On the Psychotheology of Everyday Life

This text puts Sigmund Freud in dialogue with his contemporary Franz Rosenzwig in the service of re-imagining ethical and political life. It expl ores the theological aspects of Freud's writings and reveals the psychoanalytic implications in the religious philosophy of Rosenzwig's work, "The Star of Redemption". Santner makes an argument for understanding theological notions of revelation in theraputic terms and offers a look at how this understanding suggests ways of re-conceiving political community. Revelation itself becomes redefined as an openess towards what is singular, enigmatic, even uncanny about the "Other", thereby linking a theory of drives and desire to a critical account of sociality. By bringing Freud and Rosenzwig together, Santner clarifies the connections between psychoanalysis and the Judeo-Christian tradition, and illuminates what it means to be open to another person or culture and to share the responsibility for one's implication in the dilemmas of difference.