Abstract
There is a long and winding way that leads from Reichenau to Todtnauberg. It is Martin Heidegger’s way. Past the moor and through the fields it wends its way over the hills, only to wander now this way, now that, along uncharted forest trails. Yet for all its meandering, it moves in a single direction, it is but a single way. The purpose of these pages is to trace in some measure that way in order to raise the question if others may walk it too.1
Reichenau: a small island in the western arm of Lake Constance, where a Benedictine abbey, founded by Pirmin (724), was an important center of Christian culture in mediaeval Europe. Todtnauberg: Heidegger’s Black Forest retreat. The poem, “Abendgang auf der Reichenau,” composed during the summer vacation of 1916, appears in Das Bodenseebuch, 1917 (Constance, 1917), P- 152. Writer’s translation.
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Notes
Reichenau: a small island in the western arm of Lake Constance, where a Benedictine abbey, founded by Pirmin (724), was an important center of Christian culture in mediaeval Europe. Todtnauberg: Heidegger’s Black Forest retreat. The poem, “Abendgang auf der Reichenau,” composed during the summer vacation of 1916, appears in Das Bodenseebuch, 1917 (Constance, 1917), P-152. Writer’s translation.
“Wie du anfiengst, wirst du bleiben,” cited in Unterwegs zur Sprache (Pfullingen: Neske, 1959), p. 93. (Hereafter: US). See Franz Brentano, Von der mannigfachen Bedeutung des Seienden nach Aristoteles (Freiburg im Breisgau, 1862).
The fascination abides. As in 1929 (Kant und das Problem der Metaphysik, 2nd ed. [Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1951], p. 205 [hereafter: KM]), so in 1952 (Was heisst Denken? [Tübingen: Niemeyer, 1954], pp. 107, 137 [hereafter: WD]), the author returns again and again to the strange magic. N.B. We translate Heidegger’s Seiende (that-which-is) as “being” and Sein (that by which it is) as “Being.”
In 1935, Heidegger meditates the sense of the Greek word for Being (ειναι). After examining first its grammar (pp. 42–54), then its etymology (pp. 54ι55), he finds the results meager enough, then resorts once more to meditating “is” (p. 68), concluding that the primal form of ειναι must be neither the substantive nor infinitive, but the third person singular, sc. “is” itself (p. 70). (Einführung in die Metaphysik [Tübingen: Niemeyer, 1953], pp. 40–70 [hereafter: EM]).
The question bifurcates immediately into the question of what beings are and that they are, hence the question about essence and existence.
See Zur Seinsfrage (Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1956), pp. 18, 36–37. (Hereafter: SF). Cf. N, I, p. 454.
Heidegger claims that this sense of φύσις may still be found even in Aristotle (Metaphysics IV, 1, 1003 a 27). Moreover, he maintains that, given this sense of φύσις, all metaphysics, whether it conceive Being as Pure Act, as Absolute Concept or as Will-unto-Power, remains essentially a “physics.” This gives rise to an ambiguity on which the author later capitalizes. If all metaphysics is a “physics” because it considers beings as beings (in their φύσις) then to go beyond metaphysics in order to consider Being (here: φύσις) itself is to attempt a meta-“physics” of a higher sort. It is to this type of meta-“physics” that Heidegger himself would introduce his readers, because it means “overcoming” or “founding” metaphysics in the Aristotelian sense. This ambiguity, deliberately embraced, gives rise to the title of the lecture series of 1935 (see EM, pp. 14–15).
μετ' ἐℵεῖνα … εἰς ταῦτα. (Piatons Lehre von der Wahrheit, 2nd ed. Überlieferung und Auftrag, Band 5 [Bern: Francke, 1954], p. 48 [hereafter: PW]).
Was ist Metaphysik? 7th ed. (Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1955), P. 7. (Hereafter: WM). See also Über den “Humanismus” (in PW, pp. 53–119), pp. 76–77. (Hereafter: HB).
“Doch das Sein — was ist das Sein? … Das’ sein’ — das ist nicht Gott und nicht ein Weltgrund. Das Sein ist weiter denn alles Seiende und ist gleichwohl dem Menschen näher als jedes Seiende, sei dies ein Fels, ein Tier, ein Kunstwerk, eine Maschine, sei es ein Engel oder Gott. Das Sein ist das Nächste. Doch die Nähe bleibt dem Menschen am weitesten. …” (HB, p. 76).
This process-character of Being accounts for the fact that the important word Wesen has for Heidegger a verbal sense. See: Vom Wesen der Wahrheit, 3rd ed. (Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1954), pp. 25, 26. (Hereafter: WW). Vorträge und Aufsätze (Pfullingen: Neske, 1954), p. 38. (Hereafter: VA). WD, p. 143. To underline the process-character we have been tempted to translate Sein by the infinitive: To-be. We have opted for the more normal form, however: because Heidegger himself usually uses the definite article das, when by omitting it he would have drawn attention to the verbal character of Sein; because Being is better accomodated to the exigencies of readable English than To-be; because the ambiguity that inevitably results may not be altogether a bad thing.
HB, pp. 77 (Lichtung), 101 (Zwischen). May we say that Being thus conceived “is”? If so, then only Being “is”; beings, properly speaking, “are” not. The essential is to recognize the difference. (See HB, p. 80). In 1957, Heidegger will accept the formula “Being is,” provided that “is” be understood transitively. See Identität und Differenz (Pfullingen: Neske, 1957), p. 62. (Hereafter: ID).
WM, p. 8.
WM, p. 7 and passim.
The “ground”-question (Grundfrage) is to be distinguished from the “guide”-question (Leitfrage), the question about ὄν ᾐ ὄν See: EM, p. 15; N,I, pp. 79–81; 454–462. N.B. Parenthetical German words in notes are for purposes of identification only. Hence we cite the original form without alteration.
“…’ sinn von Sein’ und ‘Wahrheit des Seins’ sagen das Selbe.” (WM, p. 18). See: HB, p. 84; WM, p. 44; Holzwege, 2nd ed. (Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1952), p. 245. (Hereafter: HW). Cf. Sein und Zeit, 6th ed. (Tübingen: Niemeyer, 1949), p. 151. (Hereafter: SZ). Note that we follow the sixth edition of 1949. In the numerous reprintings, sometimes the type has been re-set, causing minor variations in pagination. It seems impossible to forestall all possibility of confusion for readers who use different printings.
“… denn sie stellt das Seiende (ὄν) stets nur in dem vor, was sich als Seiendes (ᾐ ὄν) schon von diesem her gezeigt hat….” (WM, p. 20). Cf. p. 8.
“… Die Metaphysik achtet jedoch dessen nie, was sich in eben diesem ὄν, insofern es unverborgen wurde, auch schon verborgen hat.” (WM, p. 20). Note that in speaking here of two “dimensions” in beings, we have all that is necessary to help us understand the distinction between “ontic” and “ontological” as it appears in SZ.
“… Als Metaphysik ist sie von der Erfahrung des Seins durch ihr eigenes Wesen ausgeschlossen….” (WM, p. 20).
“Auf dieses Verborgene im ὄν bleibt die Metaphysik gegründet, …” (WM, p. 20).
Cf. N, I, p. 460.
The terminology as such is not Heidegger’s, although we shall find a certain warrant for it in SZ. We are inclined to think of positivity and negativity here (if images of this kind do not do more harm than good) as two complementary components in a single movement, as in the composition of forces. In any case, the words must not be taken in any dialectical sense.
V.g. See WW, p. 15.
SF, p. 18. Thus in Kantian terms one would speak of metaphysics in the first sense as a reflection upon the “transcendental,” and in the second sense upon “transcendent Transcendence.” See HW, p. 318.
WM, pp. 19–20. In ID, p. 51, the author recalls the formula of WM (1929), p. 38, which says that metaphysics meditates beings-as-such (therefore Being-in-general) and in their totality (Being as Supreme Being). We follow here the prologue added to fifth edition of WM (1949). The sense is the same. Cf. KM, p. 17
HW, pp. 161–162, 317.
Heidegger claims that the word participium meant precisely “taking part” in two senses, sc. of noun and verb, at once. The point, however, is less cogent in English than in German, for we reserve the word “participle” to the verbal adjective, calling the verbal noun a “gerund.” See WD, p. 133.
HW, pp. 317–318.
ID, p. 67. Cf. VA, pp. 222, 224.
ID, pp. 59, 62, 66–69. Cf. VA, pp. 218–221.
ID, p. 67. Cf. VA, pp. 222, 224.
WD, pp. 134–135, 174–175 taken as a unit. Heidegger italicizes the vorausgesetzt (P-135).
Vom Wesen des Grundes, 3rd ed. (Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1949), p. 15. (Hereafter: WG).
“… Die Seinsvergessenheit 1st die Vergessenheit des Unterschiedes des Seins zum Seienden.” (HW, p. 336). (Writer italicizes here; Heidegger italicizes the whole) The same point was made m 1929 (KM, p. 212), but it comes into sharp focus only in retrospect.
“Weil die Metaphysik das Seiende als das Seiende befragt, bleibt sie beim Seienden und kehrt sich nicht an das Sein als Sein. …” (WM, p. 8). Yet metaphysics profits from the difference constantly, and the transcendence proper to it must pass through the difference as such (WD, p. 175).
“Denken wir … im Hervorkommen des Zwiefachen von Anwesendem und Anwesen aus der sich verbergenden Zweideutigkeit des ὄν das Wesen der Metaphysik, dann fallt der Beginn der Metaphysik mit dem Beginn des abendländischen Denkens zusammen Nimmt man dagegen als das Wesen der Metaphysik die Trennung zwischen einer ubersinnlichen und einer sinnlichen Welt, … dann beginnt die Metaphysik mit Sokrates und Platon.…” (HW, p. 162). Cf. HW, p. 243, where pre-Platonic thought is conceived as a “preparation” (vorbereitet) for metaphysics m the strict sense A case in point: the correlation of ‘Έν-Πάντα in Heraclitus’ Λóγος (ID, p. 67; VA, pp. 222, 224).
ID, pp. 46–47.
“… Warum ist überhaupt Seiendes und nicht vielmehr Nichts?” (WM, p. 42).
“… Woher kommt es, dass überall Seiendes den Vorrang hat und jegliches ‘ist’ für sich beansprucht, während das, was nicht ein Seiendes ist, das so verstandene Nichts als das Sein selbst, vergessen bleibt?…” (WM, p. 23).
WM, pp. 9–10 (gräbt, pflügt). Rückgang appears in the title of the introduction to WM (1949) and passim throughout. Note a discrepancy between text (1929) and introduction (1949): in 1929, it seems possible to ground metaphysics while remaining interior to it, for the question of Non-being is a “metaphysical” question (WM, pp. 41, 24–27, 38). Similarly in KM, pp. 13–14, we are told that the foundation of metaphysics must not be conceived as a basis that supports it from the outside but as the projecting of a blueprint (Entwerfen des Bauplans) for metaphysics, as discernible in the nature of man. It is the “metaphysics of metaphysics” (v.g. KM, p. 208). In 1949, it is clearly necessary to quit metaphysics entirely in order to meditate its ground. Latent here is the entire transition from the early to the late Heidegger.
SZ, p. 13; KM, p. 13.
WM, p. 21. Thus the word “ontological” has become for Heidegger suspect. Cf. Gelassenheit (Pfullingen: Neske, 1959), p. 55. (Hereafter: G). In the later years, even the “ontological difference” becomes simply the difference (Differenz, Unterschied), vg. US, p. 24.
Denken is literally an infinitive. Used as a noun (more often in German than in English), it implies the activity or process of thinking. In English, this is more easily rendered by the participle than by the infinitive. Hence we translate it usually as “thinking,” occasionally as “thought,” intending this always to mean “thought” in the active sense, sc. as in the process of accomplishing itself. Wesentliche comports the full verbal sense of Wesen, which can be appreciated only as we proceed.
In the résumé that follows, we condense Part III of our research into the briefest possible form. Since the analysis is examined later in detail, we omit here all textual justification. We refer only to such matters as we shall not have the occasion to remark again.
EM, pp. 11–12 (aufgehenden und verweilenden Waltens), 54, 77 (φυ-, φάινεσϑαι), 47 (ἀ-λήϑεια).
Present-ative thinking reaches its fulfillment in the subject-ism of Descartes but it is a type of thinking that is intrinsic to metaphysics as such. For in meditating beings as beings it (re)presents these beings in terms of their being-ness, hence present-ative thought simply transposes onto the level of thought the process of transcendence. It has its origin in Plato to the extent that, in transforming Being into a being (Idea), Plato conceived the being-ness of beings as see-able (εἴδος: ἰδεῖν), hence present-able through some type of vision.
SF, p. 18 (Reszendenz).
Was ist das–die Philosophie? (Pfullingen: Neske, 1956). (Hereafter: WP).
WP, pp. 21–22 (Heraclitus), 23–24 (Sophists), 24–25 (Aristotle).
WP, pp. 25–27 (ἐπιστήμη…), 28–29 (freie Folge). The word “free” here has a polemical connotation, directed against the Hegelian notion according to which the mittences of Being would be determined by a dialectical necessity. Cf. p. 31.
V.g. PW, p. 48 (narrow sense); WW, p. 24 (broad sense).
“Auf einen Stern zugehen, nur dieses.…” (Aus der Erfahrung des Denkens [Pfullingen: Neske, 1954], p. 7 [Hereafter: ED]).
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Richardson, W.J. (1963). Introduction. In: Heidegger. Phaenomenologica. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-6188-8_1
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