Half-day symposium "Rethinking the Theological-Political Complex: Derrida's Spinoza" of the Jackman Humanities Institute (JHI), co-sponsored by the Centre for Jewish Studies, the Centre for Comparative Literature, the Department of Philosophy, and the Department of French at the University of Toronto, Jackman Humanities Building, Room 100, 170 St. George Street, Toronto, Canada, (Sunday!) 7 March 2010, 2.00-6.00 pm
www.humanities.utoronto.ca/event_details/id=198
Speakers: Warren Montag (English and Comparative Literature, Occidental College): "Immanence, Transcendence and the Trace: Derrida Between Levinas and Spinoza"; Gerard Bensussan (Philosophy, University of Strasbourg): "L'effroi de Spinoza: Derrida lecteure du Traité théologico-politique"; Willi Goetschel (German, University of Toronto): "Rethinking the Theological-Political: Derrida's Spinoza"; followed by a round table.
The location is wheelchair-accessible. If you are a person with a disability and require accommodation, please contact Kim Yates by
1 March 2010 to make appropriate arrangements: jhi.associate@utoronto.ca
You may want to contact them upfront to see whether persons from outside the University of Toronto can participate.
Showing posts with label Theologico-Political Treatise. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Theologico-Political Treatise. Show all posts
29 September 2009
CONF: Association for Jewish Studies 2009 annual conference
41st Annual Conference of the Association for Jewish Studies (AJS), Hyatt Regency Century Plaza Hotel, Los Angeles, California, USA,
20-22 December 2009
This year's annual conference of the AJS features a multi-panel session on "Modern Jewish Thought and Theology" with a particular interest in political theology.
Scheduled panels include, firstly, "Jacob Taubes's Political Theology in Light of His Relationship to Carl Schmitt" (21 December, 2-4 pm, Room 3):
Abstract: The panel is devoted to Jacob Taubes, the Jewish thinker, historian of religion, gnosticism, and apocalyptic strains in Judaism and Christianity, who influenced generations of scholars during his academic career at the Hebrew University, Harvard, Columbia, the Free University at Berlin, and the Maison des Sciences de l'Homme in Paris, but whose work has elicited much wider attention of late. This is due, in part, to a general, renewed interest in the problem of political theology, due, as well, to the engagement with his work on the part of Giorgio Agamben and others, but chiefly to the recent translation of his powerful late lectures on "The Political Theology of Paul". Taubes's articles are about to be collected for the first time in an English-language edition, and more is to follow. Taubes was a prodigious letter writer, and the first correspondence to be published is the one between Taubes and the political theorist Carl Schmitt, 35 years his senior, with whose work Taubes was deeply engaged since the immediate postwar period while keeping a measured distance until the late 1970s, when the two men exchanged a series of letters and Taubes visited Schmitt in his remote refuge in Plettenberg.
The panel is led by Martin Treml's presentation on the letters exchanged between Taubes and Schmitt. Treml is currently finishing his edition of the Taubes-Schmitt correspondence at the Center for Literary and Cultural Research Berlin, which houses Taubes's literary estate. Nitzan Lebovic (Sussex) and Arnd Wedemeyer (Princeton), who both have conducted research at the Taubes Archive, will discuss the context of the correspondence and its implications for Taubes's conception of political theology. Lebovic will reconstruct Taubes's unique mobilization of apocalypticism for his antinomian conception of the law, devised, Lebovic argues, not only as an answer to Schmitt's theopolitical antiliberalism, but also to Martin Buber's own reaction against Schmitt. Wedemeyer will focus on one particular problem of Pauline theology, the so-called "curse of the law", in the context both of Taubes's relation to Schmitt, as well as to previous Jewish interpreters of Paul.
Second panel: "Political Theology and Judaism in Spinoza, Mendelssohn and Fackenheim" (22 December, 8.30-10.30 am, Room 9):
Abstract: If "political theology" means a politics guided by theological considerations and/or a theology guided by political considerations, then if these considerations are in tension or incompatible, which should take priority? Our panel examines this question in three key modern Jewish thinkers. For each, "politics" means liberal democracy (or, for Mendelssohn, constitutional monarchy), and "theology" means biblical theology (or, for Spinoza and Mendelssohn, some "rationalist" equivalent).
Joshua Parens (Dallas) explores what Spinoza's "Ethics" indicates about his political theology in "Tractatus Theologico-Politicus" (TTP). What does the congeniality between TTP and the "rationalist" theology of "Ethics", its introduction, teach about Spinoza's political theology: if the "Ethics" provides deeper insight into Spinoza's modified version of biblical theology in TTP than does TTP by itself, is the ground for that theology biblical or utilitarian, as TTP leads us to suspect?
Martin D. Yaffe (North Texas) asks how well Mendelssohn's rationalist theology serves to underwrite his practical-political argument for Christian-Jewish tolerance. Yaffe compares Mendelssohn's theologically-grounded argument with Lessing's, which Mendelssohn professes not to understand. Lessing's argument, Yaffe finds, is more "political" than "theological" – being designed not just to rubber-stamp its readers' Christian theology, but to expand that theology towards increased appreciation and tolerance for Judaism. Mendelssohn's rationalist political theology fails to come to grips with Lessing's politically (and philosophically) motivated irony.
Sharon Portnoff (Connecticut College) suggests that Fackenheim's political theology is located in his "quasi-historicism". She suggests that Fackenheim was well aware of the dangers of incorporating historicism into Jewish theology and explores the way in which Fackenheim navigated these dangers. She finds that Fackenheim's quasi-historicism both serves to defend Jews and Judaism politically and also, paradoxically, remains open to the political possibility that it evolve into its own obsolescence.
Kenneth Green (Toronto) considers the phrase "demonic evil" in Fackenheim's mature thought. He asks how much Fackenheim's related subterranean emphasis on the devil is a significant even if largely unrecognized factor in his theological response to the Holocaust and radical evil. Green raises a question with regard to Fackenheim's political theology: because rejection of the devil issues in concerted political action, is it as a direct consequence that he disallow as immoral any political neutrality on such political action?
Further panels of particular interest to political theology include "Monotheism and Its Discontents" (21 December, 8.30-10.30 am, Room 12); "Religion, Politics, Ethics" – including a paper "Determined to be Free: Spinoza's Political Theology of Freedom" by Steven H. Frankel (Xavier University) – (22 December, 10.45 am-12.45 pm, Room 9); and "Rosenzweig and Arendt" – including a paper "'The Light of the Public Obscures Everything': Arendt and the Public Threat of Political Theology" by Benjamin Aldes Wurgaft (Berkeley) – (20 December, 2-4 pm, Room 11).
The detailed conference programme can be browsed and searched here:
http://64.112.226.77/one/ajs/ajs09/index.php?cmd=ajs09&id=
General conference information (including a link to the registration page) is to be found at:
www.ajsnet.org/generalinfo.htm
20-22 December 2009
This year's annual conference of the AJS features a multi-panel session on "Modern Jewish Thought and Theology" with a particular interest in political theology.
Scheduled panels include, firstly, "Jacob Taubes's Political Theology in Light of His Relationship to Carl Schmitt" (21 December, 2-4 pm, Room 3):
Abstract: The panel is devoted to Jacob Taubes, the Jewish thinker, historian of religion, gnosticism, and apocalyptic strains in Judaism and Christianity, who influenced generations of scholars during his academic career at the Hebrew University, Harvard, Columbia, the Free University at Berlin, and the Maison des Sciences de l'Homme in Paris, but whose work has elicited much wider attention of late. This is due, in part, to a general, renewed interest in the problem of political theology, due, as well, to the engagement with his work on the part of Giorgio Agamben and others, but chiefly to the recent translation of his powerful late lectures on "The Political Theology of Paul". Taubes's articles are about to be collected for the first time in an English-language edition, and more is to follow. Taubes was a prodigious letter writer, and the first correspondence to be published is the one between Taubes and the political theorist Carl Schmitt, 35 years his senior, with whose work Taubes was deeply engaged since the immediate postwar period while keeping a measured distance until the late 1970s, when the two men exchanged a series of letters and Taubes visited Schmitt in his remote refuge in Plettenberg.
The panel is led by Martin Treml's presentation on the letters exchanged between Taubes and Schmitt. Treml is currently finishing his edition of the Taubes-Schmitt correspondence at the Center for Literary and Cultural Research Berlin, which houses Taubes's literary estate. Nitzan Lebovic (Sussex) and Arnd Wedemeyer (Princeton), who both have conducted research at the Taubes Archive, will discuss the context of the correspondence and its implications for Taubes's conception of political theology. Lebovic will reconstruct Taubes's unique mobilization of apocalypticism for his antinomian conception of the law, devised, Lebovic argues, not only as an answer to Schmitt's theopolitical antiliberalism, but also to Martin Buber's own reaction against Schmitt. Wedemeyer will focus on one particular problem of Pauline theology, the so-called "curse of the law", in the context both of Taubes's relation to Schmitt, as well as to previous Jewish interpreters of Paul.
Second panel: "Political Theology and Judaism in Spinoza, Mendelssohn and Fackenheim" (22 December, 8.30-10.30 am, Room 9):
Abstract: If "political theology" means a politics guided by theological considerations and/or a theology guided by political considerations, then if these considerations are in tension or incompatible, which should take priority? Our panel examines this question in three key modern Jewish thinkers. For each, "politics" means liberal democracy (or, for Mendelssohn, constitutional monarchy), and "theology" means biblical theology (or, for Spinoza and Mendelssohn, some "rationalist" equivalent).
Joshua Parens (Dallas) explores what Spinoza's "Ethics" indicates about his political theology in "Tractatus Theologico-Politicus" (TTP). What does the congeniality between TTP and the "rationalist" theology of "Ethics", its introduction, teach about Spinoza's political theology: if the "Ethics" provides deeper insight into Spinoza's modified version of biblical theology in TTP than does TTP by itself, is the ground for that theology biblical or utilitarian, as TTP leads us to suspect?
Martin D. Yaffe (North Texas) asks how well Mendelssohn's rationalist theology serves to underwrite his practical-political argument for Christian-Jewish tolerance. Yaffe compares Mendelssohn's theologically-grounded argument with Lessing's, which Mendelssohn professes not to understand. Lessing's argument, Yaffe finds, is more "political" than "theological" – being designed not just to rubber-stamp its readers' Christian theology, but to expand that theology towards increased appreciation and tolerance for Judaism. Mendelssohn's rationalist political theology fails to come to grips with Lessing's politically (and philosophically) motivated irony.
Sharon Portnoff (Connecticut College) suggests that Fackenheim's political theology is located in his "quasi-historicism". She suggests that Fackenheim was well aware of the dangers of incorporating historicism into Jewish theology and explores the way in which Fackenheim navigated these dangers. She finds that Fackenheim's quasi-historicism both serves to defend Jews and Judaism politically and also, paradoxically, remains open to the political possibility that it evolve into its own obsolescence.
Kenneth Green (Toronto) considers the phrase "demonic evil" in Fackenheim's mature thought. He asks how much Fackenheim's related subterranean emphasis on the devil is a significant even if largely unrecognized factor in his theological response to the Holocaust and radical evil. Green raises a question with regard to Fackenheim's political theology: because rejection of the devil issues in concerted political action, is it as a direct consequence that he disallow as immoral any political neutrality on such political action?
Further panels of particular interest to political theology include "Monotheism and Its Discontents" (21 December, 8.30-10.30 am, Room 12); "Religion, Politics, Ethics" – including a paper "Determined to be Free: Spinoza's Political Theology of Freedom" by Steven H. Frankel (Xavier University) – (22 December, 10.45 am-12.45 pm, Room 9); and "Rosenzweig and Arendt" – including a paper "'The Light of the Public Obscures Everything': Arendt and the Public Threat of Political Theology" by Benjamin Aldes Wurgaft (Berkeley) – (20 December, 2-4 pm, Room 11).
The detailed conference programme can be browsed and searched here:
http://64.112.226.77/one/ajs/ajs09/index.php?cmd=ajs09&id=
General conference information (including a link to the registration page) is to be found at:
www.ajsnet.org/generalinfo.htm
09 March 2009
CONF: Thinking with Spinoza: Politics, Philosophy and Religion
Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities, Birkbeck College at the University of London
7-8 May 2009, Room B35 Birkbeck Main Building
Does religious pluralism undermine political co-operation? Does religion differ from superstition? What is the scope of philosophical knowledge? Can it live alongside religious faith? How can states combine pluralism with solidarity? How deeply does political co-operation depend on imagined narratives? These and other themes of Spinoza’s seminal "Theologico-Political Treatise" will be discussed at the two-day conference "Thinking with Spinoza: Politics, Philosophy and Religion".
Speakers:
- Etienne Balibar (Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities), "Spinoza’s Three Gods and the Modes of Communication"
- Aaron Garrett, (Boston University), "Knowing the Essence of the State"
- Don Garrett (New York University), "Spinoza’s ‘Promising’ Ideas: Contract and Covenant in the Theologico-Political Treatise"
- Moira Gatens (University of Sydney), "Compelling Fictions: Spinoza and George Eliot on Belief and Faith"
- Susan James (Birkbeck College), "When does Truth Matter? The Politics of Spinoza’s Philosophy"
- Warren Montag (Occidental College), "Lucretius Hebraizant: Spinoza’s reading of Ecclesiastes"
- Pierre-Francois Moreau (Ecole Normale Supérieure des Lettres et Sciences Humaines, Lyon), "From Scripture to Nations: Spinoza’s Theory of History in the Theologico-Political Treatise"
Further attraction:
Beth Lord (University of Dundee) will launch the Spinoza Research Network, a two-year project funded by the UK Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC).
Registration essential. Standard fee £45; Birkbeck staff and all students £20.
Booking forms are available at:
www.bbk.ac.uk/bih/news/spinoza
The Spinoza Research Network offers two travel bursaries for doctoral candidates (or academics on part-time/fixed-term contracts) to attend this conference and the Network meeting. The bursary reimburses travel from within Europe (max. £150), registration fee (£20) and accommodation (max. £100). You will need to explain how the conference is relevant to your research. Doctoral candidates should include contact details for their supervisor. To apply, please email Beth Lord: b.lord@dundee.ac.uk
Spinoza Research Network:
www.dundee.ac.uk/philosophy/spinoza/
This conference is co-sponsored by the European Journal of Philosophy and the Institute of Philosophy.
7-8 May 2009, Room B35 Birkbeck Main Building
Does religious pluralism undermine political co-operation? Does religion differ from superstition? What is the scope of philosophical knowledge? Can it live alongside religious faith? How can states combine pluralism with solidarity? How deeply does political co-operation depend on imagined narratives? These and other themes of Spinoza’s seminal "Theologico-Political Treatise" will be discussed at the two-day conference "Thinking with Spinoza: Politics, Philosophy and Religion".
Speakers:
- Etienne Balibar (Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities), "Spinoza’s Three Gods and the Modes of Communication"
- Aaron Garrett, (Boston University), "Knowing the Essence of the State"
- Don Garrett (New York University), "Spinoza’s ‘Promising’ Ideas: Contract and Covenant in the Theologico-Political Treatise"
- Moira Gatens (University of Sydney), "Compelling Fictions: Spinoza and George Eliot on Belief and Faith"
- Susan James (Birkbeck College), "When does Truth Matter? The Politics of Spinoza’s Philosophy"
- Warren Montag (Occidental College), "Lucretius Hebraizant: Spinoza’s reading of Ecclesiastes"
- Pierre-Francois Moreau (Ecole Normale Supérieure des Lettres et Sciences Humaines, Lyon), "From Scripture to Nations: Spinoza’s Theory of History in the Theologico-Political Treatise"
Further attraction:
Beth Lord (University of Dundee) will launch the Spinoza Research Network, a two-year project funded by the UK Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC).
Registration essential. Standard fee £45; Birkbeck staff and all students £20.
Booking forms are available at:
www.bbk.ac.uk/bih/news/spinoza
The Spinoza Research Network offers two travel bursaries for doctoral candidates (or academics on part-time/fixed-term contracts) to attend this conference and the Network meeting. The bursary reimburses travel from within Europe (max. £150), registration fee (£20) and accommodation (max. £100). You will need to explain how the conference is relevant to your research. Doctoral candidates should include contact details for their supervisor. To apply, please email Beth Lord: b.lord@dundee.ac.uk
Spinoza Research Network:
www.dundee.ac.uk/philosophy/spinoza/
This conference is co-sponsored by the European Journal of Philosophy and the Institute of Philosophy.
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