Joseph Palmisano offers an in-depth examination of the significance of empathy for Jewish-Christian understanding. Drawing on the writings of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-1972) and Edith Stein (1891-1942), he develops a phenomenological category of empathy defined as a way of "re-membering" oneself with the religious other.

Palmisano follows Heschel's and Stein's philosophical theory and praxis through the unprecedented horrors of the Shoah, showing that Heschel's call to Christians for a return to God is an ecumenical call to humanity to embrace perceived others: a call to...