Progress And Return

question of the relationship between reason and revelation is a crucial topic in the history of Western thought.The reason-and-revelation debate ran like a thread through the development of the history of Western thought over time;it paved a foundation for a lot of fruitful discussions concerning the connotations and limits of reason.However,there are two general problems for the history of Western philosophy.For one thing,as to the reason-and-revelation debate,modern Western philosophy,under the influence of Enlightenment reason,tends to be more rational than revelatory.And for another,as far as the revelation is concerned,Western philosophy,deeply indebted to the Christianity tradition,often obscures the very origins of Christianity: The Hebrew Bible and Judaism.The foundation of western thought and civilization was laid by both ancient Greek philosophy and the Hebrew Bible,which merged into the Christian philosophy in the military conquest of Europe and the Middle East by the Roman Empire and subsequently dominated the Western world for more than a thousand years.In the modern era,the Enlightenment reason gave birth to modernity through the critique of Christian philosophy.But whether the nature of modernity can be defined by the triumph of reason over revelation is still a debatable question.Perhaps,a more prudent acceptance of the coexistence of and tension between reason and revelation can demonstrate the strong vitality of Western culture and is more conducive for us to achieve an objective understanding of Western culture.Therefore,a reinterpretation of Western thought from the perspective of the Jewish Problem can provide us with an alternative perspective.Usually the Jewish question has a broad sense and a narrow sense: the Jewish question in the broad sense refers to the question of whether and how Jews should assimilate with the culture of the host country brought about by the Jewish diasporas worldwide.In the narrow sense,it refers specifically to the Jewish Problem that arose after the emergence of Enlightenment reason,that is,the question of whether Jews after the Enlightenment should accept assimilation or remain “a state within a state ”in the context of gaining political and legal equality.This dissertation takes the work of Isaac Bashevis Singer as a case study,who comes from a literary background,but explores the thought exemplified in his work.His life and literary works are relevant to the Jewish Problem in the narrow sense,which can be used as a contemporary case to understand the tension between reason and revelation in Western thought.This dissertation focuses on the theme of progress and return.The so-called“progress and return” is the modern expression of reason and revelation and Athens and Jerusalem in philosophical discourses.The reason of using this perspective is twofold.On the one hand,it is because Singer explicitly questioned in his interviews the Enlightenment and the anti-religious and progressive spirit it represents,and through his works he shows the encounters of many Jews with the Enlightenment reasons,who have eventually returned to traditional faith.On the other hand,he also shows in his works sympathy for some of the characters who step out from the ghetto and enter the modern world.Under the framework set forth by the said theme,this dissertation studies the Jewish Problem in Singer’s works.Focusing on selected Singer’s representative works,the dissertation is structured in the following sequence: “before the Enlightenment”,“acceptance of the Enlightenment,” “encountering the problems incurred by the Enlightenment idea of progress” and the “return.” Chapter 1 starts with the overview of Singer and his literary works,which gradually leads up to the focused theme,namely the Jewish Problem.Chapter 2 discusses the differences between the Jewish Problem in the broad sense and the Jewish Problem in the narrow sense and makes a preliminary theoretical overview of the analytical framework.The textual analysis of Singer’s works starts from Chapter 3 that investigates the changes and their consequences before and after the Jewish Enlightenment depicted in the short stories.Specifically,this chapter analyzes the Enlightenment reason’s triumph over the old-fashioned,traditional faith-based and law-based Jewish way of life.It also discusses how “the synagogue,my father’s court and the scriptural studies in the synagogue no longer appealed to me.” The chapter concludes that the Enlightenment reason is not a panacea for the Jews and their Jewish way of life based on faith and laws should not be taken as an old coat to be thrown away at will.Chapter 4 mainly studies the novel The Magician of Lublin to demonstrate the wandering status of the Jewish people between the two extremes: modern Enlightenment reason and the Jewish traditional world.It ends with the thoroughness of Yasha’s return to the Jewish faith.Chapter 5 analyses another novel,The Enemy,a Love Story.Because of its background concerning the Holocaust and the subsequent “new exile”,this story further intensifies the Jewish Problem caught in-between progress and return.The hero of the novel is Hermann whose eventual “irresponsible escape” highlights the extreme “nihilism” in dealing with the Jewish Problem.But the harmonious family formed by the love from the female member gives “new hope” to continue to live in the “new world”: Hermann is symbolically preserved in the “memory”.From this point of view,when dealing with the Jewish Problem of progress and return,Singer’s work fully demonstrates the tension of between progress and return.Yet,his preference to return is also very outstanding.The chapter concludes that Singer has given a definite answer: return to the revelatory faith.Chapter 6 thus focuses on the image of the fool that frequently appears in Singer’s work: fool not completely irrational but with rational faith,and his return to the beginning in the stories of the fool.The return in this chapter is the return in progress.On the one hand,it has vertical inheritance that shows that the fool has never abandoned religious belief.On the other hand,it involves horizontal absorption that shows that the fool has been baptized by the Enlightenment reason and therefore this return is a return based on the recognition of the functions of reason.Return in progress—like the plain background decorated with beautiful pattern,return to the basics.