I Am an Impure Thinker

by Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy. Argo, 2001.



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In his foreword to this book, W.H. Auden writes: “Whatever he may have to say about God, Man, the World, Time, etc., Rosenstock-Huessy always starts out from his own experience as a human being, who must pass through successive stages between birth and death, learning something essential from each one of them.”

I Am an Impure Thinker is a collection of essays that can be read as an introduction to Rosenstock-Huessy’s thought. He was an “impure thinker” because he believed that fruitful thought can only grow from passionate conviction and engagement rather than academic “objectivity,” but also because he sees the truths of Christianity present throughout mankind’s long history. Taken together, these apparently unrelated essays offer an answer to Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s question: How can we speak of God to modern man who has come of age?

Bonhoeffer’s close friend and biographer, Eberhardt Bethge, wrote that “Rosenstock-Huessy refuses to do anything in the usual way, but you may safely turn yourself over to him. Behind it all stands the responsibility of a great teacher committed to opening our eyes.”

Argo Books, second edition, 2001. Paperback, 248 pages.
(A PDF of this edition may be read here.)