"Agamben abandons the language of “community” in favor of form-of-life. This concept emphasizes a life inseparable from its form—a way of living that cannot be abstracted into “bare life” or reduced to juridical identity. Form-of-life is not a collective noun; it’s an ethical mode of existence. It resists being grouped, counted, or named. In this shift, Agamben moves from imagining a community of singularities to envisioning singular lives lived in messianic suspension.

Agamben’s reflections on Shabbat further illustrate this turn. Shabbat is not just rest—it’s a suspension of the machinery that binds life to labor and obligation. It’s a figure of messianic time, where life is lived in use, not possession. In this rhythm, the idea of community—especially as a structured, bounded entity—becomes irrelevant. What matters is not who belongs, but how one lives. Shabbat exemplifies form-of-life: a life lived in the presence of messianic interruption, without the need for communal identity."