231. Paul Gottfried on Leo Strauss and the Conservative Movement in America

In this episode, we welcome back Dr. Paul Gottfried to discuss his book Leo Strauss and the Conservative Movement in America: A Critical Appraisal. Who was Leo Strauss, and why does he matter? Deeply influencing the conservative movement in America - what was Strauss’ distinctive interpretive approach to texts, including his understanding of “Jerusalem and Athens” as well as his distinction between exoteric and esoteric readings? Leo Strauss was a veteran of WWI for Germany who will eventually be an academic exile at the University of Chicago very much shaped and motivated by the trauma of WWII and the threat of the Cold War. Both connecting and distinguishing Strauss from many of his later students and varying schools of his thought – how should conservatives view the strengths and weaknesses of his/their work? Although often framed as an exercise in retrieving wisdom from the ancients, Gottfried questions how truly committed the Straussian method is to true historical awareness regarding ancient texts, rather than simply an exercise in quirky appropriation for modern concerns - or the selective use of ancient texts for a predictable story leading invariably to the assumed goodness of the modern democratic state. Though Straussians are often critiquing the “triple scourge” of relativism, historicism and postivism against the Left, what are some fundamental concerns that conservatives should have with Strauss, coming from the Right? Is a deep commitment and concern for historical context to be guilty of “historicism”? Indeed, why should Protestant Christians care about this debate, especially how Strauss’ approach can impact both the approach to ancient texts, such as Plato’s Phaedrus (and by implication, the Bible), as well as how those ancient texts may speak to the world today? Though sometimes only seen in a debate over the American founding, it is a symptom of a much larger conflict over the value of history, and even how that should or shouldn’t connect to modern concerns.

Book: Leo Strauss and the Conservative Movement in America: A Critical Appraisal

Also check-out Chronicles Magazine (especially the print magazine):

- “Three Conceptions of Conservatism”

- “The ‘Creedal Nation’ Myth Just Won’t Die”

- “Further Thoughts on a Creedal Nation”

Also: “Getting Rights Wrong”

Check out our previous interviews: here, and here

Other books by Dr. Gottfried:

The Search for Historical Meaning: Hegel and the Postwar American Right

Multiculturalism and the Politics of Guilt: Toward a Secular Theocracy

After Liberalism: Mass Democracy in the Managerial State

Fascism: The Career of a Concept

Antifascism: The Course of a Crusade

Other resources:

Check out Bibliography of Leo Strauss

- Liberalism Ancient and Modern

- The City and Man

- Natural Right and History

Plato: Phaedrus, Republic, Timaeus, Phaedo (also here, here and here and here)

Aristotle: Politics, Nicomachean Ethics

Leo Strauss and Anglo-American Democracy by Grant Havers

“Harry Jaffa and the Demise of the Old Republic” by Barry Shain

“The Heresy of Equality” by M.E. Bradford

The Morals of History by Tzvetan Todorov