In the spirit of Paul

thinking the hebraic inheritance (Heidegger, Bultmann, Jonas)

Hans Ruin

pp. 49-75

in: Mårten Björk, Jayne Svenungsson (eds), Heidegger's Black notebooks and the future of theology, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2017

Abstract

This chapter explores the relation between Heidegger, Rudolf Bultmann and Hans Jonas, through the figure of Paul. Bultmann was Heidegger's friend and colleague from Marburg who used an existential ontology to reinvent Lutheran theology. Hans Jonas was a student of both of them, who left Germany for USA in 1933. For Heidegger, Paul was a voice of original facticity and historicity, but also a source for his choice of National Socialism and anti-Judaism. For Bultmann, Paul and Christianity served as a defence against totalitarian temptations. Jonas's return to Paul in his later years is both a response to Heidegger's betrayal and a celebration of his original interpretation in a reinvention of Paul as a Jewish existential thinker.

Cited authors

Heidegger Martin

Bultmann Rudolf

Jonas Hans