ABSTRACT
In posing the question this way I am not asking - at least primarily - about the so-called 'plain' meaning of the theory. Anyone sufficiently diligent can, with text in hand, decipher much of what the Durkheimians say about sacrifice. No great mystery lurks in the 'plain' meaning of the theory, although it would be tedious and involve a rehearsal of all of it here. But one can illustrate something about the 'plain' meaning of the theory. We know, for example, that Hubert and Mauss wanted to put two points at the centre of any definition of sacrifice: consecration and the victim:
Thus, unlike both Robertson Smith and Durkheim who made communion central to sacrifice, what is essential for Hubert and Mauss is the process of something's becoming (or ceasing to become) sacred, and less, or sometimes not at all, what happens before or after.
