Hermann Cohen: An Intellectual Biography

Hermann Cohen: An Intellectual Biography is the first comprehensive intellectual biography of Herman Cohen, a central figure in German philosophy and Judaism. Cohen was the leader of the Marburg school of neo-Kantianism and defended an interpretation of Kant that is now seen as standard. His book on the philosophy of religion – The Religion of Reason – is one of the great classics of Jewish religious rationalism. Cohen was one of the first major spokesmen in the defence of Judaism against anti-Semitism and in the formulation of a cosmopolitan conception of Judaism against Zionism. Frederick C. Beiser pays special attention to all phases of Cohen’s intellectual development across seven decades, contending throughout this text that Cohen’s Judaism was a consistent development of his radical rationalism and that his religion should be seen as a religion of reason.