Minimal Theologies: Critiques of Secular Reason in Adorno and Levinas

by Hent de Vries, Geoffrey Hale (Translator)

Overview

Originally 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 Jürgen 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 texts, his investigations of the concepts of history, subjectivity, and language in their writings provide a radical interpretation of their paradoxical modes of thought and reveal remarkable and hitherto unsuspected parallels between their philosophical methods, parallels that amount to a plausible way of overcoming certain impasses in contemporary philosophical thinking. In Adorno, this takes the form of a dialectical critique of dialectics; in Levinas, that of a phenomenological critique of phenomenology, each of which sheds new light on ancient and modern questions of metaphysics, ethics, and aesthetics. For the English-language publication, the author has extensively revised and updated the prize-winning German version.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781421437484
Publisher:	Johns Hopkins University Press
Publication date:	12/01/2019
Pages:	758
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.55(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Hent de Vries is Paulette Goddard Professor of the Humanities. He is Professor of German, Religious Studies, Comparative Literature, and Affiliated Professor of Philosophy. He received his BA/MA in Judaica and Hellenistic Thought (Theology), Public Finance and Political Economy (Law), at Leiden University, and obtained his PhD there in Philosophy of Religion, with a study on Theodor W. Adorno and Emmanuel Levinas, Jürgen Habermas and Jacques Derrida, entitled Theologie im pianissimo: Zwischen Rationalität und Dekonstruktion. Before joining NYU, de Vries directed The Humanities Center at Johns Hopkins University, holding the Russ Family Chair in the Humanities with a joint appointment in Philosophy. He also taught in the Philosophy departments of Loyola University in Chicago and the University of Amsterdam, where he long held the Chair of Metaphysics and its History and co-founded and directed the Amsterdam School for Cultural Analysis. He received visiting positions and fellowships at Harvard, Chicago, Princeton, Brown, Columbia, the Paris Collège International de Philosophie, the Université Saint Louis in Brussels, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and the Université de Paris, Panthéon-Sorbonne. Hent de Vries is currently serving his second term as Director of the summer School of Criticism and Theory at Cornell University (SCT), Ithaca. In 2018, he was the Titulaire of the Chaire de Métaphysique Étienne Gilson at the Institut Catholique, Paris. He is the Editor of the book series "Cultural Memory in the Present," published by Stanford University Press.

Table of Contents

Preface 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

What People are Saying About This

"Hent de Vries's outstanding book presents an absolutely new approach to the question of religious philosophy in our time. It overcomes the classical opposition between Faith and Reason in defining a 'minimal theology'. "

Rodolphe Gasché

Truly original. For anyone concerned with the critical theory of the Frankfurt school, deconstruction, and developments in theology, this is obligatory reading. This impressive book is not only a piece of sound, rigorous, and meticulous scholarship, it is also one whose thesis is extraordinarily important.

Stéphane Mosès

Hent de Vries's outstanding book presents an absolutely new approach to the question of religious philosophy in our time. It overcomes the classical opposition between Faith and Reason in defining a 'minimal theology'.

From the Publisher

Truly original. For anyone concerned with the critical theory of the Frankfurt school, deconstruction, and developments in theology, this is obligatory reading. This impressive book is not only a piece of sound, rigorous, and meticulous scholarship, it is also one whose thesis is extraordinarily important.
—Rodolphe Gasché, State University of New York, Buffalo

Hent de Vries's Philosophy and the Turn to Religion and Religion and Violence were landmarks in the international debate over the ethical and metaphysical implications of philosophy's entanglement with religion. The long-overdue translation of his earliest book, Minimal Theologies, adds a masterful analysis of the encounter between religious faith and secular reason in the work of Adorno and Levinas. As always, de Vries shows himself to be a rigorous, judicious and illuminating guide through the most tangled of theoretical labyrinths, an enlightener who knows the limits of pure enlightenment.
—Martin Jay, University of California, Berkeley

This bold and brilliantly executed work ventures into new terrain and is simply indispensable reading for anyone interested in the quandaries that arise in contemporary philosophical thinking. By exposing previously unperceived affinities between the philosophies of Adorno and Levinas, de Vries brings to light possibilities for a fundamental reconfiguring of traditional religious, theological, and metaphysical concepts. Clear of confessional form, these thinkers convey jointly what neither could convey individually. Far from positing the reducibility of one to the other, the author recasts both Adorno's negative dialectics and Levinas' idea of the infinite, leading to the emergence of a radically innovative minimal theology, a theology in 'pianissimo' that is anticipated in their work. Habermas's and Derrida's accounts of language and rationality are also explored as they shed light on these matters. This landmark study promises to become a reference point for considering major issues animating current philosophical discussion.
—Edith Wyschogrod, Rice University

Hent de Vries's outstanding book presents an absolutely new approach to the question of religious philosophy in our time. It overcomes the classical opposition between Faith and Reason in defining a 'minimal theology'.
—Stéphane Mosès, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Stéphane Mosès

Hent de Vries's outstanding book presents an absolutely new approach to the question of religious philosophy in our time. It overcomes the classical opposition between Faith and Reason in defining a 'minimal theology'.

— Stéphane Mosès, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Martin Jay

Hent de Vries's Philosophy and the Turn to Religion and Religion and Violence were landmarks in the international debate over the ethical and metaphysical implications of philosophy's entanglement with religion. The long-overdue translation of his earliest book, Minimal Theologies, adds a masterful analysis of the encounter between religious faith and secular reason in the work of Adorno and Levinas. As always, de Vries shows himself to be a rigorous, judicious and illuminating guide through the most tangled of theoretical labyrinths, an enlightener who knows the limits of pure enlightenment.

— Martin Jay, University of California, Berkeley

Rodolphe Gasché

Truly original. For anyone concerned with the critical theory of the Frankfurt school, deconstruction, and developments in theology, this is obligatory reading. This impressive book is not only a piece of sound, rigorous, and meticulous scholarship, it is also one whose thesis is extraordinarily important.

— Rodolphe Gasché, State University of New York, Buffalo

Edith Wyschogrod

This bold and brilliantly executed work ventures into new terrain and is simply indispensable reading for anyone interested in the quandaries that arise in contemporary philosophical thinking. By exposing previously unperceived affinities between the philosophies of Adorno and Levinas, de Vries brings to light possibilities for a fundamental reconfiguring of traditional religious, theological, and metaphysical concepts. Clear of confessional form, these thinkers convey jointly what neither could convey individually. Far from positing the reducibility of one to the other, the author recasts both Adorno's negative dialectics and Levinas' idea of the infinite, leading to the emergence of a radically innovative minimal theology, a theology in "pianissimo" that is anticipated in their work. Habermas's and Derrida's accounts of language and rationality are also explored as they shed light on these matters. This landmark study promises to become a reference point for considering major issues animating current philosophical discussion.

— Edith Wyschogrod, Rice University

Editorial Reviews

This 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 Supplement

A deeply impressive achievement and an important contribution to theological debate in the wake of Critical Theory and deconstruction.
—Colin Davis, Modern Language Review

Is 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 Philosophy

A substantial contribution to the philosophy of religion and to the study of the thought of Adorno and Levinas.
—Studies in Religion / Sciences Religieuses

Very demanding but rewarding book.
—Marsha Aileen Hewitt, Religious Studies Review

Deserves to be examined with care.
—Ryan Coyne, Journal of Religion

This 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 Bharata

From the Publisher

This 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 Bharata

"Very demanding but rewarding book."

Religious Studies Review - Marsha Aileen Hewitt

"Deserves to be examined with care."

Journal of Religion - Ryan Coyne

"This 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."

Times Literary Supplement - Christopher J. Insole

"Is 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."

Radical Philosophy - Espen Hammer

"A substantial contribution to the philosophy of religion and to the study of the thought of Adorno and Levinas."

Studies in Religion / Sciences Religieuses

"A deeply impressive achievement and an important contribution to theological debate in the wake of Critical Theory and deconstruction."

Modern Language Review - Colin Davis

Deserves to be examined with care.

— Ryan Coyne

Journal of Religion

Very demanding but rewarding book.

— Marsha Aileen Hewitt

Religious Studies Review

Is 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 Philosophy

A deeply impressive achievement and an important contribution to theological debate in the wake of Critical Theory and deconstruction.

— Colin Davis

Modern Language Review

This 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 Supplement