How Emmanuel Levinas Brought German Thought to France, and the Talmud to Philosophy

Born in 1905 into an observant Jewish family in Russian-ruled Kovno (later Lithuanian Kaunas), Emmanuel Levinas attended a secular high school and then left for France to pursue a higher education. In the 1930s, his writings introduced the latest German philosophy to a French audience, paving the way for Jean-Paul Sartre and others. He also became increasingly interested in Jewish topics, first confronting rising anti-Semitism and eventually giving philosophical lectures, later committed to writing, on the Talmud. Sarah Hammerschlag discusses Levinas’s life, the theological basis of his ethical system, his evolving attitude toward Zionism, his career as the principal of a Jewish high school, and his place in the Jewish intellectual tradition with J.J. Kimche.