Emmanuel Levinas was a
LithuaniaLithuania , officially the Republic of Lithuania is a country in Northern Europe, the biggest of the three Baltic states. It is situated along the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea, whereby to the west lie Sweden and Denmark...
n-born French Jewish philosopher and
TalmudThe Talmud is a central text of mainstream Judaism. It takes the form of a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, philosophy, customs and history....
ic commentator.
Life
Emanuelis Levinas (later adapted to
FrenchFrench is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
orthographyThe orthography of a language specifies a standardized way of using a specific writing system to write the language. Where more than one writing system is used for a language, for example Kurdish, Uyghur, Serbian or Inuktitut, there can be more than one orthography...
as Emmanuel Levinas) received a traditional Jewish education in Lithuania. After the Second World War, he studied the
TalmudThe Talmud is a central text of mainstream Judaism. It takes the form of a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, philosophy, customs and history....
under the enigmatic "
Monsieur ChouchaniMonsieur Chouchani , or "Shushani," is the nickname of an otherwise anonymous and enigmatic Jewish teacher who taught a small number of distinguished students in post-World War II Europe and elsewhere, including Emmanuel Levinas and Elie Wiesel....
", whose influence he acknowledged only late in his life.
Levinas began his philosophical studies at Strasbourg University in 1924, where he began his lifelong friendship with the French philosopher
Maurice BlanchotMaurice Blanchot was a French writer, philosopher, and literary theorist. His work had a strong influence on post-structuralist philosophers such as Jacques Derrida.-Works:...
. In 1928, he went to Freiburg University to study phenomenology under
Edmund HusserlEdmund Gustav Albrecht Husserl was a philosopher and mathematician and the founder of the 20th century philosophical school of phenomenology. He broke with the positivist orientation of the science and philosophy of his day, yet he elaborated critiques of historicism and of psychologism in logic...
. At
FreiburgFreiburg im Breisgau is a city in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. In the extreme south-west of the country, it straddles the Dreisam river, at the foot of the Schlossberg. Historically, the city has acted as the hub of the Breisgau region on the western edge of the Black Forest in the Upper Rhine Plain...
he also met
Martin HeideggerMartin Heidegger was a German philosopher known for his existential and phenomenological explorations of the "question of Being."...
. Levinas became one of the very first French intellectuals to draw attention to Heidegger and Husserl, by translating Husserl's Cartesian Meditations and by drawing on their ideas in his own philosophy, in works such as his The Theory of Intuition in Husserl’s Phenomenology, , and .
According to his
obituaryAn obituary is a news article that reports the recent death of a person, typically along with an account of the person's life and information about the upcoming funeral. In large cities and larger newspapers, obituaries are written only for people considered significant...
in New York Times, Levinas came to regret his enthusiasm for Heidegger, because of the latter's affinity for the Nazis. During a lecture on forgiveness, Levinas stated "One can forgive many Germans, but there are some Germans it is difficult to forgive. It is difficult to forgive Heidegger."
After earning his doctorate Levinas taught at a private Jewish High School in Paris, the École Normale Israélite Orientale, eventually becoming its director. He began teaching at the
University of PoitiersThe University of Poitiers is a university in Poitiers, France. It is a member of the Coimbra Group.-History:Founded in 1431 by Pope Eugene IV and chartered by King Charles VII, the University of Poitiers was originally composed of five faculties: theology, canon law, civil law, medicine, and...
in 1961, at the Nanterre campus of the
University of ParisThe University of Paris was a university located in Paris, France and one of the earliest to be established in Europe. It was founded in the mid 12th century, and officially recognized as a university probably between 1160 and 1250...
in 1967, and at the
SorbonneThe Sorbonne is an edifice of the Latin Quarter, in Paris, France, which has been the historical house of the former University of Paris...
in 1973, from which he retired in 1979. He was also a Professor at the
University of FribourgThe University of Fribourg is a university in the city of Fribourg, Switzerland.The roots of the University can be traced back to 1582, when the notable Jesuit Peter Canisius founded the Collège Saint-Michel in the City of Fribourg. In 1763, an Academy of law was founded by the state of Frobourg...
in
SwitzerlandSwitzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
. In 1989 he was awarded the
Balzan PrizeThe International Balzan Prize Foundation awards four annual monetary prizes to people or organisations who have made outstanding achievements in the fields of humanities, natural sciences, culture, as well as for endeavours for peace and the brotherhood of man.-Rewards and assets:Each year the...
for Philosophy.
Among his most famous students is Rabbi Baruch Garzon from
TetouanTetouan is a city in northern Morocco. The Berber name means literally "the eyes" and figuratively "the water springs". Tetouan is one of the two major ports of Morocco on the Mediterranean Sea. It lies a few miles south of the Strait of Gibraltar, and about 40 mi E.S.E. of Tangier...
(Morocco), who studied Philosophy with Levinas at the
SorbonneThe Sorbonne is an edifice of the Latin Quarter, in Paris, France, which has been the historical house of the former University of Paris...
and later went on to become one of the most important Rabbis of the Spanish-speaking world.
Philosophy
In the 1950s, Levinas emerged from the circle of intellectuals surrounding
Jean WahlJean André Wahl was a French philosopher.-Early career:He was professor at the Sorbonne from 1936 to 1967, broken by World War II. He was in the U.S...
as a leading French thinker. His work is based on the
ethicsEthics, also known as moral philosophy, is a branch of philosophy that addresses questions about morality—that is, concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime, etc.Major branches of ethics include:...
of
the OtherThe Other or Constitutive Other is a key concept in continental philosophy; it opposes the Same. The Other refers, or attempts to refer, to that which is Other than the initial concept being considered...
or, in Levinas' terms, on "ethics as first philosophy". For Levinas, the Other is not knowable and cannot be made into an object of the self, as is done by traditional
metaphysicsMetaphysics is a branch of philosophy concerned with explaining the fundamental nature of being and the world, although the term is not easily defined. Traditionally, metaphysics attempts to answer two basic questions in the broadest possible terms:...
(which Lévinas called "
ontologyOntology is the philosophical study of the nature of being, existence or reality as such, as well as the basic categories of being and their relations...
"). Lévinas prefers to think of philosophy as the "wisdom of love" rather than the love of wisdom (the literal Greek meaning of the word "philosophy"). In his view, responsibility precedes any "objective searching after truth".
Levinas derives the primacy of his ethics from the experience of the encounter with the Other. For Levinas, the irreducible relation, the epiphany, of the
face-to-faceThe face-to-face relation refers to a concept in the French philosopher Emmanuel Levinas' thought on human sociality.Lévinas' phenomenological account of the "face-to-face" encounter serves as the basis for his ethics and the rest of his philosophy...
, the encounter with another, is a privileged
phenomenonA phenomenon , plural phenomena, is any observable occurrence. Phenomena are often, but not always, understood as 'appearances' or 'experiences'...
in which the other person's proximity and distance are both strongly felt. "The Other precisely
reveals himself in his
alterityAlterity is a philosophical term meaning "otherness", strictly being in the sense of the other of two . In the phenomenological tradition it is usually understood as the entity in contrast to which an identity is constructed, and it implies the ability to distinguish between self and not-self, and...
not in a shock negating the I, but as the primordial phenomenon of gentleness." At the same time, the revelation of the face makes a demand, this demand is before one can express, or know one's freedom, to affirm or deny. One instantly recognizes the transcendence and heteronomy of the Other. Even murder fails as an attempt to take hold of this otherness.
Following
Totality and InfinityTotality and Infinity is a work of philosophy authored by Emmanuel Levinas. It advances the thesis that all ethics derive from a confrontation with an other...
, Levinas later argued that responsibility for the other is rooted within our subjective constitution. It should be noted that the first line of the preface of this book is "everyone will readily agree that it is of the highest importance to know whether we are not duped by morality." This idea appears in his of recurrence (chapter 4 in Otherwise Than Being), in which Levinas maintains that subjectivity is formed in and through our subjection to the other. Subjectivity, Levinas argued, is primordially ethical, not theoretical: that is to say, our responsibility for the other is not a derivative feature of our subjectivity, but instead, founds our subjective being-in-the-world by giving it a meaningful direction and orientation. Levinas's thesis "ethics as first philosophy", then, means that the traditional philosophical pursuit of knowledge is secondary to a basic ethical duty to the other. To meet the Other is to have the idea of Infinity
The elderly Levinas was a distinguished French public intellectual, whose books reportedly sold well. He had a major impact on the young
Jacques DerridaJacques Derrida was a French philosopher, born in French Algeria. He developed the critical theory known as deconstruction and his work has been labeled as post-structuralism and associated with postmodern philosophy...
, a fellow French Jew whose seminal Writing and Difference contains an essay, "Violence and Metaphysics", on Levinas. Derrida also delivered a eulogy at Lévinas's funeral, later published as Adieu à Emmanuel Levinas, an appreciation and exploration of Levinas's moral philosophy. In a memorial essay for Levinas,
Jean-Luc MarionJean-Luc Marion is among the best-known living philosophers in France, former student of Jacques Derrida and one of the leading Catholic thinkers of modern times. Marion's take on the postmodern is informed by his expertise in patristic and mystical theology, phenomenology, and modern philosophy...
claimed that "If one defines a great philosopher as someone without whom philosophy would not have been what it is, then in France there are two great philosophers of the 20th Century:
BergsonHenri-Louis Bergson was a major French philosopher, influential especially in the first half of the 20th century. Bergson convinced many thinkers that immediate experience and intuition are more significant than rationalism and science for understanding reality.He was awarded the 1927 Nobel Prize...
and Levinas."
A concise evaluation of his impact on modern philosophical thought may be found in his New York Times obituary.
War experiences
Levinas became a naturalized French citizen in 1930. When France declared war on Germany, he was ordered to report for military duty. During the German invasion of France in 1940, his military unit was quickly surrounded and forced to surrender. Levinas spent the rest of
World War IIWorld War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
as a prisoner of war in a camp near Hannover in
GermanyGermany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
. Lévinas was assigned to a special barrack for Jewish prisoners, who were forbidden any forms of religious worship. Life in the camp was as difficult as might be expected, with Levinas often forced to chop wood and do other menial tasks. Other prisoners saw him frequently jotting in a notebook. These jottings were later developed into his book De l'Existence à l'Existent (1947) and a series of lectures published under the title Le Temps et l'Autre (1948). His wartime notebooks have now been published in their original form as Oeuvres: Tome 1, Carnets de captivité suivi de Ecrits sur la captivité et Notes philosophiques diverses (2009).
Meanwhile,
Maurice BlanchotMaurice Blanchot was a French writer, philosopher, and literary theorist. His work had a strong influence on post-structuralist philosophers such as Jacques Derrida.-Works:...
helped Levinas' wife and daughter spend the war in a monastery, thus sparing them from the Holocaust. Blanchot, at considerable personal risk, also saw to it that Levinas was able to keep in contact with his immediate family through letters and other messages. Other members of Levinas' family were not so fortunate; his mother-in-law was deported and never heard from again, while his father and brothers were killed in Lithuania by the
SSThe Schutzstaffel |Sig runes]]) was a major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. Built upon the Nazi ideology, the SS under Heinrich Himmler's command was responsible for many of the crimes against humanity during World War II...
.
See also
- Authenticity
Authenticity is a technical term in existentialist philosophy, and is also used in the philosophy of art and psychology. In philosophy, the conscious self is seen as coming to terms with being in a material world and with encountering external forces, pressures and influences which are very...
- Martin Buber
Martin Buber was an Austrian-born Jewish philosopher best known for his philosophy of dialogue, a form of religious existentialism centered on the distinction between the I-Thou relationship and the I-It relationship....
- Face-to-face
The face-to-face relation refers to a concept in the French philosopher Emmanuel Levinas' thought on human sociality.Lévinas' phenomenological account of the "face-to-face" encounter serves as the basis for his ethics and the rest of his philosophy...
- Golden Rule
The Golden Rule or ethic of reciprocity is a maxim, ethical code, or moralitythat essentially states either of the following:* : One should treat others as one would like others to treat oneself....
- Lithuanian Jews
Lithuanian Jews or Litvaks are Jews with roots in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania:...
- Knud Ejler Løgstrup
Knud Ejler Løgstrup was a Danish philosopher and theologian.Løgstrup was an ethical intuitionist who was critical of rule-based ethics of the type advocated by Immanuel Kant...
- The Other
The Other or Constitutive Other is a key concept in continental philosophy; it opposes the Same. The Other refers, or attempts to refer, to that which is Other than the initial concept being considered...
Selected writings by Levinas
A full bibliography of all Levinas' publications up until 1981 is found in Roger Burggraeve Emmanuel Levinas (1982).
A list of works, translated into English but not appearing in any collections, may be found in Critchley, S. and Bernasconi, R., (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to Levinas (publ. Cambridge UP, 2002), pp. 269–270.
Bibliography of English translations of Levinas's writings.
- 1929. Sur les « Ideen » de M. E. Husserl
- 1930. La théorie de l'intuition dans la phénoménologie de Husserl
- 1931. Der Begriff des Irrationalen als philosophisches Problem (with E.H.Eisenruth)
- 1931. Fribourg, Husserl et la phénoménologie
- 1931. Les recherches sur la philosophie des mathématiques en Allemagne, aperçu général (with W.Dubislav)
- 1931. Méditations Cartésiennes. Introduction à la phénoménologie (with E.Husserl and G.Pfeiffer)
- 1932. Martin Heidegger et l'ontologie
- 1934. La présence totale (with Louis Lavelle
Louis Lavelle was a French philosopher. His magnum opus is La Dialectique de l'éternel présent, a metaphysical work in four volumes: De l'Être , De l'Acte , Du Temps et de l'Eternité , and De l'Âme Humaine .Lavelle's other writings include La dialectique du monde...
)
- 1934. Phénoménologie
- 1934. Quelques réflexions sur la philosophie de l'hitlérisme
- 1935. De l'évasion
- 1935. La notion du temps (with N.Khersonsky)
- 1935. L'actualité de Maimonide
- 1935. L'inspiration religieuse de l'Alliance
- 1936. Allure du transcendental (with Georges Bénézé
Georges Bénézé was a French philosopherBénézé was a disciple and editor of Alain. He taught Hegel to Jean Hippolyte at the lycée in Poitiers.-Works:*Allure du transcendental, 1936*Valeu. Essai d'une théorie générale, 1936...
)
- 1936. Esquisses d'une énergétique mentale (with J.Duflo)
- 1936. Fraterniser sans se convertir
- 1936. Les aspects de l'image visuelle (with R.Duret)
- 1936. L'esthétique française contemporaine (with V.Feldman)
- 1936. L'individu dans le déséquilibre moderne (with R.Munsch)
- 1936. Valeur (with Georges Bénézé)
- 1947. De l'Existence à l'Existent. (Existence and Existents)
- 1948. Le Temps et l'Autre. (Time and the Other)
- 1949. En Découvrant l’Existence avec Husserl et Heidegger.
- 1961. Totalité et Infini: essai sur l'extériorité. (Totality and Infinity)
- 1962. De l'Évasion
- 1963 & 1976. Difficult Freedom: Essays on Judaism
- 1968. Quatre lectures talmudiques
- 1972. Humanisme de l'autre homme (Humanism of the Other)
- 1974. Autrement qu'être ou au-delà de l'essence. (Otherwise than Being or Beyond Essence)
- “A Language Familiar to Us”. Telos 44 (Summer 1980). New York: Telos Press.
- 1976. Sur Maurice Blanchot
- 1976. Noms propres
- 1977. Du Sacré au saint – cinq nouvelles lectures talmudiques
- 1980. Le Temps et l'Autre
- 1982. L'Au-delà du verset: lectures et discours talmudiques
- 1982. Of God Who Comes to Mind
- 1982. Ethique et infini (dialogues of Emmanuel Levinas and Philippe Nemo)
- 1984. Transcendence et intelligibilité
- 1988. A l'Heure des nations
- 1991. Entre Nous
- 1995. Altérité et transcendence ("Alterity and Transcendence")
Further reading
- Adriaan Theodoor Peperzak, Robert Bernasconi & Simon Critchley, Emmanuel Levinas (1996)
- Simon Critchley
Simon Critchley is an English philosopher currently teaching at The New School. He works in continental philosophy. Critchley argues that philosophy commences in disappointment, either religious or political...
& Robert BernasconiRobert L. Bernasconi is the Lillian and Morrie Moss Professor of Philosophy at the University of Memphis. He is well known as a reader of Martin Heidegger and Emmanuel Levinas, and for his work on the concept of race...
(ed.) The Cambridge Companion to Levinas (2002)
- Theodore De Boer, The Rationality of Transcendence: Studies in the Philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas. Amsterdam: J. C. Gieben, 1997.
- Roger Burggraeve, The Wisdom of Love in the Service of Love: Emmanuel Levinas on Justice, Peace, and Human Rights, trans. Jeffrey Bloechl. Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 2002.
- Roger Burggraeve (ed.) The awakening to the other: a provocative dialogue with Emmanuel Levinas, Leuven: Peeters, 2008
- Cristian Ciocan, Georges Hansel, Levinas Concordance. Dordrecht: Springer, 2005.
- Richard A. Cohen, Ethics, Exegesis and Philosophy: Interpretation After Levinas. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001.
- Richard A. Cohen, Elevations: The Height of the Good in Rosenzweig and Levinas. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1994.
- Joseph Cohen, Alternances de la métaphysique. Essais sur Emmanuel Levinas. Paris: Galilée, 2009. [in French]
- Simon Critchley
Simon Critchley is an English philosopher currently teaching at The New School. He works in continental philosophy. Critchley argues that philosophy commences in disappointment, either religious or political...
, "Emmanuel Levinas: A Disparate Inventory," in The Cambridge Companion to Levinas, ed. S. Critchley & R. Bernasconi. Cambridge & New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002.
- Derrida, Jacques
Jacques Derrida was a French philosopher, born in French Algeria. He developed the critical theory known as deconstruction and his work has been labeled as post-structuralism and associated with postmodern philosophy...
, Adieu to Emmanuel Levinas, trans. Pascale-Anne Brault and Michael Naas. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999.
- Derrida, Jacques
Jacques Derrida was a French philosopher, born in French Algeria. He developed the critical theory known as deconstruction and his work has been labeled as post-structuralism and associated with postmodern philosophy...
, "At This Very Moment in This Work Here I Am," trans. Ruben Berezdivin and Peggy Kamuf, in Psyche: Inventions of the Other, Vol. 1, ed. Peggy Kamuf and Elizabeth G. Rottenberg. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2007. 143-90.
- Derrida, Jacques
Jacques Derrida was a French philosopher, born in French Algeria. He developed the critical theory known as deconstruction and his work has been labeled as post-structuralism and associated with postmodern philosophy...
, "Violence and Metaphysics: An Essay on the Thought of Emmanuel Levinas," in Writing and Difference, trans. Alan Bass. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1978. 79-153.
- Michael Eldred, 'Worldsharing and Encounter: Heidegger's ontology and Lévinas' ethics' 2010.
- Marie-Anne Lescourt, Emmanuel Levinas, 2nd edition. Flammarion, 2006. [in French]
- Emmanuel Levinas, Ethics and Infinity: Conversations with Philippe Nemo, trans. R.A. Cohen. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1985.
- Emmanuel Levinas, "Signature," in Difficult Freedom: Essays on Judaism, trans. Sean Hand. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990 & 1997.
- Seán Hand, Emmanuel Levinas, London: Routledge, 2009
- Benda Hofmeyr (ed.), Radical passivity – rethinking ethical agency in Levinas, Dordrecht: Springer, 2009
- Diane Perpich The ethics of Emmanuel Levinas Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2008
- Tanja Staehler, Plato and Levinas – the ambiguous out-side of ethics, London: Routledge 2010 [i.e. 2009]
External links
- Institute for Levinassian Studies. Complete primary and secondary bibliography, a search engine for Levinas' texts, and more
- The Levinas Online Bibliography (Prof. dr. Joachim Duyndam, editor-in-chief), levinas.nl Hosted by the University of Humanistics, Utrecht, the Netherlands.
- Bibliography of the secondary literature in English.
- Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy is a freely-accessible online encyclopedia of philosophy maintained by Stanford University. Each entry is written and maintained by an expert in the field, including professors from over 65 academic institutions worldwide...
: "Emmanuel Levinas," by Bettina Bergo.
- Books by a Levinas scholar
- The Emmanuel Levinas web page by Peter Atterton. Includes a short biography.
- New York Times obituary.
- North American Levinas Society: Resources, Calls for Papers, Announcements
- Levinas and Anarchism. Articles and Research Tools by Mitchell Cowen Verter
- Michael R. Michau. "On Escape," a review of Levinas' De L'êvasion. Other Voices, January 2005.
- A Century with Levinas: Celebration of Emmanuel Levinas Centennial · January 1–December 31, 2006
- Adeus: The Epiphany of the Other according to Levinas.
- Espacethique: Emmanuel Levinas and the ethic of responsibility.
- "Emmanuel Levinas" on the Mystical Site.
- Institut d'études Levinassiennes.
- Société Internationale de Recherche Emmanuel Levinas.