Karl Jaspers: Philosopher Among Philosophers / Philosoph Unter Philosophen [Paperback]

Richard Wisser (Author), Leonard H. Ehrlich (Editor)

Product Details

• Paperback: 357 pages
• Publisher: Editions Rodopi (January 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 9051834764
• ISBN-13: 978-9051834765
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.1 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #7,805,657 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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4.0 out of 5 stars A Critical Critique, October 29, 2011

By 

Glenn C. Wood - See all my reviews

This review is from: Karl Jaspers: Philosopher Among Philosophers / Philosoph Unter Philosophen (Paperback)

This book-review zero's in on Gregory's contribution because it seems to purposively depart from Jaspers as the philosopher among philosophers.
Gregory J. Walters' article on "Jaspers's Philosophical Faith and Revelational Faith Today. Can the Two Faiths Meet in the Struggle for Human Liberation?" is a good example of a non-practicing Catholic serving the back-porch by influencing others to go around to that Church's front porch. In the clear context of Karl Jaspers being a Philosopher among Philosophers, Gregory shows an awareness of and engages in the struggle for souls that unfolds and reveals the frontline side of...the battle where even the poor and oppressed are used as funneling corrals to the porch.
Using Karl Jaspers Gregory expounds off Jaspers and propounds the liberation theology of Gustavo Gutierrez. Gustavo is a Catholic convert, a Dominican priest. Karl Jaspers is arguably the progenitor of liberation thinking in theology and philosophy and no stranger to the needs of the oppressed. I'm not judging Gustavo regarding his political-force's motivation for converting to Catholicism, but, like it or not, his renowned priesthood status serves as a porch to Catholicism. But Gregory in effect is pointing to the front porch. (How one can convert to something that greatly contributed to the problem Gustavo sought to remedy is a mystery to me--but I defer judgment to a higher power than that to which he converted.)
One could ask why the need to spin off Jaspers by reducing his Philosophical faith to a "Jaspers could not foresee..." a Gutierrez liberation faith. That's not my question, for the answer is that Gregory was around that time representing Catholicism in an obligatory manner, like at "St." Mary's University, San Antonio, Texas (there as Assistant Professor of Theology). Note, Gregory's research on Jaspers--as a known protestant with prophetic insight befitting a top psychopathologist--coincided with one of Gregory's awkward moments while cow-cowing to the forces like the propagation of the "faith". It seems to me that what Gregory is murmuring between the lines is that not even Jaspers could predict that a liberation theology and its tenets could save Catholicity from its historical reputation. Well, Jaspers could foresee it by not being judgmental while understanding that one can "praxis" being an undercover small "p" protestant and a smaller "c" catholic while having a high case "C" "vocation".
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