Chers sociétaires, chers amis,
Poursuivant nos travaux, nous pouvons annoncer que la prochaine rencontre de la Société Dantesque de France se tiendra le :
Vendredi 20 mars 2026, à 16 heures 30
Bibliothèque interuniversitaire de la Sorbonne
Salle de formation
Pierre Bouretz, de l’EHESS, présentera une communication intitulée « Une saison avec Dante ». L’affiche est en pièce jointe. Si vous ne possédez la carte de la BIS, merci de vous inscrire par retour de courriel, ou en écrivant à l’adresse suivante : Questo indirizzo email è protetto dagli spambots. È necessario abilitare JavaScript per vederlo.
En espérant vous retrouver nombreux,
Cordialement,
SDdF
Pierre Bouretz est un philosophe français né le 24 novembre 1958 à Lille.Il est directeur d'études à l’École des hautes études en sciences sociales (EHESS) à Paris, où il est rattaché au Centre des savoirs sur le politique. Recherches et analyses (CESPRA – CNRS/EHESS). Il a également été membre du Centre d'études interdisciplinaires des faits religieux (CEIFR) et a exercé des responsabilités éditoriales, notamment comme co-directeur de la revue Esprit pendant plusieurs années.
Domaines de spécialisation
Ses travaux portent principalement sur :
- la philosophie allemande (Kant, Hegel, Cohen, Habermas, etc.),
- le messianisme et ses liens avec la philosophie et la religion,
- la pensée juive moderne (en particulier Hermann Cohen),
- les rapports entre philosophie, religion et politique,
- la question de la raison face à la foi et au sécularisme.
Principaux ouvrages
Parmi ses publications les plus connues :
- Témoins du futur. Philosophie et messianisme (Gallimard, 2003) – un ouvrage de référence sur le messianisme juif et ses échos philosophiques,
- Qu'appelle-t-on philosopher ?,
- La raison ou les dieux,
- Sur Dante (Gallimard, 2023) – essai philosophique récent où il propose une lecture originale de La Divine Comédie de Dante, en insistant sur sa dimension politique, poétique et transgressive pour l’époque médiévale.
Il est régulièrement invité à intervenir sur ces thèmes, y compris dans des cycles prestigieux comme le Cycle Marc Bloch à l’EHESS (conférence « Démons et merveilles » en 2025).
Dans le contexte de la Société Dantesque de France, son intervention prévue le 20 mars 2026 à la Bibliothèque interuniversitaire de la Sorbonne s’inscrit logiquement dans sa réflexion récente sur Dante, qu’il aborde avant tout comme philosophe plutôt que comme pur spécialiste de littérature médiévale.
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Hermann Cohen (1842–1918) stands as one of the most influential philosophers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He founded the Marburg School of Neo-Kantianism, which dominated German academic philosophy until World War I, and is widely regarded as the most important Jewish philosopher of the 19th century. His thought evolved from rigorous reinterpretations of Kant into a comprehensive “system of philosophy” grounded in pure reason, before culminating in a distinctive “religion of reason” drawn from Jewish sources. Cohen’s philosophy emphasizes anti-psychologism, the constructive power of pure thinking, ethical idealism, and a messianic vision of universal human progress.
plato.stanford.edu
jewishstudies.washington.edu
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Biography and Intellectual Context
Born on July 4, 1842, in Coswig (Anhalt), Germany, to a devout Jewish family—his father was a synagogue cantor—Cohen initially trained for the rabbinate at the Jewish Theological Seminary in Breslau. He shifted to secular philosophy, studying at universities in Breslau, Berlin, and Halle (Ph.D. 1865). Influenced by Adolf Trendelenburg and Heymann Steinthal, he turned decisively to Kant. In 1873 he became a Privatdozent at the University of Marburg; by 1876 he was full professor—a rare achievement for an unconverted Jew in Bismarck’s Germany. He faced anti-Semitism (e.g., from historian Heinrich von Treitschke), to which he responded publicly in his 1880 “Declaration on the Jewish Question.” Cohen taught at Marburg until retiring in 1912, then moved to Berlin to lecture on Jewish philosophy at the Academy for the Science of Judaism until his death on April 4, 1918.
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His career divides into three phases:
- Early Kant commentaries (1870s–1880s).
- Mature systematic philosophy (1902–1912).
- Late religious writings (1915–1919, the last posthumous).
Interpretation of Kant and the Marburg School Cohen’s breakthrough came with Kant’s Theory of Experience (1871; 2nd ed. 1885). He rescued Kant from psychologistic misreadings (e.g., those reducing a priori forms to subjective mental structures) and from metaphysical ones. For Cohen, Kant’s critical philosophy investigates the transcendental conditions that make objective experience (especially mathematical natural science) possible. The “fact of science” is the starting point; philosophy articulates its a priori principles.
plato.stanford.edu
This anti-psychologism—rejecting any reduction of logic or ethics to empirical psychology—became the hallmark of the Marburg School (with students like Paul Natorp and Ernst Cassirer). Cohen introduced the “principle of the infinitesimal method” (1883), arguing that the infinitesimal calculus exemplifies how pure thinking generates continuity and objectivity without relying on “given” sensations. He rejected Kant’s independent “thing-in-itself” and sensible intuition as ultimate; instead, thinking itself originates the laws of nature.
The System of Philosophy (1902–1912)Cohen’s three-part System presents critical idealism in its purest form:
- Logic of Pure Knowledge (1902): Knowledge arises from “pure thinking” alone—no sensations, no external “given.” Thinking generates principles through judgment forms (origin, identity, contradiction, etc.). The infinitesimal is paradigmatic: “the triumph of pure thinking.” Objects of science are constituted by these logical laws, ensuring objectivity without psychologism.
- Ethics of Pure Will (1904): Ethics begins not with individual psychology but with the “fact” of pure jurisprudence—universal laws governing human action. The moral subject is humanity as a whole; the ideal is a “realm of ends” realized through democratic institutions, universal suffrage, and worker collectives. Cohen’s Kantian ethics thus grounds a non-Marxist democratic socialism: treating people as ends prohibits labor exploitation.
- Aesthetics of Pure Feeling (1912): Pure feeling is the consciousness of consciousness—the awareness that we experience the lawful objects of science and ethics. It produces the objects of art and links aesthetics to religion (especially through lyric poetry).
A planned fourth part on psychology of cultural consciousness remained unwritten. Throughout, Cohen used a historical “problemgeschichte” method: philosophy reconstructs the evolution of concepts to reveal their rational necessity.
plato.stanford.edu
Philosophy of Religion and Judaism: The Late Turn
After 1912, Cohen’s focus shifted. In Berlin he immersed himself in Jewish sources, producing The Concept of Religion in the System of Philosophy (1915) and the monumental Religion of Reason Out of the Sources of Judaism (posthumous, 1919). Religion does not replace ethics or philosophy but complements them. Ethics deals with the abstract “I” as member of humanity; religion addresses the concrete individual “Thou”—the suffering person, sin, repentance, and atonement.
Central innovation: the correlation between God and humanity. God is not a metaphysical entity but the unique ethical ideal that guarantees the possibility of moral progress. Humanity discovers itself through sin and atonement; God is the “guarantor” of the correlation. Judaism provides the original sources of “religion of reason”: strict monotheism (one God for all humanity) and prophetic messianism—the hope for the “dominion of the good on earth,” a future ethical community without national or political boundaries.
plato.stanford.edu
Cohen rejected Zionism (e.g., in debates with Martin Buber), viewing it as a regression into history; Judaism’s mission is universal and spiritual, best fulfilled in diaspora. He championed German-Jewish symbiosis and ethical socialism. In his words, love of God is knowledge of the ultimate moral purpose of mankind.
Key Innovations and Themes
- Pure thinking as originative, not receptive.
- Anti-psychologism as defense of philosophy’s autonomy.
- Infinitesimal method linking mathematics, logic, and reality.
- Ethical monotheism and messianism as rational hope.
- Reconciliation of reason and faith: Judaism as the purest “religion of reason.”
Influence and Legacy
Cohen shaped 20th-century thought profoundly. In general philosophy, his transcendental method influenced Cassirer’s philosophy of symbolic forms, phenomenology, and even logical positivism. In Jewish philosophy, he inspired Martin Buber’s dialogical “I-Thou,” Franz Rosenzweig, and Emmanuel Levinas. His messianic optimism—radical hope amid crisis—continues to resonate (e.g., in Pierre Bouretz’s studies of messianism). Today, scholars revisit Cohen for his integration of ethics, politics, and religion, his critique of nationalism, and his vision of perpetual ethical progress.
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Cohen’s philosophy invites us to see reason not as cold abstraction but as the creative force behind science, morality, art, and the hope for a just world. Exploring his works—especially the Ethics of Pure Will and Religion of Reason—reveals a thinker who never separated rigorous critique from profound ethical and religious commitment. For primary reading, the 2021 English anthology Hermann Cohen: Writings on Neo-Kantianism and Jewish Philosophy is an excellent starting point.