The Denial of Death

Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 1973

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Preface-Chapter 1

Chapters 2-3

Chapters 4-5

Chapters 6-7

Chapters 8-9

Chapters 10-11

Key Figures

Themes

Index of Terms

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

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Discussion Questions

Themes

Binary of the Bodily and Symbolic

A key component of Ernest Becker’s thesis is the idea that the human condition is built on a balance between the bodily and the spiritual, or, to use Becker’s own terms, the physical and the symbolic (231).

Drawing on Freudian ideas of psychoanalysis, Becker argues that from very early childhood, people are at least subconsciously aware of this binary once they become aware of genital differences and of their own body’s production of excrement (30-42). As Becker writes, “The body [...] is one’s animal fate that has to be struggled against in some ways” (44). According to Becker, the fear of death is the primary motivator of all human activity (x), but this fear is closely related to this tension between our having physical bodies and having higher awareness. Specifically, we are aware of our bodies’ frailty, limits, and mortality, but we are capable of envisioning a mental or spiritual transcendence. Becker even notes that awareness of this binary can drive people insane (27).

Becker implies that there is no real way to get past this tension. However, we do strive for what Becker calls heroism, which is how humans can achieve transcendence (5-6). Ancient cultures and traditional religions used to provide avenues for this heroism through, for example, the Christian belief that an individual can ascend to the higher reality of Heaven (160). With the decline of traditional religion in the modern world, there have been no good substitutes, with alternatives such as materialism and romantic love failing to fill the void. Furthermore, although everyone subconsciously struggles with this binary, it is also at the root of what we consider mental illnesses, along with sexual fetishes, anxieties, and phobias. These things result from individuals’ subconscious strategies to cope with humans living with the dual experiences of being both animals and transcendent beings (227-31).

In the face of this dilemma, Becker does not offer a definitive solution, especially given that so much of the problem is innate to the nature of the modern world. Instead, the closest thing to a solution is to develop a belief system that acknowledges the unpleasant realities of the body and the world while also allowing people to develop a healthy sense of themselves in a metaphysical or spiritual and individual sense (273-77). Becker refers to this as “types of heroic dedication” (284). In other words, there must be some kind of cultural or philosophical system that helps people strike a balance with this binary rather than cause people to turn to the emptiness of consumer culture or the harshness of raw science.

Dealing With the World and Culture

Becker argues throughout The Denial of Death that “the idea of death, the fear of it, haunts the human animal like nothing else; it is a mainspring of human activity” (x). However, Becker discusses not only the threat of death itself but how overwhelming the natural world can be in its scope. The fear of death can also cause people to, in a way, fear life and its dangers.

According to Becker, when faced with the universe, a person feels “an impotence to stand alone, firmly rooted on his own powers” (54). Becker cites the philosopher Søren Kierkegaard’s concept of philistinism to describe the result. People become concerned only with external reality. As Becker describes it, “Why does man accept to live a trivial life? Because of the danger of a full horizon of experience, of course” (74). One way Becker describes how people deal with the vastness of the world is through transference, which is a “passive surrender” (129) during which a person identifies with and submits to anything from a political or religious leader to a sexual fetish to a bodily illness. While people still strive to be individuals, transference provides people with a “locus” for “projecting our cares into the world” (144).

Another important way individuals interact with the world around them is through culture. Becker does not provide a set definition for culture. However, he does describe it as the “superego,” which “sets [...] limits” on an individual’s human experience (265). It is through culture that people can live with the problem of being both animalistic and spiritual beings, as well as with the knowledge of death.

In Becker’s argument, cultures do this by providing avenues for heroism, such as through rituals (237) and shared beliefs (160). More specifically, cultures provide a “plan for action” (6) for people to assert their individuality while also functioning within a wider society. At the same time, however, Becker implies that ancient or so-called “primitive” cultures were better at fulfilling this function than modern cultures, as he believes that modern culture now lacks a sufficiently heroic or transcendent dimension.

The Problem of the Modern World

A frequent critique that Becker makes is that the modern world is failing to give people ways to overcome their fundamental fear of death, unlike ancient cultures and traditional religions. For Becker, societies developed to offer people a way to accept their bodily nature while also feeling themselves to be a part of something greater. According to Becker’s sources, ancient societies “believe that death is the ultimate promotion, the final ritual elevation to a higher form of life” (ix). This is similar to the way that Christianity made the individual “part of a great whole” (159).

Becker argues that the cultures of the modern world have seen these beliefs and their benefits decline. As Becker claims, “The one thing modern man cannot do is what Kierkegaard prescribed: the lonely leap into faith, the naive personal trust in some kind of transcendental support for one’s life” (200). Becker argues that, in the modern era, people lack the same ability to truly and easily accept the mysterious and metaphysical. In fact, Becker compares the modern fixation on pure reason to a kind of madness (201). Within such a system, there is no sense of what Becker describes as heroism, which can offer “a feeling of primary value, of cosmic specialness, of ultimate usefulness to creation, of unshakable meaning” (5).

Instead, the modern world can only offer weak alternatives that cannot satisfy. Among these are romantic love (160), consumerism (268-71), science (283-84), and psychology itself (268-76). “Modern man is drinking and drugging himself out of awareness, or he spends his time shopping, which is the same thing” (284), Becker writes. None of these alternatives can fully provide the same sense of transcendence. Becker’s suggested solution is the creation of a new belief system that could give individuals a sense of being “awe-filled creatures trying to live in harmony with the rest of creation” (282). Only by regaining a sense of the heroic and the transcendent, Becker suggests, will modern humanity manage to break out of its sense of malaise.