Before and within the Bible. Religion, halakhah, and philosophy of existence in Joseph B. Soloveitchik’s philosophical anthropology

The subject matter of this work is the relationship between the thought of Joseph B. Soloveitchik and European philosophy. My objective is to address such relationship in a twofold manner: on the one hand by looking at the Rav's corpus as influenced by Western philosophy, and on the other hand underscoring the search for an authentic Jewish philosophy within the Bible and other Jewish sources. The work is divided into five chapters. The first chapter analyzes the influence of philosophers in the Rav's using of typological anthropology in the 1940s, Soloveitchik's «academic phase»; while the second chapter reconstructs typologies in the Rav's «existential-therapeutic approach». Chapter three approaches narrative and biblical characters: Maimonidean and Kierkegaardian nuances are underscored in Soloveitchik's Abraham. The fourth chapter portrays Soloveitchik's philosophy of existence as the merge of narrative thought and halakhic commitment, pointing at Job as a paradigmatic figure. Chapter five provides an account of Soloveitchik's use of dialectics as a philosophical tool in his late and posthumous writings.