Man’s place lies in the framework of the three elements.
Dr. Zadok Krouz, PhD, HDL, DD. CGT,
As a result of using "you," the dialogue naturally develops into a structure containing three elements important to Rosenzweig’s philosophy:
God, man, and the world. On these three elements, Rosenzweig bases "The Star of Redemption," the star of David. The reciprocity is executed by means of dialogue. For "God" in Hebrew syntax ("Elohim") speaks of relationship, and "to" ("el") is the relational word.
The elements which function in the dialogue are these: God, individual man, and the world (all men). Between them is a living dialogue, dynamic and creative, which leads, eventually, to redemption of the world. It is impossible to understand the place of man without the necessity of both God and the world. All history, which explains the place of man in terms of content alone, ostensibly self-sufficiently, and which forbids itself to leave the borders of history of mankind, falsifies reality, because God entered history at Mount Sinai.
Man does not stand in his place on his own; he is in constant reciprocity with the aforementioned elements. The dialogue creates the concept of man’s interaction with his God. The word "you," by which the dialogue occurs, makes the Star of David real by going from the potential to the active in the semblance of the interactions which shall be called "revelation" and "redemption" in later chapters.
The three points of the first triangle (God, man, and the world) are joined by three "paths" (Naharayim 221) of a second triangle (Creation, revelation and redemption). These three paths of the second triangle are the three characteristics of human existence; in man alone, we find creation, in man before God, revelation, and in man in society, redemption.
Methodologically, the elements answer the questions: the universe-- how can it be understood? How can it be experienced? How can one observe it? God, man, world-- each stands alongside the other, none of whom are dependent on the other. God, man, and the world are three Kantian ideas (Soul, World and God) reincarnated in Rosenzweig, according to Rotenstreich ("The Philosophical Foundation" 74-87). The single change in the Kantian framework of the three ideas, Rotenstreich maintains, is the use of the term "soul" for man. According to Rotenstreich, the use of the term "soul" for man. According to Rotenstreich, Rosenzweig did that for understandable reasons, since vis-א-vis real man, the soul seems to him a philosophical abstraction. Each of the three is made a fundamental element of the method which decrees the two types of other being: world and man from God, God and world from man, God and man from the world. Rosenzweig makes this distinction in crystallized form in his article "The New Thinking" (Naharayim 222-224), where he also formulates more sharply the result of the dissolution of the idealistic "All" to three separate beings. By means of these elements, mankind can relate to the reality not as a fundamental, but as a concrete occurrence in various historical periods. The three elements are revealed by their static aloneness--as if the eyes of man and the world were opened to God, opened also to see each other and to interact. These three elements are diametrically opposed. A thing and its opposite will serve, concurrently, both individuality and universality:"… [individually] we know [God, but universally]… we do not know [Him] to the same degree…" because the place of God is everywhere in the world (Naharayim 224).
God is only active, the world only passive, and man stands in his place both passively, receiving from God, and actively, giving it back to the world, mankind. Thus, Rosenzweig connects, in the spirit of Judaism, two Biblical verses--("you shall love your friend as yourself" (Lev. 19:18) and "you shall love the Lord, your God") (Deut. 11:1)-- in the dialogue between man and his surroundings. In fact, these three elements do not exist, at least not according to Rosenzweig, without time (past--creation, present--revelation, future--redemption) and without mutual dialogue. The dialogue develops naturally within the structure of the three elements: god, man and the world.
Together they form the All, the Whole, by means of their dialogue with one another. These three elements are distinguishable, since in their relationship to each other they form the All: God, world, man. This division is proffered in the introduction to the Star of Redemption--"On the Possibility of the Cognition of the All"-- and is crystallized towards the end. Everything is based on the One. On the other hand, Greek philosophy does not recognize God, the creator of the universe. It is as if the three elements of Greek philosophy--God, man and the world--each turn inwards and away from the other elements, preventing unification of the totality. Each one of the three elements of the world is a complete and particular thing in itself, whose existence is independent of the others. The world is immersed in itself, unconnected to the gods and to man, just as in Greek tragedies that describe heroes, whose greatness lies in their strength and whose fate is isolation.1 The revelation of God’s love is the heart of the All, all conformations of the "method" are special creations of the same initial illumination in which the believer attains revelation (Star 397, 219; Naharayim 223).
The source of this claim is in the language of the dialogue, in which we find words ready to mark these three "types of being." It may be more precise to say that Rosenzweig arrived at his claim by dissembling "the All," which appears in idealistic philosophy as a whole. This philosophy, while it offered the method of "the All" as an alternative to religion, did not do away with the concept of God. For example, Descartes, the rationalist, argued that the connection between the soul and the body exists only with the help of God, and the concept of the natural light of the intellect comes from God, and the concept of the natural light of the intellect comes from God served Descarted as the theological basis for his theory of the conscious (Meditationes; see also Toldot HaPhilosophia (173-147). In the Star, Rosenzweig discussed the separation between Godly-being and the idealistic All, in particular as it related to the matter of God (Star 56-57).
Absolute empiricism in respect of the place of man.
The term "absolute empiricism" defines the place of man in the philosophy of Rosenzweig. At the end of his article "The New thinking, Notes on The Star of Redemption" (1925), Rosenzweig characterizes the philosophic "system"; "absolute empiricism," by which one must relate to the three elements (God, man and the world). It is no accident that he was inclined to characterize his conception, following Shelling, as "absolute empiricism." Moshe Shwarcz correctly notes that Schelling’s "empiricism of the a priori" is explained in Star of Redemption as "the a priori of empiricism." Schelling coined a new term in philosophy, Mr. Shwarcz writes, and "a priori empiricism" was also called "philosophical empiricism" (MiMytos 245). "The negative philosophy is a priori empiricism, it is the a priorism of the empirical, but precisely because of this, it is not itself empiricism, from which it became the positive philosophy: empirical a priorism, or, the empiricism of the a priori, in respect of it proving the prior by the subsequent, and thereby proving the existence of God" (S?mtliche Werke 130). Defining absolute empiricism, Rosenzweig, in "The New Thinking," writes: "therefore, the most appropriate of all the systems that may be labeled with my position is, apparently, absolute empiricism; in any event, this designation divides the special approach of the new thinking in each of the three domains… pre-world… the existing world… and the world of truth" (Naharayim 240). According to absolute empiricism, man can experience the absolute God, his ultimate self and the world.
When he says that "man experiences God," the expression means simply that man speaks to God. This empiricism is absolute, because it can be contained also with regard to the absolute, but within himself man finds only the human, in the world the worldly, and in God only the divine. Rosenzweig’s empiricism cannot be understood in the most restricted meaning of the Locke or of the English empiricists of the 18th Century; instead, his empiricism is understood in the sense that Schelling spoke of it in his book Description of Philosophical Empiricism. Contrary to the negative philosophy, a product of Schelling, which seeks to shear everything from the concepts, a philosophy of Rosenzweig’s type seeks to be a tale-philosophy, in the special sense of being linked to Biblical stories, a philosophy that explains how things occurred and are taking place in the verity of the world, in truth and not "in fact" (according to the philosopher). This absolute perception demonstrates God’s acts of creation, revelation and redemption. The absolute stands in a double relation: one before the absolute (A = B) and one after it (B = A). And each A (image) = B (image), Rosenzweig emphasizes, was resurrected in B = A.2 That is, the absolute of empiricism results from the framework of man’s various relationships, which is either B = B bound in the absolute A = A, or that the absolute A = A is found in B = B from power of the image (Naharayim 215)3 Zohar’s words come to express what Rosenzweig means in the absolute (A= B) "This man is the Almighty" (Lev. 7). "And man is only God, the Almighty and his Divine Presence is called man" (Num. 228). "That I shall call man, who will be yud hey vav hey" (the name of God) (Gen. 25).4 Rosenzweig seeks to explain with the term "absolute empiricism" used in Naharayim (240), that God is "I," A = B of the individual in the sense of the image in him. The Bible is full of anthropomorphic portraits and has no qualms in this regard. "I" is pure subject when the gods of the idolaters are objects. Rosenzweig stated, in the first part of Star of Redemption. The Torah and the prophets are included in one word "I am God" or A (image) = B (image)5
In Rosenzweig’s comparative mathematical framework, the above explanation portrays the essence of the "system" in the following form: Rosenzweig calls the letter "A" God. "A" is the general, no doubt after the first letter of the German word "allgemeine," as opposed to the "B" of the specific, the "besonders" (Naharayim 209). He adds that "A" is not identified with any "A" other than itself; "its reality is itself,"6 as expressed in the verse "I am God, the Almighty, who took you out of Egypt. You shall have no other gods before me." (Exod. 20:1, 2; Deut. 5:6, 7). "I am God" means that I identify with God, for here He and I are, and I am not reduced. He and I constitute one "I." "I am God, it is the I in him…" (Star 210).
This simple, everyday word used in every circumstance and situation explains to us the conception of God’s unity, according to Rosenzweig. The foundation as a full and complete section, notwithstanding its contradictions and idiosyncrasies, is defined ans\d set forth as an organized and secure unit. "I am your God" because God on the sea was seen as a hero, as a man of war, and on Mount Sinai, as teacher of the Torah, and in the time of Daniel, as an old man sitting and learning. And, therefore, God said to them: "Not because you see me in various forms are there many domains, but it is I who was on the sea and Mount Sinai" (P’sikta de Rav Kahana 98, Vilna 1888).
A (universal monotheism) = A (the equivalent of A [universal monotheism] in a renewed state) is the same domain as God’s unity. Rosenzweig wrote that A (image) = B (image) became B (mere man) = B (specific man) (Naharayim 215), expressing the ethics of the Bible as formulated as "I am God" or "I am he," or A = B, thus shows that every "I" is he and every him is me, the "I." Therefore, he adds to its comparable A = A (A = A1, A2, A3); A (universal monotheism) = A (the equivalent of universal monotheism in a renewed state) expresses, then, the unity of God (Naharayim 208, 211; Star 71- 72).7 And only from A = A came the commandment B = B, which is the formulation of man. The redeeming word changes the B = B to "I" (Naharayim 211); therefore, A = A is the radiance of "I," a radiance that raises "I" from indifference, from being enclosed in the concrete freedom of the active speaker, the dialogue (Naharayim 210). Rosenzweig mentions the new commentary on Ruth, called Medrash Ha Ne’elam, chapter 1: "The Almighty created in man "yud’ ‘hey’ ‘vav’ ‘hey,’ which is the holy name, and because of the letter he is called man ‘yud’ ‘hey’ ‘vav’ ‘hey’ (the Tetragram) is called man and its light is dispersed into 45 lights, which in gematria is man (45), and this is the calculation of man and of ‘yad’ ‘hey’ ‘vav’ ‘hey.’"
This idea is very to that of Martin Heidegger (Being 287), according to whom man’s act of association turns him from a mere being, "a being as he is," to actual "I." The difference is that, in Heidegger, the joining of man is with the conscience, and in Rosenzweig the joining is with God and afterwards with the world. In Martin Heidegger, man turns from "Das man" ("ordinary man") to "eigentliches Dasein" ("Being itself") by a silent, thin voice (l?rmlos), conscience. The conscience rises from its slumber in the ‘commonplace’ and calls for independence, "sein Zum Sein-k?nnen, das man Selbst" ("Being towards the ability of being itself"), changing mere man to "Das Dasein ist seindes, dem es seinem sein um dieses sein selbst" ("It is that which, in his being is involved with his being"), "Sein Zum Tode" ("Being towards death"). The conscience calls each of us to become we, to belong to himself (Sich Zu eigen). This call to realize the possibilities means preparation (Entschlossenheit). We prepare ourselves to accept, willingly, that which is imposed upon us by fate. The result is admiration of fate or, more accurately, love of fate. Preparation is beneficial, since it changes passivity to activity and instructs man to "change your fate to your activity, choose you yourself, the true and accurate from;" it is a call not to a specific type of existence, but to an ideal of human existence. Conscience does not place before man a specific, a particular, demand. This ideal belongs in human existence, and it comprises the enduring relationship of man to himself. We can compare, this thin voice with the call of God to Abraham in Gen. 22:11 and to Samuel in Sam. 3:6. The call of the conscience is intended only for the essence of man, as Rosenzweig said: "Anruf des selbst zu seinem Selbstein" ("the call of the conscience is intended only for the essence of man"). Conscience ends, whereas, according to Rosenzweig, God is eternal. In this lies the essential difference.
Each act of joining A = A to B = B does not damage the essence of the unity of God and although the image of God must be expressed by man, the ultimate essence of man is not changed, and he remains mortal (Star 187-188). This perception is expressed in the following formula:
Supreme Axiom = Image = (B = B) = (A = A).8
The mental perception or the supreme axiom is comparable to God. In Morei Nevuchim (ed. Shmuel Ibn Tibon, pt. 1, ch. 1), Maimonides explains the sources of the act of joining between A = A to B = B: "…I want to speak about the essence of the matter [image]…in the image of God He created him…" This mental perception makes man comparable to God. "Les us make man in our image … [T]he species form [the particular form for each of the human species] which is the mental perception [again, perception and not the picture and the attribute]" (The Guide 12- 13). The singularity of man is infused with the image of God, buried in his living body; such as was given him, apparently as with common attributes to man and God. This image of God gave man supremacy and graciously bestowed his body, making man into a being with enormous possibilities that exceeded those of the living kingdom, giving him a sense of conscious freedom, self-identity, and self- criticism, talent and power. His position was only slightly lower than the divine.
God is united only vis-?-vis the image that is in man such that A = B was transfigured into B = B and the image is the only source of the unity of God in man. Feuerbach said, "Man for himself is man, man with man--the unity of "I" and "Thou"--is God." (Kleine philosophische 60) The A = A, then, is "I" and not him. That is, the A, which is universal monotheism, remains the same A, and it is not another, different A. This is the unity of I, whose existence is itself and is thus independent.9 An I = I or A= B. These are the actual formulae, writes Rosenzweig (Naharayim 216). The formula expresses the reality, itself, or the form of cognition of reality. The above idea can be described also in the following triangular structure, which as been translated and adapted from Bergman’s Hoge HaDor 197, and which is based on Naharayim 216:
There is in this a sort of mutual game between A and B. The B, the born child, is the innovation, the phenomenon; but B is drawn more and more by the power of A. The species development of youth is the development of B towards A; in the act of coupling, it is as if B loses totally its individuality and is made entirely a vessel or expression of the type, of the species. The results of the maturity of A on B is a new B, born from this coupling, such that it received the form: B-A-B. The individual aspires to the species, and when it is absorbed completely by the species and the species overwhelms it, a new B is created. The form which results is a circular form, repetitive (Dialogical Philosophy 199- 245). The absolute formula, B = A expresses the place of man in the philosophy of Rosenzweig, the absolute meeting with man and his joining with his vis-?-vis the image.
This comparison expresses the "absolute empiricism" and is the apex of the method which is the dialogue of man with God, the absolute dialogue of absolute empiricism (Naharayim 205- 218). In comparison with this absoluteness, all the rest of the utterances and possible answers must be seen as decreed. God is the "other," the absolute, and for this reason, the philosophy of "you" is ultimately pushed to the eternal "you." Karl Heim, on Buber’s "I and Thou," comments that it must be one or the other: either the "I and Thou" leads to an infinite line, because each "Thou" is again the "I" of another "Thou," and ultimately the link of "I-Thou" is nourished by an implied assumption, or one must assume an absolute "Thou," which is derived by its own power and in which all the others are made "I" (2:336- 338).
The dialogue with God and the world.
The dialogue involves, not a psychological experience, but rather the revelation to man via dialogue, through which man comes to know God and the way of the world. The dialogue is the place where man meets God. Out of dialogue is born the language of true dialogue, as well as the language of epic, of knowledge and choral singing (Naharayim 230). Only through place is there transformation, man coming to dialogue. Only when man hears his name and he answers "I have called thee by thy name; thou art mine" (Isa. 43:1; see Star 206- 209), is he born anew. This place is a form of chosen utterance, in which is seen the true origin of the soul. This place assumes the reality of those speaking; thus, both God and man, who comes to speak with God, exist. This place is reality in its fullest meaning, only if there is dialogue with God and the world.
On the other hand, thought can form only a static world, lifeless; only the place of man in dialogue creates the real world. "Not in speaking, but by thought was the idealistic world formed" (Naharayim 223). The language of the dialogue consists of proverb and interpretation: "If language is more than only an analogy, if it is truly analogous – and therefore more than analogue - than that which we hear as a living word in our I and which resounds toward us out of our Thou must also be ‘as it is written’ in the great historical testament of revelation. The Frenchman, Reni Descartes, the father of rationalism, is the antithesis of Rosenzweig. He reaches the conclusion that there is only one thing which is indisputable--the thought "I think, therefore I am" ("Cogito, ergo Sum"). The intellect, he contended, is the singular authority of certain knowledge and sets forth choice as the true test (Meditationes; see also Toldot HaPhilosophia 147- 173). Descartes’ thought is complex and difficult. He maintains there are periods in the history of man in which thought itself does not prove his actual, human existence. Man thinks, but he thinks for not-man Rosenzweig states. Man thinks, and with his thoughts as well as in spite of them, man becomes "cannon fodder," as Rosenzweig experienced life, on the Macedonian front. There are times in which your entire essence will say: your honor and actuality as man are the revolt, the rejection which leads one to idealism. "I revolt" means that "I exist," Rosenzweig tells us.
Rosenzweig emphasizes concretely the mutual relationship between the mouth and ears and their actual functions in supplying speech and hearing. They have a purpose in the meeting between God and man; God calls (hearing) and man answers (speech).
Man’s place is nourished and exists by the ear and mouth jointly, mutually effectuating the real, dynamic experience: dialogue. It is thus clear why this place constitutes the pillar upon which the entire system rests. All true speech, combining the ear and the mouth, represents man’s true place, place which is simply the dialogue of two dynamic beings acting in marvelous mutuality. The conversation of addressing and answering is the mutuality which joins the sides and not the subject matter contemplated in the minds of the speakers. Only speech between two persons, "I" and "you," is responsible, real speech. This actual, feeling, conscious friendship is characterized by a responsibility and experiential substance occurring now. The ‘individuum’ is in the function of companion whose principal part comprises a significant contribution to the new thinking. This dialogue is expressed, in actuality, only in regard to the other elements. Otherwise, there is no concrete, dynamic experiential significance to the single element that is prevented from being unified. According to Heidegger (Being 58-59), the subjectivity of his being relates not outwards, to the other elements, but remains in man, and there is no need for the subjectivity to attain anything; therefore, there is no link to the human and absolute "you."
It is different with Rosenzweig, who proceeds by realizing the revelation and the redemption that is expressed in the symbol of the Star of David, which itself symbolizes eternal truth.
Rosenzweig recognizes the place of man as the singular place in which man can contact his God, who serves man as the intermediary to revelation. Rosenzweig speaks about place, clarifying in the process this relationship of the other or the knowledge obtained from the source of experience. Experience in this case is understood to be a living dialogue between two dynamic parties.
This place is man’s starting block. The dialogue opens with the question "where," and this question raises the "you" (Star 207- 209). Man confesses in the first person, the human "I,": "I heard your voice in the Garden, and I was afraid…and I hid myself," and with this, man commences his way to God (Gen. 3:10). The answer to the call opened the closed, organic personality in favor of an absolute connection, one which led to unification with God at the level of the supreme axiom. This connection is both active and passive: "To the ‘I’ there responds in God’s interior a ‘Thou’" (Star 207). This is actual dialogue, with each side speaking his words.
The place of man is a new method created by Rosenzweig; it is the method of conversation: a dynamic conversation in which each side speaks freely. The place of the method of thought developed in earlier philosophies, inherits the method of thought, developed in earlier philosophies, inherits the method of the conversation (Naharayim 231, 222-228). But it must be emphasized that the place of man is a starting block to the absolute and its unification with it; only in regard to the image of the supreme axiom shared by man and his God, though not an essential, qualitative unification and interconnection. Joining does not occur in revelation. God and man do not constitute together one. They are placed in a veritable correlation that is never joined in unity, in which the two are contained in parts:
The gap between the human-worldly and the divine is indicated precisely in the interdicability of personal names. It is beyond the power--ascetic or mystic-- of men and the world to leap over. It is deeper and more real than any ascetic’s arrogance, or any mystic’s conceit will ever admit in his despisal of the ‘sound and haze’ of earthly and heavenly names. And it would, at the same time, have to be recognized and acknowledged as such. (Star 79)
Man’s place brings God within man’s intimate sphere ("the four paces") and makes him a living God. It also grants man a sure and certain existential reality, "… whereas within revelation he at once becomes manifest…" (Star 192).
Rosenzweig maintains that man’s place with God must be complemented by his place in the world, one reached by loving God and his fellow man (Star 201-103, 210). Rosenzweig saw "redemption" of the future world as the world of the rest of mankind, as the conscious task of the Jew and all men on behalf of man (Naharayim 230). Contrary to Rosenzweig’s perception, Y. Leibowitz, maintains that man’s function is to serve God (Emunat haRambam). Such is the function of the place of man in his connection to the world. This unites philosophers such as Sךren Kierkegaard, Friedrich Nietzsche, Ludwig Feuerbach, Karl Marx, Hermann Cohen, Martin Buber, Jean-Paul Sartre, Karl Jaspers, Gabriel Marcel, Albert Camus and many others. Notwithstanding their differences, each accentuates the relationship between essential man and the world, "the world" being understood fundamentally in the sense of other human beings, with whom one must live in society. Dialogue with the world is the reformation, in the future, of the Kingdom of God (Star 278-280), and the conclusion of the act of creation of openness to the world by man, and vice-versa. Man’s place at this stage is final. The conception of "The Kingdom of God, which will be discussed in the last part of this thesis, is not consistent with the conceptions of M. Buber in his books Malchut Shamaim and Torah haNevi’im, which rely on the commentary to Psalms of Mowinkel and which sharpen Rosenzweig’s understanding of this matter. According to the Rabbinical Sages, "The Kingdom of Heaven" is "The Kingdom of Justice; and justice requires that mercy accompany it. Thus, in Biblical literature, two traits are often linked, such as justice and mercy, mercy and truth, justice and truth, and the like. But such characteristics as justice, mercy and truth are not attributed to the king. Such an attribution may be given to one king or another, as, for example, David doing justice with the People; however, such an attribution contains no condition, no essence of the earthly Kingdom. Justice and mercy come from the essence of the Kingdom of Heaven in the Bible is the Kingdom of God, a God of values and not corporeality. In the early prophets, the Kingdom of Heaven was manifested by theocracy, and in the latter prophets only as an idea, with no substantive implications. So, too, was the case in the Psalms. Only in one song, actually in one prophet, Isa. 11, is there a hint of realizing the ideal, when a future king acts with divine intuition, inspired by God, to effectuate justice and law. But in the most significant matters of government, such as land and taxes, there is no hint of divine intuition. It appears that we are left in empty space. When the kingdom of man commenced, the idea of the Kingdom of Heaven became utopia. Rosenzweig attempts to connect the divine and the terrestrial in his discussion of the concept "Kingdom of Heaven" and thereby make flexible the dichotomy between heaven and earth. In communication between man and other men, by giving his love, in acting and being responsible, man shows himself not only at the final place but also as the total place - complete man (Naharayim 215). The two elements in dialogue ("I" and "you") reach their greatest departure in "We" (Naharayim 230; Star 278-280), in which the world of redemption attains its complete permanence and factuality.
Man’s place in the philosophy of faith lies in his dialogue with God, a dialogue which constitutes the initial step to the absolute and to all mankind (world). Love constitutes the content of the place. From this place, man can attain that for which he longs and he can become attached to his destination completely. 1
1 The term "completion" in Rosenzweig’s usage is set forth in Naharayim (215). Completion is the concealed’s aspiration for a system. Completion is a battle for their (A=B and B=B) existence, A=B wrestling with B=B, a war of substance against isolation. Completion is the unification of man with his God in the "image" sense, man’s meeting with his God and fellow man.
1 Compare, Star 46, 70 and 96 and Short Writings 381.
2 For further information, see Appendix.
3 For further information, see Appendix.
4 See also Shlomo Ephraim Luntshitz in his article, "Ollelot Ephraim," who added: "And man is only God, he gives and does not take, and in him there is only the semblance of man."
5 See Chapter Two, below: "On the Source of Self Persuasion and Influence," and Appendix, for further explanation.
6 See Moshe ben Maimon, Morei Nevuchim, Ed. Shmuel Ibn Tibon, ch 57, which discusses the attributes of God.
7 For further explanation, see Appendix.
For further information, see Appendix.
8 For further explanation, see Appendix. Writings 381.
[ix] For further information, see Appendix.
[ix] For further information, see Appendix.
[ix] See also Shlomo Ephraim Luntshitz in his article, "Ollelot Ephraim," who added: "And man is only God, he gives and does not take, and in him there is only the semblance of man."
[ix] See Chapter Two, below: "On the Source of Self Persuasion and Influence," and Appendix, for further explanation.
[ix] See Moshe ben Maimon, Morei Nevuchim, Ed. Shmuel Ibn Tibon, ch 57, which discusses the attributes of God.
[ix] For further explanation, see Appendix.
[ix] For further information, see Appendix.
[ix] For further explanation, see Appendix.
LIST OF SOURCE MATERIAL ABBREVIATIONS
|
Heidegger, Martin. Being and Time. Trans. John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson. New York: Harper, 1962.
|
Being
|
|
Bergman, Samuel Hugo. Dialogical Philosophy from Kierkegaard to Buber. Jerusalem: Bialik Inst., 1974. 199-245.
|
Dialogical Philosophy
|
|
Leibowitz, Yeshayahu. Emunat HaRambam [The Faith of Maimonides]. Tel-Aviv: Min. of Defense, 1980.
|
Emunat HaRambam
|
|
Bergman, Samuel Hugo. Hoge HaDor [Contemporary Thinkers]. Tel-Aviv: Mezpei P, 1935. 194-207.
|
Hoge HaDor
|
|
Feuerbach, L. A. Kleine Philosophische Schriften [Short Philosophical Writings]. Leipzig: F. Meiner, 1950.
|
Kleine Philosophische
|
|
Schwarcz, Moshe. MiMytos l'Hitgalut [From Myth to Revelation]. Tel-Aviv: HaKibbutz haMeuchad, 1978.
|
MiMytos
|
|
Descartes, Rene. Meditationes de Prima Philosophia [Meditations on First Philosophy]. Trans. Y. Or. Paris: Charles Adam, 1963.
|
Meditations
|
|
P’sikta Rabbati. New York: Mandelbaum P. 1954.
|
Psikta Rabbati
|
|
Rosenzweig, Franz. Naharayim [Selected Writings of Franz Rosenzweig]. Trans. Yehoshua Amir. Jerusalem: Bialik Inst., 1977.
|
Naharayim
|
|
Rosenzweig, Franz. The Star of Redemption. 2d ed. Trans. William W. Hallo. New York: U of Notre Dame P, 1985.
|
Star
|
|
Schelling, Friedrich. W. J. Simtliche Werke. [Complete Works]. Leipzig: F. Eckardt, 1907.
|
Simtliche Werke
|
|
Moshe ben Maimon. Morei Nevuchim [The Guide to the Perplexed]. Ed. Rabbi Shmuel Ibn Tibon. Jerusalem: S. Monzon, 1938.
|
The Guide
|
|
Bergman, Samuel Hugo. Toldot haPhilosophia haHadasha [History of Philosophy: From Nicolaus Cusanus to the Age of Enlightenment]. Jerusalem, Bialik Inst., 1974. 185-204.
|
Toldot HaPhilosophia
|
|
Zohar, 2d ed. Jerusalem: Mossad H’Rav Kook, 1956.
|
Zohar
|
Fig. 1. Star of Redemption, Hodge HaDor 199.
http://www.pbase.com/krouzzadok/inbox
Fig 2
http://www.pbase.com/krouzzadok/inbox
Fig 3
APPENDIX
The Data
The Thesis
B1= mere man - prior to revelation (the meeting) man exists in a silent, objective creation, without function as a believer, as sort of tragic hero, engulfed within the stubborn silence of his self.
B2= specific man- in the revelation of the meeting with God, man opens his mouth and begins to speak, he listens, a personal, independent, subjective relationship is developed, he has a function as a believer, man is oriented, that is, God is revealed in the relationship of love.
A1- universal monotheism- God is concealed in regard to man and the universe, there is not yet a subjective relationship nor is there an act of subjective, experiential faith.
A2= the equivalent of A1 in a renewed state, renewal being the revelation of what was hidden, a human-like God appearing in the looking glass of revelation, a personal God to whom one may turn and share love.
The Antithesis:
B1 = B2 The mute, objective thesis, lacking a relationship to God and to faith, etc. becomes its opposite, it becomes in revelation a different to B, to man as he is ‘I," able to demand love from God by the word "Ayeka" ("where are you"). Man’s potential, which was hidden, is revealed in his soul and in the depths of his belief. When B1=B2, all activity is direct and not by means of analogy alone. Man is "I" and not him (third person singular).
B1 = B2 expresses the "I," the free, subjective personality; man finds himself, and when he identifies the "I" in him, he can then also identify the fellow man with whom he comes in contact. Man then reveals his neighbor and redeems the world.
A1 = A2 The God concealed in creation becomes in revelation a revealed God, a lover to whom one can turn, a personal, nearby God with whom one can talk, consciousness of self being a basis of the act of faith.
The Synthesis:
A1 = A2 = B1 = B2 or, in brief, A=B, or B=A, is the dynamic meeting between man, who is aware of and acts by and according to his image, and God, who is part of this image. The fact that God shares this image results in man’s awareness of God. This equality which Rosenzweig presents, it should be noted, relates only to the factor of image, and in this image sense, man is equal to God.
Interpretation
The fact that man acknowledges an irrational power, his soul, his belief and his image turns the objective fact in creation (that God creates with His great kindness and love a beautiful and perfect world) into a subjective, experiential fact in revelation and makes God present in the intimate four paces of man in a most vital manner in the present. This reality is disclosed and dynamic, a revelation which occurs every moment in the soul of man. According to the above explanation, B=A means that the image of A= the image of B, that is, the relationship of man B is a direct relationship to A. With the power of the image in B, God can be seen as a side of the reality which impels man to use his self-consciousness to transcend the traits which he shares with other animals found at his external level in creation as B1 and be a lofty and exalted creature.
B1=B2 from this image point of view and man attains the knowledge of God (when image= the supreme axiom) in his contact and meeting with Him, precisely by means of his experiential consciousness, when that consciousness is already developed to the degree that it will recognize the divinity in its experience. Now one can better understand what Rosenzweig stated in Naharayim: "When man (experiential) is B=B, he can relate to A since all A=B emerges in B=B… only due to the fact that following A=A the utterance was made to B=B, thereby removing B (B1) from its seclusion, can man relate to his neighbor, can the neighbor think that he is like you (man)" (210).
In conclusion, when man (B1) acknowledges or reveals the image within him, he then becomes able to communicate with God. Man can then become aware of others of comparable images and communicate with them and bring redemption to the world. When man is only B1- mere man- without awareness of the supreme axiom in him or of his image or his soul, he is comparable to other animals lacking the facility of speech and hearing. When B1=B2, man is aware of that which comprises him, of his image, of that which makes him man, of the "I," and not just his animal aspect. Man can then rise and attain the domain of God in him, by means of which he can communicate with God, who changed from A1 to A2, acknowledging man’s image. (It should be noted that Rosenzweig uses existentialist terms of Heidegger. See the itemization in Chapter One, above.)