哲学杂志철학 학술지哲学のジャーナルEast Asian
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Publication details

Publisher: Springer

Place: Berlin

Year: 2012

Pages: 445-455

Series: Phaenomenologica

Full citation:

Rudi Visker, "The letter and the soil", in: Life, subjectivity and art, Berlin, Springer, 2012

Abstract

I took my title from a brief, but central passage in Difficult Freedom: "The spirit is free within the letter, and it is enslaved within the root".1 I shall not comment on the immediate context of this phrase where Levinas takes exception to SimoneWeil's "hatred' of the Bible which, as he remarks, "she knows poorly" (136/193) and "only in translation" (135/191). Nor will I spend much time analyzing the underlying dispute with those who believe that with Christ spirit has overcome and freed itself from the letter to which the Jews would have remained "stubbornly attached" (49/76). The hyphen in "judaeo-christianity' which sees in the Old Testament a mere "prefiguration' of the New (161/226) covers up the deep differend between both positions.

Cited authors

Publication details

Publisher: Springer

Place: Berlin

Year: 2012

Pages: 445-455

Series: Phaenomenologica

Full citation:

Rudi Visker, "The letter and the soil", in: Life, subjectivity and art, Berlin, Springer, 2012