Reading Leo Strauss : politics, philosophy, Judaism
Steven B. Smith (Author)
"Interest in Leo Strauss is greater now than at any time since his death, mostly because of the purported link between his thought and the political movement known as neoconservatism. Steven B. Smith, though, surprisingly depicts Strauss not as the high priest of neoconservatism but as a friend of liberal democracy - perhaps the best defender democracy has ever had. Moreover, in Reading Leo Strauss, Smith shows that Strauss's defense of liberal democracy was closely connected to his skepticism of the extreme Left and extreme Right alike." "Smith asserts that this philosophical skeptism defined Strauss's thought. It was as a skeptic, Smith argues, that Strauss considered the seemingly irreconcilable conflict between reason and revelation - a conflict Strauss dubbed the "theologico-political problem." Calling this problem "the theme of my investigations," Strauss asked the same fundamental question throughout his life: what is the relation of the political order to revelation in general and Judaism in particular? Smith organizes his book with this question, first addressing Strauss's views on religion and then examining his thought on philosophical political issues."--Jacket
xi, 256 pages ; 24 cm
9780226764023, 9780226763897, 0226764028, 0226763897
62172702
Introduction: why Strauss, why now?
Jerusalem
How Jewish was Leo Strauss?
Gershom Scholem and Leo Strauss : notes toward a German-Jewish dialogue
Strauss's Spinoza
Athens
Leo Strauss's platonic liberalism
Destruktion or recovery? on Strauss's critique of Heidegger
Tyranny ancient and modern
Strauss's America
WWLSD; or, what would Leo Strauss do?