Der Religionsphilosoph Johannes Hessen (1889-1971): Ein Gelertenleben zwischen Modernismus und Linkskatholizismus by Chrisoph Weber

Abstract

Der Religionspbilosoph Johannes Hessen (1889-1971): Ein Gelertenleben zwischen Modernismus und Linkskatholizismus. By Chrisoph Weber. [Beitrage zur Kirchen- und Kulturgeschichte, Band 1.] (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang. 1994. Pp. 693. $97.95.) The subject of this four-part study is tumultuous life of Johannes Hessen, a priest and philosopher of religion at University of Cologne, who in course of his life managed to run afoul of church hierarchy, university faculty, National Socialist regime, and politics of Bundesrepublik in 1950's. A major part of book is devoted to Hessen's marginalization within Church,' reason, author charges, why he is largely forgotten today (p. 23). Leaving judgment of merits of Hessen's thought to philosophers, author undertakes to document historically the struggles of an independent mind in age of ideology (p. 23). The task is difficult, not least because of relative scarcity and incompleteness of available sources, a situation not improved by Hessen's own highly selective retrospective in 1959, entitled Geistige Kampfe der Zeit im Spiegel eines Lebens. The author accordingly provides readers with a valuable array of relevant documents, including unedited archive materials, in last three parts of study (over two-thirds of book). The first part of book is an introduction to Hessen's philosophy of religion as well as many conflicts spawned by it (more on this later). The second part is a collection of short but illuminating excerpts from Hessen's writings. The third part, entitled six dossiers on his life and struggles, assembles materials on his difficulties with ecclesiastical authorities (including a critical piece by Karl Rahner), University of Cologne documents from 1924 to 1950 (including a recommendation by Max Scheler, his Habilitationsvater), correspondence regarding his suspension by Archbishop of Cologne in 1928, State Police reports about Hessen from 1942-43, letters concerning restoration of his academic status after war (including a favorable review by Karl Jaspers), and documentation of his political activity against rearmament in 1950's. The fourth part of study is an extensive register of Hessen's writings as well as those of collaborators and critics, interlocutors and reviewers. The author identifies Hessen as an eclectic modernist, bent on appropriating Neokantian, critical realist, and phenomenological insights into Augustinian tradition of Catholic philosophy, on way to establishing an epistemological and axiological foundation of religion. A valuable portrait of influences on young Hessen (especially Hermann Lotze, Ernst Troeltsch, Rudolf Eucken, and Georg Hertling) is given along with a regrettably all too condensed review of his major works, including Die Religionsphilosophie des Neukantianismus (1919), Wertphilosophie (1937), Platonismus und Prophetismus (1939), Lehrbuch der Philosophie (3 vols.,1947-1950), and Religionsphilosophie (2 vols.,1948). With his rejection of rational proofs of God's existence and their implications for relation between philosophy and theology, Hessen is portrayed as a philosopher of religion ahead of his time, more prescient than Przywara and Guardini regarding need to move beyond Neo-Scholasticism to historical-critical thinking. …