Return Statements: The Return of Religion in Contemporary Philosophy (Incitements)

to the other horizon, or to the evening of the last day that was now setting on the West.

Thus it seemed that the only mortal enemies were the literal and historical senses of each of these terms, senses which seemed to belong only

it became possible for one to proclaim one’s faith without necessarily being religious,

a literal meaning was reattached to the term, as if religion in this sense was the most direct signification of the phenomena and could not, for that reason, undergo any possible metaphorical substitution as, for example, standing for “culture” or “belief-system.”

the second horizon

According to the first horizon, the semantic and cultural meaning of religion was weakening and philosophically pacific (though not necessarily pacifist).