This chapter consists in a close reading of ‘And God Created Woman’, a Talmudic commentary presented by Levinas in 1972. Its purpose is to deconstruct the concept of creation in order to demonstrate the radical passivity preceding human freedom. In his reading, Levinas points to the orthographic issue of the duplication of the yod in ‘vayyitzer’ (‘made’ or ‘created’). This duplication seems to point to two moments in creation. In the first creation out of nothing, humanity is at stake. Creation is the condition in which man appears as totally exposed to the all-seeing gaze of God. This passivity, without refuge, makes ethics possible. This is called ‘the mystery of the human psyche’. In the second act of creation, the relation between man and woman is established as the concrete shape of the first creation. Here Levinas deepens responsibility to unconditional responsibility: being created means being made responsible. The two concepts of creation are brought into relief with the aid of the thought of Derrida and Nancy. The relation with the alterity of the son is the incarnation of the created responsibility. This aspect is elaborated in dialogue with Kierkegaard's and Cathérine Chalier's commentary on the Abraham story. The son teaches by asking the question about the reality of the convenant that registers itself in being created. From the reality of the convenant, the question appears in its ultimate passivity.
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Anckaert, L. (2009). L'Être Entre les Lettres. Creation and Passivity in ‘And God Created Woman’. In: Hofmeyr, B. (eds) Radical Passivity. Library of Ethics and Applied Philosophy, vol 20. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-9347-0_10
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