Franz Rosenzweig and the Systematic Task of Philosophy

“Franz Rosenzweig and the Systematic Task of Philosophy is, by a very long shot, the best book written on The Star. In its general framing of the issues and intellectual context, in its painstaking attention to detail, in its philosophical sensitivity and interpretive creativity, and in its striking originality, it is simply beyond comparison. Perhaps most striking of all its virtues is the great light Pollock’s book sheds on the method of The Star, which turns out to be a highly original method rooted in a radical rethinking of the methodological resources of post-Kantianism. This is almost as much a tribute to Pollock’s philosophical agility as it is to Rosenzweig’s. The book is a must-read for anybody with a serious interest in modern Jewish thought. But it should also find an audience among those interested in continental philosophy, post-Kantian philosophy, and contemporary Christian theology. Anybody who has ever struggled with The Star, and many more who one hopes will struggle with it, will be grateful for this book.” – Paul Franks, University of Toronto

"Going against the grain of a number of dominant strands in the interpretation of Rosenzweig’s The Star of Redemption, especially in the last twenty years, Benjamin Pollock returns to the way in which a number of Rosenzweig’s contemporaries and, Pollock claims, Rosenzweig himself understood the task of the Star: as a systematic attempt to know “the All.” Lucidly written and meticulously researched, this book will enliven discussion not only about Rosenzweig’s The Star but also about the charge of philosophical thinking, broadly understood." --Leora Batnitzky, Princeton University

“One of this book’s great strengths is the close, patient, and philosophically attuned way Pollock reads texts. The scholarship is meticulous and comprehensive, superior to anything else we have, and the book reads like a detective story. But for all its quality scholarship, it is the philosophical subtlety and nuance of Pollock’s analysis that stands out. This is philosophical reconstruction and interpretation of a very high quality, comparable in every way to the best work we have on figures like Fichte and Hegel.” – Michael Morgan, Indiana University

“In this rigorous and lucid book the most philosophically demanding topic in the single greatest work of modern Jewish philosophy comes alive for the first time. For no question in Rosenzweig’s The Star of Redemption is more exacting than the question of system. Pollock’s work opens the door to a new philosophical reading of The Star, showing how Rosenzweig’s interests in dialogue, prayer, vision, death, and life all contribute to the renewal of the philosophical task of thinking systematically.” – Robert Gibbs, University of Toronto

“Pollock teaches us how to read Rosenzweig as a philosopher. Scholars and students in the fields of Jewish philosophy, German philosophy, and European intellectual history need this book.” – Martin Kavka, Florida State University