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  • Wittgenstein and Judaism: A Triumph of Concealment
  • Alick Isaacs (bio)
Ranjit Chatterjee , Wittgenstein and Judaism: A Triumph of Concealment (New York: Lang, 2004), 207 pp.

A survey of the scholarship on Wittgenstein might leave one with the sense that his work is something of a hexagonal pin, tenaciously resisting the various round holes provided. Wittgenstein has been "spoken for" as Buddhist, Catholic, homosexual, anti-Semite, communist, engineer/architect, etc. Each reading adds to an overall understanding of the mystery. But (happily, I might add) none so far has encouraged me to feel that Wittgenstein's genius has at last been accounted for and explained. Chatterjee offers an ingenious new understanding that seems closer to home—closer, that is, to Wittgenstein's family home—than many of its predecessors. Chatterjee argues that Wittgenstein's work is enigmatic because his Judaism (hereditary and philosophical rather than legal or behavioral) is concealed in it. Chatterjee argues that Jews, notably the mystics and conversos among them, typically developed sophisticated methods for hiding their true intentions "out in the open" for only a savvy few to find. Similarly, Wittgenstein's work is intended for the rare reader who has already thought the thoughts that it contains. Moreover, Jewish traditions of both thought and practice center, as Wittgenstein's philosophy does, on linguistic concerns. In Jewish tradition, language is a tool used by human beings and by God for doing more than for saying.

Chatterjee does not accept the view that there are two Wittgensteins, early and late. He sees the whole of Wittgenstein's work as full of twists and turns, ruses, contradictions, and foils (such as, notoriously, Otto Weininger) and sees them all as pointing at, or alluding to, a long tradition of biblical, rabbinic, Maimonidean, and kabbalistic dicta on ethics. While this book is a little lean on the Jewish side, the new context that Chatterjee proffers for reading Wittgenstein is [End Page 169] original, appealing, and evocative. The book contributes to the literature on the Jewishness (non-Hellenism) of the postmodern project, tracing lines from Wittgenstein through Levinas and Derrida: a genealogy with exciting prospects for readers interested in the reconciliation of Jewish and non-Jewish thinking in the contemporary world.

Alick Isaacs

Alick Isaacs teaches Jewish history at the Hebrew University and is a research fellow at the Hartman Institute in Jerusalem. He is associate editor of Common Knowledge for history, religion, and special projects and is currently writing a book about prophecy and peace.

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