The Empty Chair: Living with Openness to the Other

I have come to believe that every human being lives in relation to the “not yet.” We all carry longings, dreams, and hopes that stretch beyond the present moment. Some wait for a messiah, some fight for justice, others simply dream of a better tomorrow for those they love. In each case, life bends toward what has not yet arrived, asking us to make space for what might be.

This is the heart of what Jacques Derrida called “the messianic without messiah.” He described it as a universal structure, a posture of openness to what may come. What matters is not the particular promise, but the readiness to receive it. If the future only ever looks like what we already imagine, it is not truly new. It is repetition, history dressed in new clothes. For transformation to happen, it must arrive as Other, beyond what we can predict or control.

This “coming one,” which Derrida called the arrivant, arrives on their own terms, not ours. If we try to force them into our categories or fit them into our plans, we close the very space of hope. This is why he spoke of the need to leave room, what he called “the empty place.”

For me, this is not just philosophy. It is how I try to live.

In relationships, I notice how easy it is to meet others as projections of what I expect them to be. A partner, a friend, a child. The temptation is to shape them in my imagination and then grow frustrated when they do not fit. But when I leave the empty chair, I give them the freedom to arrive as they are. That is an act of reverence, and it brings its own kind of liberation.

In community, I see how often we search for solutions that resemble what we already know. Another program, another initiative, another plan. Yet real change often comes from the edge, from the voice that was not in the room at the beginning. Leaving the empty chair means staying open to the unexpected guest, the outsider, the stranger who carries wisdom we did not anticipate.

In our work for justice, I recognize how easy it is to believe we already know the future we are building. But if we hold too tightly to that vision, we risk recreating the very patterns we hoped to undo. Leaving the empty chair reminds me that the future worth having will carry its own mystery, its own voice, its own demand to be welcomed.

Living this way is not comfortable. It asks me to hold hope without certainty. It asks me to trust that what comes, if it comes, will not fit neatly into my plans. The true event, as Derrida described it, will always be more than I can contain. It is “monstrous” in its wildness.

There is a Jewish tradition of leaving an empty chair at the Passover table for Elijah. I imagine that chair not as a symbol to be filled, but as an invitation to reverence. It is a reminder that the Other must arrive on their own terms, not mine.

So I try to live with that posture. Not clinging to certainty. Not mistaking my hopes for what is truly to come. But keeping the empty chair ready, waiting, open. Because without that openness, nothing ever really changes. With it, something new may yet arrive.