Abstract

This dissertation examines the work of Emmanuel Levinas from the perspective of the philosophy of religion. It explores the various strategies through which Levinas seeks to integrate a significant conception of transcendence into strictly philosophical discourse. Thus the present work restricts its analysis to Levinas' two major philosophical texts, Totality and Infinity, and Otherwise than Being or Beyond Essence. ;It is argued herein that the concepts of language and revelation play a pivotal role in Levinas' philosophical project, and in particular that these two concepts form the heart of Levinas' argument that we encounter absolute otherness in the face-to-face encounter between human beings. The dissertation analyzes these two concepts, the relationship between them, and the way in which Levinas' understanding of them changes over the course of his philosophical career. ;After comparing Levinas' view of language with that of Jacques Derrida, and working through Levinas' methodological remarks, the dissertation reaches three basic conclusions. ;First of all the concept of luxury, and its equivalents "gratuity", "folly" and "enigma" in Levinas' later work, will play a crucial role in Levinas' attempt to reconcile revelation and philosophy. The concept of luxury, hitherto ignored in studies of Levinas, provides Levinas with a way to express the radically unforeseeable and disruptive character of revelation in philosophical terms. ;Secondly, Levinas' philosophical position in his later work embodies a clearly religious worldview, one that might be called "prophetic messianism". Thus the distinction between Levinas' "philosophical writings" and his "religious or Jewish writings" may have to be modified or abandoned entirely. ;Finally, Levinas' view of language, which remains connected with an idea of revelation, maintains the primacy of ethics or prophecy in the phenomenon of language. This challenges all philosophies of language which accord primacy to the impersonality, instrumentality, or systematicity of language