Franz Rosenzweig Quotes
Franz Rosenzweig was a German Jewish philosopher and one of the great figures of twentieth-century Jewish thought. After a near-conversion to Christianity, he returned to Judaism in 1913 and devoted his life to its philosophical and educational renewal. The quotes below are attributed to Franz Rosenzweig, organized by topic.
Browse Franz Rosenzweig by topic
Franz Rosenzweig on Death
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“Philosophy takes it upon itself to throw off the fear of things earthly, to rob death of its poisonous sting.”
The Star of Redemption (1921), p. 3.
Franz Rosenzweig on God
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Attributed to Franz Rosenzweig:
“God, world, and man are the three irreducible terms of all genuine thought.”
Franz Rosenzweig on Knowledge
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Attributed to Franz Rosenzweig:
“The new thinking begins with experience and ends with experience.”
Franz Rosenzweig on Life
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“Cognition is autonomous; it refuses to have any answers foisted on it from the outside. Yet it suffers without protest having certain questions prescribed to it from the outside (and it is here that my heresy regarding the unwritten law of the university originates). Not every question seems to me worth asking. Scientific curiosity and omnivorous aesthetic appetite mean equally little to me today,”
in Franz Rosenzweig: His Life and Thought (1961/1998), p. 97
Franz Rosenzweig on Love
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Attributed to Franz Rosenzweig:
“To love is to step into the open with another.”
Franz Rosenzweig on Time
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Attributed to Franz Rosenzweig:
“Eternity does not negate time; it fulfills it.”
Franz Rosenzweig on Truth
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Attributed to Franz Rosenzweig:
“Truth is not what we possess but what we are sent to find.”