A Philosophy of the Unsayable

Abstract

This chapter questions what William Franke understands by “a philosophy of the unsayable.” Apophatic practice is traditionally tied to theology, not philosophy, and is a practice in which the loving soul seeks to gain unity with God not by knowledge but by repentance and love. Yet there is also philosophical apophaticism that can be found in Kant’s detaching of God from theoretical discourse, and in Burke’s account of the sublime. In postmodernity, these strains continue in another key, by way of the transcendental and the transcendent, which are analyzed by way of fascination and contemplation.