Levinaas Philosophy Of Love Derrid Rida Analysis

Levinas’ remarkable criticism of the West Universalist philosophical tradition questions the dominant and self-sufficient status of the self, this arrogant self which pretends to possess the monopole over Truth and Freedom. “Drunk with being in himself and for himself in the presence – or the modernity – […], man is capable of sobering up and of dis-interestedness and extreme vigilance vis-à-vis his absolutely other fellow man.” But Levinas’ thought does not remain a negation in the bossom of criticism. He suggests another path: a philosophy which is aware that the interpersonal relations start from the inter-subjectivity, but “the direction is not oriented to the whole as a final goal, rather than the Other in his alterity. (Translation mine)” This turn in philosophical thinking is what Derrida calls “the death of philosophy”.

By the first lines of his mature work “Totality and Infinity” Levinas discloses his intentions to set “Ethics as First Philosophy”: “Everyone will readily agree that it is of the highest importance to know whether we are not duped by morality.” Obvious from the very beginning of his work, Levinas is initially concerned about the reduction of morality to standardized external mechanisms, which lead to alienation and indifference between individuals. Instead, he suggests that ethics derive from the interaction of the self with the Other – a face-to-face encounter determined by the “irreducible” and infinite responsibility of the self for the Other. The face of the other, in its purity and bareness, questions the Da in my Dasein, provoking me to look for justification of my existence, different from the facticity of