Strauss, Leo
Leo Strauss (1899–1973) was the most influential political philosopher of the twentieth century as well as its most extraordinary teacher. He was born into an Orthodox Jewish family in Kirchain, Hessen, Germany, on September 20. Strauss completed a doctorate at Hamburg in 1921 and immigrated to the United States in 1938. He taught at several American universities and attracted many gifted students. Their respect for his thought has led to those students being called disciples or Straussians. He died on October 18 in Annapolis, Maryland.
Philosophy and History
Like many scholars who left Germany in the 1930s, Strauss believed that a philosopher's work must be understood in the light of a political situation. Perhaps uniquely, he thought that all philosophers are in the same situation. Every regime, every society that sustains a government, is founded on certain shared opinions about what is noble and sacred, what is just, and what is in the common interest. Philosophers want to replace those cherished opinions with knowledge. This means that philosophy is by definition potentially subversive and is always likely to arouse the hostility of the regime. The story of Socrates' trial and execution is the best expression of this problem.
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