Webster's dictionary defines "apologetics" as "systemic argumentative discourse in defense [of religious belief]," and "polemics" as "the art or practice of disputation...for the refutation of errors," particularly theological ones. They very roughly correspond to the defensive/offensive sides of the same coin. However, as other-directed communication, apologetics has to reach beyond religion to become a self-directed discourse about identity and the significant self. In the pre-Copernican world - regulated by strict empirical and epistemological ideals which viewed human understanding as a "mirror of nature" - apologetics was a profession without dignity. Individuals or communities participated in apologetic discourse only to defend themselves against outside danger. To do so, they often had to give up, at least partially, their authentic inner truth and objective reality. From the very beginning, the religious and philosophical dimensions of apologetics qua self-definition and defense were intermingled. The autobiographical narratives of Socrates are archetypical ancient examples of this intimate linkage between philosophy, religion and politics.
In his 1923 essay Apologetisches Denken, the German-Jewish philosopher Franz Rosenzweig defined apologetics as the occupation of the "lawyer." Although he clearly recognized the philosophically problematic character of apologetic thought, he also recognized its importance for creating cultural identity. He saw Judaism as the best example of his ambivalent judgment of apologetic thought. Always surrounded by foreign cultures, Judaism has always had to be apologetic, which led to self-reflexive thought and reflexive thinking - not only Jewish thought but also thinking about Jewish thought. In such self-reflection, the self-evident (Selbst-Verständliche) becomes a necessary inner condition of community; the formation of a European Jewish cultural identity was a reaction to other European cultural identities. It has since become a common characteristic of modern communities that they are surrounded by other cultures and evolve in response to their influences. The apologetic moment of self-reflection has become constant and self-evident, for both individuals and whole communities.
Apologetic thought, attitude and discourse are the subject of a joint project involving scholars from Tel Aviv University, the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University (Frankfurt) and the Forschungsstätte der Evangelischen Studiengemeinschft (FEST, Heidelberg). They have already had two international conferences on "Religious Apologetics, Philosophical Argumentation," one in September 2001, held under the dramatic backdrop of September 11 (which provided inter-religious apologetics a new perspective), and one in July 2002. The collected papers have been edited by Profs. Yossef Schwartz (TAU) and Volkhard Krech (FEST).
The general discussion included philosophical and religious autobiographies describing the act of self-definition of an individual or community. It also searched for the hidden or manifest apologetic assumptions underlying modern scholarship on traditional texts. Both approaches emphasize the importance of narrative in creating a philosophical/religious identity and in defining the scope (and protecting the methods) of each discipline. The philosophical aspects of inter-religious discourse and the philosophic background of religious hermeneutics are equally significant, which highlights the difficult relationship between religious apologetics and philosophical argumentation in pre-modern culture. Modern manifestations of apologetics in the Jewish and modern European context were also discussed.
This innovative joint TAU-German project elaborates on the basic assumption that the relationship between philosophy and religion must be considered either as a relationship between theology and religious thought, or between philosophy and rational thought, and that it has been (and is) fed by the instrumental usage of apologetics and polemics. Religion uses philosophical arguments to create specific dogma as a protection against other religions; but it also uses polemic arguments against philosophy itself. Philosophy uses religious arguments for self-definition; but it also transforms religious motives into philosophic speculation. In the end, neither the need for self-justification nor the claim for integrative social power belongs solely to the religious realm; philosophy and the sciences bear a similar dimension of self-justification.
