The Trace of God: Derrida and Religion (Perspectives in Continental Philosophy) - Softcover

Baring, Edward; Gordon, Peter E.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0823262103 ISBN 13: 9780823262106

Publisher: Fordham University Press, 2014

Synopsis

Derrida’s writings on the question of religion have played a crucial role in the transformation of scholarly debate across the globe. The Trace of God provides a compact introduction to this debate. It considers Derrida’s fraught relationship to Judaism and his Jewish identity, broaches the question of Derrida's relation to the Western Christian tradition, and examines both the points of contact and the silences in Derrida's treatment of Islam.

About this title

About the Author:

Edward Baring is Assistant Professor in Modern Europe an Intellectual and Cultural History at Drew University. He is the author of The Young Derrida and French Philosophy, 1945– 1968 (Cambridge University Press, 2011), which won the Morris D. Forkosch Prize from the Journal of the History of Ideas for Best Book in Intellectual History. He has written articles on Derrida and Sartre, which have appeared in Critical Inquiry, Modern Intellectual History, and elsewhere. He is currently working on a Europe- wide history of phenomenology in the period before 1950.

Review:

Jacques Derrida’s most lasting legacy might well be his writings on religion, which not only restored the dialogue between religion and philosophy but also traced the entanglements of faith and knowledge, sacral and secular. If the perplexed seek a guide, they can do no better than this excellent volume. It explores Derrida’s engagements with religion across the entire span of his career and the vast range of his interests. Bringing together established voices and younger scholars, these essays highlight the complexity and ambiguity of Derrida’s thought and accentuate robust disagreements rather than harmonious consensus. (―Warren Breckman University of Pennsylvania)

“Edward Baring and Peter Gordon are to be commended for assembling such a
high-quality collection.”

(―Samir Haddad Fordham University)

“Edward Baring and Peter Gordon offer up to us an astonishingly fresh and vivid set of essays that not only cast new light on the work of the greatest philosophical provocateur of the late twentieth century but also provide food for reflecting today on the relations among violence, modernity, secularity, and religion.” (―Allan Megill University of Virginia)

About this edition

• Publisher: Fordham University Press
• Publication date: 2014
• ISBN 10: 0823262103
• ISBN 13: 9780823262106
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 296