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LETTERS OF JACOB TAUBES & CARL SCHMITT

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1
Jacob Taubes to Carl Schmitt
Boston, 2 August 1955

Dear Professor Carl Schmitt,
Armin Mohler and Roman Schnur have known for years that I am indebted to your work, as are many
others who wont admit it, both for manner of inquiry and perspective. You were very kind in dedicating
two small but exceptional works to me via Roman Schnur. I have written to Roman Schnur with some
annotations and sent today a number of separate prints whichunfortunatelydo not represent an
equivalent[Gegenwert; also: consideration, counter value]. In such domains the potlatch-process
still holds sway [gilt noch]!
In media res: as editor [Engl.] of a series [Engl.] I am thinking about a volume: The Conservative
Tradition [Engl.]. A few weeks ago I discovered that already in 1847 de Maistress: Essai sur le principe
gnrateuar des constitutions politiques was translated [bertragen] into English. My question for you: do
you think this text by itself will not suffice and that we must bring in a larger excerpt from the Essay on
Catholicism from Donoso and a smaller work from Bonald? Donosos Ensayo has been translated which
chapters (those hanging together) should we choose? And what should we choose from Bonald? One self-
contained essay would be my preference to be sure. Do you think that these three would be enough?
Perhaps some documents from Pious IX as well? Since in the papacy of Pious IX the three great theorists
of the conservative tradition [Engl.] are treated as well. Your critique and your advice will be most
highly received, I can assure you.
My permanent address: Beacon Press. In the fall well be moving to Princeton, New Jersey, one of the
few towns next to Cambridge, Massachussetts, where Europeans are able to live.
Sincerely,
Jacob Taubes




1
Translator notes: the authors use Latin and French phrases occasionally. These I have left untranslated and
unitalicizedthat is, as they appear in the original letters. German words and phrases with more than one possible
meaning suitable to context and unusual terms are translated then followed with the original German word italicized
in brackets, followed by additional possibilities in English, if there are any. Dashes, quotation marks and
underscores that appear in the letters are left intact in the translation. timothy.edwards@ucla.edu
2
Jacob Taubes to Carl Schmitt
Berlin, 17 November 1977
Dear Mr. Schmitt,
Hans-Dietrich Sander, at my request, has taken the first step and inquired whether you would be willing
to reprint Part 5 of Leviathan, 1938. Granted, debates about Spinoza have been carried out for decades,
especially now, in 1977, three hundred years after his death, a time when one Spinoza festival chases
another and the eternal return of the same celebrates its triumph in philosophical doxography, yet the
1938 text, already forty years old, has yet to enter the discussion, and remains a novelty.
Our aperiodical [Aperiodikon] for Hermeneutics and Human Sciences (polemically against those social
sciences which are vulgarly Marxist or still angrily [and] positivistically degenerate [positivistisch
verkommen]) shall be called KASSIBER (argot for katw ktiwa, Hebrew for piece of writing, letter, text).
The Kassiber in KASSIBER would naturally be your text in an aperiodical edited [herausgegeben; could
also be published] by, among other, Jacob Taubes. The text shall be introduced by way of an allusion to
Walter Benjamins letter to you, 1930, to which little can be added, unless this writing was known to the
Archive in Frankfurt (something like Adorno to me [so Adorno an mich]) and it ergo repressed it.
Because despite the printing at Han-Dietrich Sander, this letter by Benjamin is still unknown!
A lecture by Hermann Cohen with a forward by Franz Rosenzweig belongs to the vetera, who are actually
novissima, a bit of it from Leo Strauss out of the preliminary studies to Spinozas Critique of Religion like
his unsettling [erschuetterndes; also shocking, upsetting] preface to the American edition of his
[pronoun ambiguous] Critique of Religion.
I hear that Rudolf Smend has in fact made some comments about your illuminating and deeply revelatory
[erhellenden und tief heimleuchtenden]. If you approve that this text too be published, I am all for it. Its
in your hands.
My contribution is: Nietzsche and Spinoza as Interpreters of the Apostle Paul; Hans-Dietrich Sander
will be elucidating Spinoza for the Forum of Marxisms [Marxismen; author undlerlines last two letters of
this work, presumably to indicate the plural of Marxismus (Marxism)]. That is to say, a constellation ad
Spinozam which should differentiate itself from the usual palaver ad Spinozam the way the constellation
of the bear differentiates itself from the bears of a circus. Will you be in on it? [Sind Sie mit von der
Partie?]
A Xerox [xerocopie] copy of Leo Strauss preface to the American edition of his Critique of Religion is
being sent as well. Perhaps the reading will elicit from you a remark, correction, or a tip of some sort.
This, too, would be Kassiber in KASSIBER of the German (and the French) countryside.
A hand reaching out over the abyss greets you.
Jacob Taubes

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Carl Schmitt to Jacob Taubes
Plettenberg, 29 November 1977

Dear Mr. Taubes,
With gratitude and readiness I reciprocate your call from November 17
th
. The adequate wavelength has
yet to reveal itself. These lines are nothing more than reception confirmation and as confirmation a bit
more in fact. Your call made me fully aware after the fact and for the first time of my torturous situation
concerning [gegenueber] Leo Strauss . The essay Spinozas Critique of Religion (from 1962) was not
known to me when I had published my Hobbes-Crystal (1963) and my essay The Reformation
Completed (1965). Leo Strauss had both as addressee; in this kind of a dialogue I am the besieged
from the very beginning. This does not lend itself well to written explication, much less in the
handwriting of a 90-year-old. Therefore, Ill respond straightaway to the special topic of your letter.
I find your proposal to publish the 5
th
chapter of my Leviathan from 1938 in your planned new magazine
[Zeitschrift] a distinction beyond a pour le mrite. Acceptance renders impossible my situation and the
situation of my destroyed image and of my figure, which in the last weeks and months has been thrown
in my face in an especially harsh manner. I dont want to hold you up with that. It has taken over twenty
years to clear up such a simple and documentarily clear case as the letters of Walter Benjamin from
December 1930, at least for those few philologically interested individuals. If I may, let me now try to
explain my request for your understanding and my reservedness.
Everything that concerns me presently is becoming a question of political theology. Max Weber, too, as a
revanchist of the Versailles Peace Treaty from 1918/19 openly became this at the end of his life: a
political theologian. For me this means something akin to what Hugo Ball expressed in 1924: in the
certain form of his talent [in der Gewissensform seiner Begabung] he (Carl Schmitt) experienced his
time. To me this is a specifically forensic [juristisch; also: juridical, judicial] talent. In other words, I can
clearly distinguish Nomos and Norm, a fundamental, constitutive difference, which the prevailing
juridical positivism through self-evisceration [Selbstverstuemmelung] has robbed of itself.
For the new publication you are planning, the title and name Kassiber has been proposed. A watchword
[eine Parole] belongs to the aura of such a name that establishes something concrete for the jurists more
than for all others. Perhaps the following adumbration [Andeutung; also: intimation, suggestion, overtone]
will suffice; it is not a judgment regarding your goals or intentions. I am expressing it in order that I dont
leave a suggestion and transmission [Sendung] such as that from 17 November categorically received
ungratefully. In the meantime I remain at Habakuk 2, 2ff and 2 Thessalonians 2, 6ff. Abyssus vocat
Abyssum. Remarks regarding Hermann Cohen [zu Hermann Cohen] (present to me 1912-177
uninterrupted) will hopefully follow another time; he remains present, above all because the Value
discussion has barely begun; value and life, regarding these subjects Cohen is today more relevant than
the valiant [wackere] Schopenhauer, whose legal [Rechts-] and state [Staats] philosophy aligns itself [sich
aneignen; also: adopt, appropriate] with Hobbesianism one hundred percent.
Yours
Carl Schmitt



4.
Jacob Taubes to Carl Schmitt
Paris 21 February 1978

Dear Mr. Schmitt,
Only a week ago did I begin to travel toward Chantilly, making immediate arrangements for Germany, so
that I will be able to travel by way of Plettenberg between 26 Feb and 1 March from Berlin back to
Chantilly.
I will be able to plan more exactly while Im in Berlin and will inform you immediately when I do and
also ask at that time for an appointment convenient for you. Precisely how I will travel is something I can
also only determine in Berlin. In the meantime I am read from time to time for comfort and solace ex
captivitate salus, which Emil Cioran in Paris knows most exactly.
Why shouldnt KASSIBER not transmit something from the Wisdom of the cell [Weisheit der Zelle ] to
a generation that desperately needs it? And what has so aged in Historiographia in Nuce in the last thirty
years? On the contrary: only now can one without apologia pro vita sua understand, that nostra res agitur.
Today the silete should not be directed toward the theologians, but rather toward a whole swarm
[Schwarm] of sociologists, psychologistsmore about that and other matters soon, eye to eye [Aug in
Aug].
Warm regards,
Jacob Taubes





5.
Carl Schmitt to Jacob Taubes
Plettenberg, 24 February 1978

Dear Mr. Taubes,
Your letter from Chantilly made me happy: your remark regarding Ex Captivitate, the message to Cioran
and most of all: the announcement of your visit. Many thanks! But Pasel is a village that lies next to the
thoroughfare between Plattenberg and Finnentrop. The village is for my marginal existence completely
adequate, but for visitors it is not found without difficulty. Should we really arrange our talk as obitur
dictum in a rather complicated and hurried (hurry is the worst thing) travel itinerary? Better to have no
talk than a half of one. I allow for myself the quiet of an all-knowing old man [eines allwissenden
Greises], a tout ce qui arrive est adorable; yet may I dissuade [nicht zumuten] you from a visit from a
distant world [der aus fernen Welten kommt]. My calendar is nearly as clear as that of Diogenes; your
time is oriented according to very differently structured spaces, routes, lines and vehicles. You determine
when and where; I would be grateful to have one less decision to make.
Once again many thanks for your letter from 21 February and many greetings.
Carl Schmitt













11 0 Appendix B
did ger into the Chr. consciousness t hrough rhe back door, bur wirh a
guilty conscience) . judaism "is" pol. rheology- that is irs "cross," because
rheology final ly cannot be brol<en down by di viding it by "political," be-
cause law is final ly nor rhe first and rhe last after all , because rhere are
"even" between man and man relationships rhar "exceed, '' "transcend"
law- love, mercy, forgiveness (nor ar all "senrimenrally," bur '' in re<tlity").
I wouldn' t know how ro rake a single step further in my wretched and of-
ten warped li fe (and indeed I don't know how to rake a step furrher) with-
our holding fast to "these three," and t his leads me again and aga in-
against my "wi ll"-ro- Paul.
Cordially,
Jacob
SOURCE: Jacob Taubcs, Ad Cnrl Srhmitt: Gegmstrl'bigr Fiigung
(Berl in: Mervc.:, 1987), 31-35
Esteemed Mr. Schmi tt:
Maison des Sciences de: l' homme
Paris, September 18, 1979
Let me thank you again for your fri endly, indeed amicable, reception,
for your patience, and for your openness in spe<tking also of rhe f.1ilures in
rhe long li fe of ::t legist. Even in his failures, if I may vary a li ne rhat still
rings in my ear from student days, "an incomparable poliric:tl reacher. "
1
Precisely as an arch-Jew, I know to hesitat e before condemning some-
one. Because in all t he unutterable horror we were spared one thing. We
had no choice: Hitler chose us as absolute enemy. But where there is no
choice, there may also be no judgment, least of all of others. Which doesn't
mean that I am nor pursued by rhe wish to understand what "really" (not at
all in rhe historical sense, bur more in the eschatologicaJ sense of rhe emer-
gency situation [ Ernstfo/1]) happened- where the swi tches were set roward
catastrophe (our catastrophe and yours). Which, however, brings us to the
topic of pol itical rheology, to that "Parthian arrack" by Peterson.
The upright and solid work of the Heidcl bergers
3
has, as ] have al-
ready indicated to you, only served to bring our the problem more clearly.
Everything important is already in Political Theology 11,
4
albeit as a critique
of Peterson- without noticing that Pet erson's "weaknesses" are his
strength, his topicali ty in Dedicated to Sancto Augusrino, intro-
duced with a prayer thar this Church Father at a "turn of the ages" (I 'm cit-
Tivo Letters u I
ing from memory) also stand by us roday, closing wi th a reference to Carl
Schmitt's Political TheoLogy, with a fi nal remark, exiled to a footnote, about
rhe rheologic.1l impossibili ty of political rheology-this entirely unique
[einmalig] introduction and conclusion was (and is) completely directed
roward you. What is important for so distinguished a stylist as Peterson is
not (only) what he repeats often, and what can (and should) therefore be
processed with a computer, but one must above all attend ro what is intro-
duced for one t ime only [einmalig], in a Aash, his " leap" (from Eusebius ro
Augustine) is whar it is important ro notice. As if "Professor" Erik Peter-
son would not himself have "noticed" this and had not been able, had he
wanted to, to "better" prepare ir in an academically competent manner!
Unique [ einmalig], as you yourself noticed, are rhe expression Fzihrer,
unique the mention of " Christian ideology" for Eusebius's rheolo-
goumenon. Astonishing, roo, the reference to City of Gocl no, which
yields nothing "hisrorically," which in 1935, in an explosively topical way
(caems tUque improvidw foturorum ["so blind and unable to sec the fu-
ture")), addresses itself to you in a coded warning-and fails to reach you.
You did nor have a better fri end than Peterson, whom you also led onro the
path to rhe eccl csia. "Faithful are rhe wounds a friend's arrow inAicrs"
(quickly in Hebrew: ne'emanim pitsei ohez;), rhe Psalmist says someplace
[Proverbs 27:6] (no Bible to hand, here in the "Maison") . This is no
"Parthi an arrow, " but a Christian one, the arrow of Peterson.
Alt hough I don't rake it lightly at all that rhe Nazi program spoke of
"positive Christiani ty" and that this was taken "seriously" by both
Catholics and Proresranrs (they wanted to rake ir seriously, bur rhey also
could: Hider and Goebbels had, after all , never left the "church," thar is,
ifl understand correcrly, t hey paid rheir "church tax" until the end!); still,
with the "race question," a political "rheo-zoology" (this expression is nor
mine, bur comes from Liebenfels, who means it "positively" and hands it
off to Hitler) was introduced and heralded in, which should have made
people pay arrenrion. Is this not so? l can't hear this from inside the
church- ! simply want to learn to "understand" why the :was nor felt
here, despite Rom. 13.
At the moment I am trying to read my way dutifully through the
newer Hobbes li terature and can't get over my astonishment at the extent
ro which it reads past the text- while Hobbes himself, in word and image,
left no room f(w interpretation about rhe fact that rhe Lez;iathan discussc.: s
rhc situ:uion ot' dw l'Oillll lollwlalrh as (fi rst) eccl c.:siastical (and then) civi l.
Letter 6
112 Appendix B
Thus I must return to your now forry-year-old li ttl e book about the sym-
bol of the Leviathan and can only harbor sad thoughts about scholarly
progress. I don't know whether one ought not to read Hobbes even more
literally than you propose. Why should Leviathan be considered only a
"literary idea"? Hobbes is dead serious when he speaks of the "great
Leviathan," rhar "morral God" to whom we owe-and this is the decisive
poinr-"peace and defense" "under rhe immortal God. " This is also why
"that Jesus in rhe Christ" is nor an empty phrase, bur an ever-returning
principle. This is why the machine of t he stare is not a perpetuum mobile,
a thousand-year Reich, sine fine, but thus mortally a fragile balance be-
tween inside and outside, rhus mortally also always defeated. Ir was nor
only the "first liberal Jew"
6
who discovered this "barely visible crack," bur
the Aposde Paul (also highly "valued" by the "fi rst liberal Jew") , to whom
I rurn at the wrn of rhe ages, distinguished inside and outside, also for "the
political. " Without this distinction we arc exposed to the thrones and
powers that in a "monistic" cosmos no longer know any Beyond. T he
boundary between spiritua.l and worldly may be controversial and is always
to be drawn anew (a neverending task of pol iric.-d rheology), but should
this separation cease, we will run our of (Occidental) breath- and so
would T homas Hobbes, who, as always, distinguishes "power ecclesiastical
and civil. " Your reference to Barion's reference in the Savigny Journal is
worth libraries of the Hobbes "lirerature."
7
I'm going to Zurich, where the
material is easier for me to fi nd (here I can find neither Barion nor Kempf)
and want to begin from this reference (which r might suggest also sur-
passes and sharpens your Hobbes book) , in order to launch the Hobbcs-
Spihoza lecture c6urse-ro students wbo at best have Strauss, x and at
worst Macpherson,
9
as a guide. The lecture course is a risky enterprise in
the Marxoid atmosphere; ir also consciously, with a note "for advanced stu-
dents only," demarcates itself from the marketplace of Philosophicum stu-
dents that we serve at the Institute, and it will likely not be open to the
public- which can only be to its benefit.
Rest assured non jam frustra doces Carl Schmitt ["Carl Schmitt, now
you do not teach in vain!"], also because of the failures and ill-fated blows
(including the one against poor Julius Stahl, which I privately applaud).
Perhaps there will still come a moment at which we can speak abour what
is to me t he most significant Jewish as well as Christian political theology,
Romans 9-11.
10
The word "enemy" also appears there, in the absolute
sense, but-and rhis seems ro me to be t he most decisive of decisive
Two Letters
points-connected with "loved." That these chapters were "on rhe
agenda" [dnm] in 1935 (and that they still are in 1978) is something that Pe-
terson, your critic (outwardly) and your best friend (inwardly), knew, and
this differentiates him supremely from the existential isms of his most im-
portant contemporary in New Testament exegesis, Rudolf Bultmann. By
way of Peterson, many a person will still find their way-will still have to
find their way-to Plettenberg.
Wit h fri endly greetings,
Jacob Taubes
SOUJ(CE: Jacob Taubes, Ad Carl Schmitt: Cegemtrebige Fiigung
( Berlin: Merve, 19S7) , 39-44:
' I
J
I
7.
Schmitt to Taubes
Plettenberg, 12 October 1978

Dear Mr. Taubes,
You letter from September 18 of this year arrived from Paris on time. Since then I have had a few dozen
answers rumoring in my head. How should this all end? First, however: which address should I write to?
Or may I just reckon with a continuation of spoken discussion? That would of course be best. Please dont
forget, that you have moved me to action with explosive materials, which one cannot simply consign to
the wind: the evangelic-theological specifically-Pauline image of the Messiah of the Tuebinger David
Friedrich Straus (the kernel of the matter: at that time Christianity was the new big thing, now it is the
old one, that is: what at that time was paganism [Heidentum; also: heathenism] and Judaism, that is
Legitimacy of the great-new=time [Legitimitt der Grossen-Neu=Zeit; author uses an equal sign to
connect new and time; NB: Neuzeit can also be translated as modernity depending on context] as the
Great New comme tel, taliter qualiter. And that is just the first exposition of drama, that is, just an act of
political-theological tragedy). To which address should I address my written reply? I dont even know
whether you received my letter to the FU from March of this year. The semester has also begun and your
thoughts will be moving in wholly different directions than toward Sauerland. And rightly so.
With best wishes
Carl Schmitt

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