"A
strikingly original interpretation of Heidegger's politics that
explores the religious sources of his idiosyncratic vision of National
Socialism." —Bernard Yack, University of
Wisconsin-Madison
'The considerable interest of Rickey's work is to show in detail
that Heidegger is not the proto-communitarian he is sometimes described
as, but rather a peculiar kind of failed Christian communitarian,
loyal not to human beings but to being." —Tom Rockmore, Duquesne
University
Heidegger's connection with Nazism is well known and has been exhaustively
debated. But we need to understand better why Heidegger believed
National Socialism to be the best cure for the ills of modern society.
In this book Christopher Rickey examines the internal logic of Heidegger's
ideas to explain how they led him to become a powerful critic of
liberalism and a Nazi supporter.
Key to Rickey's interpretation is the radically antinomian conception
of religiosity he finds at the core of Heidegger's challenge to
modernity. Heidegger responds to the crisis of modernity with a
philosophy attuned to the fundamental need for humans to live with
the proper stance toward the divine. Inspired by Lutheran and mystical
theology, Heidegger outlines an essentially religious conception
of authentic human being. Like his radical Lutheran forerunners,
Heidegger politicizes the radical strains of Luther's theology to
create a potent revolutionary brew: the revolution of the saints.
Rickey traces out the ways in which these currents fundamentally
shape Heidegger's thought: the Lutheran background to his critique
of modern science and the technological rationality it spawns; his
transformation of Aristotle's prudential conception of practical
wisdom into the total revelation of being that lays the basis for
revolutionary political action; and his mystical and sectarian understanding
of authentic community.
Rickey shows how this political-theological vision forms the basis
of Heidegger's concrete political action, and concludes with an
analysis of the fundamental problems this vision poses to our political
thinking today.
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