Tra socialismo e messianismo. L’utopia in Cohen, Buber e Benjamin

The essay analyzes how Hermann Cohen, Martin Buber, and Walter Benjamin secularize Jewish messianism into distinct yet interconnected forms of modern utopian thought. Cohen transforms the messianic idea into a rational-ethical principle orienting humanity toward an infinite process of moral and social development. Influenced by Gustav Landauer’s libertarian socialism, Buber promotes a dialogical socialism rooted in the communal renewal of life and labour, where the I-Thou relation provides the ethical foundation for social transformation. Benjamin radicalizes this trajectory by articulating a revolutionary messianism in which redemption emerges through the interruption of historical continuity (Jetztzeit) and the recovery of memory of oppressed people. Through this trajectory, the essay retraces a dialectic between restoration and revolution in which Jewish messianism and libertarian utopia converge as critical responses to modernity and alternative models of emancipation.