Totality, the Other, the Infinite: The relation between ethics and religion in the thought of Emmanuel Levinas

The present study seeks to address the general question of the relation between Levinas's ethics and his account of religion. The specific questions pursued here include the following: Is his ethics secular or religious, and in what sense is it so, either way? Does his ethics depend on religion? How does Levinas himself understand 'religion'? This thesis will show that any interpretation of Levinas's ethics cannot be separated from its religious dimension, namely, the openness to exteriority as Desire for the Infinite. Religion, despite all consolations it may bring, cannot dispense with this ethical demand.;Chapter One analyzes Levinas's account of ethics as the outward movement towards the Other and the putting into question of the I by the Other. The face of the Other challenges the self-preoccupation and the conatus essendi of the I, including its tendency to incorporate everything into itself. Through its appeal and demand, the face calls the I to responsibility. The shift from self-preoccupation to responsibility for the Other constitutes the asymmetrical relation between the I and the Other. The chapter will end with the discussion of justice that involves the third party, given the fact that we live in a world that consists of a multiplicity of beings.;Chapter Two explores the subjectivity of the human subject that makes possible the responsibility it carries for the Other. It will show that instead of a conscious and thinking subject that often characterizes the modern conception of human subjectivity, Levinas offers us a sensible and feeling subject. Sensibility allows the human subject to feel the appeal of the face of the Other and to respond to its demand. The analysis of the relation between the subject's exposure to the Other and temporality brings out the religious dimension of such human subjectivity that is manifested in the election by the Good to the responsibility for the Other.;Chapter Three discusses the metaphysical desire for the Infinite that the very Infinite within the subject produces. It begins with the Levinasian distinction between Desire and Need, which is based on their cause of movement towards their object as well as on their potential fulfillment. The chapter then analyzes the Cartesian idea of the Infinite and Levinas's appropriation of it in order to show both the limitation of the intending consciousness and the infinity of the Infinite. After the discussion of the relation between the Infinite, God, and the Good, it brings us to a deeper analysis of the Desire for the Infinite that never reaches satisfaction, but instead gets diverted to the neighbor. The responsibility for the Other is thus never the result of the free choice of the subject, but rather of the order of the Infinite.;Chapter Four brings us to a more evident link between ethics and religion in Levinas's thought, namely, to the discussion of the face of the Other as a trace of the Infinite. Navigating between presence and absence, the notion of a trace brings out not only the unique signification of the face, but also a new conception of God as Illeity that always escapes representation. As a trace of the Infinite, the face is no longer a phenomenon, but rather an enigma. The chapter ends with the discussion of the structure of ethical language through the distinction between the Saying and the Said that roughly shows the relation between the subject's exposure to the Other and the effort to thematize the encounter.;Chapter Five discusses the major elements that bring together ethics and religion in Levinas's thought. It begins with the analysis of his general concept of religion, which emphasizes, among other things, the relation between God and the human being without totalization and sociality. Then it brings forth the religious character of Levinas's ethics that was discussed in the previous chapters. Following this analysis is the discussion of the ethical character of religion that is centered on the responsibility for the Other. Religion becomes meaningful only if it fully commits itself to the horizontal and sensible dimension of human existence.