From the myth of being to the myth of justice

The prayers and tears of John Caputo

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.34024/prometeica.2023.28.15293

Keywords:

ethics, John Caputo, Heideggerian Phenomenology, deconstruction, justice

Abstract

The present article wishes to examine John Caputo’s notion of ‘hyperbolic justice’ considering his critique of Heideggerian philosophy. In Demythologizing Heidegger (1993), Caputo tries to deconstruct Martin Heidegger’s account of Dasein’s being as Sorge, as Being-towards-death in its existentiality, facticity and fallenness, not by rejecting that account but by showing that it is fissured by an absence, the absence of kardia (heart), of flesh, disablement, affliction. According to Caputo, Heidegger’s aesthetics of Being, and his concern to overcome the oblivion of Being, left him scandalously oblivious to the cry of the suffering other. Against Heidegger, Caputo opposes what he calls the “prophetic imagination” of Emmanuel Levinas, Jean-François Lyotard, and particularly Jacques Derrida. I will seek to examine the ways in which Caputo opposes to Heidegger Derrida’s ‘undeconstructibility of justice,’ whilst also resorting to Levinas’ ‘hyperbolic justice’.

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Author Biography

  • Ricardo Gil Costa Fonseca Soeiro, Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa

    Ricardo Gil Soeiro (PhD, Univ. of Lisbon, 2009) is an Auxiliary Professor (with tenure) at the School of Arts and Humanities, University of Lisbon. He is also a Senior Researcher at the Center for Comparative Studies, where he currently conducts the following research project: A Sabedoria da Incerteza: Imaginação Literária e Poética da Obrigação. Formerly a professor at the ISLA Campus Lisboa – Laureate International Universities, he has taught graduate and postgraduate courses at the University of Lisbon, ranging from contemporary Portuguese literature to the MA course ‘Memory and Literature in a Globalised Culture’.  His publications include Gramática da Esperança (Vega, 2009), Iminência do Encontro (Roma, 2009), collections of poetry, and the edited volume The Wounds of Possibility (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2012). His essays, articles, and reviews have appeared in numerous journals and collections, including Ellipsis, Ítaca, Impossibilia, Revista de Filologia Romanica, and the Journal of Romance Studies. He is the recipient of several national literary and academic awards, including a PEN Prize, awarded in 2010 and the Prize Amicus Romaniae 2019. His main areas of research are: Comparative Studies. Contemporary Portuguese Poetry. Hermeneutics. Critical Posthumanism. Selected publications: A Sabedoria da Incerteza. Imaginação Literária e Poética da Obrigação, V.N. Famalicão, Húmus, 2015. Paul Celan: Da Ética do Silêncio à Poética do Encontro (com Maria João Cantinho, Carlos João Correia e Cristina Beckert). The Wounds of Possibility. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing. (com Sofia Tavares). Rethinking the Humanities. Paths & Challenges, Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing. Gramática da Esperança: Da Hermenêutica da Transcendência à Hermenêutica Radical. Lisboa: Nova Vega Editora. O Pensamento Tornado Dança. Lisboa: Roma Editora. Some publications are available in the repository of the University of Lisbon.

References

Caputo, John D. (1978). The Mystical Element in Heidegger’s Thought. Athens. Ohio University Press.

Caputo, John D. (1986). “Telling Left from Right: Hermeneutics, Deconstruction, and the Work of Art. Journal of Philosophy”. 83. 678-685.

Caputo, John D. (1987). Radical Hermeneutics: Repetition, Deconstruction, and the Hermeneutic Project. Bloomington. Indiana University Press.

Caputo, John D. (1993a). Against Ethics: Contributions to a Poetics of Obligation with Constant Reference to Deconstruction. Bloomington. Indiana University Press.

Caputo, John D. (1993b). Demythologizing Heidegger. Bloomington. Indiana University Press.

Caputo, John D. (1997). The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida: Religion Without Religion. Bloomington. Indiana University Press.

Caputo, John D. (1999). “On Mystics, Magi, and Deconstructionists. In Portraits of American Continental Philosophers”. Edited by James R. Watson. Bloomington. Indiana University Press. 24-33.

Caputo, John D. (2000). More Radical Hermeneutics: On Not Knowing Who We Are. Bloomington. Indiana University Press.

CAPUTO, John D. (2002). “Hoping in Hope, Hoping against Hope: a Response. In Religion with/out Religion: the Prayers and Tears of John D. Caputo.” Edited by James Olthuis. Routledge. 120-149.

Caputo, John D. (2003). “Abyssys Abyssum Invocat: A Response to Kearney.” In A Passion for the Impossible. John D. Caputo in focus, edited by Mark Dooley. Albany. State University of New York Press. 123-127.

Caputo, John D. and Gianni Vattimo. (2007). After the Death of God. New York. Columbia University Press.

Caputo, John D. (2008). “Radical Encounter.” In Iminência do Encontro. Lisbon. Roma Editora. 21.

Derrida, Jacques (1974). Glas. Paris. Galilée.

Derrida, Jacques (1982). Margins of Philosophy. Trans. Alan Bass. Chicago. University of Chicago Press.

Derrida, Jacques (1990). “Force of Law: The ‘Mystical Foundation of Authority’.” Cardozo Law Review: 919-1045.

Dooley, Mark, ed. (2003). A Passion for the Impossible. John D. Caputo in focus. Albany. State University of New York Press.

Joyce, James (1992). Ulysses. London: Penguin Books.

Levinas, Emmanuel (1969). Totality and Infinity: An Essay on Exteriority. Pittsburgh. Duquesne University Press.

Levinas, Emmanuel (1987). Time and the Other. Pittsburgh. Duquesne University Press.

Levinas, Emmanuel (1998). Discovering Existence with Husserl. Evanston: Northwestern University Press.

Nussbaum, Martha (1992). Love’s Knowledge. Essays on Philosophy and Literature. NY/Oxford. Oxford University Press.

Olthuis, James (2000). Religion with/out Religion: The Prayers and Tears of John D. Caputo. London/New York. Routledge.

Putt, B. Keith (2003). “Faith, Hope, and Love: Radical Hermeneutics as a Pauline Philosophy of Religion”. In A Passion for the Impossible. John D. Caputo in focus. Edited by Mark Dooley. Albany. State University of New York Press. 237-250.

Zimmerman, Michael E. (1998). “John D. Caputo: A Postmodern, Prophetic, Liberal American in Paris.” In Continental Philosophy Review. 31. 195-214.

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Published

2023-11-11

Issue

Vol. 28 (2023): Prometeica - v 28 (11/2023 - 02/2024)

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Articles

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Copyright (c) 2023 Ricardo Gil Costa Fonseca Soeiro

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How to Cite

Costa Fonseca Soeiro, R. G. . (2023). From the myth of being to the myth of justice: The prayers and tears of John Caputo. Prometeica - Journal of Philosophy and Science, 28, 74-82. https://doi.org/10.34024/prometeica.2023.28.15293
Received 2023-07-03
Accepted 2023-10-24
Published 2023-11-11