Lexington Books
Pages: 192
•
Trim: 6⅜ x 9
978-1-7936-0464-4 • Hardback • July 2019 • $111.00 • (£85.00)
978-1-7936-0466-8 • Paperback • March 2022 • $41.99 • (£35.00)
978-1-7936-0465-1 • eBook • July 2019 • $39.50 • (£30.00)
Stephen R. Palmquist is professor of religion and philosophy at Hong Kong Baptist University.
Preface
Introduction: The Problem of Mystical Experience in Kant
Part I
Swedenborg’s Influence on Kant’s Critical Awakening
Chapter 1 — The Copernican Hypothesis as the Key to Kant’s Awakening from Dogmatic Slumber
Chapter 2 — The Impact of Swedenborg’s Mysticism on Kant’s Metaphysical Dreams
Chapter 3 — Kant’s Awakening: The Copernican Hypothesis as the Key to Critical Mysticism
Chapter 4 — Kant’s Metaphysical Dream: A System of Critical Philosophy
Part II
Kant’s Critical Philosophy as a Critique of Mysticism
Chapter 5 — Does Mystical Experience Always Prompt Delirium?
Chapter 6 — Kant’s Critique of Delirious Mysticism
Chapter 7 — Critical Mysticism as Immediate Experience of the Moral
Chapter 8 — Key Metaphors Guiding Kant’s Critical Mysticism
Part III
The Opus Postumum as an Experiment in Critical Mysticism
Chapter 9 — Can the Original (Threefold) Synthesis Be Consciously Experienced?
Chapter 10 — The Categorical Imperative as the Voice of God
Chapter 11 — Matter’s Living Force as Immediate Experience of the World
Chapter 12 — The Highest Purpose of Philosophy as Exhibiting the God–Man
Conclusion — Kantian Mysticism for the Twenty-First Century
“Palmquist … is to be applauded for his willingness to challenge conventional accounts of the development of Kant’s Critical philosophy and broaden the scope of Kant interpretation in this and other works.” - J. Colin McQuillan, St. Mary’s University
“Kant and Mysticism lucidly unfolds a significant alternative to the standard interpretations of Dreams [of a Spirit-Seer] and, more generally, mysticism in Kant’s philosophy. It is an eloquent and nuanced reading of the conceptual development of Kant’s Critical philosophy in its historical context and Kant’s thinking of problems of experience, intuition and the religious that will become an essential reference for future scholarship.” - Eric S. Nelson, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology
“The whole book is a bold attempt to overturn and dismantle the standard interpretation (namely, that Kant is primarily an empirical philosopher, the all-destroyer of metaphysics and a reducer of religion to morality) and its frown on any form of mysticism in Kant whatsoever.” - Prof. Chris L. Firestone, Trinity International University
— Kantian Review
Kant and Mysticismdoes a good job of capturing what is mystical in Kant, pushing some key Kantian themes toward the mystical while seemingly preserving their spirit. . . . Palmquist thus helps us to see a Kant whose concern with the limits of knowledge goes beyond developing a metaphysics, and whose concern with religion goes beyond grafting doctrines onto morality. . . . Palmquist’s work deserves praise and attention for drawing together underutilized parts of Kant’s work in an illuminating way.
— Review of Metaphysics
Kant’s Dreams of a Spirit-Seer, his early sardonic critique of the Swedish mystic Emanuel Swedenborg, is often taken as an odd and unimportant episode in the development of Kant’s critical philosophy. But Stephen R. Palmquist convincingly shows that Kant was significantly influenced by Swedenborg’s writings, borrowing elements of epistemology, ethics, and religious thinking from Swedenborg. Palmquist’s work also profoundly deepens our understanding of the extent to which a mysticism of reason lies at the heart of Kant’s whole critical philosophy.— Ronald M. Green, Dartmouth College
The term "mysticism" is generally regarded as having negative connotations for Kant. Thus, for example, references to Kant’s interest in K.A. Wilmans’ dissertation on this topic are often one-sided. Consequently, works clarifying Kant’s actual relation to mysticism are most welcome. In view of the widespread disregard for Kant’s central questions, this new book is of the highest importance, especially its last chapter, on the mystical implications of Kant’s Opus Postumum.— Norbert Fischer, Katholische Universität Eichstätt-Ingolstadt
Palmquist's holistic and perspectival interpretation offers a provocative way to rethink Kant's arguments and their implications.— Eric S. Nelson, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology