ABSTRACT
This commentary introduces Levinas’s idea of the saint as an aspiration that comes out of our human capacity for valuing others, a capacity needing further development today. This psychic force, archetype, or tendency is part of Levinas’s portrayal of a fully human being. Guilt associated with failure to put the other first calls us to be responsive beings to the vulnerability of others. We encounter this appeal in the raw nakedness of the human face. Responsibility as “responsiveness” involves caring for difference, remaining “within difference” rather than indifference, and refraining from absolutizing using totalistic thinking. Totality in this sense forecloses and is contrasted with infinity as openness. Bion, Eigen, and Levinas advocate waiting, patience, passivity, and faith in the face of insoluble problems. For Levinas, this attitude can draw people close as they keep watch over unknown possibilities. The author notes a shared experience with seminar members concerning themes covered in this book: the proximity of persons before the insoluble problem of emotional life.
