Encounters Between Judaism and Modern Philosophy

by Emil L. Fackenheim

s/t A preface to future Jewish thought

Genres: Philosophy

Hardcover

Published May 17, 1973

Reviews

[Shawn · Rating 2 out of 5]

“Jewish existence today overwhelms existentialist and indeed all philosophical thought.” (228). A peculiar strain of thought, philosophy, and deduction of reasons. True to the title, it’s about Jewish existence, both now and in the future, and there are a handful of heavy, weighty and existential subjects that are discussed. It’s esoteric & abstract. Fackenheim, like so many philosophers, obsesses about the writings of other philosophers, so unless one has an intermediate familiarity with the philosophy of, say, Hegel or Kant or Heidegger, there will be mild degrees of consternation whensoever he makes reference to their works or maxims. There are gems of understanding to be discovered in his riverbed of fervent dialogue nonetheless.

I’d advise religous scholars to read The Kitab í ‘Íqán (The Book of Certitude). In it are luminous explanations & powerfully indisputable elucidations. I was heartily taken away by the sincerity of Fackenheim’s assessment of the state of Jewish being & identity. It’s like, where do we go from here now? The Holocaust occurred, and preceding that were centuries of oppression and alienation, until you go way back to the fall of the Temple of Jerusalem, so where do they go from now?

Admittedly, some of the material was either too subjective or too ephemeral for me to grasp. His manner of writing was tricky to parse through for it was weighted w/rhetorical questions, admirably big words, double-negative sentences & statements, and conclusions that would suddenly pop up and unsettle one’s ground of comprehension. In dealing w/The Holy Torah, and the Midrash and the Talmud, readers just hafta go with the flow of his perception. He will reference verses and moments, such as the prophet Elijah‘s ascension, and connect them to moments in the 19th and 20th centuries. This supported his arguments & ideas for the most part but I wasn’t entirely ‘sold’. The overall reading experience of the book was wilting because it felt confined to a time, a Book, and a Figurehead, and I sensed the grasping and the reaching for permission to change something to fit this time, and if that permission did not come already through the blessed person of the Christ, then how ever will it come? The author mentions a group of seven Jewish scholars who determined to ‘refit’ the faith to the conditions of the time and who were ultimately defeated in their purpose (one converted to Christianity), and the book is pretty sincere in its description of the shortcomings & limitations of just about everyone on this planet. There aren’t any solid answers given and I think the author’s limited scope doesn’t allow for many (or any) ‘Aha! Eureka!’ moments. The grasp of Christianity seemed tenuous, and there was virtually no mention of anything after 2000 years ago, beside the holocaust. Religious scholars or students, or philosophers, or curious members of the Jewish community might find some pleasure in reading through this book, but others might find it rather uninspiring.