Levinas and the Greek Heritage

Levinas and the Greek Heritage PDF Author: Jean-Marc Narbonne
Publisher: Peeters Publishers
ISBN: 9789042917668
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 264

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Book Description
Levinas and the Greek Heritage shows that throughout his career, Emmanuel Levinas always admired and recognized his profound debt to Plato and to the philosophical tradition he initiated, which have been largely transmitted to us by the Neoplatonists, most notably Plotinus and Proclus. How can we read Otherwise than Being or Beyond Essence in any other way than as some sort of Neoplatonic programme, prolonging Plato's Good "beyond being" of the republic VI, 509b, in the direction of the "other man," the one which in his "nudity" and "fragility," opens for us the horizon of a new humanism? There are many ways by which one can attempt to go over and above Being, not only a Greek way (primordially metaphysical), but also a Biblical way (mainly ethical). One of the interests of Levinas' philosophy is to show us the hidden community - and perhaps unavoidable interdependency - of these two approaches. One Hundred Years of Neoplatonism in France shows that during the Twentieth century a retrieval of Neoplatonism is a powerful hidden feature of French philosophy and theology, of spiritual and institutional life. Beginning with Henri Bergson, it passes by way of figures like Maurice Blondel, A.J. Festugire, Henri de Lubac, Jean Trouillard, Henry Dumry, and culminates with Michel Henry, Pierre Hadot, and Jean-Luc Marion. The book examines the particular character Neoplatonism takes in this retrieval, and traces connections between leading figures within the French and Anglophone worlds.

Levinas and the Greek Heritage

Levinas and the Greek Heritage PDF Author: Jean-Marc Narbonne
Publisher: Peeters Publishers
ISBN: 9789042917668
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 264

Get Book

Book Description
Levinas and the Greek Heritage shows that throughout his career, Emmanuel Levinas always admired and recognized his profound debt to Plato and to the philosophical tradition he initiated, which have been largely transmitted to us by the Neoplatonists, most notably Plotinus and Proclus. How can we read Otherwise than Being or Beyond Essence in any other way than as some sort of Neoplatonic programme, prolonging Plato's Good "beyond being" of the republic VI, 509b, in the direction of the "other man," the one which in his "nudity" and "fragility," opens for us the horizon of a new humanism? There are many ways by which one can attempt to go over and above Being, not only a Greek way (primordially metaphysical), but also a Biblical way (mainly ethical). One of the interests of Levinas' philosophy is to show us the hidden community - and perhaps unavoidable interdependency - of these two approaches. One Hundred Years of Neoplatonism in France shows that during the Twentieth century a retrieval of Neoplatonism is a powerful hidden feature of French philosophy and theology, of spiritual and institutional life. Beginning with Henri Bergson, it passes by way of figures like Maurice Blondel, A.J. Festugire, Henri de Lubac, Jean Trouillard, Henry Dumry, and culminates with Michel Henry, Pierre Hadot, and Jean-Luc Marion. The book examines the particular character Neoplatonism takes in this retrieval, and traces connections between leading figures within the French and Anglophone worlds.

Levinas and the Ancients

Levinas and the Ancients PDF Author: Brian Schroeder
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253000734
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 546

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Book Description
The relation between the Greek and Judeo-Christian traditions is "the great problem" of Western philosophy, according to Emmanuel Levinas. In this book Brian Schroeder, Silvia Benso, and an international group of philosophers address the relationship between Levinas and the world of ancient thought. In addition to philosophy, themes touching on religion, mythology, metaphysics, ontology, epistemology, ethics, and politics are also explored. The volume as a whole provides a unified and extended discussion of how an engagement between Levinas and thinkers from the ancient tradition works to enrich understandings of both. This book opens new pathways in ancient and modern philosophical studies as it illuminates new interpretations of Levinas' ethics and his social and political philosophy.

Dialogues with Contemporary Continental Thinkers

Dialogues with Contemporary Continental Thinkers PDF Author: Richard Kearney
Publisher: Manchester University Press
ISBN: 9780719010873
Category : Philosophy, Modern
Languages : en
Pages : 162

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Book Description


The Lesser Good

The Lesser Good PDF Author: Wendy C. Hamblet
Publisher: Lexington Books
ISBN: 1461634407
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 130

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Book Description
Western civilization is founded upon the assumption that there exists a "natural order" to the world, an embedded principle of justice with which human reason is aligned. The imagery is seductive. However, Emil Fackenheim raises a troubling fact in his To Mend the World when he names the Holocaust the "rupture that ruptures philosophy." The Holocaust and countless other horrors over thousands of years of eager philosophical pursuit could not order the troublesome human soul to that state of justice that the Plato claims to be the most natural and happy state of human beings, if they can simply know their best interests. The philosopher, physician to the human soul, has proven impotent in healing the open ethical wound of human inhumanity; worse, the grand ontological and epistemological structures that philosophers have constructed may be linked to the ethical failures of the planet, to colonial and imperial worldviews. The work of post-Holocaust phenomenologist, Emmanuel Levinas, is written under the somber backdrop of the Holocaust. Levinas, by his own admission, stages a return to Plato. He shares Plato's sense of ethical urgency in the philosophical task, but he sets course for a new Platonism that thinks the difference separating (rather than the unity gathering) being. Levinas, more than Plato, appreciates that the exigencies and labor of everyday life can eclipse the needs of others and waylay the ethical life. Levinas too holds out more hope than Plato that the worst human beings can simply forget themselves and their self-interested projects, and become their brothers' keepers. Levinas quests for the good beyond being as he challenges the tradition of Western thought and the post-Holocaust world to a new ethos: we must decide between the starry skies above (the ordered ontologies of the Western tradition) and the moral law within. The Lesser Good represents a timely consideration of the ethical exigencies of human life, politics, and justice, demonstrating that philosophy's fa

Collected Philosophical Papers

Collected Philosophical Papers PDF Author: E. Levinas
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 9789024733958
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 228

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Book Description
Brings together some of the most important short texts of Emmanuel Levinas, a major voice in 20th-century philosophical thought. These writings originally appeared separately as lectures and journal articles over a period of 30 years. Essays introduce or clarify themes found throughout Levinas' thought, particularly his two most sweeping philosophical works, Totality and Infinity and Otherwise than Being, or Beyond Essence. Includes an introduction to his philosophy by the translator. First published in 1987. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

A Covenant of Creatures

A Covenant of Creatures PDF Author: Michael Fagenblat
Publisher: Stanford University Press
ISBN: 0804774684
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 320

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Book Description
"I am not a particularly Jewish thinker," said Emmanuel Levinas, "I am just a thinker." This book argues against the idea, affirmed by Levinas himself, that Totality and Infinity and Otherwise Than Being separate philosophy from Judaism. By reading Levinas's philosophical works through the prism of Judaic texts and ideas, Michael Fagenblat argues that what Levinas called "ethics" is as much a hermeneutical product wrought from the Judaic heritage as a series of phenomenological observations. Decoding the Levinas's philosophy of Judaism within a Heideggerian and Pauline framework, Fagenblat uses biblical, rabbinic, and Maimonidean texts to provide sustained interpretations of the philosopher's work. Ultimately he calls for a reconsideration of the relation between tradition and philosophy, and of the meaning of faith after the death of epistemology.

Radical Passivity

Radical Passivity PDF Author: Benda Hofmeyr
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 1402093470
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 165

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Book Description
Levinas’s ethical metaphysics is essentially a meditation on what makes ethical agency possible – that which enables us to act in the interest of another, to put the well-being of another before our own. This line of questioning found its inception in and drew its inspiration from the mass atrocities that occurred during the Second World War. The Holocaust , like the Cambodian genocide, or those in Rwanda and Srebrenica, exemplifies what have come to be known as the ‘never again’ situations. After these events, we looked back each time, with varying degrees of incomprehension, horror, anger and shame, asking ourselves how we could possibly have let it all happen again. And yet, atrocity crimes are still rampant. After Rwanda (1994) and Bosnia-Herzegovina (1992–1995), came Kosovo (1999) and Darfur (2003). In our present-day world , hate crimes motivated by racial, sexual, or other prejudice, and mass hate such as genocide and terror, are on the rise (think, for example, of Burma, Zimbabwe, Sri Lanka and North Korea). A critical revaluation of the conditions of possibility of ethical agency is therefore more necessary than ever. This volume is committed to the possibility of ‘never again’. It is dedicated to all the victims – living and dead – of what Levinas calls the ‘sober, Cain-like coldness’ at the root of all crime against humanity , as much as every singular crime against another human being .

Emmanuel Levinas: Levinas, phenomenology and his critics

Emmanuel Levinas: Levinas, phenomenology and his critics PDF Author: Claire Elise Katz
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 9780415310512
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 464

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Book Description
Emmanuel Levinas (1905-1995) was one of the foremost thinkers of the twentieth century. His work influencing a wide range of intellectuals such as Maurice Blanchot, Jacques Derrida, Luce Irigaray and Jean-Luc Marion.

The Cambridge Companion to Levinas

The Cambridge Companion to Levinas PDF Author: Simon Critchley
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521665650
Category : Literary Collections
Languages : en
Pages : 328

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Book Description
A convenient and accessible guide to Levinas, first published in 2002, which emphasises the interdisciplinary significance of his work.

A Companion to Derrida

A Companion to Derrida PDF Author: Zeynep Direk
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 1118607295
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 659

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Book Description
A Companion to Derrida is the most comprehensive single volume reference work on the thought of Jacques Derrida. Leading scholars present a summary of his most important accomplishments across a broad range of subjects, and offer new assessments of these achievements. The most comprehensive single volume reference work on the thought of Jacques Derrida, with contributions from highly prominent Derrida scholars Unique focus on three major philosophical themes of metaphysics and epistemology; ethics, religion, and politics; and art and literature Introduces the reader to the positions Derrida took in various areas of philosophy, as well as clarifying how derrideans interpret them in the present Contributions present not only a summary of Derrida’s most important accomplishments in relation to a wide range of disciplines, but also a new assessment of these accomplishments Offers a greater understanding of how Derrida’s work has fared since his death