Wiedebach, Hartwig. Review of Benjamin Pollock, FRANZ ROSENZWEIG AND THE THE SYSTEMATIC TASK OF PHILOSOPHY. NDPR (November 2009).

Pollock, Benjamin. Franz Rosenzweig and the Systematic Task of Philosophy. Cambridge: CUP, 2009. In 1921, Franz Rosenzweig (1886-1929) published his philosophical-theological opus magnum: Der Stern der Erlösung (The Star of Redemption, SE), in the Kauffmann-Verlag in Frankfurt, a renowned publishing house for Jewish studies. The book had a mixed reception, marked by both interest and puzzlement. Consequently, four years later, Rosenzweig published "additional remarks" regarding the book. He explained that SE was not a Jewish book in the common understanding of the term. Almost provocatively, Rosenzweig wrote: "rather it is merely a system of philosophy". Benjamin Pollock's book is the most extensive and detailed study to date on this assertion. It presents all the earlier stages in Rosenzweig's thought that led to this conception, and then discusses the systematic construction of SE itself. The presentation is clear and understandable (and particularly accessible because of its wise use of cross-references and frequent restatements of the main theses). Pollock documents in a highly illuminating manner the extensive dispute Rosenzweig waged with Kant, with the tradition of German idealism nourished by Spinoza and Jacobi's counter-criticism, and with a number of contemporary comrades in thought and friends in his own circle. That is manifest, for example, in looking at the question of what actually motivated Rosenzweig to engage in constructing a system. Pollock discovers this motivation in Rosenzweig's well-known early works. . . . Read the whole review here: http://ndpr.nd.edu/review.cfm?id=18066.