Produktdetaljer
Biografisk notat
Rabbi Dr. Tal Sessler is the Dean of the Rabbinical School at the Academy of Jewish Religion in California, where he also teaches Jewish philosophy. He is the author of four books in philosophy and contemporary Jewish identity, and the incoming Senior Rabbi of Congregation Ner Tamid in Palos Verdes.Yeshayahu Leibowitz and Emmanuel Levinas were amongst the two leading Jewish thinkers to have emerged in the second half of the twentieth century. This book puts in dialogue these two titanic figures, particularly within the framework of their respective critiques of political theology, European totalitarianism, as well as their doctrinal approaches to the Zionist enterprise. This work constitutes a lens through which to reappraise some of the chief questions of contemporary Jewish identity, including the Holocaust, the State of Israel, Diaspora Jewry, modernity and traditionalism, as well as continuity and change.
Introduction
1. A Portrait of the Philosopher as a Young Man
2. The 1930s—Early Writings
3. The Case against Political Messianism and the Philosophy of History
4. Leibowitz, Levinas, and Zionism
5. Mysticism Under the Guise of Musar
Afterword
“Tal Sessler’s exceptional book presents to us the profound contribution of Levinas and Leibowitz to the most fundamental concerns of modern humanism and its struggles and the meaning of religious life. These two giants, deeply rooted in the Jewish tradition, are brilliantly interpreted by Sessler in their full complexity and difference.”
– Moshe Halbertal, Professor of Jewish Thought and Philosophy, Hebrew UniversityOn the original Hebrew edition
“Tal Sessler’s book merits being cherished, for it constitutes an introduction to the respective thoughts of two of the leading Jewish philosophers of the twentieth century.”
– Catherine Chalier, Professor emerita of Philosophy, Paris Ouest Nanterre University