Volume 4, Issue Part 2, 2007
Selected Essays from Northern Europe Part 2
Thomas Vongehr
Pages 853-893
„Der liebe Meister“
Edith Stein über Edmund und Malvine Husserl
In this biographically orientated paper, I investigate the relation between Edith Stein and the family of Edmund Husserl, with specific emphasis on the relation between Stein and Husserl’s wife Malvine. Stein followed Husserl from the University of Gottingen to the University of Freiburg, where in 1916 she received her doctorate of philosophy with a dissertation written under Husserl’s supervision: “On The Problem of Empathy.” Between 1916-1917 Edith Stein was Husserl’s assistant. Despite the fact that Husserl did not support her in obtaining a professorship, she maintained, after a break of some years, contact with the Husserl family. After Husserl’s death in 1938 Stein reestablished her relationship with Malvine Husserl through a correspondence. Stein gave her some advice concerning her conversion to Catholicism. A step which Stein had taken some years before.