What Kind of (Sceptical) Work is Simone Luzzatto’s Socrates?
In: Simone Luzzatto’s Scepticism in the Context of Early Modern ThoughtSearch for other papers by Josef Stern in
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Abstract
This chapter addresses the question of whether Luzzatto’s Socrates is a sceptical work and, if so, what kind of sceptical work it is. It proposes two criteria for determining whether a work is sceptical: (i) its use of the sceptic’s notions and tools, such as modes or tropes, and (ii) the overall shape of the life it envisions and its conception of happiness. After examining Luzzatto’s unquestionable use of the classical sceptic’s tropes, it argues that nonetheless, the kind of life that it “recommends” (keeping in mind that the sceptic takes no positions of his own) is not sceptical, but closer to that of a Kant-like critical philosophy that advocates the primacy of the practical over the theoretical. This chapter concludes with an analysis of the book’s imprese in light of the image of the silkworm in the Zohar and how this imprese might serve as a clue to the book’s identity.