Levinas’ Theological Ethics

doi:10.1017/9781108233705.011

11 - Levinas’ Theological Ethics

from Part III - Modern

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 03 December 2020

Richard A. Cohen

Edited by

Steven Kepnes

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Steven Kepnes: Affiliation:
Colgate University, New York

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Summary

Reversing the familiar nostrum that religion – with its omniscient omnipotent onto-theological God - is the buttress of ethics and of all things of value; Levinas follows Kant’s enlightened claim that ethics is the real truth of religion, that the imperatives of kindness (“love thy neighbor”) and of social justice are religions highest teaching, the very essence of holiness, religion for adults. The Akedah is thus a test as much of God’s justice as of Abraham’s faith. Rituals, holidays, traditions, halakha, sacred texts, Talmudic learning, and so on, retain their worth as service to kindness and justice, else, taken sacramentally, they devolve into superstition and fanaticism.

Keywords

Levinas Other Face Time Justice

Type: Chapter
Information: The Cambridge Companion to Jewish Theology , pp. 239 - 264

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108233705.011 [Opens in a new window]

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Print publication year: 2020

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References

Selected Further Reading

Cohen, Richard A. “Emmanuel Levinas.” In The Routledge Companion to Phenomenology, 71–81. Edited by Luft, S. and Overgaard, S.. New York: Routledge, 2012.Google Scholar

Cohen, Richard A. Levinasian Meditations. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 2010.Google Scholar

Hand, S. ed. The Levinas Reader. Oxford: Basil Blackwood, 1989.Google Scholar

Kant, Immanuel. Religion Within the Limits of Reason Alone. Translated by T. M. Greene and H. H. Hudson. New York: Harper & Row, 1960.Google Scholar

Levinas, Emmanuel. Beyond the Verse. Translated by G. D. Mole. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994.Google Scholar

Levinas, Emmanuel. Difficult Freedom. Translated by Sean Hand. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990.Google Scholar

Levinas, Emmanuel. Ethics and Infinity. Translated by R. A. Cohen. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1985.Google Scholar

Levinas, Emmanuel. “God and Philosophy.” In Collected Philosophical Papers: Emmanuel Levinas, Translated by Alphonso Lingis. Dordrecht: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1987.Google Scholar

Levinas, Emmanuel. In the Time of the Nations. Translated by M. B. Smith. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994.Google Scholar

Levinas, Emmanuel. New Talmudic Readings. Translated by R. A. Cohen. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1999.Google Scholar

Levinas, Emmanuel. Nine Talmudic Readings. Translated by A. Aronowicz. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1990.Google Scholar

Levinas, Emmanuel. Otherwise than Being or Beyond Essence. Translated by A. Lingis. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1998.Google Scholar

Levinas, Emmanuel. Totality and Infinity. Translated by A. Lingis. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1969.Google Scholar

Robbins, J. ed. Is it Righteous to Be? Interviews with Emmanuel Levinas. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001.Google Scholar

Spinoza, Baruch. Theological-Political Treatise, 2nd ed. Translated by S. Shirley. Indianapolis: Hackett, 2001.Google Scholar