Hermeneutics as a profanation of the new concept of sacred: the challenge and task for bioethics

Abstract

The paper considers and argues about the challenging task of bioethics to profane the new immanent sacred realities – life, health and body – that are present in the current socio-cultural context. The starting point of the article is the Agamben concept of profanation. Something becomes sacred when removed from its common use and conceived as a separate reality, which requires authority and expertise to control. Life health and body are currently perceived as entities separated from common use and made immanently sacred. Agamben proposes as a fundamental task of philosophy, the profanation of the new sacred realities that remain within a secularized context. If bioethics is a secular knowledge, it cannot elude this task. Critical hermeneutics is the most appropriate methodology for this profanation, because it seeks to critically unravel the hidden reasons and the given explanations by making use of a dismantling strategy.