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Adolph Franck's Biography (Books)

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Adolphe Franck, born in Liocourt 1 December 18101 and died in Paris April 11, 1893, is a French philosopher, both spiritual and eclectic philosopher in the tradition of Victor Cousin, Judaism philosopher and philosopher of law.

Adolphe Franck studied at the school of Liocourt where there was a schoolteacher for Jews, Moses Crehange and Hebrew studies preparatory to Nancy with Marchand Ennery. It is also continuing its secular training. Having completed the philosophy class at the Royal College Nancy, he studied philosophy, law and literature at the University of Toulouse. Unable to obtain a scholarship to continue his rabbinical studies, he turned to medicine, then opts for philosophy. In 1832 he received the first philosophy aggregation contest and gets the same year his Doctor of Letters. He was then professor of philosophy colleges of Douai, Nancy and Versailles, then at Charlemagne high school in Paris, where he among other students Edmond About and Francisque Sarcey.

In 1840, he inaugurated the Sorbonne free course on social philosophy, which is interrupted by an illness that leads him to stay for some time in Pisa. In 1844, his book on Kabbalah, described by Jules Michelet "critical masterpiece," 3 it is to be elected member of the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences at the age of only 36 years. The same year, while beginning to look the Dictionary of Science philsosophiques he wrote with fifty employees, he became a member of the Central Consistory of Jews of Nancy. In 1848 he ran unsuccessfully in the parliamentary elections of Meurthe. From 1849 to 1852, he was the deputy of Jules Barthelemy-Saint-Hilaire to the chair of Greek and Latin philosophy at the College de France. In 1852, he became assistant curator of the Imperial Library. From 1854 to 1881 he provides courses on the law of nature and people at the College of France. From 1882 he is member of the Society of Jewish Studies, which he was president in 1888. He is also member of the Board of Education and one of the founders and presidents of the League of Peace and freedom and the national League against atheism, which he founded in 1888 the journal social Peace.

Besides twenty books, Adolphe Franck is the author of numerous contributions to publications of the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences, the Israelites Archives France, Hansard and Journal des savants.

The most innovative aspect of Adolphe Franck philosophy lies in the area of the foundations of civil law, and especially criminal law. The principle of atonement as the basis for the penalty and the alleged right to punish or chastise, taken in the sense of 'reward evil with evil, "he opposes the law of conservation society is -to say its legitimate right of defense in respect of all that tends to destroy it. Hence derive the other two rights of society: the right to intimidation and repair law. According to Alfred Fouillee Adolphe Franck theory "lacks neither originality nor boldness; it is a considerable improvement on the doctrines of Kant, Cousin, Guizot, Duc de Broglie, as also on utility theories or purely medicales theories "

An important part of the work of Adolphe Franck is devoted to Judaism. In Kabbalah and Philosophy Religious Hebrew, he made a thorough analysis of the Sefer Yetzirah and the Zohar and parallels the philosophical concepts of Kabbalah with those of Plato, Philo of Alexandria, Christianity, Gnosticism and ancient Chaldean religions. He concluded that the origins of Kabbalah must be sought in Zoroastrianism, at the time of the first Jewish exile, that is to say long before its first written manifestations in the middle of the thirteenth century. In the field of mysticism, Adolphe Franck also published several essays on Eastern philosophies and a major study on the origins of martinisme.

The Dictionary of Philosophical Sciences, which includes some 1800 pages and Adolphe Franck which itself contributes a large number of articles, devoted mainly to the history of philosophy and the "four forms of human thought" that must according to him the subject of a "conciliation phase" naturalism, idealism, skepticism, mysticism. The major philosophical works of the nineteenth century in the field of criticism and experimental sciences, especially in terms of perception and psychology, however there are largely neglected.

Adolphe Franck's principales publications:


- Literary Revolutions, literature thesis presented at the Faculty of Letters of Toulouse (1832)
- Outline of a history of logic, preceded by an extensive analysis of the Organum of Aristotle (1838; 1898)
- Kabbalah or the Religious Philosophy of the Hebrews (1843; 1889, 1892). Reissue: Slatkine, Geneva, 1981
- Dictionary of Philosophical Sciences Society by professors and scholars, under the direction of Mr. Ad Franck Institute (6 volumes, 1844-1852; 1875: 1885).
- Of Certitude, compared to the Academie des Sciences Morales et Politiques, preceded by an introduction on the duties of philosophy in the present time of the company (1847)
- Communism judged by history (1848, 1849, 1871)
- Oriental Studies (1861; 1864)
- Reformers and publicists of Europe, Middle Ages, Renaissance (1864)
- Philosophy of Criminal Law (1864; 1880; 1888)
- Philosophy of ecclesiastical law, Reports of religion and state (1864; 1885)
- The mystical philosophy in France in the late eighteenth century: Saint Martin and his master Pasqualis Martinez (1866)
- Philosophy and Religion (1867; 1869)
- Moral elements (1868; 1872; 1872; 1885)
- Morals for All (1868; 1873; 1880; 1884) Online text
- Moralists and philosophers (1872; 1874) gallica.bnf.fr
- modern philosophers, foreign and French (1879)
- Reformers and publicists of Europe, seventeenth century (1881)
- Philosophical critique tests (1885)
- Philosophy of Civil Law (1886)
- New philosophical critical essays (1890)
- Reformers and publicists of Europe, the eighteenth century (1893)
- New Oriental Studies (1896)

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