Emil Fackenheim

Emil Fackenheim sensed early on that existentialism could be a source for the rejuvenation of Jewish identity.  For Fackenheim, the greatest existentialist thinker was Martin Heidegger.  And yet Heidegger had also embraced the Third Reich, which attempted the extermination of the Jewish people and faith. The complex conundrum of what could be disentangled from Heidegger’s ontology of Being that might contribute to a deeper exploration of Jewish existence as opposed to those aspects of it that appeared to endorse its most lethal foe was a recurrent theme in Fackenheim’s writings. In this essay, I will explore some of its major contours, including whether and to what extent the “later” Heidegger differed from the earlier.

This paper is taken from the last chapter of  “The De-Judaization of the Image of Jesus of Nazareth (the Virgin Mary) at the Time of the Holocaust: Ensoulment and the Human Ovum” by Thomas Blüger (Xlibris 2021)

Introduction
Reviews two chapters from Ron Rosenbaum’s recent book Explaining Hitler while addressing certain metaphysical realities surrounding the Shoah. I do this for two reasons. First, has to do with the fact that questions raised by Ron Rosenbaum are of central importance to what I have written throughout this inquiry. Second, is that only a few theologians have responded to Rosenbaum’s concerns including Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, then Cardinal Ratzinger, as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. At that time, because of his delicate position, Cardinal Ratzinger did not respond directly; but as the reader shall see, he has addressed what Rosenbaum has laid out.

Existential questions are the big questions about the human condition: love, death, freedom, evil, suffering, and suicide. These questions were treated by existentialists as an end unto themselves. As Paul Tillich write: "only the philosophical question is perennial, not the answers" (The Dynamics of Faith, 94). In a similar vein, Elie Wiesel wrote "every question possessed a power that did not lie in the answer." (Night). James Diamond in his new book seeks to create a Jewish theology of questions from the text of Maimonides. James A. Diamond holds the Joseph and Wolf Lebovic Chair of Jewish Studies at the University of Waterloo. He earned an

El sentido sacrificial ha sido la interpretación habitual del capítulo 22 del libro del Génesis. La cuestión principal que nos planteamos es averiguar si es posible realizar otro tipo de lecturas del relato del sacrificio de Isaac teniendo en cuenta, además, la perspectiva concreta del Holocausto. Pretendemos arrojar alguna luz, por muy tenue que sea, sobre ese acontecimiento inédito e insondable que nombramos habitualmente con el término “Holocausto”, una denominación que, como tendremos ocasión también de explicar, resulta muy inapropiada para referirse con exactitud a lo que allí infelizmente aconteció.

The paper uses tropes culled from several of Hannah Arendt's works, as well as Rebecca Schneider's performance-theoretical considerations on "reenactment", to analyze the work of artist Miriam Shenitzer, specifically a show of drawings, captions, and objects called "A Putative Life of Hannah Arendt." The essay probes this "putative life" as construed from the artist's own memory fragments (including the memories of others that have become the artist's own), as well as from faux-artifacts that constitute a "collection" (à la Benjamin) without claim to representing an actual past. With access to history denied and a heritage claimed "without testament," the artist opens a space "between past and future," a moment of contemplation on the borders between private and public lives.

Dit boek bevat circa 30 korte essays met portretten van joodse denkers, joodse schrijvers en thema's uit de joodse geschiedenis en cultuur. Over Lévinas, Buber, Rosenzweig, Heschel, Fackenheim en Leibowitz, het land Israël, identiteit, waarheid en geschiedenis.

In het tweede gedeelte van het boek geeft de auteur zijn aan de Hebreeuwse tekst getrouwe vertaling van een aantal psalmen met daarbijhorende commentaar. Hij schenkt veel aandacht aan het literaire aspect van de psalmen en situeert hen binnen de eeuwenlange joodse geloofservaring.


"... Je moet weten dat de eenheid van God een eenheid van de mens impliceert, de eenheid van de mensheid en van elk mens afzonderlijk. Als je echter slechts de eenheid van God bevestigt, zonder deze ook te realiseren, zet je de onenigheid van de goddelijke Naam door vereniging van de wereld."

In this paper, Jonathan Milevsky explores Jewish understandings of the social order by examining the thought of two influential 20th century rabbis, David Novak and Emil Fackenheim. This paper is the second in a series of three papers published by the Cardus Religious Freedom Institute on the intersection of civil law and Jewish law (halakha). It was delivered at a CRFI symposium at the Ottawa Torah Centre in November 2018.