Author: Kenneth Hart Green File Type: epub In Leo Strauss and the Rediscovery of Maimonides, Kenneth Hart Green explores the critical role played by Maimonides in shaping Leo Strausss thought. In uncovering the esoteric tradition employed in Maimonidess Guide of the Perplexed, Strauss made the radical realization that other ancient and medieval philosophers might be concealing their true thoughts through literary artifice. Maimonides and al-Farabi, he saw, allowed their message to be altered by dogmatic considerations only to the extent required by moral and political imperatives and were in fact avid advocates for enlightenment. Strauss also revealed Maimonidess potential relevance to contemporary concerns, especially his paradoxical conviction that one must confront the conflict between reason and revelation rather than resolve it.An invaluable companion to Greens comprehensive collection of Strausss writings on Maimonides, this volume shows how Strauss confronted the commonly accepted approaches to the medieval philosopher, resulting in both a new understanding of Maimonides and a new depth and direction for his own thought. It will be welcomed by anyone engaged with the work of either philosopher.**ReviewKenneth Greens collection of essays rigorously retraces the stages by which Strauss came to see Maimonides and his teachings in a new light. Leo Strauss and the Rediscovery of Maimonides is an ambitious attempt to see Strausss preoccupation with Maimonides as a manifestation of his overall philosophical concerns.(Ralph Lerner, University of Chicago) Green synthesizes Strausss thoughts about Maimonides, providing their intellectual context and chronological development. A central theme of the book is how and why Strauss believed that Maimonides held the keys to unlocking the problems encountered by modern Western people. Greens deep familiarity with Strausss writings allows him to blend them into an integrated whole, and the footnotes to the book provide references to ongoing developments in scholarship.(Jewish Libraries Newsletter 2014-01-10) If Maimonides allows readers a new beginning with respect to an understanding of philosophy, and if Strauss allows readers a similarly new beginning concerning Maimonidess thought, then surely Kenneth Hart Greens two impressive new volumes allow readers an analogous beginning concerning the thought of Leo Strauss as it pertains to the question of revealed Law and reasonor, as Strauss put it, Jerusalem and Athens. . . . Where Leo Strauss on Maimonides is marked by its systematic completeness (as much as, in any event, can reasonably be expected from one volume), Leo Straussand the Rediscovery of Maimonides gives a more spacious and open-ended presentation of the Strauss-Maimonides relation as a companion volume, it surveys the forest in which the trees presented in the former volume reside.(International Journal for the Philosophy of Religion 2014-01-15) Do we need medieval wisdom, and to explore anew the foundations of modern rationalism? Green gives a resolutely positive answer to these questions in his comprehensive study on Leo Strausss lifelong exploration of Maimonidess work. His study is written in a personal and pleasing style which makes it a fitting companion to his recent edition of Strausss complete writings on this twelfth-century Jewish leader, physician, and philosopher. . . . One more significant contribution by Green to our understanding of Strausss work and to the contemporary resources for thinking through the theologico-political problem.(Review of Politics 2014-08-04) Greens account of Strausss dissatisfaction with his predecessors and his attempt to free himself from the question-begging assumptions that marred their interpretations is both clear and thorough. To the best of my knowledge, no one has gone into this aspect of Strausss thought with Greens diligence. As Green shows in convincing detail, Strausss frustration with the literature on Maimonides is symptomatic of a wider dissatisfaction with modern philosophy as a whole.(Association for Jewish Studies Review 2015-05-22) Green has produced a fascinating book in which he examines Leo Strausss rediscovery of Moses Maimonides. In this study, we encounter a long and complex discussion of Strausss careful reading of Maimonidess philosophical masterpiece, the Guide of the Perplexed.(Political Theory 2015-06-23) Green gives us a Strauss who takes not just Athens but Athens and Jerusalem entirely seriously, and who sees the cure for historicism not in the one or the other but in keeping the two opponents and competitors for the truth in civilized, even if often paradoxical, conversation.(Jewish Review of Books 2015-06-25) Green, one of the foremost contemporary Strauss scholars, argues that rather than reading Strauss on Maimonides as an achievement of historical scholarship, we should instead see him as primarily and perhaps most significantly, a thinker . . . [and] only secondarily a historical scholar, albeit a masterly one. . . . [This is an] impressive and tightly-written book.(Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews 2015-10-22) In his exceptionally thoughtful and wide-ranging book, Leo Strauss and the Rediscovery of Maimonides, Green . . . puts forward a distinctive motive for studying the Guide, namely, the desire for eternity, that is to say, the desire for truth and knowledge, which ultimately depend upon what is eternal.(Journal of Jewish Thought and Philosophy 2016-04-25) About the Author Kenneth Hart Green is associate professor in the Department for the Study of Religion at the University of Toronto. He is the author of Jew and Philosopher The Return to Maimonides in the Jewish Thought of Leo Strauss.