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Review
“...Deconstruction is structured like a religion. Like a prayer and tear for the coming of the wholly other (tout autre), for something impossible...Like a faith in the coming of something we cannot quite make out, a blind faith where knowledge fails and faith is all we have to go on, which even believes in ghosts and specters.” -- John D. Caputo, from the Introduction
When deconstruction first came on the scene many saw it as a further, if not final, challenge to the idea of a all-powerful deity. However, in the recent work of Jacques Derrida, one of deconstruction’s leading figures, there has been a return to a kind of faith in the impossible. Caputo writes, “The essays in this collection, taken from a conference in 1997, examine the convergence between religion and Deconstruction through the work of Jacques Derrida.” One of the major components of this book is a dialogue between Derrida and the theologian/philosopher Jean-Luc Marion. Also included in this volume are essays by leading scholars on postmodernism and religion and responses and discussion to those articles. Contents include: “In the Name: How to Avoid Speaking of ‘Negative Theology,’” Jean Luc Marion; “On the Gift: A Discussion between Jacques Derrida and Jean-Luc Marion, Moderated by Richard Kearney”; “Loose Canons: Augustine and Derrida on Their Selves,” Robert Dodaro; “Fragments: The Spiritual Situation of Our Times,” David Tracy; “Apostles of the Impossible: On God and the Gift in Derrida and Marion,” John D. Caputo; “Betting on Vegas,” Mark C. Taylor; “Eating the Text, Defiling the Hands: Specters in Arnold Schoenberg’s Moses and Aron,” Edith Wyschogrod; “Re-embodying: Virginity Secularized,” Francoise Meltzer; “Our Own Faces in Deep Wells: A Future for Historical Jesus Research,” John Dominic Crossan.
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