Cultures of Continuity: Jewish-Muslim Conversations on a Contested Ideal (Traditions in Transformation. Thinking with Theology, 2)

“The thread of historical continuity,” Hannah Arendt once remarked, “was the first substitute for tradition." To the historian, the assumed continuity of historical events became an Ersatzreligion of sorts, a substitute religion that rejected not the ideas of tradition and transmission as such but, rather, their unquestioned authority. Yet, while seemingly secular and rooted in culture, the idea, or ideal, of continuity is propagated also by traditional religious groups and forces. It appears as much as a resistance to cultural discontinuities as it functions as a critique of modernity itself.

Continuity, therefore, has remained a contested concept not only among modern thinkers, but also with the post-modern turn; here, assumed historical linearities have been brought into question and deconstructed with force. We are rightly concerned about hegemonic continuities and about continuity for its own sake. Why, if at all, should continuity matter?

Karl Löwith understood continuity not as an erasure of difference and plurality, but instead as a conscious effort to build invisible bridges in time. “Conscious historical continuity,” he writes, “constitutes tradition and frees us from it.” Is there a legitimate place for continuity, understood in this way, and thus for cultures of continuity, in a world where change and rupture have assumed their own kind of normativity? Can conscious continuities offer helpful insights into enduring debates on pluralistic societies, collective identity, and cultural resilience?

Ufuk Topkara, Humboldt University Berlin, Germany; Asher Biemann, University of Virginia, USA.