The Argonauts

by Maggie Nelson

According to Kaja Silverman, the turn to a paternal God comes on the heels of the child’s recognition that the mother cannot protect against all harm, that her milk—be it literal or figurative—doesn’t solve all problems. As the human mother proves herself a separate, finite entity, she disappoints, and gravely. In its rage at maternal finitude, the child turns to an all-powerful patriarch—God—who, by definition, cannot let anyone down. “The extraordinarily difficult task imposed upon the child’s primary caretaker not only by the culture but also by Being itself is to induct it into relationality by saying over and over again, in a multitude of ways, what death will otherwise have to teach it: ‘This is where you end and others begin.’ Unfortunately, this lesson seldom ‘takes,’ and the mother usually delivers it at enormous cost to herself. Most children respond to the partial satisfaction of their demands with extreme rage, rage that is predicated on the belief that the mother is withholding something that is within her power to provide.”