As a deeply religious thinker who disclaimed all rationalistic systems, Martin Buber produced an insightful critique of modern philosophical ethics, one that became productive soil for another nontraditional philosophical ethic: feminism's care ethic. In light of the recent emphasis on the new morality, antifoundationalism, and postmodernism in ethics, the dialogical ethics of Martin Buber merits close examination. Most important, Walters compares and contrasts Buber's and feminism's personalist ethics in light of two considerations: the lack of attention by feminist writers to the feminist-Buber linkage and the long-standing and general inattention by twentieth-century thinkers to the ethical dimensions of Buber's thought.

Twentieth century continental thinkers such as Bergson, Levinas and Jonas have brought fresh and renewed attentions to Jewish ethics, yet it still remains fairly low profile in the Anglophone academic world. This collection of critical essays brings together the work of established and up-and-coming scholars from Israel, the United States, and around the world on the topic of Jewish religious and philosophical ethics. The chapters are broken into three main sections – Rabbinics, Philosophy, and Contemporary Challenges. The authors address, using a variety of research strategies, the work of both major and lesser-known figures in historical Jewish religious and philosophical traditions. The book discusses a wide variety of topics related to Jewish ethics, including "ethics and the Mishnah," "Afro Jewish ethics," "Jewish historiographical ethics," as well as the conceptual/philosophical foundations of the law and virtues in the work of Martin Buber, Hermann Cohen, and Baruch Spinoza.The volume closes with four contributions on present-day frontiers in Jewish ethics. As the first book to focus on the nature, scope and ramifications of the Jewish ethics at work in religious and philosophical contexts, this book will be of great interest to anyone studying Jewish Studies, Philosophy and Religion.

Martin Buber’s philosophy of dialogue sought to express the human experience through the ways in which we encounter and interact with others. His "I—Thou" theory of dialogue and "I—It" theory of monologue expressed ways of understanding one’s place in the world in relation to others, objects, and especially God. Buber died in 1965, leaving behind a vast library of writings and ardent students and scholars eager to engage with his ideas. One of the most prominent scholars was Maurice Friedman. Friedman and Buber shared a professional as well as a personal relationship, based on translating, interpreting, and intellectual curiosity. Beginning in the summer of 1950 and ending with Buber’s death, this volume takes the reader through Buber’s three visits to America, his wife’s death, the author’s stay in Jerusalem, and the articulation of Buber’s culminating philosophy of the interhuman. In tracing this chronology, Friedman draws extensively on his personal collection of letters exchanged with Buber. Intimate and meditative, this book provides an exploration of a deeply intellectual friendship shared between two extraordinary thinkers.

"An in-depth examination of a significant, but marginalized, body of literature: the texts produced in English Benedictine convents on the Continent between 1600 and 1800"--

Broad in scope, yet precise in exposition, the Sixth Edition of this highly acclaimed ethics text has been infused with new insights and updated material. Richard Johannesen and new coauthors Kathleen Valde and Karen Whedbee provide a thorough, comprehensive overview of philosophical perspectives and communication contexts, pinpointing and explicating ethical issues unique to human communication. Chief among the authors objectives are to: provide classic and contemporary perspectives for making ethical judgments about human communication; sensitize communication participants to essential ethical issues in the human communication process; illuminate complexities and challenges involved in making evaluations of communication ethics; and offer ideas for becoming more discerning evaluators of others communication. Provocative questions and illustrative case studies stimulate reflexive thinking and aid readers in developing their own approach to communication ethics. A comprehensive list of resources spotlights books, scholarly articles, videos, and Web sites useful for further research or personal exploration.

Part religious studies, part feminist theory, part philosophy, part indescribable: such is Numinous Subjects. Described by the author as ‘a kaleidoscopic exploration of why three gendered figures of the sacred matter within western culture,’ the experience of reading this text truly is akin to gazing through a constantly turning kaleidoscope. Images, concepts, phrases and quotes are continually revisited, recombined, though never repeated in quite the same way. From these tumbling constellations arises a new understanding and wary appreciation of the figures of the virgin, the mother, and the whore. Drawing on the insights of thinkers as diverse as Rudolph Otto, Julia Kristeva, Simone de Beauvoir, and Martin Buber, Numinous Subjects simultaneously expands and focuses our attention on the myth of the sacred and its implications for female subjects in western culture today.

Thinking Jewish Culture in America argues that Jewish thought extends our awareness and deepens the complexity of American Jewish culture. This volume stretches the disciplinary boundaries of Jewish thought so that it can productively engage expanding arenas of culture by drawing Jewish thought into the orbit of cultural studies. The eleven contributors to Thinking Jewish Cultures, together with Chancellor Arnold Eisen’s postscript, position Jewish thought within the dynamics and possibilities of contemporary Jewish culture. These diverse essays in Jewish thought re-imagine cultural space as a public and sometimes contested performance of Jewish identity, and they each seek to re-enliven that space with reflective accounts of cultural meaning. How do Jews imagine themselves as embodied actors in America? Do cultural obligations limit or expand notions of the self? How should we imagine Jewish thought as a cultural performance? What notions of peoplehood might sustain a vibrant Jewish collectivity in a globalized economy? How do programs in Jewish studies work within the academy? These and other questions engage both Jewish thought and culture, opening space for theoretical works to broaden the range of cultural studies, and to deepen our understanding of Jewish cultural dynamics. Thinking Jewish Culture is a work about Jewish cultural identity reflected through literature, visual arts, philosophy, and theology. But it is more than a mere reflection of cultural patterns and choices: the argument pursued throughout Thinking Jewish Culture is that reflective sources help produce the very cultural meanings and performances they purport to analyze.

A Chomprehensive anthology of classic writings on Jewish philosophy from the Bible to postmodernism.

Arguing for a retrieval of the landmark work, God’s Fierce Whimsy, Stina Busman Jost establishes the critical importance of this volume for the construction of a dialogic theological method. This is accomplished through a close reading of God’s Fierce Whimsy in which the author identifies key methodological characteristics informing the volume’s formation. Critical importance also is established through interviews with the volume’s authors, the Mud Flower Collective—which included Katie G. Cannon, Beverly W. Harrison, Carter Heyward, Ada María Isasi-Díaz, Bess B. Johnson (Delores Williams), Mary D. Pellauer, and Nancy D. Richardson. Undergirding this endeavor is a recognition of the theoretical importance of difference to the project of theological construction and the vital form of the dialogic as constitutive of theological practice; this is carried forward through engagement with the pivotal theorists Martin Buber and Mikhail Bakhtin, who helped pioneer the philosophical and literary critical importance of otherness, difference, and dialogue. Finally, the author constructively engages recent developments in feminist theologies and postcolonial theories—ultimately making the argument that a dialogic theological method is relevant for the doing of theology today.