Yitzhak Goldstein

Yitzhak Goldstein is a professor of philosophy at Harvard University. Born in Israel in 1943, he read philosophy and ethics at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem before emigrating to the US where he became an eminent and highly respected philosopher specialising in morality and ethics. Published in 1994, ‘An essay concerning objective morality’, is widely regarded to be his masterpiece and has been translated into over 25 languages. Although often misinterpreted, his work is believed by many to have revolutionised the landscape of ethical thought and lead to Goldstein’s being described by the late French ethical philosopher Emmanuel Lévinas as “one of the greatest moral thinkers of our time.”
An essay concerning objective morality challenged common conceptions that morals are objective or that things can be described in objective terms as morally good or bad.
"It is not behavioural traits we are referring to when we talk of morals, but rather the meaning we interpret and attach to them. Whilst it is not possible for a rational man to deny the existence of murderous behaviour, it is conceivable that one might reject the idea that murder is wrong - for in saying that anything whatsoever is morally wrong one is expressing an interpretation of that thing, not a fact about it.¹ It is for this reason that morals are distinctly human."
Published work
Yoel Schwartz and Yitzhak Goldstein, Shoah- A Jewish Perspective on Tragedy in the Context
of the Holocaust (New York. Mesorah Publications, 1990)

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