This study brings the work of three thinkers of the Enlightenment---particularly the German-Jewish Enlightenment: Moses Mendelssohn, Immanuel Kant, and Hermann Cohen (as heir to the Enlightenment)---to bear on recent discussions about the structural intolerance inherent in the worldview largely shared by the Abrahamic monotheisms. I use recent scholarship on monotheism to highlight the inadequacies of the philosophical accounts of tolerance and pluralism by the thinkers Jurgen Habermas and Jean-Francois Lyotard, which pay insufficient attention to the unique challenges posed to these principles by monotheistic religions. I argue that the problems inherent in monotheistic intolerance are better addressed by the earlier philosophical ruminations of Mendelssohn, Kant, and Cohen. These three Enlightenment thinkers are able to preserve the tense dialectic inherent in the monotheistic worldview while mitigating the violence of its agonistic tendencies by synthesizing the logic operative in monotheistic religions, what I have termed 'scriptural universalism' with a very different logic, what I have termed 'rational universalism.' The exclusivist structures of scriptural universalism such as election, idolatry, and historical mission engender an agonistic relationship with those outside of the monotheistic community. Rational universalism however is more broadly inclusive in that it appeals to all human beings by virtue of their capacity to reason. By synthesizing scriptural universalism with rational universalism, these thinkers reconfigure the basic structures of the monotheistic worldview, appealing to the faculty of reason intrinsic in all human beings rather than relying solely on revelation via a particular set of Scriptures. As a result, with varying degrees of success, Mendelssohn, Kant, and Cohen are able to ameliorate the violence bound up with monotheistic intolerance while nevertheless preserving monotheism's basic structures, a feat contemporary, secular thinkers of tolerance are unable to accomplish. While Mendelssohn and Kant contribute substantially to the development of this trajectory of thought, ultimately Cohen presents not only the most cogent conception of a monotheistic worldview freed of violence and hostility towards the Other, but one that remains viable in the contemporary intellectual climate.

This thesis examines the process of discernment as described by three Spanish Catholic mystics of the sixteenth century: Ignatius Loyola (1492-1556), Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), and John of the Cross (1542-1591). Discernment refers to the process of distinguishing those things which are of God from those which are not. This thesis demonstrates that all three of these mystics had specific criteria by which they evaluated their mystical experiences to determine whether or not they were from God, shows that there are important commonalities between their discernment criteria, and argues that these criteria in large part derive from their social and historical setting.

Kierkegaard identifies "philosophy" as the perspective which seeks to grasp Truth with thought. Thought is taken as a passion for ideality, immanence, and closure. But for Kierkegaard Truth involves reality transcendence, and openness. It thus transcends thought and can only be grasped by the whole person; i.e. Truth is known in "maximal subjectivity." Kierkegaard's affirmations about Truth rest on dogmatic assumptions. In contrast to the Socratic view, which takes Truth as immanent and attainable by way of remembrance, Kierkegaard views Truth as "coming" in a significant Moment called "the fullness of time." To the unregenerated self this Truth will appear as a paradox. If the self affirms itself, then the paradox is taken as "offence." But if the self gives up itself and embraces the paradox in faith, then there is a resurrection of reason such that the paradox is no longer contradiction.

To date, the most developed models of compromise in situations of value conflict come out of the bargaining theory or rational choice theory literature. While useful in compromises over more straightforward preferences and interests, these models are shown to be seriously limited when applied to decisions involving moral commitments and moral compromise, especially among firm moral believers. A series of arguments is offered to motivate compromise over moral commitments, and these arguments attempt to take seriously the experience of the firm believer who is not moved by the straightforward maximizing arguments offered by bargaining theory. Two types of compromise are defended: separation compromises and direct compromises. The first defends indirect forms of compromise or assent to compromise where the damage done to firm moral beliefs is minimized through varying degrees of psychological distancing. Separation compromises include the use of arbiters, reliance on procedural solutions to conflict, separation between private and public or professional roles, withholding of intent, and symbolic gestures of protest or dissent. These indirect compromises, while often the only way of protecting firm beliefs and avoiding protracted conflict by assenting to compromise, come at a sometimes tragic price; at the very least the agent will still be complicit in the compromise, and responsible for immoral compromises. A second, more positive account of compromise is then defended. Three arguments are offered to motivate direct compromise, even among firm believers, in situations where there is some willingness among all parties concerned to at least enter into debate. The first is an appeal to the often self-defeating implications of protracted conflict and "walking away". The second argument appeals to moral fallibility. The third argument demonstrates the important relationship between our underdetermined moral principles and certain forms of conceptual compromise; compromise on this third account can be an important way of filling out our underdetermined regions of moral belief and principle. In closing, the normative limits on moral compromise are considered, as generated by appeals to fairness, moral complicity, and moral integrity.

This work elucidates elements of Leibniz's theodicy which are non-teleological. Rather than ignoring the personal dimensions of suffering, as some have charged, Leibniz actually recognizes the threat that the problem of innocent suffering presents for a perfectly good God. His theodicy goes beyond the global greater-good defense of the best possible world argument in several ways. He appeals to personal greater-goods to justify some instances of suffering, but he also invokes deontological principles in his retributive justice arguments, his response to the author of sin problem, and his constraint against damnation of infants. However, an evidential version of the problem of horrible suffering of innocents would still threaten his theodicy. This problem persists due to Leibniz's rejection of theological voluntarism in favor of a unified system of ethics for God and rational creatures. Finally, Leibniz's rejection of quietism provides an important resource for a response to suffering. His theodicy thus implies a moral activism whereby the good for each rational creature is bound up with the general good of others in the amelioration of the world.

The shift from a traditional, being-based Christian cosmology---in which God creates all things through an ontologically-invested reason in which man shares---to a voluntarist, will-based Christian cosmology---in which God creates all things through an arbitrary act of will knowable to man only through experience---is considered crucial to the rise of empiricism and its related experimental method, two cornerstones of the Scientific Revolution. This dissertation examines how the shift from a being- to a logos-based cosmology, with its entailed shift from a realist to a nominalist ontology, affected this world's relation to a next. It explores this issue by considering the resurrection views of three writers whose works, taken together, span the seventeenth-century both temporally and intellectually, from the vestigial medieval scholasticism of John Donne (1572--1631) through the Renaissance neo-Platonism of Thomas Browne (1605--1682) to the Early-Modern mechanism of Robert Boyle (1627--1691). This dissertation argues that the traditional, being-based cosmologies shared by Donne and Browne underlie their teleological understandings of natural processes and, in doing so, allows them to find evidence in this world for resurrection to the next. Boyle's voluntarist cosmology, on the other hand, banishes inherent teleology from the natural world and thereby silences this world with regard to a next. This dissertation further argues that this shift in cosmology and more specifically, the entailed shift from a realist to a nominalist ontology, allowed man to make nature speak a new, operational language that could be used to man's benefit. By considering works written around the time of London's 1665 plague, we will see how mechanistic medicine produced such operational knowledge through the use of human-made instruments and methods, including experimentation. Although such knowledge provides no intelligence about a next world, it does allow humanity to make its way better in this one.

The study examines three myths endemic to Western culture, autochthony (indigenousness), promised land, and exile, taking as figurative representations Athens for autochthony and Jerusalem for promised land. The myth of autochthony is found in ancient Greek literature and the myth of promised land is found in Hebrew scripture. The notion of exile is shown to be a corollary to promised land, and in opposition to autochthony. The philosophy of Martin Heidegger is shown to articulate an essential commitment to autochthony, which is explicitly contrasted to rootlessness and homelessness (what Heidegger takes to be the substance of modernity itself). The philosophy of Franz Rosenzweig is shown to prioritize Jewish exile as necessary for world redemption, a notion of exile explicitly contrasted to autochthony. Nazi Germany exemplifies the opposition of German autochthony and Jewish exile.

A cross-cultural study of a never-before translated 14$\rm\sp{th}$ century Tibetan Bon Severance (gcod) text and the theoretical work of 20$\rm\sp{th}$ century French theorist Georges Bataille is undertaken. Juxtaposing these two radically different materials is justified by themes related to sacrifice identified and highlighted in both works as well as by Bataille's expressed interest in inner experience, shamanism and Tibetan spirituality. Through exploring the role played by fear, horror and the threat of death in effecting human transformation in these two materials, a complex understanding of compassion that accommodates self-conscious transgression is put forth. A critical edition (in dbu chen) and translation of the Precious Garland of Severance Instructions (gcod gdams rin chen phreng ba) are included.

<p> I wanted to see if there were points of overlap between the various accounts of creation found in folklore, philosophy and physics. In order to justify such a project, I initially considered literature from each of these disciplines regarding the necessity of interdisciplinary dialogue generally and specifically the need for both intuition and logic when considering how anything actually exists. Through my research and casual observation, I hypothesized that opposition seemed to be a universal characteristic of nature. I then looked at how each discipline has described fundamentally opposing pairs and created a list of primary features that those accounts had in common. Finally, I demonstrated (in my study <i>The Symmetry of God</i>) the utility of an interdisciplinary approach to myth by showing how science and philosophy can improve our understanding of myth and conversely how folklore (myth in particular) may suggest meaningful and potentially <i>revolutionary</i> relationships not yet considered by science.</p>

<p> In his 1978 lectures at the College de France, <i>Security Territory Population</i>, Michel Foucault shifts his analysis of power by arguing for pastoral power as both the prelude to governmentality and as the decisive moment in the constitution of the Western subject. If the history of the Christian pastorate involves "the entire history of procedures of human individualization in the West (184)," then, Foucault argues, there has never been a revolt against pastoral power because such a revolt would be a revolt against the constitution of the self, that is to say against self-consciousness. If the revolt against pastoral power is a revolt against self-consciousness, then I argue that the psychagogic-spiritual, as opposed to rhetorical-theological, practices of religious conversion may be where counter-conducts (already understood to be subsumed within Christian pastoral power) may also overwhelm the Christian pastorate. In his conversion to Christianity Augustine employs techniques that are `overwhelming' to pastoral power, but are never actually an attempt to overcome pastoral power. In the specific experiences recalled by Augustine in his Confessions, through the various non-discrete phases of his conversion he takes up what Foucault calls counter-conducts. Through asceticism (especially in the author's struggle with conscupience); through the establishment of a new religious community (as a Manichean catechumen) through mysticism (in the doctrine of `inner illumination)'; through the exegesis of scripture (significantly in the voluntary reading of Romans 13:12-14 prior to becoming a catechumen of the Christian Church); and through eschatological belief (specifically in the a-millennial conception of the return of Christ), Augustine, author of the Confessions, emerges as a convert to Christianity. Towards Foucault's call for genealogies of pastoral power and towards the call of philosophy understood as ethico-poetic praxes of Eros captured in the phrase epimeleia heatou, this thesis will investigate Augustine of Hippo's conversion to Christianity as an enactment of Foucault's `counter-conducts.' I will argue, through exegesis of Augustine's Confessions, that this parrhesiatic document is simultaneously a narrative of psychagogic practices which reflects Augustine's profound ascesis towards Christian subjectivation as well as a document of the counter-conducts that overwhelm Christian pastoral power while never revolting against it. As a result of his pluralistic and deeply personal approach towards conversion, Augustine's recorded experiences exemplify how `new' technologies (or at least new modalities of old technologies) are established within the Christian pastorate. It is in and through the event of his conversion that Augustine also emerges as a leader of the orthodox Church and simultaneously as an instigator for later revolts against it--arguably, for example, as an inspiration for the leaders of the Protestant Reformation. If there can be no revolution against pastoral power because it is always instituting, circumscribing, and subsuming new forms of resistance on its own, then perhaps we can best understand where counter-conducts are most dangerous to the practices of power by understanding where some practices actually fail to resist power-effects, while simultaneously transforming power-relations.</p>