In its own contemporary context, Kant’s views on the relationship between reason and religion played a crucial role in debates about the nature of the Enlightenment. The terms of that debate, as they were most sharply formulated by F. H. Jacobi, posed an either/or choice of reason or faith, between which Kant offered a third option that would synthesize reason and faith. A newly published collection of essays, Kant’s Philosophy of Religion Reconsidered, not only echoes this debate in current terms (...) but also suggests that the unfinished business of the Enlightenment in regard to morality, religion, and the historicity of reason is still with us. (shrink)

Scheler's philosophic reflections on religious experience and on the connections between this experience and those reflections seek to found a phenomenological personalism. Hence I first delineate his conception of person via his view of phenomenology as resulting from a critique of husserl. I then elaborate scheler's conception of philosophy in terms of the intentional acts involved. After a similar elaboration of scheler's view of religion, I present his 'system of conformity' of the proper interplay of philosophy and religion. I conclude (...) by indicating why his phenomenological anthropology is not only inadequate to the foundational task assigned to it but methodologically incoherent. (shrink)

There is much in this little book that will interest students both of Kant and of the Enlightenment. Its chapter headings indicate the topics addressed: "I. Kant's Middle Class Life: From Gallant Tutor to Withdrawn Scholar," "II. Kant and the Enlightenment: Kant's Theory of the Impossibility of Total Error," "III. Seeking Inner Maturity: Origin and Decline of a Leading Idea of the Enlightenment," "IV. Basic Forms of Praxis: Preliminary Reflections on the Foundations of Kant's Practical Philosophy," and "V. Ethics and (...) Politics: When is a Person Fully a Political Agent?". (shrink)