Abstract
It would be difficult to exaggerate the importance of the step we have accomplished here, and only the development that follows will enable us to see that in these few pages we touch the heart of Heidegger’s whole endeavor. Being is at once aboriginal Truth, Ground, Utterance. There-being, as the concentrating point of the gathering-process, is ὁμελεγεῖν. Whether under the guise of poetizing or of thought, There-being corresponds with and thereby helps it come-to-pass as Truth, as Ground, as Utterance. Since Being in its truth is at once aboriginal Utterance, we may discern the sense of Being- as-truth by interrogating language. That is why the Hölderlin analyses, in groping for the sense of poetizing, are an unswerving interrogation of ἀ-λήϑεια. The suggestion of some “middle-point” between and its There suggests a new aspect of the Being- process, which it is the task of foundational thought to think.
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Notes
“Logos” (Heraklit, Fg. 50), VA, pp. 207–229. Composed in 1951 as contribution to a commemorative volume for Hans Jantzen (Berlin, 1951) and delivered as a lecture (Bremen) in the same year, the essay is based on the University lecture course with the same title in summer semester, 1944. Hence we insert it here.
Restricting ourselves to those titles which explicitly mention logic or its principal themes, we find that the author treated logic in: 1916 (seminar, Aristotle’s logic), 1922 (course, Aristotle’s logic and ontology), 1925–26 (course on logic and seminar on Hegel’s Logic), 1926–27 (seminar, construction of concepts), 1927 (seminar, Aristotle’s ontology and Hegel’s Logic), 1928 (course, logic), 1928–29 (seminar, ontological principles and the categories), 1930–31 (seminar, construction of concepts), 1933 (seminar, principle of contradiction), 1934 (course, logic), 1939 (seminar, the essence of language).
“… Und weil diese bisherige Logik als Lehre von den Denkakten beanspruchte, als oberste und maßgebende Regel aller Bestimmung des Seins zu gelten, deshalb muß dieser Anspruch ursprünglich gefaßt und rücksichtsloser erneuert werden aus den ursprünglichen Begriffen des Wesens der Sprache.…” Cited from students’ lecture notes with Professor Heidegger’s approval.
For the two preceding paragraphs, see VA, pp. 208–211 (legen, nieder-und vorlegen, zusammenbringen, Verwahren, beisammen-vor-liegen-lassen).
VA, pp. 220–221 (Ἀλήϑεια), 213 (ἀποφαήνεσϑαι). Cf. P, p. 271–272; SZ, pp. 32
“Ἕν Πάντα sagt, was der Λόγος sagt, wie ιόγος west. Beide sind das Selbe.” (VA, p. 221). Cf. pp. 215 (ausgezeichnete Legen), 220 (Einzig-Eine, Einende), 207 (Einfachen), 222 (Blitz). Cf. N, II (1941), p. 483 (Insichruhen des Einfachen).
“… Das Wort ὁ Λόγος nennt Jenes, das alles Anwesende ins Anwesen versammelt und darin vorliegen läßt….” (VA, p. 227).
VA, p. 218 (Geschickliches), afterwards passim.
See SG, pp. 178–188, n.b. p. 180; ID, p. 54.
VA, pp. 210 (Im gesammelten Sammeln waltet Versammlung), 226 (braucht, schickt sich). One wonders if the conception of a “gathering point” does not give us a fresh way of understanding There-being as the “ultimate whereunto” (Woraufhin) of beings.
VA, pp. 215, 216 and passim (gehören).
VA, pp. 215 (liegt aus einem Legen, ὁμολογεῖν), 217–218, 221 (Geschick, das. Geschickliche, vollbringen).
“… Sagen und Reden wesen als das beisammen-vor-liegen-Lassen alles dessen, was, in der Unverborgenheit gelegen, anwest….” (VA, p. 212).
We translate Sagen as “utter” because Heidegger finds an affinity between Sagen and Zeigen (to show-forth, let-appear-in-the-Open, in the same sense that we are using λέγειν), and the word “utter” derives from the comparative of AS ut, meaning “out,” hence may be taken to mean “to give or bring out,” sc. into the Open. (See US, pp. 145, 200, 214, 252). Where it is necessary to distinguish, we use “Utterance” for Sage, and “uttering” or “to utter” for Sagen. Incidentally, we sense here the importance of the word Zeigen in describing the poet’s function (v.g. HD, pp. 138, 139).
VA, pp. 212, 228 (φωνή, σημαίνειν). Heidegger does not deny, of course, the correctness (richtige) of conceiving language as φωνὴ σημαντιϰή, or, for that matter, as expression (Aussage). He merely denies that such a conception is the ultimate explanation of its origin (Wesen). See VA, p. 229.
“… Das vom λέγειν her gedachte Nennen (ὄνομα) ist kein Ausdrücken einer Wortbedeutung, sondern ein vor-liegen-Lassen in dem Licht, worin etwas dadurch steht, daß es einen Namen hat.” (VA, p. 223). Note that when in 1957–58 Heidegger gives a lecture course on “The Essence of Language,” he meditates Stefan George’s line (from “Das Wort”): “Kein Ding sei wo das Wort gebricht,” but effectively he does no more than explicitate what is said here. See US, pp. 168–169, 170, 215.
“… jenes Verhältnis, auf dessen Grunde erst Anwesendes als ein solches um den Menschen und für ihn sich versammelt. Und nur weil der Mensch ist, sofern er zum Seienden als einem solchen, es entbergend und verbergend, sich verhält, kann der Mensch und muß er das ‘Wort’ haben, d.h. vom Sein des Seienden sagen. Die Wörter aber, die die Sprache gebraucht, sind nur die aus dem Wort herausgefallenen Abfälle, von denen aus der Mensch niemals zum Seienden zurück-und hinfindet, es sei denn auf dem Grunde des λέγειν….” (P, p. 272). Heidegger’s italics. Notice how the negativity of Being is here transposed into terms of language through the negativity of There-being (entbergend-verbergend).
There is no mention of Eigentlichkeit, but the repeated insistence on eigentliche Hören is thoroughly convincing. See VA, pp. 214–218.
VA, pp. 213–214, 216 (Hören-Horchen). Heidegger describes There-being’s attitude of complete docility to Λόγος by saying that we must be “all ears” (ganz Ohr) (VA, p. 214), a phrase not uncommon in colloquial English to suggest avid attentiveness to what is said. Its humorous connotation, however, leads us to avoid incorporating it into the text. It is typical Heidegger to be told that man doesn’t hear because he has ears to hear with, but he has these organs to hear with because he is structurally an attend-ant of Being (VA, p. 215).
“… das Wesen der Sprache aus dem Wesen des Seins, ja sogar als dieses selbst gedacht ….” (VA, p. 228).
“… Sein in das Wesen der Sprache bergen ….” (VA, p. 228).
The word “repose,” both as verb (beruht) and noun (Ruhe), suggests still another nuance for λέγειν, this time when used in the middle voice in the sense of “laying-oneself-down-to-rest,” sc. the tranquillity of complete (self) re-collection (VA, p. 208). The word will occur frequently in the later works and we must always understand it with these overtones. In the present case, thought reposes in Λόγος insofar as it is itself gathered-together into what it is by reason of aboriginal Λόγος.
VA, pp. 224 (er-eignet, vereignet), 226 (braucht). The fusion of ereignen and vereignen constitutes the phenomenon of Ereignis, as it will be explained later in ID (1957). It is important to note here simply how early the terminology crystallizes (1944). See ID, p. 28.
Vg. VA, pp. 215–217 (eigentlich), 214 (auf Anspruch, Zuspruch), 217 (Gehörthaben, Gesehenhaben, sich schicken).
VA, p. 221. It is impossible to suggest by a single word such as “com-mitment” all the nuances which Heidegger connotes with Geschick and geschicklich. If we understand Being as com-mitting There-being to the destiny of serving as Being’s There among beings, we must understand, too, that There-Being is given the equipment for such a task. We may speak of such equipment as an “endowment,” in the sense that we use the word to describe talent, etc. This is clearly one of the nuances of Geschick (v.g. VA, p. 217).
VA, pp. 221 (eigentlich Geschickliche), 218 (ereignet sich Geschickliches), 224 (nie das Geschick selbst), 221 (wie Ἕν-Πάντα west).
“… Nirgends finden wir eine Spur davon, daß die Griechen das Wesen der Sprache unmittelbar aus dem Wesen des Seins dachten.…” (VA, p. 228).
VA, pp. 229 (der Blitz verlosch jäh), 213 (aufspart).
VA, pp. 208 (Rätsel als Rätsel), 207 (im freien Überlegen am Leitband).
“… Dann hat sowohl das Wesende im λέγειν des ὁμολογεῖν, als auch das Wesende im λέγειν des Λόγος zugleich eine anfänglichere Herkunft in der einfachen Mitte zwischen beiden. Gibt es dahin für sterbliches Denken einen Weg?” (VA, p. 225).
VA, p. 227 (Unterschied als Unterschied).
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Richardson, W.J. (1963). Λόυοσ. In: Heidegger. Phaenomenologica. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-6188-8_24
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