The Gift of Death (Paper) (Religion and Postmodernism) - Softcover

Derrida, Jacques

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0226143066 ISBN 13: 9780226143064

Publisher: University of Chicago Press, 1996

Synopsis

While continuing to explore questions introduced in "Given Time" such as the possibility, or impossibility, of giving and the economic and anthropological nature of gifts, this work focuses on the notion of responsibility and the ultimate gifts of life and death. Jacques Derrida divides the book into four parts, which deal respectively with: the development of the notion of responsibility in the Platonic and Christian traditions; the relation between sacrifice and mortality; the contemporary meaning of the story of Abraham and Isaac; and the relation between religious ideology and economic rationality. The texts under discussion include the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament, as well as writings from Patocka, Heidegger, Levinas and Kierkegaard. Derrida's main concern is with the meaning of moral and ethical responsibility in Western religion and philosophy. He questions the limits of the rational and the responsible that is reached in granting or accepting death, whether by sacrifice, murder, execution or suicide. Beginning with a discussion of Patocka's "Heretical Essays on the History of Philosophy", Derrida develops Patocka's ideas concerning the sacred and responsibility through comparisons with the works of Heidegger, Levinas and Kierkegaard. Derrida's treatment of Kierkegaard makes clear that the two philosophers share some of the same concerns. He then undertakes a reading of Kierkegaard's "Fear and Trembling", comparing and contrasting his own conception of responsibility with that of Kierkegaard, and extending and deepening his recent accounts of the gift and sacrifice. For Derrida, the very possibility of sacrifice, especially the ultimate sacrifice of one's own life for the sake of another, comes into question.

About this title

Review:

"An important contribution to the critical study of ethics that commends itself to philosophers, social scientists, scholars of religion... [and those] made curious by the controversy that so often attends Derrida." - Booklist, on the first edition "Derrida stares death in the face in this dense but rewarding inquiry....Provocative." - Publishers Weekly "The Gift of Death is Derrida's long-awaited deconstruction of the foundations of the project of a philosophical ethics, and it will long be regarded as one of the most significant of his many writings." - Choice "[This] may be his most provocative book to date, and...is certainly his first substantial commentary on religion. Any religionist interested in Derrida should start here." - Times Literary Supplement"

About the Author:

Jacques Derrida (1930-2004) was, at the time of his death, director of studies at the Ecole des hautes etudes en sciences sociales, and professor of humanities at the University of California, Irvine. He is the author of many books published by the University of Chicago Press. David Wills is professor in the departments of English and Languages, Literatures, and Cultures at the University at Albany. He is the author of Matchbook: Essays in Deconstruction.

About this edition

• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Publication date: 1996
• ISBN 10: 0226143066
• ISBN 13: 9780226143064
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 124