Also a History of Philosophy, Volume 1 : The Project of a Genealogy of Postmetaphysical Thinking (Hardcover)

Acknowledgements

Translator’s Note

Abbreviations



Preface



I. On the Question of a Genealogy of Postmetaphysical Thinking


1. Crisis Scenarios and Narratives of Decline in Major Twentieth-Century Philosophical Theories

(1) Carl Schmitt

(2) Leo Strauss

(3) Karl Löwith

(4) Martin Heidegger

(5) The reconstruction of learning processes and the independent legitimacy of modernity



2. Religion as a ‘Contemporary’ Formation of Objective Mind?

(1) The sociological controversy over the secularization thesis

(2) John Rawls: political reason and religion

(3) Karl Jaspers: philosophical and religious ‘faith’



3. The Occidental Path of Development and the Claim to Universality of Postmetaphysical Thinking

(1) The analysis of the formative power of world religions in the theory of civilizations

(2) Intercultural understanding, secular mode of thought and concerns about the Eurocentric narrowing of perspective



4. Basic Assumptions of the Theory of Society and Programmatic Outlook

(1) The problem of social integration and the stages of social evolution

(2) Sketch of the line of thought

(3) From world views to the lifeworld



II. The Sacred Roots of the Axial Age Traditions



1. Cognitive Breakthrough and Preservation of the Sacred Core

(1) The concept of the Axial Age

(2) The two elements of religion

(3) Excursus on the concept of ‘religion’



2. Myth and Ritual Practices

(1) Performance of rituals and enactment of myths

(2) The meaning of ritual practices

(3) Excursus on the origins of language



3. The Meaning of the Sacred

(1) The self-referential character of ritual behaviour

(2) From symbolic to linguistic communication

(3) Myth as a response to the cognitive challenge of openness to the world

(4) The complementary dangers of exclusion and hyper-inclusion
(5) Ritual as a source of solidarity

(6) The explosive power of dissonant empirical knowledge



4. The Path to the Axial Age Transformation of Religious Consciousness

(1) Pantheon and religious practice in early civilizations

(2) Cult of the gods

(3) The differentiation of forms of knowledge



III. A Provisional Comparison of the Axial Age World Views


1. The Moralization of the Sacred and the Break with Mythical Thought

(1) The step of abstraction from the gods to the transcendent divine

(2) Essence and appearance

(3) Second-order thinking: discourse and dogmatics



2. The Repudiation of ‘Paganism’ by Jewish Monotheism

(1) From henotheism to the monotheistic creator, lawgiver and judge

(2) The universalistic meaning of the covenant with the transcendent God

(3) The overcoming of magical thinking and the disenchantment of ritual

(4) On the singular status of monotheism



3. The Buddha’s Teaching and Practice

(1) Brahmanism, the Upanishads and meditative practice

(2) The Buddha’s life and teachings

(3) Aims and paths of salvation in Buddhism and Judaism

(4) Meditation



4. Confucianism and Taoism

(1) Emergence of Confucianism and the era of the ‘Warring States’

(2) Confucius’s life and teachings

(3) Confucianism as ethics and learned religion

(4) The counter-model of the Taoist doctrine of salvation


5. From the Greek ‘Natural Philosophers’ to Socrates

(1) The very different original context

(2) The Presocratics

(3) Socrates



6. Plato’s Theory of Ideas – in Comparison

(1) The structure of the Platonic system

(2) The decoupling of doctrine from cult


First Intermediate Reflection: The Conceptual Trajectories of the Axial Age

(1) Emergence, dynamics and structural transformation of world views

(2) Excursus on the concept of lifeworld

(3) The structure of world views and the dogmatic form of thought

(4) The concept of the Axial Age


Bibliography


Detailed Table of Contents


Notes

Index