Hermann Cohen

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Hermann Cohen (illustration from the Jewish Encyclopedia )
Memorial plaque in Coswig (Anhalt)

Hermann Cohen (born July 4, 1842 in Coswig , † April 4, 1918 in Berlin ) was a German philosopher . He was - together with Paul Natorp - head of the Marburg Neo-Kantianism , but is also considered one of the most important representatives of Jewish philosophy in the 20th century.

Life

Hermann Cohen was the son of the teacher and cantor Gerson Cohen and his wife Friederike. He attended the grammar school in Dessau , the Matthias grammar school in Wroclaw and the Jewish-theological seminar in Wroclaw before starting his studies at the University of Wroclaw in 1861 . He studied Jewish religion, classical studies and philosophy in Breslau and Berlin, where he was particularly influenced by Friedrich Adolf Trendelenburg (1802–1872) and Heymann Steinthal (1823–1899). He also studied with August Boeckh , Emil Heinrich Du Bois-Reymond , Moriz Haupt and Karl Friedrich Werder before becoming a PhD in Halle in 1865. phil. PhD and initially published several articles in the journal for ethnic psychology and social science founded by Heymann Steinthal and Moritz Lazarus .

With a contribution to the controversy between Friedrich Adolf Trendelenburg and Kuno Fischer about problems in the interpretation of the critical philosophy of Immanuel Kant, Cohen moved into the focus of a Kant renaissance in 1870 that encompassed the entire academic philosophy in Germany. Cohen proposed a reinterpretation of Kant, which he aimed at in his publication Kant's Theory of Experience the following year. The great impression this work made on Kant's research gave Cohen the opportunity to do his habilitation in 1873, soon after Friedrich Albert Lange was called to Marburg , with a thesis on The systematic terms in Kant's pre-critical writings , which then was also carried out in 1873.

Since Friedrich Albert Lange had referred to him as his "spiritual successor", Cohen was appointed his successor after Lange's death in 1876, so that he had been professor of philosophy at the University of Marburg since that year . There he founded the Marburg School of Neo-Kantianism by continuing his Kant studies along the lines of the “three critiques”, asking about the historical conditions of Kant's philosophical concerns and thus making historicism useful for systematic philosophy. In 1912, Boris Pasternak , who later won the Russian Nobel Prize for Literature, spent a semester with Cohen. In the following years he published several works on Kant's more current positioning. For example in 1877 “Kant's Justification of Ethics” and 1889 “Kant's Justification of Aesthetics”.

In 1878 Cohen married Martha Lewandowski (murdered in Theresienstadt on September 12, 1942), the daughter of the composer Louis Lewandowski .

When he retired in 1912, the much celebrated but not undisputed Cohen was unable to get his student Ernst Cassirer to succeed him in his chair (Cohen's successor was Erich Rudolf Jaensch in 1912 ). He moved to Berlin to teach at the College for the Science of Judaism , of which he was a member of the board of trustees, and to focus more on the philosophy of religion .

Grave in the Jewish cemetery in Berlin-Weißensee

Act

The main philosophical work includes the early works of Kant's Theory of Experience , Kant's Justification of Ethics and Kant's Justification of Aesthetics, as well as the writings of an independent “system of philosophy”, namely logic , which further developed Kant's philosophy of pure knowledge , ethics of pure will and aesthetics of pure feeling , and numerous other smaller and larger writings. Since 1977 the Olms Verlag has published a by Helmut Holzhey u. a. published work edition.

Cohen's Neo-Kantianism interpreted Kant's categorical imperative in such a way that he urged: "Make self-legislation in the person of every human being your purpose". This revealed that the Marburg neo-Kantian used the philosophy of Kant to establish a political and social program that the socialism was close to. While the "red Kantians" Karl Vorländer and Franz Staudinger stood for a Marburg tradition of philosophy advocating political social reforms, which also shaped the later Bavarian revolutionary and Prime Minister Kurt Eisner , Cohen advocated the right of Jews in front of a broader public. to be able to be German even without Christian baptism. For Cohen, the ethical idealism, which he saw theoretically justified by Kant, was just as anchored in German culture as in the Jewish religion, the "glow of the moral enthusiasm of the prophets".

“This is how the Jews pray on their highest feast days: 'That all created unite in a league'. And so the closing prayer every day is: 'that the world may be founded on the kingdom of God'. Monotheism has become messianism. For in messianism the prophetic Jew thinks the goal of the one humanity 'at the end of days'. And every day in human life, in the life of peoples, must steer towards this end, this goal. This is our belief in the One God of the United Humanity. - What does Israel mean in humanity? Nothing else and nothing less than the messenger of this ambiguous unity [monotheism and messianism]. This message is the meaning of his [Israel] election. "

- Hermann Cohen : Monotheism and Messianism.

Cohen's most important contribution to the Jewish religious philosophy was his book The Religion of Reason from the Sources of Judaism , published in 1919 , published within the outline of the overall science of Judaism . The second edition, edited by Bruno Strauss , has the corrected title Religion of Reason from the Sources of Judaism .

Fonts

Single issues

  • On the controversy between Trendelenburg and Kuno Fischer 1870
  • Kant's theory of experience 1871
  • The systematic term in Kant's pre-critical writings in 1872
  • Kant's foundation of ethics 1877
  • Kant's foundation of aesthetics in 1889
  • Logic of Pure Knowledge 1902
  • Ethics of Pure Will 1904
  • Aesthetics of pure feeling 1912
  • The concept of religion in the system of philosophy 1915
  • Germanism and Judaism: with fundamental considerations on the state and internationalism , Giessen, A. Töpelmann, 1915
  • The religion of reason from the sources of Judaism 1918 in: Journal "New Jewish Monthly Issues", 2nd year, issue 15/16
    • Parallel edition under the same title, without serial title: J. Kauffmann , Frankfurt 1919
    • "Second edition": Religion [!] Of reason from the sources of Judaism. Revised from the author's manuscript and provided with an afterword by Bruno Strauss . With a picture of the author by Max Liebermann . Preface Martha Cohen. 2nd edition, J. Kauffmann, Frankfurt 1929
    • Reprint: Joseph Melzer, Cologne 1959; plus Scientific Book Society , Darmstadt 1959
    • further reprints: Melzer, Cologne 1966; Fourier, Wiesbaden 1978; again ibid. 1988; again ibid. 1995.
    • Religion of reason from the sources of Judaism. Ed. Bruno Strauss , introduced by Ulrich Oelschläger. Marix, Wiesbaden 2008
  • The principle of the infinitesimal method and its history. A chapter on the foundation of the critique of knowledge . Dümmler, Berlin 1883; again in: Werke (see above), 5; again separately: with an introduction by Astrid Deuber-Mankowsky. Edited by Johannes Kleinbeck. Turia + Kant, Vienna 2014

Complete edition ("works")

  • Works. Edited by the Hermann Cohen Archive at the Philosophical Seminar of the University of Zurich under the direction of Helmut Holzhey. Olms, Hildesheim 1977 ff.

Foreign language editions

  • Dat ha-Tevunah mi-Mekorot ha-Yahadut . Translated by Zvi Wislavsky. Edited with notes by Shmuel Hugo Bergmann and Nathan Rotenstreich , Jerusalem: Mossad Bialik, 1971.
  • Religion of reason out of the sources of Judaism . Translated with an introduction by Simon Kaplan; introductory essays by Leo Strauss , New York: F. Ungar Pub. Co., 1972 [Second edition: Introductory essays for the 2nd ed. By Steven S. Schwarzschild, Atlanta, Ga (USA): Scholars Press, 1995 (Texts and translations series; 7)]
  • Religion de la raison: tirée des sources du judaïsme . Traduction de l'allemand par Marc B. de Launay et Anne Lagny, Paris: Presses universitaires de France, 1994.
  • Religione della ragione dalle fonti dell 'ebraismo . Edizione italiana a cura di Andrea Poma; traduzione e note di Pierfrancesco Fiorato, San Paolo: Cinisello Balsamo, 1994 (Classici del pensiero; 3).

literature

  • Myriam beehive: Cohen face à Rosenzweig: Débat sur la pensée allemande. Vrin, Paris 2009 ISBN 978-2-7116-2170-5 . A complete revision of the French volume now under the title: Cohen and Rosenzweig. Your examination of German idealism, Freiburg & Munich, Alber, 2018, 298 pages. ISBN 978-3-495-48680-1 .
  • Julius Ebbinghaus: Hermann Cohen , Neue Deutsche Biographie, Volume 3, 1957, p. 310ff, in: http://www.deutsche-biographie.de/pnd1182521411.html
  • Hermann Cohen: l'idéalisme critique aux prices avec le matérialisme . Focus of the magazine Revue de métaphysique et de morale , Ed. Myriam Bienenstock. PUF , Paris 2011 ISBN 978-2-13-058738-5
  • Nina Dmitrieva: The Russian Neo-Kantianism: Marburg in Russia. Historical-philosophical sketches. Moscow 2007 ISBN 978-5-8243-0835-8 .
  • Hans Martin Dober, Matthias Morgenstern (ed.): Religion from the sources of reason. Hermann Cohen and Protestant Christianity. (= Religion in Philosophy and Theology , 65) Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 2012, ISBN 978-3-16-151951-2 .
  • Geert Edel: From the criticism of reason to the logic of knowledge. The development of the theoretical philosophy of Hermann Cohen. Alber, Freiburg 1988. 2nd edition Gorz, Waldkirch 2010 ISBN 978-3-938095-13-3
  • Helmut Holzhey : Cohen and Natorp . 2 vols., Basel 1986
  • Wilhelm Jerusalem : My ways and goals. In Raymund Schmidt (Ed.): The German Philosophy of the Present in Self-Representations, Volume 3. Meiner, Leipzig 1922
  • Jakob Klatzkin : Hermann Cohen. Berlin 1919
  • Paul Natorp : Hermann Cohen as a person, teacher and researcher. Commemorative speech given in the auditorium of the University of Marburg, July 4, 1918. Potsdam University Library 2013 full text
  • Ulrich Sieg : The rise and fall of Marburg Neo-Kantianism. The story of a philosophical school community. Königshausen & Neumann , Würzburg 1994
  • Bruno Strauss : Hermann Cohen's Jewish writings. 1924
  • Sebastian Wogenstein: Horizons of Modernity: Tragedy and Judaism from Cohen to Lévinas. Winter, Heidelberg 2011, ISBN 978-3-8253-5851-8 .
  • Hartwig Wiedebach: Hermann Cohen's Childhood, in Kalonymos 21, 1, 2018, pp. 1–9, several images, also online

Portraits

Web links

Wikisource: Hermann Cohen  - Sources and full texts

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Herta Mayerhofer, The philosophical concept of movement in Hermann Cohen's logic of pure knowledge, is devoted to specific substantive relationships between the thinking of Cohen and Trendelenburg . Vienna University Press, 2004
  2. ^ Hermann Cohen: The systematic terms in Kant's pre-critical writings according to their relationship to critical idealism . Dümmler, Berlin 1873 (also: [Hofbuchdruckerei], [Weimar] 1873; also: Habilitation thesis, University of Marburg 1873, 58 pages)
  3. ^ Julius Ebbinghaus:  Cohen, Hermann. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 3, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1957, ISBN 3-428-00184-2 , pp. 310-313 ( digitized version )., Here p. 311.
  4. ↑ Between the worlds. Olga Martynova thinks of Pasternak in Marburg in FAZ on November 28, 2014, page 38
  5. ↑ Hermann Cohen: Kant's theory of experience . 1871, 2nd ed. 1885, 3rd ed. 1918, 4th ed. 1925, 5th ed. 1987.
  6. ↑ Hermann Cohen: Kant's justification of ethics . 1877, 2nd, exp. Edition 1910.
  7. ^ Hermann Cohen: Kant's justification of the aesthetics . 1889.
  8. ↑ Hermann Cohen: Logic of pure knowledge . 1902, 2., verb. Edition 1914.
  9. ^ Hermann Cohen: Ethics of the pure will . 1904, 2nd, rev. 1907, 3rd edition 1921, 4th edition 1923, 5th edition 1981.
  10. ↑ Hermann Cohen: Aesthetics of pure feeling . 1912, 2nd edition 1923, 3rd edition 1982.
  11. ^ A b Julius Ebbinghaus:  Cohen, Hermann. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 3, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1957, ISBN 3-428-00184-2 , pp. 310-313 ( digitized version )., Here p. 312.
  12. ^ Hermann Cohen: Monotheism and Messianism. In: New Jewish monthly books. 1st year, 4th issue, p. 108.
  13. ↑ his wife, née Isenberg, 1860–1942, pianist
  14. ↑ Figure .
personal data
SURNAME Cohen, Hermann
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German philosopher
DATE OF BIRTH 4th July 1842
PLACE OF BIRTH Coswig
DATE OF DEATH April 4, 1918
Place of death Berlin