Overview

The re-examination of Saint Paul's letters in contemporary European philosophy is one of the most important developments at the crossroads of philosophy and theology today. In discussion with a range of authors contributing to this movement, including Heidegger, Badiou, Agamben, and Taubes, Gert-Jan van der Heiden offers a new and systematic account of the philosophical potential of these letters. He does so by uncovering a dialectic of exception, which revolves around the Pauline notions of the outcast and the spirit. Against a general tendency to understand the significance of Paul in politico-theological terms alone, van der Heiden focuses on the ontological potential of Saint Paul's letters by elucidating what they imply for our thinking about (non-)beings, world, event, time, exception and spirit. Ultimately, he shows how this dialectic implies a new understanding of being and thinking and gives rise to a new art of living, both ethically and politically.

Full Product Details

Author:   Gert-Jan van der Heiden (Professor of Metaphysics, Radboud University, Nijmegen)
Publisher:   Edinburgh University Press
Imprint:   Edinburgh University Press
ISBN:  

9781399521734

ISBN 10:   139952173
Pages:   232
Publication Date:   31 May 2025
Audience:   General/trade ,  General
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   In Print  
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Table of Contents

Acknowledgments 1. Introduction: Another Legacy of Paul? Retrieving Paul Philosophical Self-Portraits as Paul Three Leitmotifs Overview 2. The Dialectic Spirit of Paul Paul, a Dualist? Gnostic Temptation and Pauline Spirit Dialectic between Monism and Dualism Which Dialectic? 3. The Ghost of Nihilism Devaluations of Life Nietzsche’s Polemic Faith as Holding-to-be-True Retrieving Ancient Thought 4. Meontology Nothing in the World Sense of an Ending As Not Cast Out from the World 5. Time, Event, and Exception Death and Resurrection Dialectic of Exception Parousia and Potentiality-of-Being-Otherwise Between Past and Future 6. Law, Promise, and Grace State of Exception Paul’s Dialectic Political Theology Dualism of Law and Grace? Katargēsis and Charis 7. Community, Exception, and Outcast All Israel Neither Jew nor Greek A Part Without Part Set Apart 8. Epilogue: A Pauline Dialectic of Exception Positioning Paul in Ancient Thought Navigating Dialectically Firstfruits of the Spirit Bibliography

Reviews

Gert-Jan van der Heiden provides an excellent map to the confusing terrain of modern-day philosophical appropriations of St Paul, in Badiou, Taubes, Zizek, Agamben, and others. Through his interpretation, Paul comes forth as a radical thinker of new beginnings and forms of life, opening a door to thinking the world differently.-- ""Hans Ruin, Södertörn University (Stockholm)""

Author Information

Gert-Jan van der Heiden is Professor of Metaphysics at Radboud University, Nijmegen, the Netherlands. He is the author of The Voice of Misery: A Continental Philosophy of Testimony (SUNY, 2020), Ontology after Ontotheology: Plurality, Event and Contingency in Contemporary Philosophy (Duquesne University Press, 2014), The Truth (and Untruth) of Language: Heidegger, Ricoeur and Derrida on Disclosure and Displacement (Duquesne University Press, 2010). He is co-editor of The Gadamerian Mind (Routledge, 2022) and Saint Paul and Philosophy: The Consonance of Ancient and Modern Thought (De Gruyter, 2017). He is editor-in-chief of the Brill series Studies in Contemporary Phenomenology.

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