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51.More information
In this paper I first (§ 2) examine the metacriticism of modern critique of religion that Strauss formulates in his first book on Spinoza (1930). According to this early interpretation by Strauss, Spinoza undertakes a metaphysical critique of religion in order to confute the ontological possibility of divine revelation (or ‘miracle thesis'). Spinoza's attempt, however, ends in an aporia: the ultimate presupposition underlying belief in revelation remains irrefutable. In the § 3 I examine a text published by Strauss shortly afterwards (1935), in which I detect a self-critique of his earlier meta-criticism of modern critique of religion. Strauss become aware here that his own understanding of Spinoza's aporia is itself aporetic. It is in this aporia, in my view, that we must look for the key to understanding what Strauss would call retrospectively (1962) his own ‘change of orientation' and, consequently, his discovery of ‘philosophical exotericism.'
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53.More information
Richard Wagner's Der fliegende Holländer is unusual among the composer's mature operas for the brevity and relative unfamiliarity of its source material. Since the legend of the Flying Dutchman was relatively unknown, both Heine and Wagner contextualize the Dutchman by relating him to better-known figures: Heine refers to the Dutchman as the Wandering Jew, and Wagner, through hunting music, connects him to the Wild Hunter. This article addresses the significance of these associations by examining the meanings of all three legends and demonstrating how they are used by Wagner to provide dramatic and musical structure in the opera.
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