Philosophy of Emil Fackenheim

Fackenheim was one of the most philosophically serious, knowledgeable, and provocative contemporary Jewish thinkers.  His original focus as a philosophical theologian was mainly on revelation, but in his later work he concerned himself primarily with the wide-ranging  implications of the  Holocaust. In this book, Kenneth Hart Green examines Fackenheim's intellectual trajectory and traces how and why he focused so intently on the Holocaust.  He explores the deeper thought that Fackenheim developed about the Holocaust, which he construed as a cataclysmic event that ruptured history and one that also brought about a change in the very structure of being. As Green demonstrates, the Holocaust, according to Fackenheim's interpretation, changes how we view all things, from God to man to history. It also radically affects Judaism, Christianity, and philosophy, the major traditions that have shaped the Western world.

'The book is the consummation of a lifetime of reflection not only on Fackenheim's unique combination of Jewish thought and philosophical speculation but also on those few, fundamental, and enduring questions that vex every age-the relation between reason and revelation, Athens and Jerusalem, the world of historical change and the search for timeless truths.' Paul Wilford, Mosaic Magazines, 'The book is the consummation of a lifetime of reflection not only on Fackenheim's unique combination of Jewish thought and philosophical speculation but also on those few, fundamental, and enduring questions that vex every age the relation between reason and revelation, Athens and Jerusalem, the world of historical change and the search for timeless truths.' Paul Wilford, Mosaic, 'The book is the consummation of a lifetime of reflection not only on Fackenheim's unique combination of Jewish thought and philosophical speculation but also on those few, fundamental, and enduring questions that vex every age-the relation between reason and revelation … Green's familiarity with the tradition […] allows him to guide his readers through a number of philosophical and theological questions, attending to Fackenheim's debt to the tradition while also illustrating his unique contribution and innovative response to the Holocaust, the crisis of his age.' Paul Wilford, German Idealism and the Philosophy of History

Kenneth Hart Green is Professor in the Department of the Study of Religion at the University of Toronto. A scholar of Jewish Thought, he is the author of numerous journal articles and books, most recently Leo Strauss and the Rediscovery of Maimonides (2013).