Luca Bertolino

This analysis of Cohen's reception of Spinoza's thought draws attention to theoretical issues: the nature of thinking and the thinking of nature. In a synoptic way it refers to several of Cohen's works, trying to determine continuity and discontinuity in his interpretation of Spinoza, with a specific focus on "Ethica ordine geometrico demonstrata". Thus, Cohen's reception of Spinoza's thought seems to be characterized by a continuity similar to what we can find in Cohen's philosophical system as a whole. Discrepancies in his interpretation of Spinoza correspond to a progressive refinement of his own speculative approach.

Starting with theoretical considerations on redemption in Rosenzweig's "Der Stern der Erlösung", this paper highlights the connection between redemption and choral form in Church music. Therefore, according to Rosenzweig, one can clearly distinguish between sacred/religious and spiritual/intellectual music. Rosenzweig also writes about renewing Jewish worship through Bach's vocal music, but we are given scant hints about this. "Bach in die Synagogen!" is nevertheless important, not only as an example for interreligious dialogue, but above all as an invitation to think about redemption in the postmodern condition.

The definition of the lowest common denominator of philosophical practices is widely debated: what is the philosophical core that allows us to distinguish them from other activities? Also, is it possible to identify a methodical peculiarity in philosophical practices? Indeed, many philosophical practitioners refer to dialogue as the specific philosophical character marking their professional activity. This statement, which as such is rather naive, is obviously somewhat problematic. However, philosophical practitioners stress the λόγος of dialogue. In addition to investigating how the dialogue is understood in the different philosophical practices, this contribution aims at enhancing the διά, the "between" of dialogue. This dimension, in fact, may be a possible theoretical framework within which to understand philosophical practices as a whole.

Rosenzweig's "new thinking" can be seen, among other things, as the vanishing point of two gazes: one addressed to the "old philosophy" of the past, the other to the postmodernity of the present. The goal of the present essay is therefore twofold: on the one hand, to go back retrospectively to the relationship between critical idealism and the theoretical proposal represented by "Der Stern der Erlösung"; on the other hand, to evaluate, in a perspectival way, what the latter has to say in relation to the philosophy of difference. It is thus possible to investigate the meaning of philosophizing in general and to assess the relevance of Rosenzweig's thought in particular. New thinking is all the more fruitful because it exists in a close dialectic relationship with modern rationality, grasping its "up-to-here-and-no-further" boundary; at the same time, it presents analogies with the postmodern philosophy of difference, without, however, reaching the same antirational conclusions. As for the meaning of philosophizing, Rosenzweig famously thought that the religious experience of revelation could offer a space-time orientation, which is why it was the keystone of his new thinking. However, if one wants to prescind from the "belief" element and find a meaning and orientation in the alogical and purposeless context of postmodernity, one has to yearn for a form that is present in absence: this tension finds its foundation in the up-to-here-and-no-further of critical idealism and is continually reconfigured in relation to difference, both thought-of and experienced.