Heidegger’s Black Notebooks and the Future of Theology

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xii

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2. Introduction: Heidegger and Theology after the Black Notebooks

   • Jayne Svenungsson

   Pages 1-22

3. Religion in the Black Notebooks: Overview and Analysis

   • Judith Wolfe

   Pages 23-48

4. In the Spirit of Paul: Thinking the Hebraic Inheritance (Heidegger, Bultmann, Jonas)

   • Hans Ruin

   Pages 49-75

5. Why Heidegger Didn’t Like Catholic Theology: The Case of Romano Guardini

   • George Pattison

   Pages 77-98

6. Anarchist Singularities or Proprietorial Resentments? on the Christian Problem in Heidegger’s Notebooks of the 1930s

   • Ward Blanton

   Pages 99-129

7. Monotheism as a Metapolitical Problem: Heidegger’s War Against Jewish Christian Monotheism

   • Christoph Schmidt

   Pages 131-157

8. Love Strong as Death: Jews Against Heidegger (On the Issue of Finitude)

   • Agata Bielik-Robson

   Pages 159-189

9. Apocalypse and the History of Being

   • Marcia Sá Cavalcante Schuback

   Pages 191-210

10. Gottwesen and the De-Divinization of the Last God: Heidegger’s Meditation on the Strange and Incalculable

    • Elliot R. Wolfson

    Pages 211-255

11. Confessions and Considerations: Heidegger’s Early Black Notebooks and His Lecture on Augustine’s Theory of Time

    • Marius Timmann Mjaaland

    Pages 257-275

12. The Irritability of Being: Martin Heidegger, Hans Driesch and the Future of Theology

    • Mårten Björk

    Pages 277-313

13. Back Matter

    Pages 315-322

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This book probes the relationship between Martin Heidegger and theology in light of the discovery of his Black Notebooks, which reveal that his privately held Antisemitism and anti-Christian sentiments were profoundly intertwined with his philosophical ideas. Heidegger himself was deeply influenced by both Catholic and Protestant theology. This prompts the question as to what extent Christian anti-Jewish motifs shaped Heidegger’s own thinking in the first place. A second question concerns modern theology’s intellectual indebtedness to Heidegger. In this volume, an array of renowned Heidegger scholars – both philosophers and theologians –investigate Heidegger’s animosity toward the biblical legacy in both its Jewish and Christian interpretations, and what it means for the future task and identity of theology.

• black notebooks
• being and time
• anti-semitism
• paul
• Levinas

“This superb collection of studies, which illuminates some of the darkest corners of Heidegger’s thought—his antisemitism, the ‘last god’ among them—shows us still one more time why Heidegger was his own worst enemy, and why theology will forever be haunted by Heidegger, for better and for worse.” (John D. Caputo, Professor Emeritus of Religion, Syracuse University, and Professor Emeritus of Philosophy, Villanova University, USA)

“For decades, the nexus between Heidegger and academic theology has comprised a rich and innovative field. However, the recent publication of the philosopher’s Black Notebooks, which are suffused with anti-Semitic invective, have, for many, cast doubt on the ultimate serviceability of Heidegger’s doctrines and views. The essays collected in Heidegger’s Black Notebooks and the Future of Theology constitute a thoughtful and timely effort to reflect on the major interpretive dilemmas that have arisen in the wake of the Black Notebooks’ publication.” (Richard Wolin, Distinguished Professor of History and Political Science, CUNY Graduate Center, USA)

“This remarkable volume elucidates the complex relation between Heidegger and theology in the light of his Black Notebooks. The contributors engage critically with Heidegger’s writings and pose important questions regarding the implications of Heidegger’s Nazism and antisemitic stereotypes for the future reception of his work. Assembling insights from Jewish thought, Catholic and Protestant theology, religious studies, continental philosophy and intellectual history, this collection of essays presents prime examples of the controversy on the (in)compatibility between Heidegger’s ontology and biblically rooted interpretations of time and history, the (in)finitude of human existence and the God-relationship. Moreover, Heidegger’s work is brought into thought-provoking dialogue with classic texts by, for instance, Augustine, Kierkegaard, Guardini, Bultmann, Barth, Rosenzweig, Levinas, Arendt, and Jonas.” (Claudia Welz, Professor of Systematic Theology, University of Copenhagen, Denmark)

• University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden

  Mårten Björk

• Centre for Theology and Religious Studies, Lund University, Lund, Sweden

  Jayne Svenungsson

Mårten Björk is a doctoral student in Theology and Religious Studies at Gothenburg University, Sweden. He is the author and editor of two books in Swedish and has published several international articles. He contributes regularly to various Scandinavian magazines and is on the editorial board of the cultural journal Subaltern.

Jayne Svenungsson is Professor of Systematic Theology at Lund University, Sweden. She is the author of Divining History: Prophetism, Messianism and the Development of the Spirit (2016) and co-editor of Jewish Thought, Utopia and Revolution (2014), Monument and Memory (2015) and The Ethos of History: Time and Responsibility (2018). 

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