Jacob Talmon

Jacob Leib Talmon (born June 14, 1916 in Rypin , Congress Poland , † June 16, 1980 in Jerusalem , Israel ) was an Israeli historian and professor of contemporary history at the University of Jerusalem . He was classified as a " Cold War Liberal" because of his sharp anti-Marxism , which runs through his entire work .

Life

Talmon studied the history of the evolution of totalitarianism and claimed that such messianism arose from the French Revolution . He emphasized the similarities between Jacobinism and Stalinism and coined the terms " totalitarian democracy " and "political messianism".

Talmon was born in Poland as Jakov Leib Fleischer into an Orthodox Jewish family. He emigrated in 1934 to study at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem . In 1939 he continued his studies in France , but had to leave the country in 1940 as a result of the French campaign for London . In 1943 he received his Ph. D. from the London School of Economics . In 1949 he returned to Israel and began teaching at the Hebrew University.

In 1957 he received the Israel Prize . His main works are The Origins of Totalitarian Democracy and Political Messianism: The Romantic Phase . Talmon argued that Rousseau's point of view could best be understood as “totalitarian democracy”. His philosophy is understood "only in the goal and the attainment of an absolute collective purpose".

Talmon's anti-utopian liberalism has similarities with the political thoughts of Karl Popper .

Major works

• The history of totalitarian democracy . 3 volumes edited by Uwe Backes . Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2013.
• The Origins of Totalitarian Democracy. 1952 (German: The origins of totalitarian democracy, Cologne 1961).
• The Nature of Jewish History - Its Universal Significance. 1957.
• Political Messianism - The Romantic Phase. 1960 (German: Political Messianism, Cologne 1963).
• The Unique and The Universal. 1965.
• Romanticism and Revolt. 1967.
• Israel among the Nations. 1968.
• The Age of Violence. 1974.
• The Myth of Nation and Vision of Revolution, The Origins of Ideological Polarization in the 20th Century. 1981.
• The Riddle of the Present and the Cunning of History. 2000 (Hebrew, pm).

literature

• Hans Otto Seitschek : Political Messianism. Criticism of totalitarianism and philosophical historiography following Jacob Leib Talmon. Schöningh, Paderborn / Munich 2005, ISBN 3-506-72929-2 .

Web links

• Political Messianism , Hans Otto Seitschek, Political Messianism in the Work of Jacob Leib Talmon, 2006 (Lecture, given in Vienna; PDF file; 98 kB)
• "The Origins of Totalitarian Democracy" , (London: Secker & Warburg , 1955)
• On The Origins of Totalitarian Democracy
• Excerpts from an "Open Letter to Prime Minister Begin Urging Israel's withdrawal from the Occupied Territories and Warning of a Future Disaster", 1980
• Two Statements on the Mid-East War , 1973
• The history of totalitarian democracy 1 - 3 , (Volume 3, published in English shortly after Talmon's death in 1980, was first translated into German.)