Meaning in History: The Theological Implications of the Philosophy of History, Traced through the Works of Burckhardt, Marx, Hegel, Proudhon, Comte, Condorcet, Turgot, Voltaire, Vico, Bossuet, Joachim, Augustine, Orosius, and The Bible

“An important and profound contribution to the reorientation of modern man to the enigma of the drama of history.” —The Journal of Religion

Modern man sees with one eye of faith and one eye of reason. Consequently, his view of history is confused. For centuries, the history of the Western world has been viewed from the Christian or classical standpoint—from a deep faith in the Kingdom of God or a belief in recurrent and eternal life-cycles. The modern mind, however, is neither Christian nor pagan—and its interpretations of history are Christian in derivation and anti-Christian in result. To develop this theory, Karl Löwith—beginning with the more accessible philosophies of history in the nineteenth and eighteenth centuries and working back to the Bible—analyzes the writings of outstanding historians both in antiquity and in Christian times.

“A book of distinction and great importance . . . The author is a master of philosophical interpretation, and each of his terse and substantial chapters has the balance of a work of art.” —Helmut Kuhn, The Journal of Philosophy

© 2024 The University of Chicago Press (E-bog): 9780226162294

Release date

E-bog: 31. maj 2024