O pożytkach z judaizmu dla filozofii współczesnej
Loading...
Przemysław Tacik, O pożytkach z judaizmu dla filozofii współczesnej.pdf (183.44 KB)
Authors
Date
2011
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Towarzystwo Doktorantów UJ
Abstract
The paper expounds the significant role of various currents of the Judaic tradition as sources of inspiration for contemporary philosophy. Unfairly consigned to oblivion throughout the period of domination of Christianity, Judaism reemerged at the end of the nineteenth century as a field of fruitful stimulations for Western thought. Moreover, the evolution of the post-Kantian epistemology brought many thinkers, such as Nietzsche, to admit the exis-tence of the irreducible, unfathomable remnant forming a fundament of our cognition, which opened the door to new secular inspirations drawn from the heritage of religion. Judaism, less marked by Greek philosophy than the Christian legacy, began thus to appear as fitting better these tendencies. The prohibition of representation, the radical monotheism, bordering on the apophatic monism, the unyielding refusal of idolatry, made Judaism a privileged source of inspiration for philosophy striving to disavow its past metaphysical presuppositions. The paper presents main contributors to the renaissance of Judaism in philosophy: Hermann Cohen (who aimed to reconcile neo-Kantism with the universal morality of Judaism), Lev Shestov (opposing Jewish fideism, embodied in the figure of “Jerusalem”, to the Greek ideal of impersonal reason, symbolised by the figure of “Athens”), Franz Rosenzweig (re-working the Hegelian heritage with Jewish concepts of Creation, Revelation and Redemp-tion), Gershom Scholem (rediscovering the originality of Kabbalist thought), Walter Benja-min (bringing a new, Messianic dimension to the perception of history), Edmond Jabès (mer-ging the inspirations of Lurianic Kaballah with contemporary theories of language and sense) and Jacques Derrida (rethinking the legacy of Western thought using Jewish themes). Judaic tradition – with its hermeneutic approach, lack of strict dogmas, interpretative creativity – provides a unique set of thought patterns which seem to be especially valuable in our times, haunted by pluralism, intertextuality, and the fall of “Great Narratives”. As Sergio Quinzio suggested, Judaism can help us to rethink the world no longer structured by logos and deve-loping in a reasonable way.