cepted but are not recognized. The Church ordered Jews tornchoose between exclusion (or physical death) or self-denialrn(spiritual and historical death). Only through conversion couldrnthey become “Christians, as others.”rnThe French Revolution emancipated Jews as individuals, butrnit condemned them to disappear as a “nation”; in this sense,rnthey were forced to become “citizens as others.” Marxism, too,rnattempted to ensure the “liberation” of the Jewish people byrnimposing on them a class division, from which their dispersionrninevitably resulted.rnThe origins of modern totalitarianism are not difficult torntrace. In a secular form, they are tied to the same radicalrnstrains of intolerance whose religious causes we have just examined.rnThe organization of totalitarianism is patterned after thernorganization of the Christian Church, and in a similar mannerrntotalitarianisms exploit the themes of the “masses”—thernthemes inherent in contemporary mass democracy. This secularizationrnof the system has, in fact, rendered totalitarianismrnmore dangerous—independently of the fact that religiousrnintolerance often triggers, in return, an equally destructivernrevolutionary intolerance. “Totalitarianism,” writes GilbertrnDurand, “is further strengthened, in so far as the powers ofrnmonotheist theology (which at least left the game of transcendencernintact) have been transferred to a human institution, tornthe Crand hiquisitor.”rnIt is a serious error to assume that totalitarianism manifestsrnits real character only when it employs crushing coercion. Historicalrnexperience has demonstrated—and continues torndemonstrate—that there can exist a “clean” totalitarianism,rnwhich, in a “soft” manner, yields the same consequences as thernclassic kinds of totalitarianism. “Happy robots” of J 984 or ofrnBrave New World have no more enviable conditions than prisonersrnof the camps. In essence, totalitarianism did not originaternwith Saint-Just, Stalin, Hegel, or Fichte. Rather, as MichelrnMaffesoli says, totalitarianism emerges “when a subtle form ofrnplural, polytheistic, and contradictory totality, that is inherentrnin organic interdependency” is superseded by a monotheisticrnone. Totalitarianism grows out of a desire to establish social andrnhuman unity by reducing the diversity of individuals and peoplesrnto a single model. In this sense, he argues, it is legitimaternto speak of a “polytheist social arena, referring to multiple andrncomplementary gods” versus a “monotheistic political arenarnfounded on the illusion of unity.” Once the polytheism of valuesrn”disappears, we face totalitarianism.” Pagan thought, onrnthe other hand, which fundamentally remains attached to rootednessrnand to the place, and which is a preferential center of therncrystallization of human identity, rejects all religious and philosophicalrnforms of universalism.rnN E W F R O M CHRONICLES • • •rnAPRIL 1996/23rnrnrn