The thought of Jean-Louis Chrétien is most familiar to those who have taken up the theological turn in French phenomenology, yet it defies reduction to either phenomenology or theology, or for that matter spirituality, literature, or Greek thought. Written in beautiful French prose and argued with unsurpassed erudition, Chrétien’s works defy easy interpretation. One nonetheless finds a center of gravity in attempts to define and then elaborate an original account of human being in terms of call and response, from which there follow penetrating studies of language and body, as well as illuminating approaches to a range of themes including temporality, prayer, and religious reading. This volume gathers original work from leading scholars in the fields of philosophy, theology and poetics, including Chrétien’s collaborators, successors, and Anglophone interpreters. They engage his work along its main lines, at once presenting it in summary fashion and exploring its strengths and weaknesses for our understanding of some of the topics and problems that held his prolonged attention. Readers new to Chrétien will easily find a number of points of access, while more advanced readers will find that their understanding is both deepened and enriched. Contributors: Rudolf Bernet, Jeffrey Bloechl, Emmanuel Falque, Jérôme de Gramont, Crina Gshwandtner, Emmanuel Housset, Stephen E. Lewis, Jean-Luc Marion, Catherine Pickstock, Andrew Prevot

In this collection of essays, the sophistication and vibrancy of contemporary phenomenological research is documented, including both its engagement with key figures in the history of philosophy as well as with critical problems defining future directions of philosophical investigations. It honors the writings of Richard Cobb-Stevens, whose work in phenomenological philosophy, analytic philosophy and the history of philosophy has served as model for generations of philosophers working between these three fields of research. The essays collected in this volume provide an unique window on the contemporary state of the art in phenomenological philosophy by leading scholars of international reputation from North America and Europe. Historical figures such as Aristotle and Hobbes are innovatively brought into dialogue with phenomenological thinking. Phenomenological thinking is brought to bear on a wide variety of problems, from the nature of artworks and photography to questions concerning consciousness and intentionality. Among the topics discussed in these specially commissioned essays: phenomenology and Aristotle; the nature of the primal ego; Hobbes and Husserl; intentionality and reference, the argument of transcendental idealism; Neo-Aristotelian ethic; Husserl and Wittgenstein; photography; the nature of artworks."

In this collection of essays, the sophistication and vibrancy of contemporary phenomenological research is documented, including both its engagement with key figures in the history of philosophy, and with critical problems defining future directions of philosophical investigations. It honors the writings of Richard Cobb-Stevens, whose work in phenomenological philosophy, analytic philosophy and the history of philosophy has served as model for generations of philosophers working between these three fields of research. The essays collected in this volume provide a unique window on the contemporary state of the art in phenomenological philosophy by leading scholars of international reputation from North America and Europe.  Historical figures such as Aristotle and Hobbes are innovatively brought into dialogue with phenomenological thinking. Phenomenological thinking is brought to bear on a wide variety of problems, from the nature of artworks and photography to questions concerning consciousness and knowledge. Among the topics discussed in these specially commissioned essays:  phenomenology and Aristotle; the nature of the primal ego; Hobbes and Husserl; intentionality and reference; Neo-Aristotelian ethics; Husserl and Wittgenstein; photography; the nature of artworks.

The Face of the Other and the Trace of God contain essays on the philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas, and how his philosophy intersects with that of other philosophers, particularly Husserl, Kierkegaard, Sartre, and Derrida. This collection is broadly divided into two parts: relations with the other, and the questions of God.

The Face of the Other and the Trace of God contain essays on the philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas, and how his philosophy intersects with that of other philosophers, particularly Husserl, Kierkegaard, Sartre, and Derrida. This collection is broadly divided into two parts: relations with the other, and the questions of God.

The Unforgettable and the Unhoped For is the first English translation of a work by Jean-Louis Chretien, one of France's leading phenomenologists. Chretien unfolds the ideas of memory and loss, of the immemorable, and of hope, in a manner that opens a phenomenological path to the heart of classical thought. This line of reflection places him in the company of Emmanuel Levinas, Jean-Luc Marion, and Michel Henry, in attempting to join philosophy and religion after Kant, Nietzsche, and Heidegger.

The extremities of time exceed our memory and expectation. For philosophy, beginning with Plato, the truth of being is immemorable and cannot be rediscovered except in passing through forgetfulness. How are we to understand this first forgetting? Modern analyses live from a denial of loss: everything would be unforgettable, and is always preserved in memory.

For Christian thought, to hope against all hope and to remember the origin are two essential acts of faith. Memory must die in order to be reborn, in order to purify itself of all nostalgia and become memory of the promise. Augustine and John of the Cross, after Philo the Jew, teach us what contemporary thought has begun to rediscover: only the Other is unforgettable, for it alone is unhoped for.

What is secularity? Might it yield or define a distinctive form of reasoning? If so, would that form of reasoning belong essentially to our modern age, or would it instead have a considerably older lineage? And what might be the relation of that form of reasoning, whatever its lineage, to the Christian thinking that is often said to oppose it? In the present volume, these and related questions are addressed by a distinguished group of scholars working primarily within the Roman Catholic theological tradition and from the perspectives of Continental philosophy. As a whole, the volume constitutes a conversation among thinkers who agree in their concerns but not necessarily their conclusions. Taken individually, each essay concentrates on a range of historical developments with close attention to their intellectual and sometimes pedagogical implications. Secular reason, they argue, is neither the antipode of Christian thought nor a stable and well-resolved component of it. Christian thinking may engage with secular reason as the site of profound difficulties, but on occasion will also learn from it as a source of new insight."Christianity and Secular Reason" contributes to the contemporary discussion of secularity prompted especially by Charles Taylor's book "A Secular Age." Unlike Taylor's work, however, this collection concentrates specifically on secular "reason" and explicitly on its relation to Christianity. In this sense, it is closer to Michael J. Buckley's "At the Origins of Modern Atheism" or, to a lesser degree, Louis Dupre's "Passage to Modernity," which concern themselves with broad cultural developments."This volume offers a variety of perspectives, some historical, some normative/constructive, on the questions of the relations between politics/culture/religion and the relations between selfhood/humanity/world. The essays are, without exception, of high quality in both scholarly-exegetical terms, and constructive-normative ones. The writers are learned, sometimes witty, and often interesting." --Paul Griffiths, Duke Divinity School "This is no other volume I know of that covers just this ground. There is a substantial literature on, for example, the Habermas/Ratzinger exhange, and on Kant's view of the relation between philosophy and religion, and on the twelfth century background for thirteenth century reflection on this relation. The merit of "Christianity and Secular Reason" is that it holds these threads together, and others besides, in a new and fruitful way." --John E. Hare, Yale University