“Makkreel is already well known as one of the leading scholars of the history of hermeneutics, but in addition he has always been an original thinker of hermeneutics as such. This book draws together Makkreel’s own hermeneutical thinking as developed over many years, and does so in a way that provides both a unified vision of hermeneutics in its philosophical context and of hermeneutics in its historical development. . . . While Makkreel’s Orientation and Judgment in Hermeneutics is indeed a valuable and significant work in its own right, providing an intriguing and innovative elaboration of hermeneutics from a Kantian-Diltheyan perspective, what is perhaps most interesting about it is precisely the topological direction that it opens up, but only partly begins to explore. Makkreel’s work, like Figal’s, thus provokes a set of further questions concerning, not only hermeneutics, but the very relation between hermeneuein and topos. Could it be, for instance, that hermeneutics is essentially topology–and what would that mean?”
 

Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews

“Makkreel’s book is full of interesting exegetical and philosophical discussion of major themes in the development of philosophical hermeneutics since Kant. . . . A new account that can better address the complex problems of interpretation and understanding in our own time. This book is a welcome step in that direction.”
 

Journal of the History of Philosophy

“Orientation and Judgment in Hermeneutics stands out as one of the most insightful and provocative books of its kind in recent years. . . . With remarkable lucidity, Makkreel re-inscribes the Kantian power of critique and self-criticism within the interpretive dynamic of a contextualized understanding.”

Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology

"Discerning and thought-provoking....Makkreel unfolds in Orientation and Judgment in Hermeneutics a significant alternative conception of hermeneutics that reconceives its universal-contextual, ontological-ontic, and philosophical character. As such, this work will be essential reading for anyone trying to come to grips with the scope and limits of interpretation within our contemporary hermeneutical situation, and it will need to be seriously considered by exponents of other interpretations of hermeneutics."

Research in Phenomenology

“In this book, Makkreel offers fresh and new insights into the problems of philosophical hermeneutics. What we need today more than ever is ‘orientation’ in our judgments on an increasingly complex and differentiated world. On the basis of his long-standing hermeneutic work on philosophy’s classics, he takes us on an unprecedented backwards journey through texts of Gadamer, Heidegger, Dilthey, Hegel, and Kant.”

Angelica Nuzzo, Graduate Center and Brooklyn College, CUNY

“In this insightful inquiry, seasoned scholar Makkreel reassesses and refines Dilthey’s conception of the human sciences—but also Kant’s hermeneutically relevant theory of reflective judgment—in order to develop an orientational and reflective form of hermeneutics that addresses the new challenges of interpretation in our multicultural and digital age.”

Jean Grondin, Université de Montréal

“Orientation and Judgment in Hermeneutics is a momentous and significant book, not only for the philosophical discipline of hermeneutics but also, because of its impeccable clarity, for a much larger audience. It is, above all, a synthetic work, Makkreel’s own original contribution to hermeneutics in the global world of the twenty-first century.”

Rodolphe Gasché, University at Buffalo, State University of New York

"Orientation and Judgment in Hermeneutics is a particularly thought-provoking contribution to the literature of hermeneutics....It will continue to generate extensive, widespread and welcome discussion."

Continental Philosophy Review