The Legacy of Liberal Judaism : : Ernst Cassirer and Hannah Arendt's Hidden Conversation / / Ned Curthoys.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter Berghahn Books Complete eBook-Package 2000-2013
• VerfasserIn: Curthoys, Ned,
• Place / Publishing House: New York ;, Oxford : : Berghahn Books, , [2013]; ©2013
• Year of Publication: 2013
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (246 p.)

Comparing the liberal Jewish ethics of the German-Jewish philosophers Ernst Cassirer and Hannah Arendt, this book argues that both espoused a diasporic, worldly conception of Jewish identity that was anchored in a pluralist and politically engaged interpretation of Jewish history and an abiding interest in the complex lived reality of modern Jews. Arendt’s indebtedness to liberal Jewish thinkers such as Moses Mendelssohn, Abraham Geiger, Hermann Cohen, and Ernst Cassirer has been obscured by her modernist posture and caustic critique of the assimilationism of her German-Jewish forebears. By reorienting our conception of Arendt as a profoundly secular thinker anchored in twentieth century political debates, we are led to rethink the philosophical, political, and ethical legacy of liberal Jewish discourse.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Acknowledgements -- Introduction -- Chapter 1 ‘This Man of Our Destiny’: Moses Mendelssohn, Nathan the Wise and the Emergence of a Liberal Jewish Ethos -- Chapter 2 Diasporic Visions: The Emergence of Liberal Judaism -- Chapter 3 Abraham Geiger: Rabbi and Writer -- Chapter 4 Hermann Cohen’s Prophetic Judaism -- Chapter 5 Ernst Cassirer and the Ethical Legacy of Hermann Cohen -- Chapter 6 Ernst Cassirer: The Enlightenment as Counter-History -- Chapter 7 Hannah Arendt: The Task of the Historian -- Chapter 8 Hannah Arendt: A Question of Character -- Conclusion The Legacies of Liberal Judaism -- Bibliography -- Index