Naturalness and Historicity: Strauss and Klein on the Quarrel between the Ancients and the Moderns

In the current article I discuss the different ways in which Leo Strauss and Jacob Klein interpret the need of reopening the hoary quarrel between the ancients and the moderns. Their task is to response to the crisis of reason characterizing European thought and the style of life after the First World War. This provides me with the opportunity to address the issue of how philosophy should face the problem of its naturalness and historicity. I argue that Strauss’s position can be understood as the mirror-image of that of Klein. Strauss thinks that the return to the ancients could overcome the historicist approach to fundamental issues characterizing modern philosophy, and consequently arise the problem of the nature of things over again. Klein thinks that the return to the ancients can lead modern man back to the hidden roots of its typical philosophical approach. The model for Strauss’s approach to philosophical eternal issues is the medieval commentary. On the contrary, Klein holds that the philosopher should devote himself, or herself, to doing history of philosophy, by reconstructing how philosophical paradigms changes over the centuries