War as an anthropological phenomenon: prohibition and the violation of the prohibition

Based on scientific literature and fiction, an attempt is made to substantiate the phenomenon of war from the anthropological perspective, reveal the essence, limits, and risks of transgressive experience, identify the qualities of a sovereign subject. While analyzing and understanding this phenomenon in the context of the prohibition, the authors present their view on relevant issues and draw reasoned conclusions. In particular, an anthropological subject objectifies its existence in the forms of excessiveness, transgressive experience reflected in “weak” forms of wastefulness (obsession with luxuries and money) and “strong” dimensions (piracy, terrorism, war). War as the experience of the absolute sovereign subject cannot be realized and transferred through philosophical categories, theories, and concepts. If the ontology and gnoseology of war are hampered, it is necessary to rely on the anthropology of the subject of sacrifice, self-sacrifice, murder, and war. The latter relates to the ban and its breach, aims to make a human sacrifice, sacralize murder, delete the views from the experience of profane sacrifice defining the conditions for the existence of a sovereign subject. The subject of absolute sovereignty constitutes the experience of the pre-predicative givenness of consciousness that is closed to the subject itself and the universal subject and reflects human philosopher. Elusiveness, fragmentation, and uncertainty of the pre-predicative experience of war have made it necessary to rely on analytics of unfinished, open-ended texts such as memoirs, diaries, prose, poetry, and cinema.