DOCSLIB.ORG

The Masks of Heidegger: National Socialism and Anti-Semitism

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
The Masks of Heidegger: National Socialism and Anti-Semitism Bard College Bard Digital Commons Senior Projects Fall 2015 Bard Undergraduate Senior Projects Fall 2015 The Masks of Heidegger: National Socialism and Anti-Semitism Julia Lauren Haerr Bard College, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.bard.edu/senproj_f2015 Part of the Continental Philosophy Commons This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License. Recommended Citation Haerr, Julia Lauren, "The Masks of Heidegger: National Socialism and Anti-Semitism" (2015). Senior Projects Fall 2015. 36. https://digitalcommons.bard.edu/senproj_f2015/36 This Open Access work is protected by copyright and/or related rights. It has been provided to you by Bard College's Stevenson Library with permission from the rights-holder(s). You are free to use this work in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights- holder(s) directly, unless additional rights are indicated by a Creative Commons license in the record and/or on the work itself. For more information, please contact [email protected]. ! ! The Masks of Heidegger: National Socialism and Anti-Semitism Senior Project submitted to The Division of Social Studies of Bard College by Julia L. Haerr Annandale-on-Hudson, New York December 2015 Acknowledgements I would like to thank Professor Ruth Zisman for her excellent guidance throughout this project. Professor Daniel Berthold, for introducing me to Nietzsche’s Beyond Good and Evil. Professor Peter Skiff, for being a great advisor, telling me great stories, and helping me navigate my interests in the first few years of my time at Bard. Thank you to my parents for enabling me to come to such a great college and supporting me in difficult times. I love you. Thank you to my partner for loving and supporting me throughout this project, discussing ideas with me, and helping me with my writing. Finally, thank you to Thomas N. Delmer, for giving me the article that began this project and translating part of a needed book. ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! 289 In the writings of a hermit one always also hears something of the echo of the desolate regions, something of the whispered tones and the furtive look of solitude; in his strongest words, even in his cry, there still vibrates a new and dangerous kind of silence—of burying something in silence. When a man has been sitting alone with his soul in confidential discord and discourse, year in and year out, day and night; when in his cave—it may be a labyrinth or a gold mine—he has become a cave bear or a treasure digger or a treasure guard and dragon; then even his concepts eventually acquire a peculiar twilight color, an odor just as much of depth as of must, something incommunicable and recalcitrant that blows at every passerby like a chill. -- Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! Table of Contents INTRODUCTION……………………………………………………………………….1 PART I: Historicality and National Socialism in Being and Time ………………………7 PART II: World Jewry in Heidegger’s Schwarze Hefte ..………………………………26 PART III: Conclusion: Nietzsche’s Masks and Interpreting the Notebooks .......…...….46 BIBLIOGRAPHY………………………………………………………………………57 ! "! Introduction: In the beginning of a course on Heidegger’s Being and Time it was mentioned to us that Heidegger had been involved in National Socialism, but we were told to put this thought on hold and to try to read the book without reference to this fact. Throughout the course, however, the question of this relationship remained on my mind. In the library I read some of an old book curiously titled German Existentialism. In the introduction the author complained that Heidegger had insulted ‘high mother philosophy’ in his decision to join the Nazi party, and the following speeches were examples of this betrayal. The transcripts of the speeches made during his time as Rector of Frieberg for the party were disturbing and weighed on my mind as we worked our way through the immensity of Being and Time. I looked for evidence of problematic ideas that may have been related to Nazism but overall, could find nothing. Indeed the work seemed antithetical to Nazism in its descriptions of the everyday and the “They.” How could this philosopher have been a part of it? How could he have fallen in with the “They” and followed the loud, small man that was Hitler (In a conversation with Jaspers he seemed to remark that it had something to do with his beautiful hands)? One day back home after the course had ended I was having a conversation with my neighbor about Heidegger. He told me about an article he had read in Foreign Affairs about a new source that had been published, the Schwarze Hefte or Black Notebooks, in which there was evidence of anti-Semitism. Tom printed a copy for me, beginning my investigation into the controversy. Heidegger and his writing has been the subject of controversy ever since his involvement in National Socialism. He remained controversial for several reasons. Partly because he refused to apologize for or acknowledge the absurdity and tragedy of the deaths of millions of Jews and other minorities in concentration camps, in which, at least in the eyes of the “victors,” he was ! #! implicated. Partly because some, particularly in the French school, continued to maintain that his foray into National Socialism had been a personal mistake, and further that Nazism had not found its way into his philosophy. Still, others, most popularly Victor Farias, argued that National Socialism was central to his philosophy, which was itself inherently fascist. However, the controversy seemed to be coming alive again, but in new form, with the questions posed by the Black Notebooks. There were many articles, some expressing resignation that their highly regarded philosopher could have stooped so low as to make anti-Semitic remarks, and some for whom it was proof that we could finally be rid of him, the Jew-hating Nazi. A very small number still maintained that Heidegger’s work is important despite his National Socialist past. Peter Trawny, the editor of the Black Notebooks, raised the question of whether these “being-historical anti-Semitisms” had “contaminated” his philosophy in some way. Most certainly the reflections in the Black Notebooks prompt us to reexamine the Philosopher’s work in light of these new revelations. They compel us to ask: what role do these anti-Semitisms have in the Black Notebooks, and further, in his greater philosophy? Do they have any at all? Somewhere in the “Heidegger Controversy” someone remarked that Heidegger had even kept his anti-Semitism secret from the Nazis themselves. Why would he do this and what really is the nature of his relationship to the National Socialist Movement? The first part of this project investigates Being and Time, specifically the sections about the concept of “historicality.” I originally decided to look back to the work because I needed to build a better understanding of Heidegger’s concepts of history, which is a major subject in the Black Notebooks. However, when I read the passages this time I began to see the basis on which Heidegger’s affinity for the National Socialist Movement could have begun, which ultimately rests on his understanding of history. I also began to see possibilities upon which Heidegger ! $! could have characterized “World Jewry” as metaphysically different and more destructive than other peoples (having to do with “heritage” and the opposition between “authentic” and “inauthentic historicality”). As I continued to read and reread the sections on historicality while investigating the historical context in which the work was written, my interpretations developed and changed. It became more clear that Heidegger’s work was not a purely philosophical, ahistorical treatise, but very definitely situated within and responding to a specific time, a specific world. In my mind there is no doubt that Heidegger’s philosophy was responding to not only “philosophical” problems, such as the forgottenness of Being and the overcoming of metaphysics, but to historical situations that affected him in his time, such as living in a collapsing society after the First World War, the diagnosis of a European nihilism that was first and profoundly described by Kierkegaard and Nietzsche, and furthermore his own Situation, which he later located as a turning point in world-history. In this, Hegel’s notion that philosophy cannot be separated from the spirit of its era is reflected: “Philosophy is identical with the spirit of the era (Zeitgeist) in which it makes its appearance; it is not superior to its era but simply the consciousness of what is substantial in it, or, it is thinking knowledge of what belongs to that era… Nevertheless, philosophy does stand over and above its own era, which is to say… it has the same content but as a knowledge of it goes beyond.”1 Thus in this part of the project I argue against the traditional way of reading Being and Time as an ahistorical work, separable from Heidegger’s historical involvement in National Socialism, against the traditional notion of “prima philosophia” or “first philosophy,” which, as Richard Wolin writes is “an approach to knowledge that betrays a superioristic disdain for the “concrete” realms of history and society.”2 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! "!Quentin Lauer, Hegel’s Idea of Philosophy: With a New Translation of Hegel’s Introduction to the History of Philosophy, (New York: Fordham University Press, 1983).! #!Karl Löwith, “The Political Implications of Heidegger’s Existentialism,” in The Heidegger Controversy: A Critical Reader, ed. Richard Wolin (MIT Press Edition, 1993), 265.! ! %! To fully understand the implications of Being and Time it needs to be read in context with its historical situation.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Jean-Luc Nancy and the Deconstruction of Christianity By
    Jean-Luc Nancy and the Deconstruction of Christianity by Tenzan Eaghll A thesis submitted in conformity with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department for the Study of Religion University of Toronto ©Copyright by Tenzan Eaghll 2016 Jean-Luc Nancy and the Deconstruction of Christianity Tenzan Eaghll Doctor of Philosophy Department for the Study of Religion University of Toronto 2016 Abstract This dissertation is a study of the origins and development of the French philosopher Jean- Luc Nancy’s work on the “deconstruction of Christianity.” By situating Nancy's work in light of the broader Continental philosophical analysis of religion in the 20th Century, it argues that what Nancy calls the "deconstruction of Christianity" and the "exit from religion" is his unique intervention into the problem of metaphysical nihilism in Western thought. The author explains that Nancy’s work on religion does not provide a new “theory” for the study of religion or Christianity, but shows how Western metaphysical foundations are caught up in a process of decomposition that has been brought about by Christianity. For Nancy, the only way out of nihilism is to think of the world as an infinite opening unto itself, for this dis- encloses any transcendent principle of value or immanent notion of meaninglessness in the finite spacing of sense, and he finds the resources to think this opening within Christianity. By reading Christian notions like "God" and "creation ex nihilo" along deconstructive lines and connecting them with the rise and fall of this civilization that once called itself "Christendom," he attempts to expose "the sense of an absenting" that is both the condition of possibility for the West and what precedes, succeeds, and exceeds it.
    [Show full text]
  • Martin Heidegger, "Heraclitus, the Inception of Occidental Thinking and Logic: Heraclitus’S Doctrine of the Logos." Trans
    Document generated on 10/01/2021 11:38 a.m. Philosophy in Review Martin Heidegger, "Heraclitus, The Inception of Occidental Thinking and Logic: Heraclitus’s Doctrine of the Logos." Trans. Julia Goesser Assaiante & S. Montgomery Ewegen. Shawn Loht Volume 40, Number 1, February 2020 URI: https://id.erudit.org/iderudit/1068150ar DOI: https://doi.org/10.7202/1068150ar See table of contents Publisher(s) University of Victoria ISSN 1206-5269 (print) 1920-8936 (digital) Explore this journal Cite this review Loht, S. (2020). Review of [Martin Heidegger, "Heraclitus, The Inception of Occidental Thinking and Logic: Heraclitus’s Doctrine of the Logos." Trans. Julia Goesser Assaiante & S. Montgomery Ewegen.] Philosophy in Review, 40(1), 13–15. https://doi.org/10.7202/1068150ar Copyright, 2020 Shawn Loht This document is protected by copyright law. Use of the services of Érudit (including reproduction) is subject to its terms and conditions, which can be viewed online. https://apropos.erudit.org/en/users/policy-on-use/ This article is disseminated and preserved by Érudit. Érudit is a non-profit inter-university consortium of the Université de Montréal, Université Laval, and the Université du Québec à Montréal. Its mission is to promote and disseminate research. https://www.erudit.org/en/ Philosophy in Review Vol. 40 no. 1 (February 2020) Martin Heidegger. Heraclitus, The Inception of Occidental Thinking and Logic: Heraclitus’s Doctrine of the Logos. Trans. Julia Goesser Assaiante & S. Montgomery Ewegen. Bloomsbury 2018. 328 pp. $88.00 USD (Hardcover ISBN 9780826462404); $26.95 USD (Paperback ISBN 9780826462411). This text contains Heidegger’s most sustained engagement with Heraclitus and arguably his most thorough, focused study of early Greek thought.
    [Show full text]
  • The New Heidegger MIGUEL OE BEISTEGUI New York: Continuum, 2005; 224 Pages
    Book Reviews / Comptes rendus 655 Nietzsche in order to arrive at similar conclusions to those of Menga. What Menga does that Oerrida does not do as clearly is show the textual heritage, to borrow an expression from Oerrida himself, which permits Heidegger to read Nietzsche in the way that he does. In the end, this book is excellent and will provide scholars and philosophers both with the background and reading necessary in order to situate and understand the relationship between Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Oerrida. ANTONIO CALCAGNO, University ofScranton The New Heidegger MIGUEL OE BEISTEGUI New York: Continuum, 2005; 224 pages. Novelty is rarely the standard by which philosophers profess the contri­ bution of a philosophical text. For this reason, readers of Miguel de Beistegui's The New Heidegger are likely to be concerned not only with the extent to which de Beistegui's Heidegger is actually a newHeidegger, but also with the philosophical need that this new Heidegger is intended to serve. What calls out for a new Heidegger? For some, the old Heidegger is already one Heidegger too many. Oe Beistegui's aim is to introduce an English-reading audiencewith no prior knowledge of Heidegger to the ebb and flow of Heidegger's thought by offering a thematic approach that concentrates on several of his fundamental ideas rather than on specific texts or lectures. There is need for such an intro­ duction, de Beistegui believes, largely because existing commentaries have focused on Heidegger's canonical works, and have thus far failed to include adequately the newer volumes of Heidegger's Gesamtausgabe that have been published in English translation over the last decade or so.
    [Show full text]
  • The “Ontological Difference” Again. a Dialetheic Perspective on Heidegger's Mainstay
    Open Philosophy 2018; 1: 143–154 Francesco Gandellini* The “Ontological Difference” Again. A Dialetheic Perspective on Heidegger’s Mainstay https://doi.org/10.1515/opphil-2018-0011 Received June 9, 2018; accepted August 16, 2018 Abstract: This paper intends to offer a new assessment of the “Ontological Difference” (OD), one of Martin Heidegger’s mainstays, in the light of the metaphysical view called “dialetheism”. In the first paragraph I briefly summarize the main argument of Heidegger’s contradiction of Being, where OD is present as a premise. In the second paragraph I introduce dialetheism, indicate two kinds of dialetheic solutions to the paradox and explain why they face comeback troubles from OD. The third paragraph is devoted to a review of Heidegger’s uses of OD and underlines the crucial role of negation in it. In the fourth paragraph I investigate the philosopher’s account of negation and show similarities with the account provided by the paraconsistent logic called “Logic of Paradox”. The fifth paragraph puts forward two possible readings of OD, the first based on the classical notion of negation and the second on the notion of negation pointed out in the previous paragraph. The second reading is proved suitable for dialetheists and in accordance with the exegesis of some textual passages from Heidegger’s late works. Keywords: Martin Heidegger, ontological difference, dialetheism, Logic of Paradox 1 Introduction Analytic philosophy’s adjudication to set aside old hates and resentments and to establish contact with Martin Heidegger’s philosophy is quite a recent phenomenon in the philosophical literature1. Casati and Wheeler2 have shown examples of this productive engagement in the fields of metaphysics and philosophy of mind.
    [Show full text]
  • Hermeneutics of Heidegger's Facticity and Its Religious Aspects
    Studia Philosophiae Christianae UKSW 50(2014)1 POVILAS AleksandravičIUS HERMENEUTICS OF HEIDEGGer’s FACTICITY AND ITS RELIGIOUS ASPECTS Abstract. The concept of facticity that was developed by Heidegger from 1919 to 1923 composes the basis of all his further thought: the conceptions of Dasein and ontological temporality will originate namely from this concept. The article analyzes various expressions of the factitious life (care, Er-eignis, life, Self- Destruction, meaningfulness, death), yet the special consideration is paid to its religious aspects. Really the essence of facticity is treated by Heidegger as a temporality that is essentially correlated with the Christian experience. The influence of Saint Augustine to Heidegger and the Heideggerian concept of methodical atheism are analyzed and this analysis raises the intricate problem of the relation of the Black Forest philosopher to Christian faith and to God. Keywords: Heidegger, hermeneutics, facticity, religious, care, Er-eignis, life, temporality 1. The emergence of the concept of facticity in Heidegger’s work. 2. The account of facticity. 3. Facticity as movement: care. 4. Er-eignis and the formation of the living world. 5. Facticity as life 6. Factical life as self-destruction. 7. Meaningfulness of factical life or the hermeneutic dimension of facticity. 8. Facticity as temporality. 9. Factical life and death. 10. Christian facticity. 11. St. Augustine’s influence on hermeneutics of facticity and the issue of God. 12. Methodological atheism and the mystery of life’s facticity. Povilas Aleksandravicius Mykolas Romeris University, [email protected] Institute of Philosophy and Humanities Ateities g. 20, LT-08303 Vilnius, Lithuania 174 Povilas aleksandravičius [2] On 9 January, 1919, a 30-year old Martin Heidegger wrote a letter to his friend, the canon Engelbert Krebs, informing him of his withdrawal from the Catholic Church and indicating the main reason for his choice: a scholastic system, where the Church aimed to squeeze Christian be- liefs, had become “problematic and unacceptable”1 to him.
    [Show full text]
  • Assessing the Significance of Heidegger's Black
    Assessing the Significance of Heidegger’s Black Notebooks Jeff Malpas, Tasmania For much of his life, and certainly from the 1930s onwards, Martin Heidegger kept a series of black-bound notebooks into which he recorded ideas and observations. Known as the Black Notebooks , Schwarze Hefte , the material they contained was periodically edited by Heidegger, and he gave different titles to different volumes and sets of volumes. Of those so far published, the first three collected volumes are the Überlegungen , Considerations ,1 which run from 1931-1942 (though the first volume from 1931 is lost, destroyed by Heidegger himself), and the second are the Anmerkungen , Remarks , running from 1942- 1949. 2 Further volumes are to be published over the coming years (and the next volume is, in fact, already close to being ready for publication). The contents of the Notebooks are quite varied: they include philosophical ideas and commentary, but they also include personal observations and ruminations, and remarks on contemporary events. In contrast with public works from the same period, the Notebooks are relatively unrestrained, they contain many instances of dismissive irony or sarcasm, and, in the 1930s and early 1940s especially, they are frequently suffused with a degree of anger and even bitterness. The form of the Notebooks echoes that of Nietzsche’s Nachlass,3 and clearly Heidegger treated the Notebooks , not merely as a writing tool for his own personal use, but as literary works of a certain type and character, and as having a very particular role and position within the larger body of his work. They do not stand on their own however, and it would be a serious mistake to suppose that one could read the Notebooks in any serious fashion independently of the rest of Heidegger’s writings.
    [Show full text]
  • The Enigma of Art in the Thought of Martin Heidegger
    The Enigma of Art in the Thought of Martin Heidegger Russell Davies Goldsmiths College, University of London Thesis submitted for the degree of: Doctor of Philosophy July 2011 Declaration I declare that the work presented in this thesis is my own. Russell Davies Date 2 Abstract In crucial places in his path of thought, Martin Heidegger appeals to the notion of an insoluble enigma as a way of elucidating that thought, to such an extent that the enigma goes to the very heart of that thinking. All the words that are central to that thinking, the words that Heidegger uses to point towards the possibility of appearance and disclosure, are marked by this figure of the insoluble enigma. Whether writing about the opening of a world that art is, or the happening that is figured as Ereignis , Heidegger resorts to the enigma to illuminate his thinking. But what does it mean to inscribe an enigmatic insolubility into one’s very thinking and what kind of explanatory power can such a figure have? To answer these questions, this thesis traces the thought of the enigma through a series of readings of Heidegger’s ‘The Origin of the Work of Art’, his 1942 lectures on Hölderlin’s ‘The Ister’ and Sophocles’s Antigone , and his writings on the poem of Parmenides. Beginning with a consideration of the enigma of art, it moves on to the enigmatic activity of the river in Hölderlin’s poem and how this gives rise to the enigma of the here and now, before moving on to the enigma of the uncanny in Antigone and the law of becoming homely in being unhomely; the place of the law itself becomes critical here.
    [Show full text]
  • And Arendt,” Symposium: Canadian Journal of Continental Philosophy 24:2 (2020): 5–29, Available in Final Form At
    This is the accepted manuscript version of the following article: Jussi Backman, “Modernity in Antiquity: Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy in Heidegger and Arendt,” Symposium: Canadian Journal of Continental Philosophy 24:2 (2020): 5–29, available in final form at https://doi.org/10.5840/symposium202024210. Modernity in Antiquity: Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy in Heidegger and Arendt Jussi Backman (University of Jyväskylä) This article looks at the role of Hellenistic thought in the historical narratives of Martin Heidegger and Hannah Arendt. To a certain extent, both see—with G. W. F. Hegel, J. G. Droysen, and Eduard Zeller—Hellenistic and Roman philosophy as a “modernity in antiquity,” but with important differences. Heidegger is generally dismissive of Hellenistic thought and comes to see it as a decisive historical turning point at which a protomodern element of subjective willing and domination is injected into the classical heritage of Plato and Aristotle. Arendt, likewise, credits Stoic philosophy with the discovery of the will as an active faculty constituting a realm of subjective freedom and autonomy. While she considers Hellenistic philosophy as essentially apolitical and world-alienated—in contrast to the inherently political and practical Roman culture—it nonetheless holds for her an important but unexploited ethical and political potential. L’article examine le rôle de la pensée hellénistique dans les récits historiques de Martin Heidegger et Hannah Arendt. Dans une certaine mesure, tous les deux voient, avec G. W. F. Hegel, J. G. Droysen et Eduard Zeller, la philosophie hellénistique et romaine comme une « modernité dans l’antiquité », mais avec des différences importantes. Généralement, Heidegger dédaigne la philosophie hellénistique et finit par la considérer comme un tournant historique décisif qui introduit un élément protomoderne de volonté et de domination subjective dans l’héritage de Platon et Aristote.
    [Show full text]
  • The Experience of Nature in Heidegger
    OPO 6 Conference Memphis, TN January 4, 2019 The Experience of Nature in Heidegger Yuto KANNARI1 In phenomenology, “Nature (Natur)” has a highly complex character, which has been extensively discussed in the literature. In Husserl, three types of nature can be identified: 1) the nature as physical, causal, mechanical nature in the naturalistic attitude: 2) the living nature as the natural basis of the spiritual Ego: and 3) the primal nature, which should have been given before any sedimentation of spiritual products.2 Nature appears as what is constituted, what constitutes and the premise of what constitutes. The circumstances are similar for Heidegger. While nature appears in the context of criticizing the traditional concept of the world in Being and Time (BT), it appears as ready-to-hand (Zuhandenes) and present-at-hand (Vorhandenes) in everyday life. Furthermore, after BT, apart from nature as individual entities, nature is the presupposition of the factical existence of Dasein. On the other hand, nature is connected with the truth (ἀ-λήθεια), the happening (Ereignis), and the fourfold (Geviert), which are the keywords in middle and late Heidegger. What is nature? How can we describe the experience of nature? The whole picture of the concept of nature has not been disclosed. In this article, by following the development of the concept of nature in Heidegger, we clarify indices that distinguish nature, and what is the experience of nature that is the presupposition of experience. This article proceeds as follows. First, we will organize the multiple meanings of nature that are ambiguously used in BT through criticizing several previous studies (Section 1).
    [Show full text]
  • Missed Appropriations: Uncovering Heidegger's Debt to Kierkegaard in Being and Time
    University of Denver Digital Commons @ DU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Graduate Studies 1-1-2016 Missed Appropriations: Uncovering Heidegger's Debt to Kierkegaard in Being and Time Kenneth David Geter University of Denver Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.du.edu/etd Part of the Continental Philosophy Commons, and the Metaphysics Commons Recommended Citation Geter, Kenneth David, "Missed Appropriations: Uncovering Heidegger's Debt to Kierkegaard in Being and Time" (2016). Electronic Theses and Dissertations. 1195. https://digitalcommons.du.edu/etd/1195 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate Studies at Digital Commons @ DU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons @ DU. For more information, please contact [email protected],[email protected]. MISSED APPROPRIATIONS: UNCOVERING HEIDEGGER’S DEBT TO KIERKEGAARD IN BEING AND TIME A Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of the University of Denver and the Iliff School of Theology Joint PhD Program University of Denver In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy by Kenneth D. Geter August 2016 Advisor: Jere O’Neill Surber ©Copyright by Kenneth D. Geter 2016 All Rights Reserved Author: Kenneth D. Geter Title: MISSED APPROPRIATIONS: UNCOVERING HEIDEGGER’S DEBT TO KIERKEGAARD IN BEING AND TIME Advisor: Jere O’Neill Surber Degree Date: August 2016 Abstract It is widely held that Martin Heidegger appropriated several existential concepts from Søren Kierkegaard in his 1927 work, Being and Time. Most scholars agree that Heidegger did not sufficiently credit Kierkegaard. What was the extent of the appropriation, and why did Heidegger not duly cite Kierkegaard? This work will focus on the concept of anxiety which appears throughout Being and Time and which was influenced by the concept of the same name presented in Kierkegaard’s 1844 work The Concept of Anxiety.
    [Show full text]
  • Heidegger on Plato, Truth, and Unconcealment: the 1931–32 Lecture on the Essence of Truth
    Inquiry, 47, 443–463 Heidegger on Plato, Truth, and Unconcealment: The 1931–32 Lecture on The Essence of Truth Mark Wrathall Brigham Young University This paper discusses Heidegger’s 1931–32 lecture course on The Essence of Truth.It argues that Heidegger read Platonic ideas, not only as stage-setting for the western philosophical tradition’s privileging of conceptualization over practice, and its correlative treatment of truth as correctness, but also as an early attempt to work through truth as the fundamental experience of unhiddenness. Wrathall shows how several of Heidegger’s more-famous claims about truth, e.g. that propositional truth is grounded in truth as world-disclosure, and including Heidegger’s critique of the self-evidence of truth as correspondence, are first revealed in a powerful (if iconoclastic) reading of Plato. In the 1920s and 1930s, Heidegger repeatedly offered lectures and seminars largely devoted to the topic of truth. His evolving thoughts on the nature and philosophical significance of truth, however, made their way into relatively few publications, and when they were published, they tended to come in an incredibly condensed and enigmatic form. The main published works from this period include }44 of Sein und Zeit (1927), and essays like ‘Vom Wesen des Grundes’ (1929), ‘Vom Wesen des Wahrheit’ (1930), and ‘Platons Lehre von der Wahrheit’ (1942).1 With the publication of Heidegger’s notes from his lecture courses, it is now becoming possible to connect the dots and flesh out Heidegger’s published account of truth.2 These lecture courses are not just of historiographical interest, however.
    [Show full text]
  • Martin Heidegger on Aletheia (Truth) As Unconcealment
    Martin Heidegger on Aletheia (Truth) as Unconcealment https://www.ontology.co/heidegger-aletheia.htm Theory and History of Ontology by Raul Corazzon | e-mail: [email protected] Martin Heidegger on Aletheia (Truth) as Unconcealment PRELIMINARY NOTE In its initial form this section will offer five pages on Martin Heidegger (the first two are contributions to the History of Truth): 1) Heidegger's contributions to the interpretation of the Greek word for Truth (Aletheia) as Unconcealment and to the history of his translation in Latin as Veritas; 2) An annotated bibliography of Heidegger's texts on Aletheia and a selection of critical studies; 3) Heidegger's contributions to the interpretation of the History of Metaphysics as Ontotheology; 4) An annotated bibliography of Heidegger's texts on the History of Metaphysics as Ontotheology and a selection of critical studies; 5) A complete list of Heidegger's German works published in the Gesamtausgabe (Collected Works Edition). INTRODUCTION "We come now to a decisive point in Heidegger's development. The effort to ground metaphysics (fundamental ontology) began as a search to illuminate the intrinsic correlation between the Being-process as such and the finitude of the being that comprehends it, sc. There-being. The first step (Sein und Zeit) was to analyse There-being phenomenologically in order to find in the pre-ontic comprehension of Being some means of discerning the sense of Being. Subsequently the author has become more and more preoccupied with Being itself, but chiefly in terms of the problem of truth, since the sense of Being is its truth. The growing importance of the problematic of truth is discernible in all of the works that followed SZ and culminates now in the essay "On the Essence of Truth," where Heidegger thematizes the problem, retaining as intrinsic to it the 1 di 10 05/01/2019, 18:26 Martin Heidegger on Aletheia (Truth) as Unconcealment https://www.ontology.co/heidegger-aletheia.htm problem of finitude, sc.
    [Show full text]