Mythologies of transparency: the language issue in the Arab-Jewish dialogue between Moncef Chelli and Éliane Amado Lévy-Valensi

Abstract

This paper aims to examine the Arab-Jewish dialogue through the intellectual exchange that took place in the 1980s-1990s between the Franco-Israeli philosopher and psychoanalyst Éliane Amado Lévy-Valensi and the Franco-Tunisian philosopher and mathematician Moncef Chelli. The primary objective is to highlight the singularity of this intellectual encounter, which is characterized by the ability of both authors to challenge and question the mediating role often played by the West in such a confrontation. The central aspect of their engagement is the issue of language: while the West has come to regard language as an entirely external and transparent tool, losing sight of its arbitrariness, the Semitic languages, by contrast, have maintained a more substantial awareness of their creative and transformative nature, offering a more critical understanding of their arbitrariness to their speaking subjects. While Hebrew and Arabic possess the potential to reveal the hidden implications of Western languages, both Chelli and Amado also call attention to their own implicit assumptions, their own blind spots, and the totalizing tendencies that emerge when their reflections on language intersect with theological discourse. Only in this mutual clarification do they finally manage to define their position between East and West with precision and more fully adhere to their identity.