Yazar
BÜTTGEN Philippe
CNRS, Research Unit on Monotheisms (CNRS/École Pratique des Hautes Études/University of Paris-Sorbonne). His specialities are history of philosophy (Germany, XVIth-XIXth centuries), religious history and historiography of modern times, history of biblical exegesis and confessionalization.
Last publications
- Lire Michel de Certeau. La formalité des pratiques – Michel de Certeau. Die Förmlichkeit der Praktiken, Frankfurt a. M., 2008 (with Christian Jouhaud [dir.]).
- Vera doctrina. L’idée de doctrine de saint Augustin à Descartes. Zur Begriffsgeschichte der Lehre von Augustinus bis Descartes, Wiesbaden, 2009 (with Ruedi Imbach, Ulrich Johannes Schneider, Herman J. Selderhuis [dir.]).
Yazilan makaleler
The Greeks, the Arabs and Us
Irène ROSIER-CATACH | Marwan RASHED | Alain LIBERA de | Philippe BÜTTGEN
6 Kasim 2009
The question of the European "we" has recently been tied to several controversies over translation and the transmission of knowledges. These debates at first seem learned, distant, specialised. It is a matter of knowing what part the translations of Arabic scientific and philosophical works have taken in the diffusion of these works within Mediaeval West. After a century of work on the subject, certain people wish to recalculate the size of this part and to diminish it. The Latin [supposedly] did not need the Arabic channel; the Arabs would never have been able to appropriate Greek knowledge. General considerations on the essence of religions and "civilisations" are linked together, a "Judaeo-Christianity" that is open and welcoming toward the Other versus a closed and aggressive Islam. The fear of the Arabs and of Islam has entered into science. One settles the score with Islam by saying that one has no 'debts'. The West is Christian, one proclaims, and as pure as possible.