Rocco Buttiglione

The achievements of John Paul II in recent years cannot be overstated. Led by this man and his profound contribution to Catholic social thought, the Catholic Church has become the world's single greatest voice for democracy and human rights. Protestants, too, have found in Pope John Paul II a brave and steadfast Christian pastor. Few people, however, know the Pope's background or the philosophy behind his thinking. Written by Rocco Buttiglione, one of the Pope's closest friends and counselors, this volume is the standard work for all who want to understand the philosophical mind of Karol Wojtyla, the man who became Pope John Paul II. Based on an accurate reading of all of Wojtyla's works and of all relevant secondary literature, this English edition of Buttiglione's book provides a complete introduction to the Pope's philosophy and his original contribution to the philosophy of freedom. The early chapters give biographical information on Wojtyla and examine his early philosophical formation. The middle chapters explore in depth two of the Pope's central philosophical and theological conceptions--human love and the acting person. The closing chapters look at Wojtyla's role at the Second Vatican Council, examine his poetic works, and place his thought in dialogue with contemporary philosophy. New to this English edition of Buttiglione's work are a foreword by Michael Novak, an appendix published for the third edition of The Acting Person, and an afterword that updates the book with a survey of secondary literature on the Pope's thought published between 1982 and 1996.

What accounts for the widespread disillusionment with politics? Person-centered Politics suggests that politics today, through its structures, processes, and institutions tends to presuppose and to impose a certain caricature of the human person that inhibits and frustrates a real sense of personal participation in an authentic common good of politics and society. In 12 chapters that touch on fundamental themes of political philosophy, Person-centered Politics proposes the social and transcendent dimensions of personal existence and their application to the renewal of politics today. The themes explore the commonly accepted assumptions of politics today and how a renewed understanding of the person can invigorate political discourse and action. In Person-centered Politics the author is in continuous dialogue with some of the major contemporary philosophers and thinkers, such as Eric Voegelin, David Walsh, Robert Sokolowski, Vaclav Havel, Pierre Manent, Peter Simpson, and Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI. Detailed footnotes in each chapter provide reference to further sources of enlightenment and research. Person-centered Politics proposes an outline for a renewed vision of politics that is centered on the truth of human existence, and not a politics that distorts and suffocates the human spirit, because, in the words of E. Voegelin, ‘the right order of the soul through philosophy furnishes the standard for the right order of society’—and not the other way round.

What accounts for the widespread disillusionment with politics? Person-centered Politics suggests that politics today, through its structures, processes, and institutions tends to presuppose and to impose a certain caricature of the human person that inhibits and frustrates a real sense of personal participation in an authentic common good of politics and society. In 12 chapters that touch on fundamental themes of political philosophy, Person-centered Politics proposes the social and transcendent dimensions of personal existence and their application to the renewal of politics today. The themes explore the commonly accepted assumptions of politics today and how a renewed understanding of the person can invigorate political discourse and action. In Person-centered Politics the author is in continuous dialogue with some of the major contemporary philosophers and thinkers, such as Eric Voegelin, David Walsh, Robert Sokolowski, Vaclav Havel, Pierre Manent, Peter Simpson, and Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI. Detailed footnotes in each chapter provide reference to further sources of enlightenment and research. Person-centered Politics proposes an outline for a renewed vision of politics that is centered on the truth of human existence, and not a politics that distorts and suffocates the human spirit, because, in the words of E. Voegelin, ‘the right order of the soul through philosophy furnishes the standard for the right order of society’—and not the other way round.

Metafisica della Conoscenza e Politica in S. Tommaso d’Aquino was originally published in Bologna in 1985 by the Centro Studi Europa Orientale. This English translation has been prepared with the explicit permission and encouragement of Buttiglione. The work grew from a series of lectures Buttiglione gave on the relationship between metaphysics, knowledge, and politics based on a critical reading of Thomas Aquinas’s Commentary on Aristotle’s Politics and other relevant texts. His aim was to advance Thomistic thinking by incorporating the insights of modern philosophy on subjectivity and relationality. In addition to its primary audience of philosophers, theologians, and political theorists, the book surprisingly enjoyed a wide general readership in Italy at the time of its publication. It represented an exciting attempt to harmonize medieval philosophy and the insights of personalism that had already had a deep impact on European intellectual life. Buttiglione was able to describe this attempt in a way accessible to a general readership, and in a way that confronted the political challenges Italy had been confronting for the last forty years. Now, thirty-five years after the book’s initial publication, the conclusions Buttiglione draws from reading Thomas Aquinas’s commentary on Aristotle’s Politics––and the connections he makes between philosophy, theology, and political theory––are more relevant than ever. He argues that the traditional definition of “person” as rationalis naturae individua substantia––an individual substance or substrate (hypokeimenon) of a rational nature––“lacks that certain element that makes Augustine’s approach to personhood so appealing.” Hence Aquinas’s definition “is left wanting since it fails to elaborate on the crucial aspect of interpersonal relationship.” The ingenuous way in which Buttiglione enlivens Thomistic political thinking with personalist philosophy helps to explain not only why free societies are more stable, tolerant, and respectful of human rights than totalitarian states, but theocratic ones as well. Only by raising the interpersonal aspects of political society to an ontological level—indeed, only by affirming and esteeming the self-transcendence of the human person as evidenced through ontological analysis—do the personal relationships that root and enliven the human person also lead to a realistic, dynamic, and convincing vision of the person’s real existence. Buttiglione was startlingly prescient of the problems we confront at the beginning of the third millennium. This book will spark new discussions as it explains the importance of both the medieval tradition and twentieth-century personalism. The book also draws on a wide range of secondary sources unavailable to English readers that I and will have the unique ability to introduce readers to the “Italian” way of relating speculative and political philosophy in a relatively slim volume.

? Gibt es eine Wahrheit, die es verdient, als objektive Wahrheit bezeichnet zu werden? Heute wird das oft bestritten. Müssen wir uns also mit einem grenzenlosen Zweifel abfinden – ohne Hoffnung, unser Leben an der Wahrheit ausrichten zu können? Andererseits erscheint es uns oft so, dass wir die ganze Wahrheit zu besitzen glauben, und dann mit restloser Gewissheit und uneingeschränktem Anspruch meinen, über sie verfügen zu können. Wir sind im Alltag also entweder Skeptiker – oder Dogmatiker. Dieses Buch versucht, vor dem Hintergrund der Wahrheitsfrage die Lage des Menschen zu schildern: Er strebt nach Wahrheit, berührt sie bisweilen auch, kann sich ihrer aber doch nie endgültig bemächtigen. Wahrheit hat eine objektive und eine subjektive Seite. Sie gewinnt Gestalt im Menschen – als Person. Was bedeutet das für unser Leben, unsere Überzeugungen, unseren Glauben? Und was heißt das für die Politik: Fordert Demokratie die Ausklammerung der Wahrheitsfrage? Der Herausgeber Christoph Böhr ist Professor für Philosophie an der Hochschule Heiligenkreuz/Wien.