Autor: Schmitz, Kenneth L.

Buch: The Gift: Creation

Titel: The Gift: Creation

Stichwort: Schöpfung - Geschenk; Definition G. (Ungeschuldetheit); G. - Haltung der Annahme; Marcel: Unterschied zw. Passivität und Aufnahmefähigkeit (gratitudo); G. Kommerz (mereo, merx, commercium)

Kurzinhalt: What is a gift? It is a free endowment upon another who receives it freely; so that the first mark of a gift is its gratuity...

Textausschnitt: 44a A reflective understanding of the gift is available to us in the empirical studies carried out over the past century by anthropologists, sociologists and historians of religion.1 But it is also as near to us as our experience of generosity in others and ourselves. I have suggested that the semantic energy of such generosity is quite unlike the relatively unbroken formal necessity to which the empirio-mathematical and systematic sciences aspire on the basis of the given or by way of self-determination. For the term gift is rooted in a domain of significance that is charged with discontinuity and contingency, with risk, vulnerability and surprise. Moreover, the gift points beyond itself to its source, to a more or less definitely apprehended giver. (Fs)

44b What is a gift? It is a free endowment upon another who receives it freely; so that the first mark of a gift is its gratuity. Even the banal conventional acceptance, "Oh! but you shouldn't have; it really wasn't necessary!" expresses this inherent gratuity. There is a quality of absoluteness about a gift in the fullest sense. I have already remarked upon the absoluteness or unconditionality that attaches to the given, viz. its incontrovertibility either by supposition (the hypothetical sense) or in fact (the evidential sense). There is also a kind of absoluteness that is endemic to the process of self-determination according to Hegel (Absolute Spirit) and his successors ("man alone"). The character which the unconditional takes in the gift, however, is just its gratuity. Of course, we ought not to expect to find in the concrete and actual human situation pure interactions of giving and receiving unmixed with other qualities and intentions. The line between a gift and a transaction, a piece of business, is eidetically clear enough, but it is not always clear in life itself, nor should we expect it to be. We know of societies in which a return gift is expected, and whose nature is precisely defined, its value weighed and ranked. Is such a handing over a gift? Or is it an exchange of "presents" undertaken out of social duty, for social advantage, or even as part of a commercial transaction? If something is given out of gratitude, it is caught in the temper of the gift; but if it is in "compensation" for something received or expected, then it falls away from the character of the gift towards that of a transaction. Now a commercial transaction (whether in monetary or other value) is an exchange measured in terms of some standard of merit (mereo, merx, commercium), whereas a gift is in the strict sense unmerited. A gift, then, qua gift does not call for an "adequate return" upon the endowment; such a return is appropriate to investments of a commercial sort. There certainly are mixed donations, most obviously in societies where custom is formalized. We have often given a "gift" because it was expected. There is, of course, nothing wrong in this, and such interpersonal and social interaction makes affairs run more easily; not without danger, however, as shown by the ease with which innocent "gifts" imperceptibly move along a line towards bribery and coercion. Still, external forms of interaction, however empty and shallow they may at times become, remind us of an essential generosity without which life itself dies. In some situations a gift may be expected and be very precisely defined, in an other it may be expected but not so exactly defined, in an other it may not be expected at all, and in still an other it may be unexpected. The two latter unobligatory situations approach most closely the full nature of the gift, whereas the former two might better be called (as I have just suggested) "presents." Although such presents may be all but obligatory, they may still be beneficial, for not all human relationships take the form of giving and receiving. Nevertheless, the more or less obligatory situations do not realize the fullest possibility of the gift. Sometimes the routine manner of accepting presents even with a ritual "surprise" built in testifies to the diminution of that possibility. If presents in such situations do take on the genuine aura of the gift, it will be because the one who presents them has invested them with personal attentiveness beyond what is called for by the formal exchange of presents. Not satisfied with discharging the minimal conditions of the exchange, he or she will have seized its deeper possibility, endowed the presentation with his or her own care, and thereby transformed a mere present into a genuine gift. Such a giver will have made more than a presentation; he will have made a present into a gift. Now, the "extra" beyond the mere present is the gratuity that animates the gift. So far, then, we have recognized the non-obligatory character of the gift. (Fs)

47a Despite the absolute gratuity inherent in the gift as endowment, reciprocity is appropriate to the gift. A gift is meant to be reciprocated. The fundamental reciprocity called for, however, is not the return of another gift. It is rather the completion of the gift being given. Now, for its completion a gift must not only be offered; it must also be received. So that reception is the original reciprocity intended in the very meaning and reality of the gift. Receptivity on the part of the recipient is the primary requisite for the completion of the gift. But the appropriate kind of receptivity is not that of passive inertia. Gabriel Marcel has distinguished between passivity and receptivity.2 The wax undergoes the imprint of the mold and may be said to "receive" it; but such passivity is especially characteristic of physical matter. A truly human mode of receptivity calls for the recipient to rally his human resources in order to make a good reception. For example, when we receive a guest into our home, we are attentive to his needs, so that we might make him "feel at home." Now, it is just such attentive receptivity that is called for by a gift. To accept it absent-mindedly, with indifference or even hostility, would not really be to receive it at all. The gratuity inherent in the gift, moreover, requires that the receptivity be grounded in what Marcel called "availability" (disponibilité), the ontological disposition in which we are ready to accept the unexpected, to make room for it.3 The reception of the gift does not follow from the endowment in the manner of a secure formal inference, but is broken by the radical surprise occasioned by the gratuity at the source of the gift. The primary reciprocation, therefore, is the acknowledgement of that gratuity and the appropriation of the gift as gratuitously given. But, if the gratuity is to be maintained, the reception must be free. In the degree to which the recipient is free in regard to the endowment, in that degree he is able to make an appropriate response. And if he is not free....? Was it not Charles Peguy who prayed to God that the poor might forgive us the bread we give them? The gratuitous character (gratuitus) of the endowment must also animate its reception (gratitudo). Such receptivity is needed to bring the gift to completion. Endowment, then, does not alone realize the gift; gratitude is also called for.4 (Fs)

48a It follows that, in giving and receiving, there is risk for both the giver and the receiver. It may go badly. For the recipient, because the giver may seek to entrap the receiver by his gift, thus abusing the gift. For the donor, because the receiver may repel the advance made by the giver with his gift, thus abusing the generosity. Again, there is risk for the giver: for his gift may be refused, and there is something marred about a gift that is badly received, either accepted gracelessly, or rejected outright. Such a refusal is the original form of non-reciprocity that preys upon and spoils a gift, rendering it not only uncompleted but flawed as well. For when it is refused, a gift, so to speak, bends back upon the giver, leaving him exposed and wounded. In an intimate relationship the refusal is felt as a personal rebuff; in a more public relationship it is likely to become an occasion for uninvited shame. The wound is not only to the dignity of the giver, however, who may be able to tolerate it. More importantly, it may be an offence against the very spirit of generosity itself, cutting off its out-reach. But there is risk to the receiver as well, who is made vulnerable by the initiative of the giver. Risk attaches to reception differently than to endowment. In reception the receiver opens himself up to the intention of the giver and to the significance of the gift. If giving and receiving are stabilized by customary forms in a society, the essential quality of the gift may be lost for both giver and recipient by virtue of the automatism lurking in such forms. But in a less formal society it may also not be easy to give and to receive a gift appropriately. If no relationship exists between the two parties, the gift is meant to establish one; and if a relationship already exists, it may alter that relationship. So that both parties are put at risk in giving and receiving. (Fs)

49a Then, too, there may be an opacity about the gift that creates a certain ambiguity. This is especially true if the gift has its own material value. For a material thing is not transparent; it is opaque, and that opacity may hide as much or more than it reveals of the intentions of the giver. Its independent substance may contain an unforeseen chain of possible consequents. Long after the gift has been given and accepted, it may subsist as a pledge of fidelity or, if dispositions or circumstances alter, as an encumbrance or an embarrassment. Moreover, the material or symbolic value of a gift may distort a relationship, its "weight" unbalancing the relationship or preventing a promising development. And so the risk is rooted not only in the dispositions of the donor and the recipient, but in the opacity of the gift itself. So far, then, we have seen: (1) the gratuity inseparable from the gift as such, (2) the primary reciprocity that brings the gift to completion: gratitude as the free reception of the gift, and (3) the risk inherent in the vulnerability of the parties and the opacity of the gift. (Fs)
50a Just as the original gift may hide the intentions of the giver and hold within it unforeseen consequences, so too a return gift may be opaque. To be sure, it may embody a more or less genuine, even innocent, gratitude, a non-devious show of appreciation, just as the original gift may be a sign of genuine affection. On the other hand, the return may be an attempt to forestall the original gift in order to reject it in its givenness, to cancel out its having been given. The return may intend to reduce the original gift to a mere present, and to "pay off" the "indebtedness" incurred by the reception of the original gift. In this way, the return may be meant to discharge a social obligation and to announce a newly regained freedom from such a debt. And so a return gift may actually embody the outright refusal to accept the original gift, representing the refusal to be obligated, rather than the acceptance of mutual obligations. If not outright refusal, at the very least a gift returned with such intent signifies a grudging acceptance of the original gift. Such an unfree reception expresses the very opposite disposition to gratitude, since to be grateful is to accept something unmerited (gratia, grace) willingly and gladly. On the other hand, many concrete situations remain obscure, even to the parties involved. The ambiguity in an interchange of gifts may remain until some unequivocal act of generosity breaks through and declares the inherently free character of giving and receiving, or until an equally unequivocal act announces by a negative freedom the deliberate refusal to take up the relationship intended by the gift. It is important to remember that there is nothing wrong with the interchange of presents out of mixed motives, for such exchange may well make smooth the pathways of interpersonal, social and even commercial relations. Moreover, not all gifts have to be accepted, anymore than they have to be given. But, if a gift is to reach its maturity, true to type, then it needs to be received with gratitude and not compensated for by a return gift. (Fs)

52a For all that has just been said, nothing is more customary, of course, than the exchange of gifts. We are told that pre-literate men hastened to return another gift in order to re-establish the equilibrium unbalanced by the initial gift;5 and this reaction is not unknown among us today. Once again, a return gift is not by its very nature a refusal or non-acceptance; but it is important to recognize that the gift is not first completed by the return of another gift. For a new gift introduces a fresh act of giving into the relationship. And so it is strictly not a return gift, but a new initiative. To be sure, a return gift is founded upon the reception of the first gift, and so it might be called a gift in return. Indeed, the gratitude with which a genuine gift is properly received itself founds an intentionality that seeks expression. The expression may surface in words and facial expressions, or in gestures or conduct. But it often tends to take tangible form in the offering of a gift in return. What finds expression in such exchange at its best is the mutual affection and respect within which both parties are at once receivers and givers to each other. It is in this way that mutual gifts build community by a cumulative effect. For, as Van der Leeuw has insisted, the do ut des formula associated with religious offerings to the gods is not to be taken as a contractual quid pro quo, but rather in the diffuse creative sense that "I give in order that you might be able to give."6 So that, although the original gift cannot be returned, it can make possible a gift in return. This bond of affection and respect rests upon the original receptivity of giving and receiving. Once again, in the concrete building of community the mutual interchange arises out of a mixture of motives; but the quality of the community is determined in a significant way by the degree to which the exchange participates in the inherent generosity of the gift. (Fs)