Michel Foucault's "About the Beginning of the Hermeneutics of the Self"

Michel Foucault discusses the hermeneutics of the self and what this meant from a pagan philosophical viewpoint and how it changed with the introduction of Christianity. Foucault is interested in how people verbalize confessions and how this leads to a definition of self. How do people define themselves? There are three major types of techniques in human societies: production, signification, and domination. While Foucault mentions that techniques of domination were important when concerned with the knowledge of the subject (or self), he believes that perhaps there needed to be a new techniques for the technology of self.

The two most important techniques for the discovery of the truth of the self are the examination of one’s conscience and confession. These two techniques transformed from the pagan era to the Christian era. Before Christianity, and especially with the Stoics, it was important for people to examine their thoughts and actions of the day in order to “know yourself.” In philosophical schools, the relationship between the master and student was important for verbalization about the truth of oneself. Seneca describes himself examining his thoughts and actions of the day – he had a system of knowing when his actions fell short and when his actions were wrong. He played administrator for himself – he was both judging his actions and being judged. With the introduction of Christianity, the focus of the confession shifted from examining one’s actions to examining one’s thoughts. How did they line up in accordance with God? The focus was on confessing one’s thoughts to a spiritual leader. With this transformation is when hermeneutics of the self begins.

What is transformed during the shift from pagan to Christian confession? In pagan philosophical confessions, the aim is truth. Truth is obtained by rhetorical explanation. The desire is to create a self where the will and knowledge are united. With Christianity, the desire is to discover the self by examining what is hidden inside the self. This is the difference. Foucault believes that modern hermeneutics of the self is rooted in Christian techniques more than the Classical (pagan) techniques. Just the very fact that he uses this term “hermeneutics” implies this in a way. Christians making confession is not an act but as a life-long affair. Self-revelation occurs at the moment of exomologesis (at the moment of reconciliation). Exomologesis is a representation of certain kind of death. It is the will attempting to free itself from the body. At the moment of the verbalization or confession, there is a renouncing of self that occurs. The question of the self becomes paradoxical: “we have to sacrifice the self in order to discover the truth about ourself, and we have to discover the truth about ourself in order to sacrifice ourself” (221). With the sacrifice of the self, a loss of self, how is autobiography possible? How is the autobiographical possible if there is ultimately a loss of the self?