The Discipline of Philosophy and the Invention of Modern Jewish Thought

by Willi Goetschel

Overview

Exploring the subject of Jewish philosophy as a controversial construction site of the project of modernity, this book examines the implications of the different and often conflicting notions that drive the debate on the question of what Jewish philosophy is or could be.

The idea of Jewish philosophy begs the question of philosophy as such. But "Jewish philosophy" does not just reflect what "philosophy" lacks. Rather, it challenges the project of philosophy itself. Examining the thought of Spinoza, Moses Mendelssohn, Heinrich Heine, Hermann Cohen Franz Rosenzweig, Martin Buber, Margarete Susman, Hermann Levin Goldschmidt, and others, the book highlights how the most philosophic moments of their works are those in which specific concerns of their "Jewish questions" inform the rethinking of philosophy's disciplinarity in principal terms.

The long overdue recognition of the modernity that informs the critical trajectories of Jewish philosophers from Spinoza and Mendelssohn to the present emancipates not just "Jewish philosophy" from an infelicitous pigeonhole these philosophers so pointedly sought to reject but, more important, emancipates philosophy from its false claims to universalism.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780823244966
Publisher:	Fordham University Press
Publication date:	11/14/2012
Pages:	280
Product dimensions:	6.20(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Willi Goetschel is Professor of German and Philosophy at the University of Toronto.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments vi

1 Introduction: Disciplining Philosophy and the Invention of Modern Jewish Thought 1

2 Hellenes, Nazarenes, and Other Jews: Heine the Fool 21

3 Jewish Philosophy? The Discourse of a Project 39

4 Inside/Outside the University: Philosophy as Way and Problem in Cohen, Buber, and Rosenzweig 58

5 A House of One's Own? University, Particularity, and the Jewish House of Learning 83

6 Jewish Thought in the Wake of Auschwitz: Margarete Susman's The Book of Job and the Destiny of the Jewish People 97

7 Contradiction Set Free: Hermann Levin Goldschmidt's Philosophy out of the Sources of Judaism 114

8 Spinoza's Smart Worm and the Interplay of Ethics, Politics, and Interpretation 133

9 Jewish Philosophers and the Enlightenment 150

10 State, Sovereignty, and the Outside Within: Mendelssohn's View from the "Jewish Colony" 178

11 Mendelssohn and the State 189

12 "An Experiment of How Coincidence May Produce Unanimity of Thoughts": Enlightenment Trajectories in Kant and Mendelssohn 210

Coda 230

Notes 233

Index 267

Editorial Reviews

". . .a much-needed contribution to the post-colonial critique of philosophy. . ."- Springer

"In this stunningly erudite and imaginative study, Willi Goetschel argues that it is precisely because the very notion of a Jewish philosophy is contested that one may discern its overarching significance. While dilating on the particularistic" concerns of their community from the perspective of universal reason, Jewish philosophers in effect challenge philosophy to revise its conception of the unity of truth and to embrace difference and alterity as defining constituents of the universal."—Paul Mendes-Flohr, Professor Emeritus, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Goetschel s new book is provocative, compelling, and profound. Tracing the influence of the thought of Spinoza, Mendelssohn, Rosenzweig, and Susman, among others, he shows how philosophy s claim to universality is necessarily undermined through its complex and troubled relation to Jewish philosophy This book dramatically and definitively refigures the distinction between Greek and Hebrew thought upon which contemporary Western philosophy rests. . . . Essential reading for anyone interested in how philosophy became what it is . . . what it still could become."—Moira Gatens, The University of Sydney

"A lively and intriguing account of many of the leading thinkers and controversies in Jewish philosophy, the text never fails to be both intelligent and provocative."—Oliver Leaman, University of Kentucky

"Goetschel persuasively argues for Jewish philosophy as a field that does not articulate the meaning of an identity-stance, but as a mode of inquiry that shows how the practice of philosophy has not yet, and perhaps never will, reach the universality at which it aims. For him, only such a critical spirit can portend a better future and produce a robust civil society. He shows us how his view continues the arguments of the earliest strata of modern Jewish philosophy, how many contemporary academics have gone wrong in thinking that Jewish philosophy is a discipline that puts forth a unique positive content, and offers readers two Swiss Jewish exemplars — Margarete Susman and Hermann Levin Goldschmidt — from whom scholars can reclaim the field's original critical energy." - Martin Kavka, Florida State University

"Rather than using a fixed structure or methodology throughout, Goetschel's analysis is wide-ranging and interdisciplinary." —H-Net Reviews

"What unifies all twelve chapters of Goetschel's study is that each offers a variation of the claim that Jewish thought cannot be reduced to a specific content; rather, the value of 'Jewish philosophy' can be found in its insistence that the universal remains unthinkable without the particular." -AJS Review

"This is a thoughtful collection of essays on a number of the main figures in modern Jewish Philosophy...In analyzing his subjects, Goetschel does an impressive job of contextualizing them in their historical environment."—Recommended—Choice Magazine

From the Publisher

A lively and intriguing account of many of the leading thinkers and controversies in Jewish philosophy, the text never fails to be both intelligent and provocative.

University of Kentucky - Oliver Leaman

In this stunningly erudite and imaginative study, Willi Goetschel argues that it is precisely because the very notion of a Jewish philosophy is contested that one may discern its overarching significance. While dilating on the “particularistic” concerns of their community from the perspective of universal reason, Jewish philosophers in effect challenge philosophy to revise its conception of the unity of truth and to embrace difference and alterity as defining constituents of the universal.

Professor Emeritus, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem - Paul Mendes-Flohr

Goetschel persuasively argues for Jewish philosophy as a field that does not articulate the meaning of an identity-stance, but as a mode of inquiry that shows how the practice of philosophy has not yet, and perhaps never will, reach the universality at which it aims. For him, only such a critical spirit can portend a better future and produce a robust civil society. He shows us how his view continues the arguments of the earliest strata of modern Jewish philosophy, how many contemporary academics have gone wrong in thinking that Jewish philosophy is a discipline that puts forth a unique positive content, and offers readers two Swiss Jewish exemplars — Margarete Susman and Hermann Levin Goldschmidt — from whom scholars can reclaim the field's original critical energy.

Florida State University - Martin Kavka

Goetschel’s new book is provocative, compelling, and profound. Tracing the influence of the thought of Spinoza, Mendelssohn, Rosenzweig, and Susman, among others, he shows how philosophy’s claim to universality is necessarily undermined through its complex and troubled relation to Jewish philosophy This book dramatically and definitively refigures the distinction between Greek and Hebrew thought upon which contemporary Western philosophy rests. . . . Essential reading for anyone interested in how philosophy became what it is . . . what it still could become.

University of Sidney - Moira Gatens