The Boundaries of Knowledge: The Unity of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik’s Jewish Philosophy in Light of His Doctoral Dissertation

2021 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 262-296
Author(s):  
Mark Smilowitz
Keyword(s):  
Doctoral Dissertation ◽  
Dialectical Method ◽  
Religious View ◽  
Jewish Philosophy ◽  
Epistemological Pluralism ◽  
Philosophical Writings

Abstract Two philosophical positions adopted by Soloveitchik in his doctoral dissertation continued to inform his Jewish philosophical writings throughout his career. The first position, epistemological pluralism, stands behind Soloveitchik’s approach to the religious view of causality and repentance in his writings during the 1940s–1960s. It also grounds his consistent use of the dialectical method. The second position, the eternal mystery of the unknown, comes from the Marburg neo-Kantian Paul Natorp; this idea is a consistent thread throughout Soloveitchik’s writings and a foundation of his existentialist writings through the late 1970s. The conclusion suggests how these two positions might be related to one another.

AVICENNA AMONG MEDIEVAL JEWS THE RECEPTION OF AVICENNA'S PHILOSOPHICAL, SCIENTIFIC AND MEDICAL WRITINGS IN JEWISH CULTURES, EAST AND WEST

2012 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 217-287 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gad Freudenthal ◽  
Mauro Zonta
Keyword(s):  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Present Article ◽  
Comprehensive Picture ◽  
East And West ◽  
Jewish Philosophy ◽  
Philosophical Writings ◽  
Medical Writings

AbstractThe reception of Avicenna by medieval Jewish readers presents an underappreciated enigma. Despite the philosophical and scientific stature of Avicenna, his philosophical writings were relatively little studied in Jewish milieus, be it in Arabic or in Hebrew. In particular, Avicenna's philosophical writings are not among the “Hebräische Übersetzungen des Mittelalters” – only very few of them were translated into Hebrew. As anauthor associated with a definite corpus of writings,Avicenna hardly existed in Jewish philosophy in Hebrew (contrary to Averroes). Paradoxically, however, some of Avicenna's most distinctive ideas were widely known and embraced by Jewish philosophers. This is the phenomenon that we dubAvicennian knowledge without Avicenna. In contrast with the philosophical treatises, Avicenna's medical writings were widely and intensively studied by Jews, especially in Hebrew, and remained influential until at least the seventeenth century. The present article presents a comprehensive picture of Avicenna's reception within medieval Jewish cultures in both Arabic and Hebrew and tries to explain the Jews’ complex attitude to Avicenna.

Luis M. Girón-Negrón. Alfonso de la Torre's Visión Deleytable: Philosophical Rationalism and the Religious Imagination in Fifteenth-Century Spain. Leiden: Brill, 2001. xvi, 306 pp.

AJS Review ◽  
2005 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 397-399
Author(s):  
Norman Roth
Keyword(s):  
Detailed Analysis ◽  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Doctoral Dissertation ◽  
Jewish Literature ◽  
Philosophical Work ◽  
Philosophical Discussion ◽  
Religious Imagination ◽  
Jewish Philosophy ◽  
Crown Prince ◽  
Amount Of Reading

Alfonso de la Torre (ca.1417–60), a person of somewhat obscure background, wrote Visión delectable de la filosofía artes liberales, metafísica y filosofía moral (or Visión deleytable as Girón-Negrón insists) ca. 1440 at the urging of the prior of Navarre, who was close to the crown prince Carlos de Viana. An unusual philosophical work for a Christian author, it does not conform to standard Scholastic doctrine, but is clearly dependent to a very great extent on the Guide for the Perplexed (Moreh nevukhim) of Maimonides. As such, the work, and this detailed analysis of it, is of particular interest to students of Jewish philosophy. At the outset, let it be said that Girón-Negrón has done a thorough and brilliant job in this book, a revision of his doctoral dissertation. He was aided by Jewish advisors in understanding and translating Hebrew texts, but one assumes that, as is the case with many Spanish scholars, his knowledge of Arabic is his own. He also has done an extensive amount of reading in secondary Jewish literature. (There are some errors, nevertheless; e.g., the philosopher Abraham Bivagch, not “Bibago,” did not engage in a “philosophical discussion” with Juan II of Aragón; rather, it was with an unnamed Christian “sage,” and it was a polemical debate, not a philosophical discussion.)

Utility of the doctoral dissertation.

1975 ◽  
Vol 30 (11) ◽  
pp. 1054-1061 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan L. Porter ◽  
Dael Wolfle
Keyword(s):  
Doctoral Dissertation

Inequality in the Promised Land

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 177-180
Author(s):  
Muhammad Sharif Uddin
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Minority Students ◽  
Doctoral Dissertation ◽  
Ethnographic Study ◽  
Suburban Area ◽  
Midwestern United States ◽  
Minority Community ◽  
Promised Land ◽  
Land Race ◽  
The Relationship

Inequality in the promised land: Race, resources, and suburban schooling is a well-written book by L’ Heureux Lewis-McCoy. The book is based on Lewis-McCoy’s doctoral dissertation, that included an ethnographic study in a suburban area named Rolling Acres in the Midwestern United States. Lewis-McCoy studied the relationship between families and those families’ relationships with schools. Through this study, the author explored how invisible inequality and racism in an affluent suburban area became the barrier for racial and economically minority students to grow up academically. Lewis-McCoy also discovered the hope of the minority community for raising their children for a better future.

The hydroid research of American naturalist Samuel F. Clarke, 1851–1928

1997 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-36 ◽  
Author(s):  
DALE R. CALDER ◽  
LESTER D. STEPHENS
Keyword(s):  
Developmental Biology ◽  
Taxonomic Status ◽  
Doctoral Dissertation ◽  
Nominal Species ◽  
Marine Biological Laboratory ◽  
Spotted Salamander ◽  
Johns Hopkins University ◽  
American Naturalist ◽  
American Schools ◽  
American Society

Samuel Fessenden Clarke was the leading specialist on hydroids (phylum Cnidaria) in North America over the last quarter of the nineteenth century. During that period he published taxonomic papers on hydroids from both the Atlantic and Pacific coasts of the continent, from the Gulf of Mexico, and from the eastern Pacific off Central and South America. He also authored a section on hydrozoan biology for “The Riverside Natural History” series. Most of his papers on hydroids were published while he was in his twenties. Clarke described as new 61 nominal species, three nominal genera, and one nominal family, as well as two “varieties” of hydroids. A list of these, and their current taxonomic status, appears in the present work. Clarke consistently provided sound descriptions and locality data for all supposed new species, and drew accurate illustrations of most of them. His research on Hydrozoa, beyond alphataxonomy, was directed towards faunal distributions and the use of hydroid assemblages as biogeographic indicators. In addition to investigations on hydroids, Clarke carried out research on the developmental biology of amphibians and reptiles. His doctoral dissertation at Johns Hopkins University was based on the embryology of the “Spotted Salamander” (=Yellow-spotted Salamander), and he published a major paper on the habits and embryology of the American Alligator. Most of Clarke's career was devoted to academic duties at Williams College, Massachusetts, where he was recognized as a dedicated and inspiring teacher. He served the American Society of Naturalists in various capacities, including a term as its president, was an influential trustee of the Marine Biological Laboratory, Woods Hole, and promoted the study of science in American schools.

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