystopic vision of the future and other times in a purely formal scheme that remains endlessly open towards the other, but practically does not offer any content at all. The future is often regarded (quasi)religiously since it cannot appear as such and become present. That is why Jacques Derrida methodically distinguishes between two modes of the future – for him, the established future (le future), the future of the timetables that could be represented and anticipated, belongs to the present, while the »real« future (l'avenir) always remains and must remain in deferral. That is the reason that he almost exclusively describes the relation of expectation towards the absent future in religious terms: promise, call, covenant, and prayer. This paper contrasts his use of a messianic vocabulary with some influential contemporary philosophers, and takes into account a linguistic background of messianic thinking.