Peter J. Leithart

In academia, Constantine is suddenly hot. Several major new biographies have appeared, joined by new editions of older volumes and a spate of monographs on aspects of Constantine’s empire and its aftermath. Academic conferences on Constantine have become a cottage industry… . Continue Reading »

This year is the 1700th anniversary of Edict of Milan, and Constantine is academically hot and politically invisible . What might it mean for our politics if Constantine disappeared into the graduate seminars? . . . . Continue Reading »

Rosenstock-Huessy points out that “we” is not simply a plural, not simply “one plus one plus one,” not a plural as “10 chairs or 10 apples are.” “We” is a fundamentally liturgical pronoun: “It was not 10 oxen who first shouted ‘Te Deum . . . . Continue Reading »

Elijah makes a sudden appearance in 1 Kings’s depressing chronicle of idolatry, unfaithfulness, war, and death. In chapter 16, there’s a rapid turnover of kings, two military commanders who rebel against their masters, a suicide, Baal-worship and a temple of Baal. Turn the page, and . . . . Continue Reading »

Buber and Rosenstock were friends, and allies in certain matters, but Rosenstock had profound objections to Buber’s thought. Cristaudo ( Religion, Redemption and Revolution: The New Speech Thinking Revolution of Franz Rozenzweig and Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy , 107 ) characterizes as the . . . . Continue Reading »

Rosenzweig and Rosenstock-Huessy were all about names, and so set themselves against philosophy as it came from Socrates and Plato. Critaudo ( Religion, Redemption and Revolution: The New Speech Thinking Revolution of Franz Rozenzweig and Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy ) summarizes Rosenstock’s . . . . Continue Reading »

Kevin Hector offers this clarification in response to my summary of his Theology Without Metaphysics: God, Language and the Spirit of Recognition: “A crucial component of what I call ‘essentialist-correspondentist metaphysics’ is that it fits objects into predetermined categories or a . . . . Continue Reading »

Rosenstock-Huessy talks about the necessity of enemies as much as Carl Schmitt. Enemies keep us awake: “Thanks to Mr. Stalin, we have kept awake. It’s wonderful. Just, you see, have a good enemy, and you are taken care of. But your friends, beware of them. They put you to sleep. Do you . . . . Continue Reading »

It’s common to tell the history of philosophy as a calm passing-on of concepts or at least of questions. There are arguments, sometimes vigorous, but they take place in the proverbial ivory tower designed just to house philosophers. Rosenstock thinks otherwise. Philosophy arises from shock, . . . . Continue Reading »

Neither Rosenstock nor Rosenzweig were moralists. They did not believe that evil could be fought by urging people to do better, as the moralist thinks. Instead, evil is fought by creative, timely speech and action: “St. Francis did not call for others to act 0 he himself acted, and his action . . . . Continue Reading »