A User's Guide to Franz Rosenzweig's Star of Redemption (Routledge Jewish Studies Series) by Norbert M. Samuelson

Author:Norbert M. Samuelson [Samuelson, Norbert M.]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
ISBN: 9781317832447
Publisher: Taylor and Francis
Published: 2014-04-04T04:00:00+00:00

CLASSICAL TRAGEDY

It is the self of the pagan human (heidnische Mensch) that is characterized by this relatively isolated state, ‘isolated’ because he/she is self-enclosed, but ‘relatively’ so because he/she is not secluded. He/she is isolated because he/she is unconscious of it; still, he/she is within the world.

In Part I, Book 3 Rosenzweig illustrated the seclusion with the Gilgamesh epic. There, the solitary self as tragic hero encounters love (Eros) through a friend, and then death (Thanatos), which the soul defies through silence. This silence characterizes the tragic hero’s spoken relationship to the world. Again, he is isolated from others, but not absolutely so.

In the case of Greek theater, the chorus makes this state vocal to the audience. It tells them what it sees but the hero cannot speak, because he has not yet been given that power through divine love.

However, once loved by God, even this barest of relations to another is lost. Hence, the extreme exclusiveness of the beloved’s love of God threatens to move the loving God and the open soul of the world back to the border of the pre-world, where God is concealed and the soul is secluded. It is this extreme isolation that is the source for the faith of the mystic (der Mystiker).

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