God, Man, and the World: Lectures and Essays

Franz Rosenzweig

Syracuse University Press, 1998 - Literary Collections - 152 pages

Translated here for the first time by Barbara E. Galli, these five lectures and writings of Franz Rosenzweig will be welcomed by both the novice and the veteran student of the great philosopher. Based on his lectures at the Jildisches Freies Lehrhaus, the famous Jewish Institute of Adult Education, the essays include notes for a group of lectures of 1920, "Faith and Knowledge," followed by a three-part lecture series of 1922: "The Science of God," "The Science of Man," and the "Science of World." The pieces form a powerful whole. Not only does this book further our understanding of Rosenzweig's daunting work, The Star of Redemption—a seemingly inexhaustible text—but of Rosenzweig's primary principles, that of the irreducibility of God, human being, and world, and of the needfulness of relation and of time for the nourishment of truth and cognition. He expounds on his premise that faith and knowledge are interdependent, and that knowledge is derivative of faith.

About the author

Rosenzweig was born in 1886 to intellectual and assimilated parents. He studied philosophy, history, and classics. While he was at university, many of his friends and relatives converted to Christianity, and he came close to converting, until a visit to an Orthodox synagogue on the eve of Yom Kippur inspired him to "return" to Judaism. His doctoral thesis, Hegel and the State, was published in 1920, and he then began to devote his energies to the construction of a Jewish philosophic system. The result, The Star of Redemption (1921), has become a classic, combining German idealism, existentialism, and Jewish tradition into a complex and enduring system. In 1921 a progressive paralysis set in and, although he soon lost his mobility and power of speech, he continued his intellectual activities for seven years. Rosenzweig's wife deciphered his signals, and, among other activities, he began a new translation of the Hebrew Bible (with Martin Buber, who finished it in the 1950s), utilizing a style of German that attempted to retain the spirit of the original Hebrew.

Bibliographic information

• Title: God, Man, and the World: Lectures and Essays; Library of Jewish Philosophy
• Author: Franz Rosenzweig
• Editor: Barbara E. Galli
• Translated by: Barbara E. Galli
• Publisher: Syracuse University Press, 1998
• ISBN: 0815627882, 9780815627883
• Length: 152 pages
• Subjects: Literary Collections / Essays; Philosophy / Religious; Religion / Judaism / General; Religion / Judaism / Theology; Religion / Philosophy