Eugen Rosenstock - Huessy Eugen Rosenstock - Huessy ( July 6 , 1888 – February 24 , 1973 ) was a historian and social philosopher , whose work spanned the disciplines of history , theology , sociology , linguistics and beyond . Born in Berlin , Germany into a non - observant Jewish family , the son of a prosperous banker , he converted to Christianity in his late teens , and thereafter the interpretation and reinterpretation of Christianity was a consistent theme in his writings . He met and married Margrit Hüssy in 1914 . In 1925 , the couple legally combined their names . They had a son , Hans , in 1921 . Rosenstock - Huessy served as an officer in the German army during World War I . His experience caused him to reexamine the foundations of liberal Western culture . He then pursued an academic career in Germany as a specialist in medieval law , which was disrupted by the rise of Nazism . In 1933 , after Adolf Hitler became Chancellor of Germany , he emigrated to the United States where he began a new academic career , initially at Harvard University and then at Dartmouth College , where he taught from 1935 to 1957 . Although never part of the mainstream of intellectual discussion during his lifetime , his work drew the attention of W . H . Auden , Harold Berman , Martin Marty , Lewis Mumford , Page Smith , and others . Rosenstock - Huessy may be best known as the close friend of and correspondent with Franz Rosenzweig . Their exchange of letters is considered by scholars of religion and theology to be indispensable in the study of the modern encounter of Jews with Christianity . In his work , Rosenstock - Huessy discussed speech and language as the dominant shaper of human character and abilities in every social context . He is viewed as belonging to a group of thinkers who revived post - Nietzschean religious thought . Early life . Rosenstock - Huessy was born Eugen Friedrich Moritz Rosenstock in Berlin , Germany on July 6 , 1888 , to Theodor and Paula Rosenstock . His father , a scholarly man , was a banker and a member of the Berlin Stock Exchange . He was the only son among seven surviving children . Despite his parents ' Jewish heritage , his family " celebrated some Christian holidays , in keeping with other German families at the time . " He joined the Lutheran Protestant Church at age 17 and was christened at age 18 . He remained a devout proponent of Christianity throughout the rest of his life . After graduating from a secondary school ( gymnasium ) with very high academic standards and an emphasis on classical languages and literature , Rosenstock - Huessy pursued law studies at the universities of Zurich , Heidelberg , and Berlin . In 1909 the University of Heidelberg granted him a doctorate in law . In 1912 he became a " Privatdozent " , a preliminary qualification to becoming a professor , at the University of Leipzig , where he taught constitutional law and the history of law until 1914 . In 1914 Rosenstock - Huessy visited Florence , Italy to conduct historical research . There he met Margrit Hüssy , a Swiss art history major . They married later that year . World War I broke out shortly thereafter . World War I . At the onset of World War I , the German Army drafted Rosenstock - Huessy and stationed him at Western Front , including 18 months at Verdun , until the war ' s end . " During this period he organized courses for the troops , replacing the limited instruction in patriotism with broader topics . In 1916 , he and his friend , the Jewish philosopher Franz Rosenzweig , also on active duty , exchanged letters on Judaism and Christianity . " That correspondence has become well known as a dialog between proponents of the two related religions . Rosenstock - Huessy ' s work , " Judaism Despite Christianity " , contains much of this correspondence . Interwar period . After World War I , Rosenstock - Huessy became active in labor issues , focusing on improving education as a means to improve the societal standard of living . He returned to academia and started publishing his first noted works . Labor education . Rosenstock - Huessy did not return to his teaching post at the University of Leipzig . Instead , he obtained a position with Daimler - Motoren - Gesellschaft , the German car manufacturer , in Stuttgart , Germany . In 1919 , he founded and became the editor until 1921 of the first factory newspaper in Germany , the Daimler " Werkzeitung " ( Work Newspaper ) . In 1921 , Rosenstock founded " Die Akademie der Arbeit " ( the Academy of Labor ) in Frankfurt am Main . " This institution offered courses and seminars for blue - collar workers , but he resigned in 1923 over differences with the trade union representatives . Nevertheless , he did not give up his involvement with adult education and his efforts to give industrial workers a voice of their own in society . " He co - founded the Patmos Verlag publishing house , which published works on " new religious , philosophical , and social perspectives . " Return to academia . In 1923 , Rosenstock - Huessy received a second doctorate in philosophy from the University of Heidelberg . He then lectured at the Technical University of Darmstadt in the faculty of social science and social history until he was offered a job at the University of Breslau as a full professor of German legal history , a position he held from 1923 until January 30 , 1933 . During this period , Rosenstock - Huessy became active in many other ways at the University of Breslau . He helped organize voluntary work service camps — " Löwenberger Arbeitslager " ( Löwenberg Work Camp ) — for students , young farmers , and young workers to address the living and labor conditions at coal mines in Waldenburg , Lower Silesia . In 1926 , Joseph Wittig , a reform - minded Roman Catholic priest , was excommunicated and thus lost his right to teach church history at the University of Breslau . Rosenstock - Huessy stood by his friend , Wittig , in this affair . In 1927 and 1928 , they co - authored " Das Alter der Kirche " ( " The Age of the Church " ) , which contained two volumes of essays on the history of the Church and a third volume devoted to documents leading up to Wittig ' s excommunication . In 1925 , he co - founded a journal , " Die Kreatur " ( " The Creature " ) , which was edited by Wittig , Martin Buber , and Viktor von Weizsäcker , men of widely different perspectives , and which lasted until 1930 . According to his recent publishers , " Among the contributors [ of " Die Kreatur " ] were Nicholas Berdyaev , Lev Shestov , Franz Rosenzweig , Ernst Simon , Hugo Bergmann , Hans Ehrenberg , Rudolf Ehrenberg , Hermann Herrigel , Rudolf Hallo , and Florens Christian Rang . Each of these men had , between 1910 and 1932 , in one way or another , offered an alternative to the idealism , positivism , and historicism that dominated German universities . " Soon after January 30 , 1933 , when the National Socialists ( Nazis ) assumed power in Germany , Rosenstock - Huessy resigned from the University of Breslau and departed Germany that year . By the end of 1933 , he received an appointment as Lecturer in German Art and Culture at Harvard University with the help of a professor of government there . Publications 1914 – 1933 . Rosenstock - Huessy published his medieval study " Königshaus und Stämme in Deutschland zwischen 911 und 1250 " ( " The Royal House and the Tribes in Germany between 911 and 1250 " ) in 1914 , which he had written in Leipzig and was the source of recognition for his second doctorate . In 1920 , Rosenstock - Huessy published " Die Hochzeit des Krieges und der Revolution " ( " The Marriage of War and Revolution " ) , " a collection of current events essays that were replete with visionary thinking and practical warnings of conflicts to come . " In 1921 , Rosenstock - Huessy published " Angewandte Seelenkunde " ( " Practical Knowledge of the Soul " ) wherein he developed a new method for the social sciences based on language , the spoken word , and his " grammatical approach . " He later called this approach " metanomics . " Together with Josef Wittig , a Roman Catholic , he published " Das Alter der Kirche " ( " The Age of the Church " ) in 1927 - 28 . That work contained two volumes of essays on the life of the Church and a third volume devoted to documents leading up to Wittig ' s excommunication . " " While he was still teaching at Breslau , Rosenstock wrote and published the first of his major works : " Die Europäischen Revolutionen : Volkscharaktere und Staatenbildung " ( " The European Revolutions and the Character of Nations ; 1931 " ) . This book showed how 1 , 000 years of European history had been created from five different European national revolutions that collectively came to an end in World War I . " Dartmouth College . Rosenstock - Huessy encountered strong opposition at Harvard University to the presentation of his ideas in social history and other topics , all of which were based on his Christian faith . Reportedly , Rosenstock - Huessy frequently mentioned God in class . He also often attacked non - religious academic thinking , a teaching tradition assumed by the Harvard faculty to be a prerequisite for high scholarship . Profound differences of opinion ensued and led , in 1935 , to his accepting an appointment as professor of social philosophy at Dartmouth College in Hanover , New Hampshire . He made his home in nearby Norwich , Vermont . He taught at Dartmouth until his retirement in 1957 . At Harvard , he had made friends there who helped him in his publishing efforts . His first major writing task was to develop an English - language revision of his earlier book on revolutions , and he soon published " Out of Revolution : Autobiography of Western Man " in 1938 . George Allen Morgan , a former Harvard student under Alfred North Whitehead and himself the author of the classic " What Nietzsche Means " , subsequently assisted Rosenstock - Huessy in the preparation of " The Christian Future or the Modern Mind Outrun " in 1946 . Further , Whitehead had strongly supported Rosenstock - Huessy in his disagreements with members of the Harvard faculty . Renewed labor education . In 1940 he presented a request to US President , Franklin Delano Roosevelt , and was granted approval to organize a youth training program for the Civilian Conservation Corps ( CCC ) . Eleanor Roosevelt and journalist Dorothy Thompson were champions of the proposal . He then founded Camp William James in Tunbridge , Vermont as a prototype for a national peacetime volunteer labor service . " Involving mainly students from Dartmouth , Radcliffe , and Harvard , its purpose was to train young leaders to expand the 7 - year - old CCC from a program for unemployed youth into a work service program that would accept volunteers from all walks of life . " The entrance of the United States into World War II in 1941 ended this and all other CCC programs because men were needed in the armed services and women became a greater part of the workforce . This concept anticipated the Peace Corps by more than two decades . Publications 1933 – 1973 . Rosenstock - Huessy published " Out of Revolution : Autobiography of Western Man " in 1938 , an English - language revision of his earlier book on revolutions . Together with George Allen Morgan , he published " The Christian Future or the Modern Mind Outrun " in 1946 . In " Out of Revolution " , Rosenstock - Huessy wrote : The present time is bound ( . . . ) to attempt an organization of future society by which the dynamite of revolution may be manipulated as persistently and consciously as contractors use real dynamite in building tunnels or roads . During 1956 through 1958 , Rosenstock - Huessy developed the principle of metanomics in his two - volume " Soziologie " ( " Sociology " ) — Volume I : " On the Forces of Common Life " ( " When Space Governs ) " and Volume II : " On the Forces of History " ( " When the Times Are Obeyed " ) . During 1963 through 1964 , he further developed this principle in Volumes I & II of , " Die Sprache des Menschengeschlechts : Eine Leibhaftige Grammatik in Vier Teilen " ( " The Speech of Mankind : A Personal Grammar in Four Parts " ) . Whereas " Soziologie " is unavailable in English , Rosenstock - Huessy ' s " Speech and Reality " is an English - language introduction to that work . A collection of his writings , " I Am an Impure Thinker " offers a good overview of Rosenstock - Huessy ' s thought processes . Transitions . Rosenstock - Huessy ' s wife , Margrit , died in 1959 . In 1960 , Freya von Moltke became Rosenstock - Huessy ' s companion . She was the widow of Helmuth James von Moltke , who had opposed National Socialism and was executed by the Nazis . After World War II and continuing through his retirement from Dartmouth , Rosenstock - Huessy was a frequent guest professor at many universities in Germany and the United States . He remained active in lecturing and writing until his final years . His output comprises more than 500 essays , articles , and monographs , as well as 40 books . He was awarded an honorary doctoral degree in 1958 at the University of Münster . Rosenstock - Huessy died on February 24 , 1973 . He and his wife are buried at the Hillside Cemetery in Norwich , Vermont . Quotations . " " The French Revolution first introduced into Europe the notion of the tissue - paper frontier . Hitherto , all boundaries had been marshes , forests , mountains , dikes ; that is to say , significant boundaries . But when boundaries can be drawn on paper , they need have no more significance than the stroke of a pen or a piece of chalk . " " " " Grammar and logic free language from being at the mercy of the tone of voice . Grammar protects us against misunderstanding the sound of an uttered name ; logic protects us against what we say having a double meaning . " "