Description
Book SynopsisOriginally published in in 2004. What, at this historical moment after Auschwitz, still remains of the questions traditionally asked by theology? What now is theology's minimal degree? This magisterial study, the first extended comparison of the writings of Theodor W. Adorno and Emmanuel Levinas, explores remnants and echoes of religious forms in these thinkers' critiques of secular reason, finding in the work of both a theology in pianissimo constituted by the trace of a transcendent other. The author analyzes, systematizes, and formalizes this idea of an other of reason. In addition, he frames these thinkers' innovative projects within the arguments of such intellectual heirs as Jurgen Habermas and Jacques Derrida, defending their work against later accusations of performative contradiction (by Habermas) or empiricism (by Derrida) and in the process casting important new light on those later writers as well. Attentive to rhetorical and rational features of Adorno's and Levinas's text
Trade ReviewThis fiercely intricate and intriguing work gestures towards a 'theological' position that avoids the Scylla of false hope and the Charybdis of nihilism . . . A suggestive, intelligent and erudite (non-linear) journey alongside Habermas, Adorno, Levinas and Derrida.
—Christopher J. Insole,
Times Literary SupplementA deeply impressive achievement and an important contribution to theological debate in the wake of Critical Theory and deconstruction.
—Colin Davis,
Modern Language ReviewIs modern or twentieth-century philosophy, as any cursory look would seem to indicate, overwhelmingly secular, or is there perhaps an unacknowledged entanglement with religion that may be constitutive of what the most sophisticated thinking was and continues to be? It is the latter alternative that Hent de Vries has explored in his now substantial body of research on the works of thinkers such as Emmanuel Levinas, Jean-Luc Marion, Jacques Derrida and Theodor W. Adorno—all of whom he takes to represent a kind of 'working through' of theological motifs in the register of conceptual, philosophical reflection. De Vries has previously published two acclaimed books on this topic—
Philosophy and the Turn to Religion (1999) and
Religion and Violence (2001) . . .
Minimal Theologies is an important book that ought to find a wide readership.
—Espen Hammer,
Radical PhilosophyA
substantial contribution to the philosophy of religion and to the study of the thought of Adorno and Levinas.
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Studies in Religion / Sciences ReligieusesVery demanding but rewarding book.
—Marsha Aileen Hewitt,
Religious Studies ReviewDeserves to be examined with care.
—Ryan Coyne,
Journal of ReligionThis volume offers an original exploration of the interactions of philosophy and religion, and is a must read for those interested in theology, critical theory, deconstruction, and dialectics.
—
Prabuddha BharataTable of ContentsPreface and Acknowledgments
Abbreviations
Introduction: Tertium Datur
Part I. Antiprolegomena
Chapter 1. Toward a Critique of Theology
Chapter 2. A Possible Internal and External Differentiation of Habermas's Theory of Rationality
Part II. Dialectica
Chapter 3. Paradox and Aporia in Adorno's Philosophy of Nonidentity
Chapter 4. The Construction of Occidental Subjectivism: Reductio ad hominem versus Remembrance of Nature in the Subject
Chapter 5. The Breaking Apart of Western Objectivism and the Resurrection of the Particular and the Ephemeral in the Philosophy of History
Chapter 6. Metaphysical Experience
Part III. Phaenomenologica
Chapter 7. Paradox and Aporia in Levinas's Philosophy of the Ethical-Religious Other
Chapter 8. Levinas on Art and Truth
Chapter 9. The Dialectics of Subjectivity and the Critique of Objectivism
Chapter 10. Loosening Logocentrism: Language and Skepticism
Part IV. Hermeneutica Sacra sive Profana
Chapter 11. From Unhappy Consciousness to Bad Conscience
Chapter 12 "The Other Theology": Conceptual, Historical, and Political Idolatry
Appendix. The Theology of the Sign and the Sign of Theology: The Apophatics of Deconstruction
Bibliography
Index
