On the Degeneration of Public Philosophy in America: Problems and Prospects

Abstract

Mark Blitz’s Plato’s Political Philosophy is reviewed in this article with special attention to two recurring themes. The first is the relation of parts to wholes and, especially, how the knowledge of parts and wholes in general and of political parts and wholes in particular relate to the philosophic attempt to know the whole itself. The second theme is that of philosophy’s relation to piety and, in particular, how the attempt to know the whole, as understood by Blitz, relates to the fundamental opposition between piety and philosophy. Attention to these themes, the author argues, helps to explain peculiarities of Blitz’s approach, especially his greater emphasis on articulating the entire “realm of political philosophy” than on explicating individual dialogues and his tendency to connect and divide Platonic thoughts, themes, and problems rather than to bore into individual Socratic problems.     

The Catholic Church,religious Revival,and the nationalist movement in East Timor, 1975–98

’We have nothing left to lose. We are human beings and they have treated us like insects. We will never accept them here. Even if we have to die resisting, we will resist. We have our dignity and our own identity. And God is with us!‘     

Book reviews

C. Skinner (ed. and tr.) Ahmad Rijaluddin's Hikayat perinteh negeri Benggala. vi, 198 pp. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1982. (Koninklijk Instituut voor Taal‐, Land‐ en Volkenkunde. Bibliotheca Indonesica, 22.)

J. A. de Moor (camp.). Indisch Militair Tijdschrift (1870–1942) a selective and annotated bibliography. [i], xiv, 236 pp. The Hague: Sectie Militaire Geschiedenis van de Landmachtstaf; Leiden: Centre for the History of European Expansion, 1983. (Bijdragen van de Sectie Militaire Geschiedenis No. 15; Intercontinenta, No. 4). Guilders 24.

A. Teeuw and S. O. Robson (ed. and tr.). Kuñjarakarna dharmakathana, Liberation through the law of the Buddha: an Old Javanese poem by Mpu Dusun. With a contribution on the reliefs of Candi Jago by A. J. Bernet Kempers. ix, 230 pp., 24 plates. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1981. (Koninklijk Instituut voor Taal‐, Land‐ en Volkenkunde. Bibliotheca Indonesica, 21.) Guilders 90.

W. van der Molen. Javaanse tekstkritiek: een overzicht en een nieuwe benadering geillustreerd aan de Kunjarakarna. ix, 316 pp. Dordrecht: Foris Publications, 1983. (Verhandelingen van het Koninklijk Instituut voor Taal‐, Land‐ en Volkenkunde, 102.) Guilders 30.

Jan B. Avé and others. West Kalimantan: a bibliography. By Jan B. Avé, Victor T. King, and Joke G. W. de Wit. x, 260 pp. Dordrecht: Foris Publications, 1983. (Koninklijk Instituut voor Taal‐, Land‐ en Volken‐kunde. Bibliographical Series, 13.) Guilders 30.