Mark Glouberman

In what respect, if any, is Kant a distinctively “critical” thinker? How does Kant’s “transcendentalism” differentiate his practice in metaphysics from that of the philosophers of the Cartesian tradition? How much does the success of Kant’s enterprise depend on the viability of the idea of the synthetic a priori? The issues that these questions raise came to a head for Kant in the attack on his novelty by the Leibnizean Johann August Eberhard, an attack to which Kant responded at length in the sarcastically titled On a discovery according to which any new critique of pure reason has been made superfluous by an earlier one. Unfortunately, Kant’s apology is quite inconclusive. In this discussion, in an effort to shed some light on the murk, I supply text-sensitive analyses of the various key notions. It emerges that while, as Eberhard complained, the “critical” turn is not at all a methodological novelty, Kant’s procedure does mark a departure from traditional metaphysics, though not one that he himself describes at all clearly. Kant’s “transcendentalism” ultimately constitutes an open-ended and ever-widening interrogation of logical possibility; hence an interrogation that, contrary to what Kant himself claims, can never furnish what legitimately counts as “proof.”

Unhappy with a recent submission of mine, a referee for a journal specialising in the history of philosophy wagged a finger at what he or she called my ‘hermeneutical principles’. Though I am no stranger to the collegial woodshed, my initial reaction was nonetheless one of surprise. For had I then been asked about interpretive methodology I would have scoffed. The construer’s best course, I would have said, is to nose about the texts until some rough shape begins to emerge from the murk, and to inch forward in an effort to block in details, frequently doubling back for more nosing about. Isn’t this —fill, back, adjust, refill, back again, re-adjust—a counsel of anti-method?

The Bible ridicules idolaters for bowing down to sticks and stones. Since idolaters worship what the sticks and stones stand for, not the sticks and stones themselves, isn’t the biblical position confused? At the basis of the Bible’s consistent refusal to observe the preceding distinction are found the conceptual underpinnings of its critique of idolatry. Men and women alone among creatures are inspired with God’s breath. Men and women alone among creatures, that is, are like God. They alone among creatures are persons. Since mere pieces of nature cannot understand prayers, entreaties, etc., and hence cannot respond in the personal way, idolatrous practices are incoherent. But while it is true that (sub-person) elements of nature cannot enter into inter-personal relations, idolatry has a sequel: the scientific interrogation of nature, an interrogation which has been magnificently effective in eliciting responses. Elijah’s dramatic confrontation with the Baalites is a stylized version of the clash between the biblical view of men and women as in an irreducible respect non-natural, and the naturalizing scientific view. On the Carmel, the prophets of the Baal are soundly defeated. Must those who inherit from them lose too? That is a live question. Read closely, the story of Elijah implies that those behind the Bible would defend the view of human distinctiveness against the renascent idolatry.

RÉSUMÉ: La Bible éclaire la distinction kantienne entre les apparences et les choses en soi. Les deux récits bibliques de la création, dans Genèse 1 et 2, offrent différentes analyses ontologiques, et seule la deuxième est, comme les apparences de Kant, relative à la condition humaine. Mais, tandis que l’autre région dont Kant parle est sans caractérisation positive, la Bible décrit amplement le monde tel qu’il est avant l’avènement des hommes et des femmes. La Bible traite de ce domaine du point de vue de l’infra-humain. Cette approche essentiellement anthropologique de l’idée des apparences clarifie l’idéalisme transcendantal.

A potential proselyte asks the great rabbi Hillel to explain the Torah to him while he stands ‘on one leg.’ Hillel responds with, essentially, the Golden Rule. This Talmudic anecdote is invariably read as critical of anyone who wants a Torah for Dummies. I offer a different interpretation. The Torah-based position, theologically speaking, rests on one principle and one principle alone, God. ‘How can an account of the creation as a whole rest on one principle only? Won’t such a structure stand unsteadily, like a person on one leg?’ Hillel’s response to the request for a distillation of the Torah does home in on the Bible’s novelty. It homes in on what God does and what pagan deities cannot do. But God’s contribution, while needed to account for the human sector of the creation, cannot manage the extra-human sector. For that, a principle that belongs to paganism is required. The whole can stand steadily, as can the proselyte, only on two legs. So his conversation must be with reservations. He might not be able to intone the main creedal profession of the Torah-based religion, the Shema. ‘Hear O Israel, the Lord [alone] is our God, the Lord is one’ (Deuteronomy 6:4). The Torah’s defenders have more of a case to make.