Prodigal Son/Elder Brother: Interpretation and Alterity in Augustine, Petrarch, Kafka, Levinas (Religion and Postmodernism Series) [Hardcover]

Jill Robbins (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0226721108 | ISBN-13: 978-0226721101 | Publication Date: July 30, 1991 | Edition: 1

"I don't know of any other book that deals with the hermeneutical problem of the relationship between Christianity and Judaism in the way this one does. Full of cunning and unpredictable turns, Prodigal Son/Elder Brother addresses the question of the elder brother's fate by opposing two sets of readings, Christian and Jewish, ancient and modern, figural and midrashic. No one, after reading this book, will any longer connect Judaism and Christianity with a hyphen."—Gerald L. Burns, University of Notre Dame

"Through a creative reading of the prodigal son parable, Jill Robbins demonstrates the hermeneutical impasse of the Christian exegete who must and yet cannot incorporate the Old Testament. Having disclosed the aporia at the heart of Christian hermeneutics, she proposes an alternative approach to the Hebrew Bible and new interpretations of Augustine, Petrarch, Kafka, and Levinas. Robbins brilliantly integrates the discourses of biblical texts, literary works, and critical analysis."—Mark C. Taylor, Williams College

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Jill Robbins is assistant professor of English and comparative literature at State University of New York, Buffalo.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 184 pages
• Publisher: University Of Chicago Press; 1 edition (July 30, 1991)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0226721108
• ISBN-13: 978-0226721101
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.7 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,329,436 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars One-anothering one another into the fullness of our humanity, June 20, 2007

By 

R. J. Stroik (Stevens Point, Wisconsin) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Prodigal Son/Elder Brother: Interpretation and Alterity in Augustine, Petrarch, Kafka, Levinas (Religion and Postmodernism Series) (Hardcover)

Other than the endorsement by Mark C. Taylor, editor of a series on Religion and Postmodernism of which this was the first volume, I can see why this is a first review, some sixteen years after its publication. Reading this book from the perspective of an historian of ideas, and not that of a literary critic, I found it a very difficult read, yet well worth my persistence. As an historian of "ideas," I seek their presuppositions and implications, seeking for culture that which is somewhat akin to the unconscious for the human person, an "un-idea."

As a "roamin'catholic," I appreciate most deeply the author's deconstruction of the false dichotomy between old and new testaments, looking for the day when the Hebrew Bible might speak to us without being encapsulated within the categories of Hellenistic thought forms. The sibling rivalry between Judaism and Christianity continues to have catastrophic consequences for our so-called Western Civilization. What we need is a cathartic deconstruction of the presuppositions of this rivalry, enabling and empowering us to see the otherness of one another, alterity. For, one-anothered into existence from the vast genetic pool of our ancestors, we never cease one-anothering one another into the fullness of our humanity.