Re-reading Messianism: “Text” and “Commentary” Between Emmanuel Levinas and Gershom Scholem

This article will examine Levinas’ first “Talmudic Readings” on rabbinic messianism (1960–1961) as a polemic answer to Scholem’s “Zum Verständnis der messianischen Idee in Judentum” (1959), beginning with Scholem’s critical answer to Levinas’ letter from 1947. The letter points out the differences between the two thinkers’ respective attitudes toward Jewish “Text” and “Commentary,” which, as will be argued, also represent some key differences between “German” and “French” approaches to the study of Judaism in a nutshell.