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Harry A. Wolfson’s PHILO as a Scholarly and Political Event

Tue, December 18, 2:30 to 4:00pm, Seaport Hotel & World Trade Center, Harborview 1 Ballroom

Abstract

The publication of Harry Austryn Wolfson’s two massive volumes PHILO: FOUNDATIONS OF RELIGIOUS PHILOSOPHY IN JUDAISM, CHRISTIANITY, AND ISLAM in 1947 by Harvard University Press created something of an international stir. While Wolfson’s main thesis – Philo as the founder of medieval philosophy who was to be replaced eventually by Spinoza – was rather courageous, his portrayal of Philo was received with great interest and remains a major achievement in Philo scholarship till today. This paper discusses Wolfson’s intense letter exchange before and after the publication of PHILO. Wolfson was promoting his book in an almost missionary way and engaged several prominent scholars in Philosophy, Classics, and Jewish Studies (such as Elias Bickerman, Gershom Scholem, Werner Jäger, Karl Jaspers and many more) in an attempt to enlist them in his heated campaign for Philo and the role of Jewish philosophy overall. The paper will discuss mostly unpublished letters and the intense intellectual exchange, at times antagonistic, at times fruitful that Wolfson had with many scholars as well as rabbis (from all denominations) at the time. The paper argues that Wolfson’s PHILO – both the book as such and its reception – also needs to be read in the context of the aftermath of the Holocaust as well as in the light of the Zionist movement. Wolfson’s interpretation of Philo as a philosopher who at the same time was greatly influential on Christian philosophers and deeply indebted to Jewish religious thought allowed for new, self-confident readings. In the eyes of some of Wolfson’s first readers he achieved nothing less than a “rehabilitation of Philo” (Ralph Marcus). Wolfson gave “Jewish philosophy a habitation and a name” (Leo Schwartz).

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