4 - Franz Rosenzweig
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 September 2009
Summary
Rosenzweig's systematic statement of what he believes about God is to be found in his The Star of Redemption. There he presents what may be characterized as a complex verbal picture of reality. That picture is constructed from three layers, each laid on top of the other. The three layers are the elements of reality (in part I), the dynamic relations between the elements (in part II), and the structuring of these relations into a single, ideal reality (in part III). The term “God” plays a critical, although different, role in each of the three constructions. The interrelationship of these three uses of the term “God” constitutes Rosenzweig's conception of God.
Rosenzweig's universe is a world, not of things but of motions. All these motions are asymptotic, that is, they are best described as directed vectors from a point of origin towards an end point. Both points, the origin and the end, are infinitely distant from any present actuality of the vectors themselves. In this context, “reality” (or “truth”) expresses the complex relationship between all of these movements and their infinitely distant origins and ends. The points of origin are the “elements,” and the ideal ends towards which the vectors are directed are the final “structure” of everything. The final “structure” is singular and not plural, because in the end everything will become one in every significant theological sense of the term.
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- Revelation and the God of Israel , pp. 63 - 90Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2002