Reparatives Denken

In an age of conflict, what forms of reasoning help repair broken relations? Peter W. Ochs draws old-new practices of Reparative Reasoning out of age-old traditions of Scriptural wisdom. Honoring both empirical science and religious-ethical command, this reasoning follows the dictates, at once, of body, heart, and mind. The author examines three prototypes: Hasdai Crescas, rabbinic leader of fourteenth century Aragon, who showed how to repair the separation of science and scriptural religion in modern society; David Halivni, celebrated scholar of the Talmud, who showed how to re-read the sacred word of Torah after terrible loss in the Shoah; and Scriptural Reasoning, a contemporary practice of inter-Abrahamic study, which shows how to foster long-term dialogue across deep religious divides.