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Paul Ricoeur (1913--2005) remains one of philosophy of religion's most distinctive voices. Ricoeur was a philosopher first, and while his religious reflections are very relevant to theology, Boyd Blundell argues that his philosophy is even more relevant. Using Ricoeur's own philosophical hermeneutics, Blundell shows that there is a way for explicitly Christian theology to maintain both its integrity and overall relevance. He demonstrates how the dominant pattern of detour and return found throughout Ricoeur's work provides a path to understanding the relationship between philosophy and theology. By putting Ricoeur in dialogue with current, fundamental, and longstanding debates about the role of philosophy in theology, Blundell offers a hermeneutically sensitive engagement with Ricoeur's thought from a theological perspective.

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Finally
Those who have appreciated Ricouer's hermeneutics over the last fewdecades, whether they tend to agree or disagree with him, will rejoice thata sampling of biblical exegesis from Ricouer has finally appeared in thisvolume.Further, Ricouer has found a powerful dialogue partner in thewell-know biblical scholar Adnre Lacocque.Ricouer's correlationalapproach comes through nicely in his discussion of selected biblical texts. The opening discussion of Genesis 2-3 is particlarly poignant.The booksstrengths also produce its weaknesses.There is only a sampling of textshere.How would Ricouer apprach the understanding of an entire biblicalbook?We still do not know.The inclusion of Lacocque's work is quitewelcome, but it means that only half the book is Ricouer.One of thehermeneutical giants of the last half of the twentieth century appears tobe nearing the end of his career.One can only hope that more applicationof his method to the Bible is forthcoming, but at least we have this onevolume. ... Read more

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Paul Ricoeur has been hailed as one of the most important thinkers of the century.Oneself as Another, the clearest account of his "philosophical ethics," substantiates this position and lays the groundwork for a metaphysics of morals.

Focusing on the concept of personal identity, Ricoeur develops a hermeneutics of the self that charts its epistemological path and ontological status. ... Read more

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Who Am I as Another? A self.
Without a doubt, Paul Ricoeur's "Oneself as Another" is dense and indicative of Ricoeur's expansive familiarity with myriad philosophical trajectories and traditions, from Ordinary Language Philosophy to Phenomenology to Deconstructionism, to name a few. It is this philosophical fluency, which allows Ricoeur to articulate an extensive philosophy of the self, an inquiry into the nature of the identity of the human person. Given the sections to which my inquiry is primarily confined (Studies 5-7), it goes without saying that such a review as my own can hardly do justice to this particular other, who is Ricoeur, or to the extent of his philosophy of self. I will, however, attempt to draw out what I view as essential to these sections, which necessarily presuppose that which leads up to the current issues and anticipates future ones.

The project that Ricoeur engages in is an arduous one, though it is taken for granted in everyday language. The "I" of the person in common parlance asserts itself as one who is--an ontological and unambiguous reality as real and as given as the air that "I" breaths. Ricoeur's desire is to transcend the hegemony of "I," however, and to articulate a philosophy of self where the "I" is neither the first principle, but nor is it simply another "separate further fact." In other words, Ricoeur seeks to develop a conceptualization of selfhood that is neither the conventional exalted ego identified by Descartes, nor one which is the utterly humiliated and reduced self of deconstructionist philosophy. A self conceived in the former terms exhibits god-like status and, without the support of a trusting God to ensure one is not being deceived, that god-like status (of being an ontological reality) is ultimately all that can be conceived of as certain and a solipsistic attitude of suspicion is difficult if not impossible to avoid for all that is deemed other. A self understood in terms of the latter deconstructionist thought echoes the Nietzschean assertion regarding perspectivalism where no ontological realities are to be found. Instead, only a fabricated and utterly contingent person (if it can be called such) is present, and who really amounts to not much more than a grammatical convenience and semantic fluke. In either case meaning and value meet either a nihilistic fate or a narcissistic existence. Meaning and value, perhaps, can be construed here in terms of Ricoeur's project of hermeneutical and phenomenological descriptions of oneself as another, respectively. With regard to the two fates, I understand the latter in terms of the essential turn to the subject where the self becomes first principle, the primary datum by which and through which all other reality is "given" meaning, and the former as the deconstructionist paring away at the self until nothing remains but a series of chance, albeit intrinsically neutral, events, i.e. no self as such.

Ricoeur sees in this philosophical quagmire of self a confrontation between the concept of identity as "sameness" (Latin idem) and identity as "selfhood" (Latin ipse). When approached from a foundationalist point of view, a posited ontological self threatens the possibility of diversity within and outside of that self. Any kind of change is dangerous insomuch as it threatens the sameness which constitutes that self. Ricoeur cited for example the notion of self as understood by Locke as demonstrating such a problem. For Locke, substantial identity which corresponds to the ability to identify the self-same over time, is bound up with memory, and memory becomes substantive reflection in the moment where in the end sameness prevails. Ricoeur comments that Locke's approach marks "a conceptual reversal in which the selfhood was silently substituted for sameness" (126). When approached from the point of view of deconstruction, where no substantive self is to be found (i.e. no principle of sameness which Ricoeur will refer to as permanence in time) the self is fleeting and elusive, an epiphenomenon that is traced to physical events, brute and neutral facts, which are hermeneutically vacuous. As representative of this line of thought, Ricoeur offers the example of Hume (and later Derek Parfit) whose doubt and suspicion render the verdict that the self is an illusion. Hume only finds "a diversity of experiences and no invariable expression relative to the idea of a self" when he enters "most intimately" into himself (127).

Part of the drive for this philosophy of self for Ricoeur, then, is the desire to formulate an answer to the question of selfhood that mediates between Locke's substantive sameness, which leaves no room for alterity without destroying the self that is constituted by uninterrupted continuity, and Hume's illusory self, which Hume is unable to find upon looking for it. In objection to Hume's nihilistic analysis and conclusion, Ricoeur is quick to point out that there is, indeed, "someone who claims to be unable to find anything but a datum stripped of selfhood [heat, cold, any perception in the memory]; someone who penetrates within himself, seeks and declares to have found nothing" (128). What then drives us to impose an identity on successive sense perceptions and to "assume that we possess an invariable and uninterrupted existence during the entire course of our life" to which some kind of sameness of self can be posited? (127).

This drive to impose an identity, to ask the question "Who am I?" (regardless of the answer), is the essential hinge around which Ricoeur's philosophy of self revolves because it asserts over against ontological certainty and deconstruction emptiness an agent "who" asks. Yet, this "who" who asks is always a "who" who acts; further, this self who acts is someone recognizable, reidentifiable (either by oneself or by another), and such re-cognition and re-identification only become necessary where sameness is threatened: this threat Ricoeur identifies as time. Of this Ricoeur says: "Looking back, the greatest lacuna in our earlier studies most obviously concerns the temporal dimension of the self as well as of action as such" (113). Time is an implicit dimension in action, thus identity. But what provides that essential "permanence in time" to which the self can look to as a composite whole, a singular self, and not simply a "separate further fact"? The answer to this question involves a combination of phenomenological and hermeneutical descriptions of and prescriptions for the self and the placing of selfhood in between a dialectic of idem and ipse, that is, of sameness and selfhood. This is accomplished by positing that identity is rooted in narrative. Narrative is by definition temporal. For Ricoeur, then, personal identity, the self, "can be articulated only in the temporal dimension of human existence" (113-114). Narrative becomes the mediator between description and understanding (and eventually prescription), between idem and ipse, and between the self and the other.

Ricoeur's reliance on the phenomenological tradition is evident in the very title Oneself as Another as it is throughout the work. This phrase is not simply (or only) a reference to an analogical relationship signified by "as," between oneself and other, but an indication of the project as a phenomenological endeavor from start to finish. The "I" so common in everyday language, with its conventional tie to the Cartesian tradition is bracketed in an effort to resolve paradoxes regarding identity. The self, then, is not approached as an "I," but as an experienced self--as something that constitutes substantive appearance over time.

The self as rooted in action becomes the question of "who?" acts and how actions are always interactions. The encounter time and again with such "facts" of life (i.e. actions) acquire meaning only in the context of acquired habits and acquired identifications. That is to say, our experiences are always interpreted in the context of one's previous encounters with the phenomena corresponding to the experience. This, of course, brings oneself back to the experience of that self and points to the title's deeper phenomenological presuppositions. Just as we cannot experience a "chair" as meaningful object crafted for the purpose of sitting without prior experiences with items of this type, neither can we know ourselves except through encounters with other such phenomena--a history of encounters that teach us what a self is, hence, oneself as another.

What other philosophical approaches (and theological approaches as well) have sought is substantive reference, an ontological basis for the self where the self is the starting place, the origin, the point of departure. By introducing the narrative identity (or the temporal dimension) into the constitution of the self Ricoeur has attested that the self is something which cannot be an ontological point of origin out of which everything else is known, but is rather the destination arrived at--and still only to find that the destination is not final, but is only layover. Perhaps in theological terms, the self is the "already" and the "not yet" of the person.

The difference between person and self as implied in Ricoeur's analysis is a distinction between "what" I am and "who" I am. Ricoeur's project is in the latter, but to provide an ontological basis of the self, (i.e. to avoid a deconstructionist and nihilistic spiral into nothingness), the whatness of "who I am" (idem) must remain part of this equation of identity. It is the difference between either a meon-ontological collapse into something (vis-à-vis the deconstructionist project) or an ontological collapse into solipsistic ego (via traditional Cartesian notions of self, or better expressed in Hume and Parfit). Narrative theory provides the mediation between the descriptive actions that constitute character and the intentional self-constancy that constitutes selfhood. The person is one who is dependent upon that other for a guiding hermeneutic and is fragile insofar as authentic selfhood is contingent upon keeping one's word.

Great book
I am not in a position to evaluate this book. However, I think this book shows a nice attempt to theorize (?) the philosophy of the self or the first person beyond Cartesian cogito and metaphysical semantics, inviting readers to pay attention to pragmatics of the self. This book is a solid synthesis of many accomplishments in pragmatics, action theories, discursive psychology, and Russian dialogism. For that reason, it is hard to find author's original points. I would recommend to read/compare with Rom Harre's Singular Self.

Subjecthood?? Subject positions?? Self-subjection??
As I understand it, the goal of Ricoeur's studies is to formulate a notion of the subject that is not susceptible to the same objections and aporia as Descartes's cogito.To accomplish this, he analyzes discursive situations and comes to the conclusion that the subject is first and foremost a being, i.e., a body in space, and that the subject understands herself first and foremost as such.Grammar reveals this self-objectivation (to borrow a term from Habermas) in that the reflexive "I" is a grammatical substitution for a corresponding third-person deictic term: "I" is the "she" of the speaking subject to the "he/him" is the "you" of the interlocutor as told from the perspective of the speaking subject, who occupies the same spatiotemporal point as the subject's particular body.
Ricoeur's findings appear rather plausible, but I cannot help but think that his findings imply sort of transcendental, or perhaps I should say, para- or transsubjective, awareness on the part of the subject that is inarticulable (neologism?) yet essential to her awareness as a body within a discursive situation.In other words, by virtue of the fact that the subject grammatically isolates herself differentially vis-à-vis her interlocutor in a discursive situation seems to me to imply that the subject's self-awareness is not as spatiotemporally limited as the body that it inhabits, or, more accurately with which it is coextensive (consubstantial?).I therefore remain uncertain on how prioritizing the corporeal subject before the thinking subject avoids the aporia of Cartesian subjectivity. ... Read more

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This is a collection in translation of essays by Paul Ricoeur which presents a comprehensive view of his philosophical hermeneutics, its relation to the views of his predecessors in the tradition and its consequences for the social sciences. The volume has three parts. The studies in the first part examine the history of hermeneutics, its central themes and the outstanding issues it has to confront. In Part II, Ricoeur's own current, constructive position is developed. A concept of the text is formulated as the implications of the theory are pursued into the domains of sociology, psychoanalysis and history. Many of the essays appear here in English for the first time; the editor's introduction brings out their background in Ricoeur's thought and the continuity of his concerns. The volume will be of great importance for those interested in hermeneutics and Ricoeur's contribution to it, and will demonstrate how much his approach offers to a number of disciplines. ... Read more

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Paul Ricoeur is widely regarded as the foremost living phenomenologist. His writings cover a wide range of topics, from the history of philosophy, literary criticism and aesthetics, to metaphysics, ethics, religion, semiotics, linguistic structuralism, the humanistic sciences, psychoanalysis, Marxism, guilt and evil, and conflicts of interpretation. In similar format to the preceding 21 volumes of the "Library of Living Philosophers", this book contains Ricoeur's intellectual autobiography, critical essays by 25 leading philosophers, and Ricoeur's replies to these criticisms. ... Read more

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In order to examine fully the nature of human beings, Paul Ricoeur crossed disciplinary boundaries in his work, moving from phenomenology to social and political thought, hermeneutics, and ethics. Running throughout Ricoeurs workparticularly Fallible Man, Time and Narrative, Oneself as Another, and his shorter pieces on hermeneutics, ethics, and religionis a theme of the human capacity for hope. According to Ricoeur, hope is a capacity of expectation, oriented toward some future action, which aims at a good for self and others. The conditions for the possibility of hope are the unity and difference that exist within the self in transcendental, practical, and effective realms, and the selfs ability to narrate, which is made possible by the selfs existence within, and understanding of, time. Our capacity for hope is understood via the symbols of good and evil found in myths and sacred writings. Furthermore, hope is not limited to those who are religious; atheists may be just as hopeful as the devout. Exploring the nature of hope in Ricoeurs work allows for a greater understanding of hope and a greater ability to cultivate hope in oneself and others. ... Read more

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The only available collection of Ricoeur's lectures on ideology and utopia, this seminal collection discusses the work of Althusser, Marx, Habermas, Geertz, Mannheim, and Weber. ... Read more

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Paul Ricoeur's entire philosophical project narrates a "passion for the possible" expressed in the hope that in spite of death, closure, and sedimentation, life is opened by superabundance, by how the world gives us much more than is possible. Ricoeur's philosophical anthropology is a phenomenology of human capacity, which gives onto the groundless ground of human being, namely, God. Thus the story of the capable man, beginning with original goodness held captive by a servile will and ending with the possibility of liberation and regeneration of the heart, underpins his passion for the more than possible. The essays in this volume trace the fluid movement between phenomenological and religious descriptions of the capable self that emerges across Ricoeur's oeuvre and establish points of connection for future developments that might draw inspiration from this body of thought. ... Read more

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Not Bad as an Introduction to Paul Ricoeur's Philosophy.
This essay examines the question of free will as against causal determinism by contrasting Paul Ricoeur's phenomenological and hermeneutic approach to the issue with the thorough analysis of the topic offered in a recent book by the pragmatist Owen Flanagan. The author provides his own own assessment of these thinkers, which I agree with, since I happen to be the person who wrote the book. The footnotes are interesting and Ricoeur's theory is summarized pretty effectively. ... Read more

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The most accessible of Ricoeur's early texts, Fallible Man offers an introduction to phenomenological method. ... Read more

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Recognition, though it figures profoundly in our understanding of objects and persons, identity and ideas, has never before been the subject of a single, sustained philosophical inquiry. This work, by one of contemporary philosophy's most distinguished voices, pursues recognition through its various philosophical guises and meanings--and, through the "course of recognition," seeks to develop nothing less than a proper hermeneutics of mutual recognition.

Originally delivered as lectures at the Institute for the Human Sciences at Vienna, the essays collected here consider recognition in three of its forms. The first chapter, focusing on knowledge of objects, points to the role of recognition in modern epistemology; the second, concerned with what might be called the recognition of responsibility, traces the understanding of agency and moral responsibility from the ancients up to the present day; and the third takes up the problem of recognition and identity, which extends from Hegel's discussion of the struggle for recognition through contemporary arguments about identity and multiculturalism. Throughout, Paul Ricoeur probes the significance of our capacity to recognize people and objects, and of self-recognition and self-identity in relation to the gift of mutual recognition. Drawing inspiration from such literary texts as The Odyssey and Oedipus at Colonus, and engaging some of the classic writings of the Continental philosophical tradition--by Kant, Hobbes, Hegel, Augustine, Locke, and Bergson--The Course of Recognition ranges over vast expanses of time and subject matter and in the process suggests a number of highly insightful ways of thinking through the major questions of modern philosophy.

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El gran pensador frances, profesor emerito en la Universidad de Chicago, despliega en este libro una nueva serie de sus brillantes reflexiones. Despues de estudiar el lenguaje como discurso (lengua y habla, acontecimiento y sentido, intencion y expresion), Ricoeur aborda la diferencia entre habla y escritura, simbolo y metafora, explicacion y comprension. ... Read more

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On Paul Ricoeur examines the later work of Paul Ricoeur, particularly his major work Time and Narrative, by extending and developing the debate this work has inspired. Time and Narrative is the finest example of contemporary philosophical hermeneutics and is one of the most significant works of philosophy published in the late twentieth century. Paul Ricoeur's study of the intertwining of time and narrative proposes and examines the possibility that narrative could remedy a fatal deficiency in any purely phenomenological approach. He analyzes both literary and historical writing, from Proust to Braudel, as well as key figures in the history of philosophy. ... Read more

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In 1950, Paul Ricoeur published his translation of Edmund Husserl's "Ideen I" under the title "Idees directrices pour une phenomenologie". It became the handbook and key to the father of phemenology. This combination of Husserl and Ricoeur should be of interest to both professors and students. ... Read more

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This collection of essays is a sequel to Ricoeur's earlier volume, "The Conflict of Interpretations: Essays in Hermeneutics 1" (1969, English edition 1989, Athlone). "From Text to Action" follows an original line of thought, passing from phenomenology to hermeneutics (defined by Ricoeur as "the general theory of interpretation") and from the hermeneutics of the text to the hermeneutics of action. It draws on the thought of Dilthey, Heidegger and Gadamer and incorporates ideas from the Social Sciences, the Philosophy of Language and Political Philosophy. The author, Paul Ricoeur, is a leading French thinker in the philosophy of language. His translated works include "The Symbolization of Evil" (1969) and "The Conflict of Interpretations" (Athlone, 1989). ... Read more