Books by Benjamin Pollock
Benjamin Pollock argues that Franz Rosenzweig's The Star of Redemption is devoted to a singularly... more Benjamin Pollock argues that Franz Rosenzweig's The Star of Redemption is devoted to a singularly ambitious philosophical task: grasping "the All" - the whole of what is - in the form of a system. In asserting Rosenzweig's abiding commitment to a systematic conception of philosophy often identified with German Idealism, this book breaks rank with the assumptions about Rosenzweig's thought that have dominated the scholarship of the last decades. Indeed, the Star's importance is often claimed to lie precisely in the way it opposes philosophy's traditional drive for systematic knowledge and upholds instead a "new thinking" attentive to the existential concerns, the alterity, and even the revelatory dimension of concrete human life. Pollock shows that these very innovations in Rosenzweig's thought are in fact to be understood as part and parcel of The Star's systematic program. But this is only the case, Pollock claims, because Rosenzweig approaches philosophy's traditional task of system in a radically original manner. For the Star not only seeks to guide its readers on the path toward knowing "the All" of which all beings are a part; it at once directs them toward realizing the redemptive unity of that very "All" through the actions, decisions, and relations of concrete human life.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Franz Rosenzweig's near-conversion to Christianity in the summer of 1913 and his subsequent decis... more Franz Rosenzweig's near-conversion to Christianity in the summer of 1913 and his subsequent decision three months later to recommit himself to Judaism is one of the foundational narratives of modern Jewish thought. In this new account of events, Benjamin Pollock suggests that what lay at the heart of Rosenzweig's religious crisis was not a struggle between faith and reason, but skepticism about the world and hope for personal salvation. A close examination of this important time in Rosenzweig’s life, the book also sheds light on the full trajectory of his philosophical development.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Papers by Benjamin Pollock
Journal of Religion, 2023
What does Spinoza mean when he uses the term "theocracy" in the TTP? Exactly what kind of politic... more What does Spinoza mean when he uses the term "theocracy" in the TTP? Exactly what kind of political arrangement does Spinoza envision when he designates the original covenant between the Israelites and God at Sinai as theocratic, and what role is God imagined to play in it? Given the clear differences between the political arrangements of the Israelites prior to and following Mosaic rule, moreover, what leads Spinoza to use the same theocratic designator emphatically to describe both? By way of answer to these questions, this essay argues there is both a critical and a positive definition of theocracy which come to light to different degrees in the different manifestations of theocracy in TTP 17. The critical meaning
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Yearbook for European Jewish Literature Studies
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Prooftexts, 2022
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
We begin to feel, or ought to, terrified that maybe language (and understanding, and knowledge) r... more We begin to feel, or ought to, terrified that maybe language (and understanding, and knowledge) rests upon very shaky foundations-a thin net over an abyss. (No doubt that is part of the reason philosophers offer absolute 'explanations' for it.) Stanley Cavell, The Claim of Reason
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
The Journal of Jewish Thought and Philosophy
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Journal of the History of Philosophy, 2020
This essay argues that Salomon Maimon's moral philosophy is held together by the same skeptical q... more This essay argues that Salomon Maimon's moral philosophy is held together by the same skeptical questioning about the "presentation" of the rational in the sensible that holds together his critique of Kant's account of experience. Granting that Kant has identified the form of rational morality, Maimon asks: 1) how is it possible for this rational form to cause or to apply to actions in a sensible realm otherwise governed by drives and inclinations (quid juris)? and 2) where can we point to an actual presentation of rational morality among the otherwise exclusively inclination-driven human strivings for ends (quid facti)?
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
According to Hermann Cohen, the Jewish people serves the goal of a united humanity under the ausp... more According to Hermann Cohen, the Jewish people serves the goal of a united humanity under the auspices of the one God, through its diasporic existence. If this is so, what meaning does he attach to the theocratic governance of ancient Israel, and what role does he assign to that particular case of theocracy, within his broader vision of the unification of humanity under monotheism? For Cohen theoc-racy is a linchpin, linking the Israelite state – and perhaps any particular state – both backwards to the unified origins of humanity in a covenant with the providential Creator, first formulated in the Noahide laws, and forward to the messianic Kingdom of God, a realm of morality in which humanity attains a unity analogous to the unity of God.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Drafts by Benjamin Pollock
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Uploads
Books by Benjamin Pollock
Papers by Benjamin Pollock
Drafts by Benjamin Pollock