Download or read book Cloaked in Virtue written by Nicholas Xenos and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2010-05-26 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It is now commonly acknowledged that numerous key players in and around the Bush administration’s planning of the Iraq invasion were connected through a common background in the political philosophy of Leo Strauss, a German-born University of Chicago professor who died in 1973. These Straussian "neocons" were held responsible for exploiting the September 11th attacks in order to further their own foreign policy agenda. Cloaked in Virtue is the first book to take a critical view of the political ideas of Leo Strauss himself by careful attention to his own writings before and after his emigration to the United States. The result is a critical examination of the political theory of Leo Strauss, lifting the veil of intentional obfuscation, and its influence on the neoconservative foreign policy of the George W. Bush administration. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of politics and international relations.
Download or read book The Tyranny of Virtue written by Robert Boyers and published by Scribner. This book was released on 2019-09-24 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From public intellectual and professor Robert Boyers, “a powerfully persuasive, insightful, and provocative prose that mixes erudition and first-hand reportage” (Joyce Carol Oates) addressing recent developments in American culture and arguing for the tolerance of difference that is at the heart of the liberal tradition. Written from the perspective of a liberal intellectual who has spent a lifetime as a writer, editor, and college professor, The Tyranny of Virtue is a “courageous, unsparing, and nuanced to a rare degree” (Mary Gaitskill) insider’s look at shifts in American culture—most especially in the American academy—that so many people find alarming. Part memoir and part polemic, Boyers’s collection of essays laments the erosion of standard liberal values, and covers such subjects as tolerance, identity, privilege, appropriation, diversity, and ableism that have turned academic life into a minefield. Why, Robert Boyers asks, are a great many liberals, people who should know better, invested in the drawing up of enemies lists and driven by the conviction that on critical issues no dispute may be tolerated? In stories, anecdotes, and character profiles, a public intellectual and longtime professor takes on those in his own progressive cohort who labor in the grip of a poisonous and illiberal fundamentalism. The end result is a finely tuned work of cultural intervention from the front lines.
Download or read book Leo Strauss and the Problem of Political Philosophy written by Michael P. Zuckert and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2014-06-30 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This critical study of the influential political theorist dispels popular myths and reveals the inner logic of his varied and notoriously complex writings. Political theorist Leo Strauss was unexpectedly thrust into the media spotlight for his alleged influence on neoconservative politics. With The Truth about Leo Strauss, Michael and Catherine Zuckert challenged the many claims and speculations about this complex thinker. Now, with Leo Strauss and the Problem of Political Philosophy, they offer a more comprehensive interpretation of Strauss’s thought, using the many manifestations of the “problem of political philosophy” as their touchstone. Strauss, they argue, sought to restore political philosophy to its original Socratic form. This is demonstrated through his critique of positivism and historicism, two intellectual currents that undermined his Socratic project. The authors also explore Strauss’s interpretation of both ancient and modern political philosophers, including Plato, Aristotle, Machiavelli, and Locke. Finally, they examine Strauss’s thought in the context of the twentieth century, when his chief interlocutors were Schmitt, Husserl, Heidegger, and Nietzsche. Leo Strauss and the Problem of Political Philosophy is the most in-depth treatment of this often misunderstood thinker, examining his ideas across his long career. It reveals Strauss’s overall intellectual project: to decode how ancient and modern theory attempted to solve the problem of political philosophy. And it shows why Strauss considered the ancient solution both philosophically and politically superior.
Download or read book Virtue written by Gordon Loud and published by Lulu.com. This book was released on 2012-07-01 with total page 152 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why do billions of people readily embrace belief in the virtue of religious faith? Explore the virtues we value and seek to uphold, and discover the role religion and politics play in our beliefs concerning virtue. Our virtuous aims lie at the heart of our manner of examining and method of questioning what we hold to be true concerning the world and religious faith. VIRTUE presents an opportunity for readers to examine religious faith and its measure while it lays bare our desires for and pursuit of virtue. From a position of clarity concerning our manner of thinking and beliefs, the focus on virtue is directed toward universal virtues we can embrace, value, and pursue in our daily living for the benefits they bestow. Where your virtue lies will shock your faith and will challenge you to embrace yourself and others in a better way.
Download or read book The Virtues and Vices in the Arts written by Shawn R Tucker and published by Lutterworth Press. This book was released on 2015-08-27 with total page 297 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The seven deadly sins are pride, envy, anger, sloth, gluttony, greed, and lust. The seven virtues are prudence, fortitude, temperance, justice, faith, hope, and love. 'The Virtues and Vices in the Arts' brings all of them together and for the first time lays out their history in a collection of the most important philosophical, religious, literary, and art-historical works. Starting with the Greco-Roman and Judeo-Christian antecedents, this anthology of source documents traces the tradition ofvirtues and vices through its cultural apex during the medieval era and then into their continued development and transformation from the Renaissance to the present. This anthology includes excerpts of Plato's 'Republic', the Bible, Dante's 'Purgatorio', and the writings of Friedrich Nietzsche and C.S. Lewis. Also included are works of art from medieval manuscripts; paintings by Giotto, Veronese, and Paul Cadmus; prints by Brueghel; and a photograph by Oscar Rejlander. What these works show is the vitality and richness of the virtues and vices in the arts from their origins to the present.
Download or read book The Soul of God written by Ray S. Anderson and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2004-08-02 with total page 236 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this theological memoir, Ray Anderson takes us on his own journey from the prairie to the pulpit, and from the soul of a believer into the soul of a theologian. As a sequel to his earlier book, 'The Soul of Ministry', he shares with us the process by which his own spiritual hunger moved from uneasiness and unrest into a deeper sense of the soul of theology as exploration into the very soul of God (Part One). In Part Two, each chapter traces out the contours of a theology which "sings as well as stings." After more than 40 years of ministry as pastor, teacher and theologian, Anderson presents a theological hermeneutic by which Scripture and human experience can be read on the same page. If reading this book produces astonishment and wonder at the depth and daring to which God's grace encounters and embraces us through Jesus Christ, then that itself will lead us, with awe and reverence, to behold the soul of God.
Download or read book Leo Strauss written by Robert Howse and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2014-09-08 with total page 201 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book analyzes Leo Strauss's writings on political violence, considering also what he taught in the classroom on this subject.
Download or read book The Legacy of Leo Strauss written by Tony Burns and published by Andrews UK Limited. This book was released on 2016-12-22 with total page 278 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Leo Strauss was a political philosopher who died in 1973 but came to came to prominent attention in the United States and also Britain around the beginning of the War in Iraq. Charges began emerging that architects of the war such as Paul Wolfowitz and large numbers of staff in the US State and Defense Departments had studied with, or been influenced by, the academic work of Strauss and his followers. A vague, but powerful, idea was generated in the popular press that a group known as the Straussians had been instrumental in the long-range strategic planning of American foreign policy, both to advance American interests and to encourage democratic revolutions outside the West. This volume of essays opens up the topic of Leo Strauss and the Straussians to those outside the relatively narrow circles who have been concerned with him and his followers up to now.
Download or read book The Book of Virtues written by William J. Bennett and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2010-05-11 with total page 2005 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Responsibility. Courage. Compassion. Honesty. Friendship. Persistence. Faith. Everyone recognizes these traits as essentials of good character. In order for our children to develop such traits, we have to offer them examples of good and bad, right and wrong. And the best places to find them are in great works of literature and exemplary stories from history. William J. Bennett has collected hundreds of stories in The Book of Virtues, an instructive and inspiring anthology that will help children understand and develop character -- and help adults teach them. From the Bible to American history, from Greek mythology to English poetry, from fairy tales to modern fiction, these stories are a rich mine of moral literacy, a reliable moral reference point that will help anchor our children and ourselves in our culture, our history, and our traditions -- the sources of the ideals by which we wish to live our lives. Complete with instructive introductions and notes, The Book of Virtues is a book the whole family can read and enjoy -- and learn from -- together.
Download or read book The Cloaking of Power written by Paul O. Carrese and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2010-02-15 with total page 351 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How did the US judiciary become so powerful—powerful enough that state and federal judges once vied to decide a presidential election? What does this prominence mean for the law, constitutionalism, and liberal democracy? In The Cloaking of Power, Paul O. Carrese provides a provocative analysis of the intellectual sources of today’s powerful judiciary, arguing that Montesquieu, in his Spirit of the Laws, first articulated a new conception of the separation of powers and strong but subtle courts. Montesquieu instructed statesmen to “cloak power” by placing judges at the center of politics, while concealing them behind juries and subtle reforms. Tracing this conception through Blackstone, Hamilton, and Tocqueville, Carrese shows how it led to the prominence of judges, courts, and lawyers in America today. But he places the blame for contemporary judicial activism squarely at the feet of Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. and his jurisprudential revolution, which he believes to be the source of the now-prevalent view that judging is merely political. To address this crisis, Carrese argues for a rediscovery of an independent judiciary—one that blends prudence and natural law with common law and that observes the moderate jurisprudence of Montesquieu and Blackstone, balancing abstract principles with realistic views of human nature and institutions. He also advocates for a return to the complex constitutionalism of the American founders and Tocqueville and for judges who understand their responsibility to elevate citizens above individualism, instructing them in law and right.
Download or read book Machiavelli written by Robert Black and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-11-20 with total page 405 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Machiavelli is history's most startling political commentator. Recent interpreters have minimised his originality, but this book restores his radicalism. Robert Black shows a clear development in Machiavelli's thought. In his most subversive works The Prince, the Discourses on Livy, The Ass and Mandragola he rejected the moral and political values inherited by the Renaissance from antiquity and the middle ages. These outrageous compositions were all written in mid-life, when Machiavelli was a political outcast in his native Florence. Later he was reconciled with the Florentine establishment, and as a result his final compositions including his famous Florentine Histories represent a return to more conventional norms. This lucid work is perfect for students of Medieval and Early Modern History, Renaissance Studies and Italian Literature, or anyone keen to learn more about one of history's most potent, influential and arresting writers.
Download or read book Can Virtue Make Us Happy written by Otfried Hoffe and published by Northwestern University Press. This book was released on 2010-03-17 with total page 386 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "In Can Virtue Make Us Happy? The Art of Living and Morality, Otfried Hoffe, one of Europe's best-known philosophers, offers a far-reaching and foundational work in philosophical ethics." "Hoffe uses clear, accessible language to present common understandings of "happiness" and "freedom" while illuminating the blind alleys in the history of philosophy. What has priority: good ends or right action? Is freedom always anarchy? Is it possible to think of a freedom enhanced by morality? Is "morality" merely a euphemism for stupidity? Does humanity have a good or a bad character? Is there such a thing as evil? Hoffe offers no simple formulas but provides enlightened philosophical reflection to fuel the reader's own examination of these questions." --Book Jacket.
Download or read book The Concept and Practice of Conversation in the Long Eighteenth Century 1688 1848 written by Katie Halsey and published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing. This book was released on 2009-05-05 with total page 250 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection of essays brings together eighteenth-century scholars from a variety of disciplines, to discuss conversation in the eighteenth century as concept and practice. At the heart of the volume is a simple question: are eighteenth-century conceptualisations of the role and purpose of conversation still relevant or useful to scholars and thinkers today? This volume contains essays by leading scholars of the period as well as early career researchers, and answers a need for a broad-ranging discussion of the concept of conversation in the arts, social sciences and humanities. The long eighteenth century is a particularly fruitful starting point for work on this topic, since ideas about conversation permeated all types of writing in this period, from the early forerunners of scientific textbooks to philosophical dialogues. The collection covers an exceptionally wide range of long-eighteenth-century authors, artists, lawmakers, texts and works of art, and, although the focus of the volume is largely on eighteenth-century Britain, the volume takes note of the rich relationships between continental European thought and British intellectual life in the period, and of the influence of British ideas in the newly independent American republic.
Download or read book Ancient Greece and American Conservatism written by John Bloxham and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2018-03-28 with total page 350 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: US conservatives have repeatedly turned to classical Greece for inspiration and rhetorical power. In the 1950s they used Plato to defend moral absolutism; in the 1960s it was Aristotle as a means to develop a uniquely conservative social science; and then Thucydides helped to justify a more assertive foreign policy in the 1990s. By tracing this phenomenon and analysing these, and various other, examples of selectivity, subversion and adaptation within their broader social and political contexts, John Bloxham here employs classical thought as a prism through which to explore competing strands in American conservatism. From the early years of the Cold War to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Bloxham illuminates the depth of conservatives' engagement with Greece, the singular flexibility of Greek ideas and the varied and diverse ways that Greek thought has reinforced and invigorated conservatism. This innovative work of reception studies offers a richer understanding of the American Right and is important reading for classicists, modern US historians and political scientists alike.
Download or read book Leo Strauss and Anglo American Democracy written by Grant Havers and published by Northern Illinois University Press. This book was released on 2013-10-15 with total page 259 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Leo Strauss and Anglo-American Democracy critically interprets Strauss's political philosophy from a conservative perspective. Most mainstream readers of Strauss have either condemned him from the Left as an extreme right-wing opponent of liberal democracy or celebrated him from the Right as a traditional defender of Western civilization. Rejecting both portrayals, Grant Havers shifts the debate beyond the conventional parameters stating that Strauss was neither a man of the Far Right nor a conservative but. in fact a secular Cold War liberal. In Leo Strauss and Anglo-American Democracy Havers contends that the most troubling implication of Straussianism is that it provides an ideological rationale for the aggressive spread of democratic values on a global basis while ignoring the preconditions that make these values possible. Concepts such as the rule of law, constitutional government, Christian morality, and the separation of church and state are not easily transplanted beyond the historic confines of Anglo-American civilization, as recent wars to spread democracy have demonstrated.
Download or read book Those With Virtue Dream For Better Days written by Thomas R. Young and published by BookLocker.com, Inc.. This book was released on 2023-10-30 with total page 1097 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: After the events of Pandora Black and witnessing the lives of the original individuals bearing the Stones of Virtue, Violet Diamond and others alongside her encounter unfortunate circumstances that spiral out of control. Sometimes living is a bad dream with a craving for a better one. The small-town tailor knows all too well that desire for good dreams when one is awake.
Download or read book Thomas Wyatt written by Susan Brigden and published by Faber & Faber. This book was released on 2012-09-18 with total page 666 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Thomas Wyatt (1503?-1542) was the first modern voice in English poetry. 'Chieftain' of a 'new company of courtly makers', he brought the Italian poetic Renaissance to England, but he was also revered as prophet-poet of the Reformation. His poetry holds a mirror to the secret, capricious world of Henry VIII's court, and alludes darkly to events which it might be death to describe. In the Tower, twice, Wyatt was betrayed and betrayer. This remarkably original biography is more - and less - than a Life, for Wyatt is so often elusive, in flight, like his Petrarchan lover, into the 'heart's forest'. Rather, it is an evocation of Wyatt among his friends, and his enemies, at princely courts in England, Italy, France and Spain, or alone in contemplative retreat. Following the sources - often new discoveries, from many archives - as far as they lead, Susan Brigden seeks Wyatt in his 'diverseness', and explores his seeming confessions of love and faith and politics. Supposed, at the time and since, to be the lover of Anne Boleyn, he was also the devoted 'slave' of Katherine of Aragon. Aspiring to honesty, he was driven to secrets and lies, and forced to live with the moral and mortal consequences of his shifting allegiances. As ambassador to Emperor Charles V, he enjoyed favour, but his embassy turned to nightmare when the Pope called for a crusade against the English King and sent the Inquisition against Wyatt. At Henry VIII's court, where only silence brought safety, Wyatt played the idealized lover, but also tried to speak truth to power. Wyatt's life, lived so restlessly and intensely, provides a way to examine a deep questioning at the beginning of the Renaissance and Reformation in England. Above all, this new biography is attuned to Wyatt's dissonant voice and broken lyre, the paradox within him of inwardness and the will to 'make plain' his heart, all of which make him exceptionally difficult to know - and fascinating to explore.
