Benjamin suggests that although we see history as a chain of events, to the angel of history, there is only one continual "catastrophe". Our history is linear, temporally defined in relation to the coming of the lord, and some schools of Christian thought believe that it is terminated with the second coming of the lord. If Benjamin's "Messianic time" can be viewed in this light, the "Messianic cessation of happening" signifies an event momentous enough to disturb this messianic continuum, or at least worthy of mention or comparison to the arrival of that messiah.

Benjamin discusses this disruption as "a revolutionary chance in the fight for the oppressed past". How does this "Messianic cessation" affect the oppressed past? What is the chance thus afforded?

Although experienced as linear, our history is far more often represented causally. For Serres, history "is, as it happens, information neither total nor null, without clear-cut boundary between the observer and the observed" (6). As we live history, we are not fully aware of the facts and influences. Only in retrospect can we truly understand our position. Benjamin discusses the fragmentary nature of our history, where snatches from the past are linked causally with others.

Events are represented out of sequence, just as Homer interrupts the Odyssey with the tale of the scar. It is seized upon, anachronistically, to enable a recognition, and as such, it becomes "causal". Perhaps it is significant as a clue to the nature of the man, but here it exists to enable the recognition by the old nurse, and thus the scar enables Odysseus to slay the suitors, because without it he could not be recognised by the old nurse.

The event is snatched from the past because there was a causal connection with the present and the future. Here, the tale of the scar can be read as the "oppressed past", and the "Messianic cessation" would be the recognition, which provides the "revolutionary chance" for the past to be recalled.

Dannielle Lovett