“Ich Habe Nicht Geantwortet”: Hermeneutics of Secrecy, Religious Silence, and Dialogvergessenheit in Martin Buber’s Exchange with Franz Rosenzweig about Halakhah
The exchange between Martin Buber and Franz Rosenzweig on the status of halakha is a well known, but also frustrating fixture in scholarship. For rather than responding to Rosenzweig’s critique, Buber seems to retreat in silence, claiming to be “unable to speak” about his position on Jewish Law. Sch...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Published: |
[2020]
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| In: |
Naharaim
Year: 2020, Volume: 14, Issue: 1, Pages: 103-132 |
| Further subjects: | B
Halakha
B Franz Rosenzweig B Hermeneutics B Martin Buber B Jewish Law |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (Verlag) Volltext (doi) |
| Summary: | The exchange between Martin Buber and Franz Rosenzweig on the status of halakha is a well known, but also frustrating fixture in scholarship. For rather than responding to Rosenzweig’s critique, Buber seems to retreat in silence, claiming to be “unable to speak” about his position on Jewish Law. Scholars have generally tried to explain Buber’s failure to respond on philosophical and biographical grounds. What I propose, by contrast, is to revisit the question of Buber’s silence and secrecy from a hermeneutical standpoint, arguing that Buber engaged in a deliberate strategy of concealment that constituted its own form of response. The hermeneutics of silence discloses a call for religious renewal that follows a state of Dialogvergessenheit, but which cannot be made audible. Neither dialogue nor its remembrance can be commanded. While Buber struggles with his Nichtredenkönnen, he also stands in a tradition of secretive hermeneutics - the Jewish hermeneutics of sod. |
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| ISSN: | 1862-9156 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Naharaim
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1515/naha-2019-0015 |