In their differentiated form, religion and science serve as functional subsystems of society, each based on their own code. They can therefore only observe—i. e. describe—one another as a specific environment. The balancing between religion and science, under the conditions of functional differentiation, is neither a task of religion nor one of science, but a matter of social coordination. (1) The functionally differentiated society is characterized by the fact that no subsystem is hierarchically superior to others and that a state of heterarchy prevails. Societal subsystems carry out their mutual observation via analogies, which are converted into information, i. e. into digital literality, by means of the respective system-specific code. From there, further information is gained by metaphorical means again. To clarify how science and religion can observe its respective environment (e. g., each other) and internally generate information from semantic energy derived from its other-referential environment, a look at the relationship between metonymy and metaphor is useful.

The process of generating meaningful information can be understood by analyzing the relationship between metonymy and metaphor. While the metaphor is a parabolic analogy with a ‘focal point’, the metonymy rests on symbolic analogy. (2) The main difference between metonymy and metaphor has been analyzed by Roman Jakobson (1971). He distinguishes two types of sign arrangements: the combination or contexture (with the two subtypes concurrence and concatenation), as well as the selection or substitution. The constituents of a piece of information are connected to a code via an internal relationship as well as to the environment, from which the material for the generation of this information originates, via an external relation (Jakobson 1971, 243). Jacobson deduces the two constitutive principles of metonymy and metaphor from these two basic operations (Jakobson 1971, 254). Metonymy consists of a specific combination of signs on the syntagmatic axis and rests on the principle of contiguity (spatial and temporal proximity). The metaphor is a selection on the paradigmatic axis. It is produced by substituting one sign for another to which it bears a paradigmatic relation and is based on the principle of similarity. These two tropes, however, are not a categorical distinction, but poles which regulate the opening and closing of semiosis (see the articles in Dirven and Pörings 2003 as well as in Spieß and Köpcke 2015). Determining a sign element as a metonymy or a metaphor is carried out by the two interpretants as processors of the elementary semiotic system: “[…] there are always two possible interpretants (Peirce’s term) of the sign, one referring to the code and the other to the context of the message. The interpretant referring to the code is linked to it by similarity (metaphor), and the interpretant referring to the message is linked to it by contiguity (metonymy)” (Wilden 1980, 47).

Metonymy and metaphor together are necessary for generating and processing information. The metonymic combination is related other-referentially to the semiotic context from which the material for the generation of information originates, and the metaphorical selection provides for the self-reference of the semiotic code. (3) For example, the sign CHURCH, if it refers paradigmatically to a SACRED SPACE, is metaphorically linked to the religious code, and metonymically linked to the semiotic context from which the material for the generation of information originates—for example in the statement: “You should go to church again.” This sentence can be embedded in religious communication, for instance in a conversation on matters regarding one’s religious conduct of life. In this case, both the code and the information context observed from an other-referential viewpoint are determined in religious terms. However, the sentence can, for instance, also be part of educational communication. In this case, the sign CHURCH is paradigmatically related to CHURCH ATTENDANCE as an educational means in the educational code communicable/non-communicable (4). The distinction as well as the interplay between syntagmatic combination and paradigmatic selection provides an explanation for the basic polysemy of individual signs (Bartsch 2003). It is only in a particular pragmatic-semiotic context that they acquire a specific sense.

Analogies, by establishing similarity between something distinctive in comparison to some distinct other, generate and process the paradox of ‘is and is not’. This is what metaphor theories call attention to. (5) The “predicative basic structure” (Weinrich 1963, 337) of a “bold” or “living” metaphor produces a split-reference (Jakobson 1960, 371) or double reference (“suspended reference and displayed reference”) (Ricœur 1978, 261); the “dead metaphor” as an entrenched metonymy or synecdoche obscures it (Silk 1974, 27–56). This is the paradox of the metaphor: “The metaphorical ‘is’ at once signifies both ‘is not’ and ‘is like’” (Ricœur 1978, 6). In systems theory metaphors arise on the boundary between systems of meaning and their environment; they combine identity within the system with other-referentially observed similarity (Tourangeau and Sternberg 1981). (6) At these transitions, coded literalism and metaphorical surplus oscillate.

What is true for semiosis, on the whole, already applies to the complete sign as its smallest systemic unit. It is based on the two operations of metonymy and metaphor in the above-mentioned sense as well as on their synthesis (Figure 12).

Figure 12: The positions of metonymy
and metaphor in the complete sign

According to Peirce’s sign theory, the metaphor is a type of representamen, because it is based on the principle of similarity and is self-referential. (7) The metonymy is a type of the sign object, because it is other-referential, even though it is transitively related to the respective code in the complete sign. The two tropes are both processor and process. In the sign system, the relations R¹–I¹ and I²–O¹ are metonymic combinations that are based on a certain code (in the case of differentiated religion: on the code transcendent/immanent). However, the relation R¹–I¹ is self-referential, because the first interpretant transforms the metaphorical surplus by means of the system-specific code into information, which is manageable for the system. The relation I²–O¹ is other-referential, because the second interpretant is environmentally sensitive and interprets the first sign object in view of other-reference. The transitions between I¹ and I² and between O¹ and O² are a metaphorical selection because they connect the level of the observing sign form with the level of the observed sign content. The relation between R² and O² is to be understood as a combination of metonymy and metaphor. While the sign object O² is other-referential and therefore context-sensitive, the representamen R² is self-referential and at the same time, it constitutes a possibility to connect to further semiosis. (8) Due to the relation between metonymy and metaphor, a change between the two can take place within the sign system (Bartsch 2003, 73–74; Goossens 1995). In the systemic process, O¹ is metonymical in character but interspersed with metaphorical elements. Conversely, R² is metaphorical in character, but transfers the other-referential metonymy into self-reference and thus also has metonymical elements. Due to the system reference of the complete sign, the relations between R¹ and O² as well as R² and O¹ are congruent.

The oscillation between metonymy and metaphor, as well as their synthesis, are the conditions for the production of semiotic information as a translation (metaphor) of the transcription (metonymy) in the interplay between closure and opening. At the same time, process (time) and structure together with the position of the elements (space) must be mediated (see Figure 12, above). In procedural terms, the metonymic transcription induces the syntagmatic closure process regarding the respective code, while the metaphorical translation is based on paradigmatic openness. In structural terms, metonymy as a sign aspect of secondness (relations) is other-referential-open, while the metaphor as a sign aspect of firstness (quality) is self-referential-closed as a result of paradigmatic selection. In the complete sign, R¹, O¹, and I¹ are closed as a unity in the shape of the observed sign content but are open in the direction of the observing sign form. The sign system is therefore open in system-internal and epistemic terms, but it is closed in operative terms regarding the environment. (9)

The metaphorical translation of the metonymic transcription is the basal process of self-observation in a system: It draws a distinction (transcription) and observes it (translation) with respect to the synthesis of self-reference and other-reference. This process corresponds to Peirce’s understanding of metaphors. They “represent the representative character of a representamen by representing a parallelism in something else” (Peirce 1994, 2). The “parallelism in something else” consists in the metonymy of the sign object. The interrelation between metonymy and metaphor as well as the oscillation of closure and opening makes it—at least to some extent—clear how semiotic information emerges in the process of translating the transcription.

Against the backdrop of the relationship between metonymy and metaphor, the process of how religion relates to its environment can be understood. Religion refers to its environment in an other-referential and analogic manner and transforms respective semantic energy into coded literalism in order to thereafter refer to transcendence under immanent conditions by means of a metaphorical surplus. At the same time, from an internal religious perspective, however, the surplus constitutes the literal sense—made evident and plausible, for example, by means of divination or revelation—, and the environmental reference constitutes the metaphorical sense, which makes it possible to fold in and understand the environment. The double-direction of self-reference and other-reference only comes into view when the metaphor is understood in accordance with the triadic-relational sign model: it contains the difference between literal and figurative and, at the same time, it generates and represents its unity. This unity makes it possible for the transmission to take place in both directions of the difference. The reality status of both ‘is’ and ‘is not’ lies not only on one of the two sides of the distinction between religious and other kinds of communication, but moves at their interference points. The digitization of analogous, simultaneous, and equally valid relationships is carried out within a system by means of self-reference.

The formal considerations shall be briefly substantiated based on empirical data. The data stems from the treatise The Flowing Light of the Godhead (FLG), whose authorship is attributed to the Christian mystic Mechthild of Magdeburg (b. ca. 1207, d. ca. 1282).

This passage—like the entire text FLG—is characterized by two metaphorical fields: physical gravity and eroticism. Both metaphors are folded in by religious communication and provided with specific religious meaning. In the perspective of the construction of religious meaning, ‘upwards’ is the positive (transcendent) value of the religious code, and ‘downwards’ is the negative (immanent) value (for the case of Jewish mysticism, see Idel 2005; for Daoism, cf. Eskildsen 2007). Within religious communication, both directions have a religious value. Hell, for example, is—typically though not universally—placed below (Bernstein 1993, 60.146⁠; Bremmer 2014⁠; Stausberg 2009⁠; Le Goff [1981] 1990), while paradise is in heaven above (Lang and McDannell 1990). “Vertical orientation is […] commonly used in metaphors that describe religious concepts. Jesus and god are considered the ‘most high’, whereas the antithesis of god, satan, is considered to be a ‘lowly’ being. Such metaphors likely develop through the historical belief that god resides high in the heavens, whereas satan resides deep in the underworld” (Meier, Scholer, and Fincher-Kiefer 2014, 51). Religion as a special coordination system connects the space determined in physical terms with meaning determined in non-religious terms—for example, with attributions of social status such as “HIGH STATUS IS UP” or political attributions such as “POWER IS UP” (Lakoff and Johnson 1980, 16) (11)—and transforms this combination into specific religious meaning. In referencing the quoted passage of the text FLG: min irdensch sinken (my sinking back to earth) goes down, and lsunge (literally: release, seperation from; religiously: salvation) from the body goes up. Both directions are mediated by sweben (hover). Sensual perception of space is aided by the sign lichamen (body) as its medium hovers between heaven and earth (or even deeper: hell). sweben is the corporeal equivalent to the metaphor of flowing that is often used in the text FLG, as well as to the spatial metaphor of unio mystica.

The second metaphorical field in text FLG, which is also used in the cited passage, is eroticism. It is a common metaphor within mystical communication (Bataille 1986, 221–251). In the text FLG, Mechthild’s soul is the bride and the lyrical ego “is produced in part by the vicissitudes of erotic experience” (Newman 1995, 143). One of the strongest statements with sexual allusions is: „Ich bin in dir und du bist in mir, Wir mgen nit naher sin" (“*I am in you and you are in me, we could not be any closer“) (Mechthild von Magdeburg 1869, III.5, 66). In addition, the metaphor of flowing has connotations of semen and vaginal fluid during sexual intercourse. However, mystical union, though it contains references* to physical sexual intercourse, is not identical to it (Keul 1999, 96).

The last part of the cited passage can be illustrated in the model of the semiotic system as follows (Figure 13):

Figure 13: A sentence from Mechthild von Magdeburg
in the semiotic model

min irdensch sinken (R¹) connects metaphorically to the preceding semiosis and is encoded by the interpretant I¹ diner [= God] einunge mines lichamen religiously. The second interpretant I² du (you) (= God), which takes the position of other-referential transcendence, draws semantic energy from the environment of religious communication in the form of lsunge as the first sign object O¹. This word functions as a metaphorical metonym and is transformed by the interpretant I² du (= God) from the semantics of physical release into a specific religious meaning. In religious meaning, lsunge stands for the other-referential unity of transcendence (salvation) and immanence (physical release). The second object reference (O²) exists in ich as the lyrical ego. At this point, the semiotic system draws energy from the self-referential environment in the form of mentally represented body perception. in dir můs sweben occupies as the representamen R² the position of a self-referential unity of transcendence (in the spatial metaphor: up) and immanence (in the spatial metaphor: down). This sign element completes the entire sign, and as a metonymic metaphor it represents the starting point for further semiosis. During the follow-on communication in the form of reading or reciting this text, the reader (as an environment of communication) can take the place of the lyrical ego. Since the lyrical ego presents itself as one with God (12), the reader or recitor (and thus the listener) can comprehend the uttered experience. The lyrical ego becomes the religious perfoming entity: an empty, context-free framework into which the readers or reciters can slip easily (Linden 2011, 379) and turn from external observers to communicatively addressed participants in religious communication (Nemes 2012, 47). In this way, religion can feed itself with further semantic energy, which it draws from the mental environment, and transform it into religious information.

Science in general, including the study of religion, also uses analogies to extract semantic energy from its environment (in this case: from religious communication as its empirical data and from certain academic approaches as the basis for modeling) and transforms it into system-specific information by means of the scientific code true/false (Luhmann 1990, 170). Every scientific model has a metaphorical character (Black 1962⁠; Hesse 1966⁠; Boyd 1993⁠; Kuhn 1993⁠; Holland 1998, 202–210⁠; Hallyn 2000⁠; Brown 2003⁠; Drewer 2003⁠; Kretzenbacher 2003⁠; Gutmann, Rathgeber, and Syed 2010, 15–16). It is “an imagined mechanism or process, postulated by analogy with familiar mechanisms or processes and used to construct a theory to correlate a set of observations” (Barbour 1974, 30). A scientific model can only be verified by the code true/false to the extent that it attempts to include reality in the form of empirical evidence into scientific knowledge and to compare it with theoretical assumptions. (13)

Through mutual observation, religion and its scientific study cause interferences in the respective system. The religious statement “The Church is the Body of Christ” (14), for example, contains a lot more, much less, and a very different meaning than the sociological proposition “The Church is a religious organization”. The opposite is true as well. The difference is expressed in the following assertion made by the former Pope Benedict XVI: “The Church is not to be deduced from her organization [other-reference; VK]; the organization is to be understood from the Church [self-reference; VK]. But at the same time it is clear that for the visible Church visible unity is more than ‘organization’ [system-referential unity of other-reference and self-reference under the condition of visible immanence; VK]” (Ratzinger 2004, 210–211). From a sociological perspective, however, the church is nothing more than a religious organization, a certain, albeit complex, social form. “Self-description problems of this kind arise particularly in those cases where religious institutions or ‘associations’ (Max Weber) claim all sacredness for themselves and regard their order and hierarchical structures as manifestations of God’s will. Religious collectives of this type resist equation to ‘profane’ or ‘secular’ organizations. This type of ‘egalitarianism’ overturns the asymmetric self-distinction between the sacred and the profane, between the ‘holy church’ and the ‘world’ (as a social environment)” (Petzke and Tyrell 2012, 275).