Franz Rosenzweig And The Systematic Task Of Philosophy

Benjamin Pollock argues that Franz Rosenzweig's The Star of Redemption is devoted to a singularly ambitious philosophical task: grasping 'the All' - the whole of what is - in the form of a system. In asserting Rosenzweig's abiding commitment to a systematic conception of philosophy, this book breaks rank with the assumptions about Rosenzweig's thought that have dominated recent scholarship. Indeed, the Star's importance is often claimed to lie precisely in the way it opposes philosophy's traditional drive for systematic knowledge and upholds instead a 'new thinking' attentive to the existential concerns, the alterity, and even the revelatory dimension of concrete human life. Pollock shows that these very innovations in Rosenzweig's thought are in fact to be understood as part and parcel of the Star's systematic program. But this is only the case, Pollock claims, because Rosenzweig approaches philosophy's traditional task of system in a radically original manner.

Pollock argues that Rosenzweig's The Star of Redemption is devoted to the philosophical task of grasping 'the All' - the whole of what is - as a system.

This volume brings together Rosenzweig's central essays on theology and philosophy, including two works available for the first time in English: the conclusion to Rosenzweig's book Hegel and the State, and Rosenzweig's famous letter to Rudolph Ehrenberg known as the Urzelle of the Star of Redemption, an essential work for understanding Rosenzweig, Weimar theology and philosophy, and German idealism and the existential reaction of the period. Additional selections are presented in new or revised translations. Introduction and notes by Franks and Morgan set Rosenzweig's works in context and illuminate his role as one of the key thinkers of the period.

Franz Rosenzweig's The Star of Redemption is best understood as a rational subjective system, and as such, as the redemptive turning point in philosophy and theology in general. In asserting Rosenzweig's essential commitment to a «new» systematic conception of thinking as the most basic, deepest, and comprehensive intellectual procedure, Franz Rosenzweig's Rational Subjective System sheds light on the extensive method of the Star and shows it to be rooted in a fundamental rethinking of the methodological and logical-metaphysical resources of Kant, most especially of the transcendent metaphysics of the psychological, cosmological, and theological substances (i.e., the «threefold nothing», or entia rationis). The true radicality and originality of Rosenzweig, Bontas claims, is the exposition of the «rational subjective» approach to substance and knowledge on the «logical form» of the hypothetical thought (i.e., the modal relation of logical consequence between original and non-natural ground and phenomenal consequence, that positively establishes the wholly final and non-ideal destinations of redemption), which valorizes the alliance between pure reason and revelation disrupted by the Kantian epistemology. The title, The Star of Redemption, indicates exactly this long rational and not exclusively mundane «new systematic principle» of coherent and reliable knowledge, which is ultimately shown to be «true» and «right» from a «self-examining» subjective perspective and thereby justified.

"With brilliance and considerable daring, Peter Gordon's Rosenzweig and Heidegger broaches the possibility of a shared horizon and a promising dialogue between these two seminal figures—these antipodes—of twentieth-century thought. It will be the bench mark for future work in the field."—Thomas Sheehan, author of Heidegger: The Man and the Thinker "In this brilliant book, Peter Gordon sheds light on Rosenzweig's most important philosophical book, The Star of Redemption, by means of an unexpected (and sure to be controversial) comparison—with the philosophy of Heidegger's Being and Time. The result is a "must read" for anyone with a serious interest in either thinker."—Hilary Putnam, author of The Collapse of the Fact/Value Dichotomy and Other Essays "A major work. Gordon persuasively argues that the true originality of Rosenzweig's achievement, heretofore associated with a distinctively "Jewish" break with his German philosophical milieu, only becomes intelligible from within that very milieu. Focusing on resemblances between Rosenzweig's and Heidegger's projects, Gordon discerns the contours of a post-Nietzschean religious sensibility condensed into the paradox of a "redemption-in-the-world." This book will be valued by readers of both Heidegger and Rosenzweig, and by anyone interested in the intersections of philosophy and religion."—Eric L. Santner, author of On the Psychotheology of Everyday Life: Reflections on Freud and Rosenzweig "A comparative reading of Rosenzweig's Star of Redemption and Heidegger's Being and Time. Peter Eli Gordon has written a work of exemplary erudition, analytical nuance, philosophical acumen and expository grace."—Paul Mendes-Flohr, author of German Jews: A Dual Identity

The Star of Redemption, * which presents Franz Rosenzweig's system of philosophy, begins with the sentence "from death, (vom Tode) , from the fear of death, originates all cognition of the All" and concludes with the words "into life. " This beginning and this conclusion of the book signify more than the first and last words of philosophical books usually do. Taken together - "from death into life" - they comprise the entire meaning of Rosenzweig's philosophy. The leitmotif of this philosophy is the life and death of the human being and not the I of philosophical idealism, where man ultimately signifies "for ethics" no more than" . . . a point to which it (ethics) relates its problems, as for science also he (man) is only a particular case of its general laws. "l Rosenzweig deals with the individual's actual existence, that which is termi nated by death; he speaks of the individual's hic et nunc, of his actions and decisions in the realm of concrete reality. This philosophy is not an exposition of theoretical principles. It is not concerned with man in general in abstract time, but rather with the individual human being, designated by a proper name, living in his particular time. ** Human existence in its finiteness and temporalness forms the focus in which Rosenzweig's motif can be gathered together.

Here, for the first time, faithfully translated in their entirety, are the principal texts for which Franz Rosenzweig initiated the project that would become The Star of Redemption. Included in the volume are Rosenzweig's essay, "The New Thinking;" four important reviews of The Star of Redemption, and his 1917 letter to Rudolf Ehrenberg, the "germcell" of The Star. Barbara E. Galli 's own essay touches on the basic concepts of Rosenzweig's work, while pointing to and going beyond his scholarship. Alan Udoff's provocative closing essay situates Rosenzweig's thought in the context of modem and postmodern philosophical concerns and suggests a new direction in assessing the philosopher's theological accomplishment. This volume is a perfect guide for students of the great philosopher and for a broader general audience seeking an introduction to Rosenzwieg's ideas.

This volume introduces an original philosophy of Jewish religious thinking as devotional intelligence. It establishes the intellectual warrant of such thinking in light of two related principles: relativity v. intelligence—the metaphysical principle that knowing is of being—and the normative principle of sacral attunement.