The Perfection of Freedom seeks to respond to the impoverished conventional notion of freedom through a recovery of an understanding rich with possibilities yet all but forgotten in contemporary thought. This understanding, developed in different but complementary ways by the German thinkers Schiller, Schelling, and Hegel, connects freedom, not exclusively with power and possibility, but rather, most fundamentally, with completion, wholeness, and actuality. What is unique here is specifically the interpretation of freedom in terms of form, whether it be aesthetic form (Schiller), organic form (Schelling), or social form (Hegel). Although this book presents serious criticisms of the three philosophers, it shows that they open new avenues for reflection on the notion of freedom; avenues that promise to overcome many of the dichotomies that continue to haunt contemporary thought – for example, between freedom and order, freedom and nature, and self and other. The Perfection of Freedom offers not only a significantly new interpretation of Schiller, Schelling, and Hegel, but also proposes a modernity more organically rooted in the ancient and classical Christian worlds.Table of ContentsAcknowledgmentsAbbreviationsIntroduction: On the German Contribution: Giving Form to Freedom1. Friedrich Schiller’s Dramatic Philosophy: Freedom in FormI. On the Significance of StyleII. Biographical BackgroundIII. Nature Speaks to NatureIV. Writing as a Free GiftV. Meaning in MotionVI. Elements of the DramaticVII. FreestyleVIII. Poet or Philosopher?2. An Aesthetics of Freedom: Schiller and the Living GestaltI. Introduction: Schiller’s BreakthroughII. The Analogy of FormIII. Form Overcoming FormIV. Manifest Freedom in NatureV. Heautonomy and HeteronomyVI. Freedom and Human NatureVII. Living Gestalt and Human WholenessVIII. The Seriousness of PlayIX. A Criticism and the Question of ContradictionX. Nobility or Bourgeois Aestheticism?3. The Dark Roots of Life: Organic Form as a Symbol of Freedom in Schelling’s NaturphilosophieI. The Philosophy of the FutureII. The Origins of Schelling’s NaturphilosophieIII. The Impoverishment of NatureIV. The Impoverishment of SpiritV. Naturphilosophie and the Place of the OrganismVI. Natural FreedomVII. Freedom or Form?4. From Organism to Incarnation: The Fall and Redemption of Finite Form in Schelling’s Late PhilosophyI. Ontological FreedomII. The Fate of the Real in the Early SystemsIII. The Positivity of Finite FreedomIV. The Actuality of Evil and Love in HistoryV. Creation as TheogonyVI. Love, Nature, and Freedom: A Final Assessment5. Freedom as the Concrete Form of Reason in Hegel’s Philosophy of RightI. Introduction: Hegel’s UniquenessII. Preliminary ConsiderationsIII. Rational PoliticsIV. Political ReasonV. On the Meaning of ActualityVI. Philosophical SourcesVII. The Importance of Being FiniteVIII. The Will as Concrete FreedomIX. Conclusion6. “The ‘I’ That Is ‘We’ and the ‘We’ That Is ‘I’”: On the Sociality of Freedom in Hegel and Its ExcessesI. The Controversy Surrounding Hegel’s Conception of the StateII. Communal SpiritIII. Sittlichkeit as Social FormIV. Freedom and Absolute Spirit7. A Dramatic Conclusion: Opening Up Actual PossibilityBibliographyIndex

The Perfection of Freedom: Schiller, Schelling, and Hegel between the Ancients and the Moderns

Literature & Fiction

Schindler, D.C.

History & Criticism

James Clarke & Co.

It is commonly observed that behind many of the political and cultural issues that we face today there are impoverished conceptions of freedom, which, according to D. C. Schindler, we have inherited from the classical liberal tradition without a sufficient awareness of its implications. Freedom from Reality presents a critique of the deceptive and ultimately self-subverting character of the modern notion of freedom, retrieving an alternative view through a new interpretation of the ancient tradition. While many have critiqued the inadequacy of identifying freedom with arbitrary choice, this book seeks to penetrate to the metaphysical roots of the modern conception by going back, through an etymological study, to the original sense of freedom. Schindler begins by uncovering a contradiction in John Locke’s seminal account of human freedom. Rather than dismissing it as a mere “academic” problem, Schindler takes this contradiction as a key to understanding the strange paradoxes that abound in the contemporary values and institutions founded on the modern notion of liberty: the very mechanisms that intend to protect modern freedom render it empty and ineffectual. In this respect, modern liberty is “diabolical”―a word that means, at its roots, that which “drives apart” and so subverts. This is contrasted with the “symbolical” (a “joining-together”), which, he suggests, most basically characterizes the premodern sense of reality. This book will appeal to students and scholars of political philosophy (especially political theorists), philosophers in the continental or historical traditions, and cultural critics with a philosophical bent.

Freedom from Reality: The Diabolical Character of Modern Liberty (Catholic Ideas for a Secular World)

Politics & Social Sciences

Philosophy

University of Notre Dame Press

Retrieving Freedom is a provocative, big-picture book, taking a long view of the “rise and fall” of the classical understanding of freedom. 
In response to the evident shortcomings of the notion of freedom that dominates contemporary discourse, Retrieving Freedom seeks to return to the sources of the Western tradition to recover a more adequate understanding. This book begins by setting forth the ancient Greek conception―summarized from the conclusion of D. C. Schindler’s previous tour de force of political and moral reasoning, Freedom from Reality―and the ancient Hebrew conception, arguing that at the heart of the Christian vision of humanity is a novel synthesis of the apparently opposed views of the Greeks and Jews. This synthesis is then taken as a measure that guides an in-depth exploration of landmark figures framing the history of the Christian appropriation of the classical tradition. Schindler conducts his investigation through five different historical periods, focusing in each case on a polarity, a pair of figures who represent the spectrum of views from that time: Plotinus and Augustine from late antiquity, Dionysius the Areopagite and Maximus the Confessor from the patristic period, Anselm and Bernard from the early middle ages, Bonaventure and Aquinas from the high middle ages, and, finally, Godfrey of Fontaines and John Duns Scotus from the late middle ages. In the end, we rediscover dimensions of freedom that have gone missing in contemporary discourse, and thereby identify tasks that remain to be accomplished. Schindler’s masterful study will interest philosophers, political theorists, and students and scholars of intellectual history, especially those who seek an alternative to contemporary philosophical understandings of freedom.

Retrieving Freedom: The Christian Appropriation of Classical Tradition (Catholic Ideas for a Secular World)

History

World

David L. Schindler is the foremost American participant in the Communio movement in Catholic theology. Over the last thirty-five years, his profound theological and ontological vision has led him to probe our most urgent cultural problems to their deepest metaphysical roots, comprehensively evaluating them in the light of Trinitarian faith. The first book-length study of Schindler’s thought, Being Holy in the World explores Schindler’s Trinitarian theology, ecclesiology, anthropology, and metaphysics in the context of the encounter between Christianity and contemporary culture.

Being Holy in the World: Theology and Culture in the Thought of David L. Schindler

Healy Jr., Nicholas J.

Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.

The Catholicity of Reason explains the "grandeur of reason," the recollection of which Benedict XVI has presented as one of the primary tasks in Christian engagement with the contemporary world. While postmodern thinkers -- religious and secular alike -- have generally sought to respond to the hubris of Western thought by humbling our presumptuous claims to knowledge, D. C. Schindler shows in this book that only a robust confidence in reason can allow us to remain genuinely open both to God and to the deep mystery of things. Drawing from both contemporary and classical theologians and philosophers, Schindler explores the basic philosophical questions concerning truth, knowledge, and being -- and proposes a new model for thinking about the relationship between faith and reason. The reflections brought together in this book bring forth a dramatic conception of human knowing that both strengthens our trust in reason and opens our mind in faith.

The Catholicity of Reason (Ressourcement: Retrieval and Renewal in Catholic Thought (RRRCT))

Plato's Critique of Impure Reason offers a dramatic interpretation of the Republic, at the center of which lies a novel reading of the historical person of Socrates as the "real image" of the good. Schindler argues that a full response to the attack on reason introduced by Thrasymachus at the dialogue's outset awaits the revelation of goodness as the cause of truth. This revelation is needed because the good is what enables the mind to know and makes things knowable. When we read Socrates' display of the good against the horizon of the challenges posed by sophistry, otherwise disparate aspects of Plato's masterpiece turn out to play essential roles in the production of an integrated whole. In this book, D. C. Schindler begins with a diagnosis of the crisis of reason in contemporary culture as a background to the study of the Republic. He then sets out a philosophical interpretation of the dialogue in five chapters: an analysis of Book 1 that shows the inherent violence and dogmatism of skepticism; a reading of goodness as cause of both being and appearance; a discussion of the dramatic reversals in the images Socrates uses for the idea of the good; an exploration of the role of the person of Socrates in the Republic; and a confrontation between the "defenselessness" of philosophy and the violence of sophistry. Finally, in a substantial coda, the book presents a new interpretation of the old quarrel between philosophy and art through an analysis of Book 10. Though based on a close reading of the text, Plato's Critique of Impure Reason always interprets the arguments with a view to fundamental human problems, and so will be valuable not only to Plato scholars but to any reader with general philosophical interests.
 ABOUT THE AUTHOR: 
 D. C. Schindler, associate professor of philosophy in the Humanities Department at Villanova University, is the translator or co-translator of twelve books including Hans Urs von Balthasar's Love Alone Is Credible, and author of Hans Urs von Balthasar and the Dramatic Structure of Truth.
 PRAISE FOR THE BOOK: 
 "In this wonderful new study of Plato's Republic, Schindler argues that the key to interpreting the dialogue lies in the twofold nature of goodness. . . . A lengthy introduction diagnoses the intellectual crisis of the postmodern academy and offers as the cure an epistemology that blends the absolute and the relative, such as Plato accomplishes in the Republic. Schindler's wide familiarity with Platonic scholarship is particularly impressive. . . . Highly recommended." ― P. Coby, Choice

Plato's Critique of Impure Reason: On Goodness and Truth in the Republic

The Catholic University of America Press

Plato's Critique of Impure Reason offers a dramatic interpretation of the Republic, at the center of which lies a novel reading of the historical person of Socrates as the "real image" of the good. Schindler argues that a full response to the attack on reason introduced by Thrasymachus at the dialogue's outset awaits the revelation of goodness as the cause of truth. This revelation is needed because the good is what enables the mind to know and makes things knowable. When we read Socrates' display of the good against the horizon of the challenges posed by sophistry, otherwise disparate aspects of Plato's masterpiece turn out to play essential roles in the production of an integrated whole. In this book, D. C. Schindler begins with a diagnosis of the crisis of reason in contemporary culture as a background to the study of the Republic. He then sets out a philosophical interpretation of the dialogue in five chapters: an analysis of Book 1 that shows the inherent violence and dogmatism of skepticism; a reading of goodness as cause of both being and appearance; a discussion of the dramatic reversals in the images Socrates uses for the idea of the good; an exploration of the role of the person of Socrates in the Republic; and a confrontation between the "defenselessness" of philosophy and the violence of sophistry. Finally, in a substantial coda, the book presents a new interpretation of the old quarrel between philosophy and art through an analysis of Book 10. Though based on a close reading of the text, Plato's Critique of Impure Reason always interprets the arguments with a view to fundamental human problems, and so will be valuable not only to Plato scholars but to any reader with general philosophical interests.

Hans Urs von Balthasar (1905-1988) was one of the most prolific and influential theologians of the twentieth century. This book, the first English-language study of Balthasar, seeks to show the fruitfulness of his thought by drawing out its philosophical implications for the question of truth.D. C. Schindler argues that a "dramatic" approach, shaping both the form and content of philosophy, enables a new conception of being, of human consciousness, and of their coming together to satisfy both traditional concerns about unity and postmodern calls for difference-while avoiding the pitfalls of a one-sided emphasis on either.

Hans Urs Von Balthasar and the Dramatic Structure of Truth: A Philosophical Investigation

Religion & Spirituality

Fordham University Press

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Schindler, D.C.. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Schindler, D.C.

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Schindler, D.C.. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

The Perfection of Freedom: Schiller, Schelling, and Hegel between the Ancients and the Moderns

Freedom from Reality: The Diabolical Character of Modern Liberty (Catholic Ideas for a Secular World)

Freedom from Reality: The Diabolical Character of Modern Liberty (Catholic Ideas for a Secular World)

Retrieving Freedom: The Christian Appropriation of Classical Tradition (Catholic Ideas for a Secular World)

Retrieving Freedom: The Christian Appropriation of Classical Tradition (Catholic Ideas for a Secular World)

Being Holy in the World: Theology and Culture in the Thought of David L. Schindler

The Catholicity of Reason (Ressourcement: Retrieval and Renewal in Catholic Thought (RRRCT))

Plato's Critique of Impure Reason: On Goodness and Truth in the Republic

Plato's Critique of Impure Reason: On Goodness and Truth in the Republic

Hans Urs Von Balthasar and the Dramatic Structure of Truth: A Philosophical Investigation