In post-Holocaust philosophy, anti-Semitism has come to be seen as a paradigmatic political and ideological evil. Jews Out of the Question examines the role that opposition to anti-Semitism has played in shaping contemporary political philosophy. Elad Lapidot argues that post-Holocaust philosophy identifies the fundamental, epistemological evil of anti-Semitic thought not in thinking against Jews, but in thinking of Jews. In other words, what philosophy denounces as anti-Semitic is the figure of “the Jew” in thought. Lapidot reveals how, paradoxically, opposition to anti-Semitism has generated a rejection of Jewish thought in post-Holocaust philosophy. Through critical readings of political philosophers such as Adorno, Horkheimer, Sartre, Arendt, Badiou, and Nancy, the book contends that by rejecting Jewish thought, the opposition to anti-Semitism comes dangerously close to anti-Semitism itself, and at work in this rejection, is a problematic understanding of the relations between politics and thought—a troubling political epistemology. Lapidot’s critique of this political epistemology is the book’s ultimate aim.
Non-fiction
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Elad Lapidot, born in Jerusalem in 1976, is a professor of Hebrew and Jewish Studies at the University of Lille. He conducts research on political epistemology in contemporary philosophy and in the Talmudic tradition of thought.
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"The book is not only an urgent call to critically engage with one of the most established sites of consensus of our time but also reveals the enormous shortcomings of that consensus, even among its most stellar and respected representatives.” Gil Anidjar
