Leo Strauss and the Alethiometer
This article by a non-Straussian sets out to think about Leo Strauss’s theories of how to read Islamic philosophical texts. It considers the main components of Strauss’s hermeneutics and investigates in detail his presentation of his theory of persecution
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Leo Strauss and the Alethiometer James E. Montgomery
There is much about Leo Strauss which I find peculiar, perplexing and confusing, principal among which is the following observation: that a twentieth century intellectual, trying to come to terms with the philosophical, moral and political legacy of Nietzsche, grappling with the implications of the theories of Heidegger, and unwilling to accommodate the demands of modernism, should have exerted arguably the most hegemonic influence (quantitatively, if not qualitatively) on the study of Arabic-Islamic philosophy. I do not claim to be an expert on the theories of Leo Strauss, or to have read more than what I take to be a representative sample of his many writings.1 I also do not claim expertise in Arabic-Islamic philosophy. The following contribution does not This study is the product of my attempts over two academic years (2007–2008 and 2008–2009) to teach a fourth-year undergraduate and taught graduate course on classical Arabic philosophical writings at the University of Cambridge. I owe much to the engagement, acumen and imagination of my students in allowing me to discern the contours of Leo Strauss’s presence in the study of these texts. I dedicate this article to them. I am also grateful to Anna and Guido, the organisers of the conference and the editors of this volume, for offering a soapbox to an impostor. 1 A standard Straussian objection to non-Straussian engagements with Strauss’s thought is to allege that the critic has not fully read all the relevant aspects of Strauss’s thought. I shall accordingly be clear about what I have read: Leo Strauss, Persecution and the Art of Writing (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1988 [1952]); ‘Farabi’s Plato’, in Louis Ginzberg: Jubilee Volume on the Occasion of his Seventieth Birthday (New York: The American Academy for Jewish Research, 1945), pp. 357–393; What is Political Philosophy? and Other Essays (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1988 [1959]); On Tyranny, Including the Strauss-Kojève Correspondence, eds Victor Gourevitch and Michael S. Roth (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2000 [1961]); Natural Right and History (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1965 [1953]). It is for my critics to decide whether I have read all the relevant aspects of Strauss’s thought. The same caveat applies, mutatis mutandis, to my coverage of the scholarly studies of Strauss and the work of the Straussians. Two important works came to my attention too late for me properly to take account of J.E. Montgomery (*) Trinity Hall, Cambridge University, Trinity Lane, CB2 1TQ Cambridge, UK e-mail: [email protected] A. Akasoy and G. Giglioni (eds.), Renaissance Averroism and Its Aftermath: Arabic Philosophy in Early Modern Europe, International Archives of the History of Ideas Archives internationales d’histoire des idées 211, DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-5240-5_15, © Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2013
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pretend to be authoritative, and is not intended to be overly polemical, for
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