Showing results by author "Oswald Sobrino" in All Categories

This short book considers a short (about thirty-seven page) speech given by the existentialist philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) in 1945. In this speech, "Existentialism is a Humanism," Sartre defended existentialism against its critics. I consider what lessons of wisdom we can take from Sartre's speech. But I do that in a critical way--not in the sense of being hostile or negative but in the sense of examining and weighing what Sartre says to see where I agree and where I disagree. Like him or not, Sartre is a great thinker who is worth considering even if you may reject some or all...

William James (1842-1910) held an M.D. degree from Harvard University but made his name as a pioneer in the new field of psychology and by having a foundational role, along with his friend C.S. Peirce and Professor John Dewey, in the American school of philosophy known as Pragmatism. James' father was an amateur theologian and writer on religious topics who strongly influenced James, while his brother was the famous novelist Henry James. Long associated with Harvard University, William James remains one--if not the foremost--of the intellect giants of that university; his home is still ...

This book is the second in my series on "5 Lessons" from famous writers. The first book in the 5 Lessons series is 5 Lessons from Augustine published in 2011 and based on the Confessions of St. Augustine. This second book 5 Lessons from Seneca is based on five of the Stoic philosopher Seneca's Moral Letters (also known as the Letters on Ethics or Moral Epistles). It discusses shrewd and practical lessons on the passage of time, on friendship, on anxiety, on courage, and on aging. For further insight on Seneca, see Seneca and Roman Slavery Under Nero's Rule (2022) also by Oswald Sobrino at ...

Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) is most famous for his classic Critique of Pure Reason which is a complex and difficult work setting forth how the categories of our understanding yield knowledge through sense experience. Yet, later in life, he also completed his work on ethics by publishing The Metaphysics of Morals (in German: Metaphysik der Sitten), which was the culmination of his previous writings and lectures on ethics. 5 Lessons from Kant discusses five themes in this culminating ethical work: 1. Moral Philosophy as External Law and as Ethics; 2. The Categorical Imperative; 3. Domestic and ...

Gabriel Marcel (1889-1973) was a French philosopher prominent in the twentieth century. He is still known as a Christian existentialist although he later rejected that label. His father was a non-practicing Catholic; his mother's family was Jewish. Since his mother died when Marcel was a very young child, his maternal aunt raised him--at some point she converted to a liberal form of Protestantism. From this eclectic background, Marcel himself eventually converted to Catholicism as a mature man and thinker. The basic outline of his philosophy had already been set before his conversion. This ...

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) was known as the Sage of Concord, i.e., Concord, Massachusetts, outside Boston and site of "the shot heard round the world” made famous by Emerson in his Concord Hymn commemorating the beginning of the American Revolutionary War. Scholars speak of Emerson and his associates sparking a second and cultural American Revolution giving rise to an independent American way of thinking. Emerson began as a Unitarian minister but eventually abandoned any remaining traditional Christian beliefs. Having received a legacy from the estate of his first wife, Emerson was ...

The Spanish existentialist philosopher José Ortega y Gasset (1883-1955) lectured on metaphysics at the University of Madrid in the nineteen thirties. 5 Lessons from Ortega comments on five distinctive passages in his published university lectures on metaphysics and invites the reader to further explore the philosophical writings of Ortega y Gasset. All passages are directly translated from the original Spanish. Ortega provides an original perspective on metaphysics (the philosophical study of ultimate reality or being) that is clear, incisive, and understandable unlike the works of some ...

This award-winning essay written in 1982-83, and now published as a book, affirms the relevance of John Dewey's social philosophy. John Dewey (1859-1952) was an American pragmatist philosopher who was a fixture as a public intellectual in the first half of the twentieth century and was most famous for his writings on education. Yet Dewey had a wider repertoire which included writings on epistemology (the theory of knowledge), on other philosophical topics, and on various social and political topics. This essay was the first-place winner in the 1983 John Dewey Undergraduate Essay Project ...

Baruch de Spinoza (also known as Benedict or Bento de Spinoza;1632-1677) is a titan of philosophy who drew on his Sephardic Jewish background and on his education in the classics and in philosophy at the hands of an ex-Jesuit. He grew up speaking Portuguese in Amsterdam but was educated in Spanish and Hebrew. A quiet, calm man, Spinoza nevertheless angered the theological authorities of his Sephardic community of Portuguese and Spanish Jews. The result was a harsh decree of excommunication. Many consider his greatest work to be his Ethics (1677), published posthumously. In this work, he ...

This small book is a commentary on the first published book of the Spanish philosopher José Ortega y Gasset in which he draws philosophical insights from the classic novel Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes (1547-1616). José Ortega y Gasset (1883-1955) was a Spanish philosopher who anticipated many of the themes of later, more famous existentialists such as Heidegger. In the Meditations on Quixote (1914), Ortega anticipates many of the philosophical ideas that he developed during the rest of his life. Reading Ortega's insights will deepen your experience of daily life as you learn to ...

René Descartes (1596-1650) has been commonly known as the "father of modern philosophy" who was also a mathematician and a scientist as the Scientific Revolution was breaking out in Europe. Descartes--a lifelong Roman Catholic educated by the Jesuit order, which in 1548 began its prestigious educational mission in Europe (well before the founding of the Protestant seminary known as Harvard)--nevertheless sought to overturn the traditional Aristotelian science taught by the Jesuits and other Catholic educators. With an obsessive focus on pursuing knowledge marked by certainty, Descartes, a ...

This short book (really a monograph) is the fourth in a series on the Spanish existentialist/vitalist philosopher José Ortega y Gasset (1883-1955), whose most famous work is The Revolt of the Masses (1930), which describes the mass man whom Ortega saw as a danger to civilization. This book seeks to critically update The Revolt of the Masses in the light of current realities such as Brexit and social media technology, while presenting the key ideas of Ortega on human life, the State, and mass mentality that are especially relevant and helpful today.

This short book provides an introduction to the writings of philosopher José Ortega y Gasset (1883-1955), by looking closely at his work entitled "What is Philosophy?" which redefines philosophy for a new era. The author Oswald Sobrino provides original translations from the beautifully written Spanish used by Ortega and provides commentary that guides you, step-by-step, through Ortega's dramatic and vital redefinition of philosophy. For Ortega, the radical reality that philosophy addresses is our life together with the world around us, with our circumstance. Hence, Ortega's famous dictum ...

This small but provoking book provides five passages from the writings of Paul of Tarsus, better known as St. Paul. These passages raise several issues relevant for us today: The priority of charity or love: 1 Corinthians 13:1-3; Going beyond social status: Galatians 3:28; Avoiding strife: Galatians 5:19-26; A surprising inclusivity: Romans 11:25-27; The victory of humility: Philippians 2:5-11. Each passage is presented in the eloquent King James or Authorized Version of the New Testament and is followed by brief commentary focused on the contemporary significance of the passage. This book ...

John Dewey (1859-1952) was the foremost American philosopher in the first half of the twentieth century. He developed the school of American Pragmatism in the wake of Charles Sanders Peirce (1839-1914) and William James (1842-1910). Born in the year that Darwin’s On the Origin of Species appeared, Dewey articulated a philosophy deeply influenced by the Darwinian emphasis on continuity and process in nature as opposed to fixed, archetypal species. Dewey also overturned the traditional Western view of knowledge by emphasizing the experimental method of science as the model for the emergence...

This book is Volume II of my work on Miguel de Cervantes, the author of the famous, pioneering novel Don Quixote de La Mancha. The novel was published in two parts: the first part in 1605 and the second part in 1615. My Volumes I and II on Cervantes discuss the first part of the novel. Future volumes will discuss the second part of the novel. Why bother with Cervantes and his most famous work? Don Quixote presents a lengthy and entertaining meditation on the meaning and significance of our human lives: the need for purpose and adventure in our lives, the crisis of aging, the role of love ...

Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) was both a naturalist as an exact and sensitive observer of plants and animals and an astute social critic who questioned the economic excesses and preoccupations of his contemporaries, especially in his classic work Walden published in 1854. Many today rightly see him as a forerunner of environmentalism. He also wrote a famous essay entitled "Civil Disobedience" that inspired major social movements in the twentieth century. Thoreau had a short and somewhat difficult life and died of tuberculosis at the age of 44. In that short time, he sought to squeeze the ...

Miguel de Cervantes (1547-1616) is the famous Spanish author of Don Quixote and many other works, including plays and short stories. This book is the first of several anticipated volumes taking us on a journey through all of Don Quixote of La Mancha, which was published by Cervantes late in life in 1605 (a second part was published in 1615). Don Quixote is a lengthy and rich work--hence several volumes are needed. Why Cervantes? It is an almost universal judgment that Cervantes was the pioneer of the modern novel and also the writer of the greatest work of Western literature. As in ...

This book provides readers new to Augustine with an introduction to five thought-provoking passages in the Confessions. Readers already familiar with Augustine will delight in revisiting these same passages and considering them more deeply. The author, Oswald Sobrino, holds an M.A. in Theology from a Catholic seminary, among other degrees (including a J.D.), and has studied Latin, ancient Greek, classical Hebrew, biblical Aramaic, Syriac, and French at the University of Michigan. The following "study" or "reflection" questions reflect some of the main themes of the book: 1. The Gospel calls...

This book is third in a series by Oswald Sobrino on the philosophy of José Ortega y Gasset. This latest book comments on Ortega's analysis of technology's relation to the human inventor and to the well-being of humans. Ortega's prescient analysis is valuable as we live through the artificial intelligence revolution and advances in computing power and as we face questions about the ultimate goals and ethics of new technology.