The Enduring Importance of Leo Strauss

In The Enduring Importance of Leo Strauss, Laurence Lampert takes on the crucial task of separating what is truly important in the work of Leo Strauss from the ephemeral politics associated with his school. Lampert focuses on exotericism - the use of artful rhetoric to simultaneously communicate a socially responsible message to the public at large and a more radical message of philosophic truth to a smaller, more intellectually fit audience. Largely forgotten after the Enlightenment, exotericism, he shows, deeply informed Strauss both as a reader and as a philosopher. Examining Strauss' most important books and essays through this exoteric lens, Lampert reevaluates not only Strauss but the philosophers - from Plato to Homer to Halevi to Nietzsche - with whom Strauss most deeply engaged. Ultimately he shows that Strauss' famous distinction between ancient and modern thinkers is primarily rhetorical, one of the great examples of Strauss' own exoteric craft. Celebrating Strauss' achievements but recognizing one main shortcoming - a lack of proper grounding in modern science, which Nietzsche would remedy - Lampert illuminates Strauss as having even greater philosophic importance than generally realized.