The Place of Hermann Cohen’s Ideas in the Philosophy of Dialogue
- DOI
- 10.5922/0207-6918-2020-4-3
- Pages
- 62-94
Abstract
My aim is to prove that Hermann Cohen was not only a philosopher of dialogue but has played an exceedingly important role in the history of that current of thought. His books Ethics of Pure Will (1904) and Religion of Reason out of the Sources of Judaism (1919) offer a detailed analysis of the relationships between I and Thou, I and It, I and We. In the first book these relationships are considered from the ethical-legal point of view and in the second from the viewpoint of religious anthropology. However, Cohen considers the problem of inter-personal relationships not in isolation, but as an important component of his entire philosophical system. Deduction of the concept of personality in Ethics of Pure Will is based on Cohen’s logic of the origin expounded in the first part of his system in The Logic of Pure Cognition. Cohen explains that the origin of the self-consciousness of I as a personality is not the external world, but another person, i.e. Thou. In turn, the partnership relationships between I and Thou create the community We which forms the basis of the law-governed state. The process of artistic creation in the framework of inter-personal relationship is explored in Aesthetics of Pure Feeling. Finally, Religion of Reason out of the Sources of Judaism formulates the conception of religion as the most complete realisation of inter-personal relationship. Thus, dialogism became an important dimension of Cohen’s entire philosophical system, a fact noted by Martin Buber. Franz Rosenzweig, in unfolding dialogical thinking, expressly appeals to all the elements of Cohen’s system. There are signs of his influence on Bakhtin’s doctrine. Thus, examining Cohen’s doctrine as part of the philosophy of dialogue gives insights into this entire trend as a coherent whole.
Reference
Bakhtin, M. M., 2003. Sobranie sochinenij [Collected Works]. Volume 1. Moscow: Yazyki slavyanskikh kultur. (In Rus.)
Bakhtin, M. M. and Duvakin, V. D., 1996. Besedy V. D. Duvakina s M. M. Bakhtinym [Conversations of V. Duvakin with M. Bakhtin]. Introduction by S. G. Bocharov and V. V. Radzishevsky; Afterword by V. V. Kozhinov. Moscow: Progress. (In Rus.)
Belov, V. N., 2000. Neokantianstvo. Part 1: Vozniknovenie neokantianstva. Marburgskaya shkola. German Kogen [Neo-Kantianism. The Rise of Neo-Kantianism. Marburg School. Hermann Cohen]. Saratov: “Nauchnaya kniga”. (In Rus.)
Belov, V. N., 2004. Philosophy of Hermann Cohen and Russian Neo-Kantianism. In: History of Philosophy Yearbook — 2003. Moscow: Nauka, pp. 333-353. (In Rus.)
Belov, V. N., 2015. Is Hermann Cohen a Neo-Kantian? Kantian Journal, 1, pp. 38-45. (In Rus.)
Bibler, V.S., 1991. Mikhail Mikhailovich Bakhtin, ili Poetika kul’tury [Mikhail Mikhailovich Bakhtin, or Poetics of Culture]. Moscow: Progress; Gnozis. (In Rus.)
Bienenstock, M., ed. 2011. Hermann Cohen: l’idéalisme critique aux prises avec le matérialisme. Revue de métaphysique et de morale, 1.
Bienenstock, M., 2018. Cohen und Rosenzweig: ihre Auseinandersetzung mit dem deutschen Idealismus. Freiburg: Verlag Karl Alber.
Buber, M., 1923. Ich und Du. In: M. Buber, 1997. Das dialogische Prinzip. Heidelberg: Schneider, pp. 7-138.
Buber, M., 1937. I and Thou. Translated by R. Gregor Smith. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark.
Buber, M., 2002. The History of the Dialogical Principle. In: M. Buber, 2002. Between Man and Man. Translated by R. Gregor-Smith. With an introduction by M. Friedman. London and New York: Routledge, pp. 249-264.
Cassirer, E., 1922. The Form of the Concept in Mythical Thinking. In: E. Cassirer, 2013. The Warburg Years (1919–1933): Essays on Language, Art, Myth, and Technology. Translated and with an Introduction by S. G. Lofts with A. Calcagno. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, pp. 1-71.
Casper, B., 1967. Das dialogische Denken: Eine Untersuchung der religionsphilosophischen Bedeutung Franz Rosenzweigs, Ferdinand Ebners und Martin Bubers. Freiburg, Basel & Wien: Herder.
Cohen, H., 1871. Kants Theorie der Erfahrung. Berlin: Dümmler.
Cohen, H., 1902. Logik der reinen Erkenntnis. Berlin: Cassirer.
Cohen, H., 1904. Ethik des reinen Willens. Berlin: Cassirer.
Cohen, H., 1912. Ästhetik des reinen Gefühls. In 2 Volumes. Berlin: Cassirer.
Cohen, H., 1919. Die Religion der Vernunft aus den Quellen des Judentums. Leipzig: Fock.
Cohen H., 1972. Religion of Reason out of the Sources of Judaism. Translated, with an introduction, by S. Kaplan. Introductory essay by L. Strauss. New York: F. Ungar.
Cristaudo, W., 2006. Rosenzweig and Rosenstock’s Critiques of Idealism: The Common Front of Contrary Allegiances. In: Franz Rosenzweigs “Neues Denken”. Band 2: Erfahrene Offenbarung — in theologos. Edited by W. Schmied-Kowarzik. Freiburg: Karl Alber,
pp. 1121-1140.
Dmitrieva, N. A., 2013. Neo-Kantian Motifs in Boris Pasternak’s World View. In: A. S. Sergeeva-Klyatis, O. A. Lekmanov, eds. 2013. “Ob’yatie v tysyachu okhvatov”: sbornik materialov, posvyashennyi pamyati Evgeniya Borisovicha Pasternaka i ego 90-letiyu [“A Hug in a Thousand Embraces”: a Collection of Papers in Memory of Evgeny Pasternak and His Ninetieth Birthday]. St. Petersburg: RChGA, pp. 59-80. (In Rus.)
Dmitrieva, N., 2016. Back to Kant, or Forward to Enlightenment: The Particularities and Issues of Russian Neo-Kantianism. Russian Studies in Philosophy, 54(5), pp. 378-394.
Dvorkin, I. S., 2002. The Thou and the It: Following of Buber and Freud. Voprosy Filosofii, 4, pp. 141-158. (In Rus.).
Dvorkin, I., 2013. Towards a Philosophy of Dialogue. In: V. A. Malakhov and G. P. Kovadlo. Filosofski dialogi’2013. Tolerantnost’ ta dialog v suchasnomu sviti [Philosophical Dialogues. Tolerance and Dialogue in Everyday Life]: Collected papers. Volume 7. Kiev: Stilos, pp. 112-171. (In Rus.)
Dvorkin I., 2019. Hermann Cohen and the Philosophy of Dialogue. In: Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Contemporary Education, Social Sciences and Humanities (ICCESSH 2019). Amsterdam and Paris: Atlantis Press, pp. 164-169. Avalable at: https://www.atlantis-press.com/proceedings/iccessh-19/125911798 (Accessed: 01.06.2020).
Ebner, F., 1921. Das Wort und die geistigen Realitäten. Pneumatologische Fragmente. Innsbruck: Brenner Verlag.
Gadamer, H. -G, 1994. Heidegger’s Ways. Translated by J. W. Stanley. Albany: SUNY Press, pp. 95-109.
Gibbs, R., 1999. Correlations in Rosenzweig and Levinas. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Gordin, J., 1929. Untersuchungen zur Theorie des unendlichen Urteils. Berlin: Akademie.
Gordon, P. E., 2010. Continental Divide: Heidegger, Cassirer, Davos. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Feuerbach, L., 1986. Principles of the Philosophy of the Future. Translated by M. Vogel with an Introduction by T. E. Wartenberg, Indianapolis: Hackett.
Hegel, G. W. F., 1991. Elements of the Philosophy of Right. Edited by A. W. Wood, translated by H. B. Nisbet. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Hegel, G. W. F., 2010a. Encyclopaedia of the Philosophical Sciences in Basic Outline. Part 1: Logic. Translated and edited by K. Brinkmann and D. O. Dahlstrom. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Hegel, G. W. F., 2010b. The Science of Logic. Translated by G. di Giovanni. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Hegel, G. W. F., 2017. Phenomenology of Spirit. Translated by T. Pinkard. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Heidegger, M., 1960. Der Ursprung des Kunstwerks. Stuttgart: Reclam.
Kagan, M. I., 2004. O hode istorii [On the Course of History]. Moscow: Yazyki slavyanskikh kultur. (In Rus.)
Kajon, I., 1989. Ebraismo e sistema di filosofia in Hermann Cohen. Padova: CEDAM.
Kant, I., 1998. Critique of Pure Reason. Translated and edited by P. Guyer and A. W. Wood. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Kant, I., 2000. Critique of the Power of Judgment. Edited by P. Guyer, translated by P. Guyer and E. Matthews. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Kant, I., 2005. Notes and Fragments. Edited by P. Guyer. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Katsman, R., 2013а. Love and Bewilderment: Matvei Kagan’s Literary Critical Concepts. Partial Answers: Journal of Literature and the History of Ideas, 11(1), pp. 9-28.
Katsman, R., 2013b. Matvei Kagan: Judaism and the European Cultural Crisis. Journal of Jewish Thought & Philosophy. 21(1), pp. 73-103.
Levinas, E., 1974. Autrement qu’être ou Au-delà de l’essence. The Hague: Martinus Nijhott & La Haye.
Makhlin, V. L., 1997. Ya i Drugoj: K istorii dialogicheskogo principa v filosofii XX v. [I and the Other: Towards the History of the Dialogical Principle in the Philosophy of the Twentieth Century]. Moscow: Labirint. (In Rus.)
Munk, R., ed. 2005. Hermann Cohen’s Critical Idealism. Dordrecht: Springer.
Neuhold, K., 2014. Franz Rosenzweig und die idealistische Philosophie. Berlin: LIT.
Pasternak, B., 1958. Safe Conduct. In: B. Pasternak, 1958. Safe Conduct. An Autobiography and Other Writings. New York: New American Library, pp. 13-116.
Poma, A., 1997. The Critical Philosophy of Hermann Cohen. Translated by J. Denton. Albany: SUNY Press.
Popov, P. S., 1960. Istoriya logiki novogo vremeni [The History of Modern Logic]. Moscow: Izdatelstvo MGU. (In Rus.)
Rosenzweig, F., 1925. Das neue Denken. Eine nachträgliche Bemerkung zum „Stern der Erlösung“. Der Morgen: Monatsschrift der Juden in Deutschland, 4, pp. 426-451.
Rosenzweig, F., 1921. Der Stern der Erlösung. Reprint 2002. With Introduction by B. Casper, edited by A. Raffelt. [e-book] Freiburg im Breisgau: Universitätsbibliothek. Available at: Universitätsbibliothek Freiburg [Accessed 28 May 2020].
Rosenzweig, F., 2005. The Star of Redemption. Translated by B. E. Galli. Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press.
Sokuler, Z. A., 2008. German Kogen i filosofiya dialoga [Hermann Cohen and the Philosophy of Dialogue]. Moscow: Progress-Traditsiya. (In Rus.)
Zank, M., 2008. New Literature on Hermann Cohen. Jewish Quarterly Review, 98(4), pp. 566-573.