Messianic thought outside theology / edited by Anna Glazova and Paul North.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Glazova, Anna, editor.

North, Paul, 1971- editor.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Messianism.

Messianism in literature.

Political messianism.

Philosophy, Modern--20th century.

Philosophy, Modern.

Philosophy, European--20th century.

Philosophy, European.

Popular culture--Philosophy.

Popular culture.

Physical Description:

vi, 307 pages ; 24 cm

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

New York : Fordham University Press, 2014.

Summary:

Why did a "seculanzed" concept of messianicity seem so crucial in the twentieth century? Are messianic structures intelligible outside the theological systems in which they were invented? This book seeks to situate the ethical, ontological, and literary adoptions of messianism within the broader contours of messianic thought. the gesture by Benjamin, Rosenzweig, and others of detaching messianism from the person of the messiah, understanding it instead as redemptive potential inherent in all human history, is one facet of a broad move in political theory, philosophy, linguistics, and historiography to redeem secular thinking though theological figures. Yet already within religious discourse the messiah figure is paradoxical. With the invocation of a future arrival "to come," history is opened, yet the previous assumption of an end threatens to shut it off from whatever unexpected night come. the coming arrival, so certain so complete, will have already come in an anteriority that seems to cancel the future and close down historical life before it starts. Book jacket.

Contents:

Saving hope, the wager of messianism / Anna Glazova and Paul North

Critiques of messianic thought

Of theory, aesthetics, and politics : configuring the messianic in early twentieth-century Europe / Lisa Marie Anderson

On the price of messianism : the intellectual rift between Gershom Scholem and Jacob Taubes / Thomas Macho

Impure inheritances : spectral materiality in Derrida and Marx / Nicole Pepperell

Agamben and the messianic : the slightest of differences / David Ferris

Messianic language and the idea of prose : Benjamin and Agamben / Vivian Liska

Inverted messianism

The demand for an end : Kant and the negative conception of history / Catharine Diehl

Migrations of the bohemian / Joshua Wilner

Paul Celan's improper names / Anna Glazova

When Christianity is finally over: images of a messianic politics in Heine and Benjamin / Peter Fenves

Negating the messiah

The crisis of the messianic claim : Scholem, Benjamin, Baudelaire / Oleg Gelikman

Messiahs and principles / Paul North

Messianic not / Werner Hamacher.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780823256716

0823256715

9780823256723

0823256723

OCLC:

861678605