Overview
Edith Stein (1891–1942), also known as St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, was a German phenomenologist who studied with Husserl and wrote On the Problem of Empathy. Of Jewish origin, she converted to Catholicism, entered Carmel, and was killed at Auschwitz; her later work joins phenomenology with Christian metaphysics.
Main ideas
Stein analyzes empathy as a distinctive experiential act through which another subject is given, not inferred as a mere analogy from one’s own case. She develops accounts of the person, community, and the relation of finite being to eternal being, moving from early Husserlian description toward a realist ontology.
Major works
- On the Problem of Empathy
- Philosophy of Psychology and the Humanities
- Finite and Eternal Being
Legacy
Stein remains central to phenomenological ethics of the other and to twentieth-century Catholic philosophy; her life also marks philosophy under totalitarian persecution.