Dean Komel

The underlying premise of this essay is that the essential contribution of the hermeneutic turn in contemporary philosophy is the acknowledgment of a historical criterion of thinking, whereby the philosophical tradition is claimed by the question of its own truth. Philosophy, historically established by founding experience in truth, thus finds itself facing the open experience of truth, i.e. the truth as the coming about of the openness. Philosophical hermeneutics, as differing from hermeneutic philosophy, cannot limit itself solely to interpretative criticism. Rather, it must follow the opening of truth primarily happening in transit from thinking to language. And the moment of this transit is the question of ourselves.

The purpose of the article is to present the outlines of the reception and the influence of Heidegger’s philosophy on the territory of former Yugoslavia. This reception and influence were in their essence co-conditioned by specific political, social and cultural circumstances in the region, which were throughout accompanied by “the syndrome of dehumanization”. The confrontation with Heidegger’s philosophy is therefore co-defined by the profoundly experienced crisis of European humanity. During both world wars the attempt of an overcoming of this crisis of humanity by the means of phenomenological and existentialist philosophy was the main focus of attention. The period after the Second World War is denoted by the linking of Marxism with Heidegger’s attempt to surpass philosophy as metaphysics through the perspective of the history of being; in this context we specifically discuss the Praxis philosophical school and the original philosophical thought of Vanja Sutlić. During the disintegration of Yugoslavia and in the period thereafter, besides the intensive appropriation of Heidegger’s thought through translations and interpretations, which also led to the thorough study of Slavic philosophical terminologies, post-Heideggerian ways of thinking came to the fore, together with the possibility for a new humanization within the wider European and global social framework.

When discussing philosophical hermeneutics, the word »philosophical« is not just an ordinary attribute. Above all, it denotes the very activity of philosophy itself, which in itself discloses the hermeneutic question of the possibility of truth. The development of the 20th century philosophical hermeneutics thus depends on the philosophy’s historical facing the question of the possibility of its immanent truth. This »historical« dimension is not something extrinsic to philosophy, but rather an intrinsic quality of the possibility of philosophical thinking itself, which implies the basic presupposition of philosophical hermeneutics we’re here trying to indicate and develop. We therefore accept in advance the historical criterion of philosophical thinking.

The underlying premise of this essay is that the essential contribution of the hermeneutic turn in contemporary philosophy is the acknowledgment of a historical criterion of thinking, whereby the philosophical tradition is claimed by the question of its own truth. Philosophy, historically established by founding experience in truth, thus finds itself facing the open experience of truth, i.e. the truth as the coming about of the openness. Philosophical hermeneutics, as differing from hermeneutic philosophy, cannot limit itself solely to interpretative criticism. Rather, it must follow the opening of truth primarily happening in transit from thinking to language. And the moment of this transit is the question of ourselves.

Kada se raspravlja o filozofskoj hermeneutici, riječ »filozofska« nije tek običan atribut. Prije svega, ona označava zbiljsku djelatnost filozofije same, koja u sebi razotkriva hermeneutičko pitanje o mogućnosti istine. Razvoj filozofske hermeneutike u 20. st. ovisi dakle o povijesnom suočavanju filozofije s pitanjem o mogućnosti njene imanentne istine. Ova »povijesna« dimenzija nije nešto izvanjsko filozofiji, već njena unutarnja sposobnost mogućnosti samog filozofskog mišljenja koje implicira temeljnu pretpostavku filozofske hermeneutike na koju ovdje pokušavamo ukazati i razraditi. Stoga unaprijed prihvaćamo povijesni kriterij filozofskog mišljenja.When discussing philosophical hermeneutics, the word »philosophical« is not just an ordinary attribute. Above all, it denotes the very activity of philosophy itself, which in itself discloses the hermeneutic question of the possibility of truth. The development of the 20th century philosophical hermeneutics thus depends on the philosophy’s historical facing the question of the possibility of its immanent truth. This »historical« dimension is not something extrinsic to philosophy, but rather an intrinsic quality of the possibility of philosophical thinking itself, which implies the basic presupposition of philosophical hermeneutics we’re here trying to indicate and develop. We therefore accept in advance the historical criterion of philosophical thinking

It seems that everything in hermeneutics begins with the question and that the very phenomenon of hermeneutics is regarded by contemporary philosophy more as a question than as a concept. It is for this very reason that it seems necessary to start a hermeneutic discussion on the possibility of philosophy as principally critical thinking, which does not only attempt to rehabilitate its previous greatness. Philosophical hermeneutics cannot accept the role of merely providing an alternative answer to the question of the possibility of philosophy, nor should it seek and find the answer in what philosophy used to be. Philosophical hermeneutics cannot impose itself neither as a new nor as a different response to philosophy. Rather, it must first and foremost respond to its question, and through this only, following Schleiermacher, hermeneutics is an ability of understanding the language of the other. And of course, we have to ask ourselves straight away, where, on which spot, from which side should philosophical hermeneutics approach this issue?

The purpose of this article is to consider interculturalism as a sort of pseudonym: it does not only deal with culture, but also with its subtracted truth. For this reason, an intercultural theory that simply criticizes Eurocentrism and western hegemony countering them with the prospects of diversity totally misses the target: change should occur originating from inside the same thought that has originated Eurocentrism. Here interculturalism differs from multiculturalism which defends diversity without seeking a common ground, identifiable, according to the Author, with the intermediate state of being in the world

Taken philosophically, Europeanness is the origin of intercultural encountering and understanding rather than some sort of substantial basis of common cultures. This of course doesn’t imply the negation of historical foundations of common European existence, which were the key determinations -- be they good or bad -- of its geography. However, these determinations remain obscure unless the horizon and the ground are constituted from the midst as the intercultural midst of the world. Intercultural evidence of culture reveals itself from within the midst of the world as the ground and horizon of mutual encountering

The question of the contemporaneity of Europe appears in the context of dialogue on the common European future, which, on the one hand is an achievement of the encounter of diverse cultural languages and, on the other, dictated through reflection on what is reestablishing the Europe of today as a world’s. Views on “opening the future” and “enabling development” cannot be mutually harmonized, since there is a lack of experience of contemporaneity in the jointing of horizons. From this experience also comes the common interest in European dialogue. The diversity of European languages does not prove to be an obstacle to reestablishing this dialogue, but its vital condition. It is, namely, the historically mediated possibility that brings the essential difference into the uniform process of the expansion of power without difference

Eden od osnovnih vzgibov razvitja filozofije v 20.stoletju je bil nedvomno poskus hermenevtične utemeljitve Geisteswissenschaften pri Wilhelmu Diltheyu, ki se je pri Heideggru zaokrenil v smer hermenevtičnega zasnovanja filozofije same in naposled doprinesel k uvidu, da znotraj filozofije ni več kaj začenjati, ter da je pristni kraj mišljenja treba določiti onkraj filozofije. Vendar pa se mišljenje, ki stopa čez filozofijjo v hkratnem sestopanju pod njo, nahaja na poti vmes, v neki vmesnosti, ki zase terja svoje razumevanje. Tako razumevanje predvsem zaznamuje »ukvarjanje s hermenevtiko«, ki se je v prejšnjem stoletju vsekakor pomenljivo preobrazila v filozofsko hermenevtiko. Kaj zaobsega ta oznaka izvemo šele, ko sežemo do tistega, kar naj bi bilo v njemu dosegu: sodobnost kot godišče filozofske hermenevtike.One of the basic incentives of the development of philosophy in the 20th century was undoubtedly the attempt at hermeneutic grounding of Geisteswissenschaften in Wilhelm Dilthey, which, in Heidegger, took the course of hermeneutic formation of philosophy itself and eventually led to the insight that there is nothing to begin with within philosophy and that the genuine place of thinking should be determined from without philosophy. However, thinking which transcends philosophy and descends under it at the same time finds itself on the way in between, in a certain midst, which calls for an understanding proper only to itself. Such understanding primarily determines “dealing with hermeneutics”, which in the previous century tellingly transformed into philosophical hermeneutics. What this designation actually embraces can only be realized after we have reached that which was in its grasp: contemporaneity as the going-on of philosophical hermeneutics.

To speak about works of art or the essential relevance of art for philosophy today is far from being an easy task, if at all possible. What needs to be called into question is this very possibility in its possibility – in both art and philosophy. The pretentiousness of the question is not related only to the fact that contemporary aesthetics and theory of art are fundamentally involved in distancing themselves from the inherited philosophical notions on art. Sooner or later, the appropriateness and scope of such restrictions turn out disputable. The weight of the question lies in the very manner of the process of artistic creation and the presence of artworks

Filozofija v zadnjih štiridesetih, petdesetih letih, nekako odkar je Heidegger odposlal svoje Pismo o humanizmu, razvija posebno »praktično teorijo«. Motrenja, ki izhajajo iz filozofske kulture, se prav zavoljo tega izhodišča skorajda nujno znajdejo v »filozofiji kulture«, ne da bi bil podan smoter. Nujnost take premestitve iz »prve« v »drugo« filozofijo prihaja namreč iz same nuje motriteljskega duha , ki je nekdaj vzniknil v kulturi filozofije, tej skrbi za dušo, in je brezdušno poniknil v nekem stanju, ki je filozofijo tako rekoč primoralo, da se prične ukvarjati s kulturo, z njenimi drobci, raztrganinami, zavržki, z nedoločnostjo, ki je postala splošna in pomeni veliko več kot pa le »nelagodje v kulturi«. Kajti, če kaj, potem danes ni več jasno to, kako kultura definira položaj človeka.In the last forty or fifty years, from the moment Heidegger sent his Letter on Humanism, philosophy has developed a special “practical theory”. Exactly due to these starting points, reflections stemming from philosophical culture almost necessarily find themselves in the “philosophy of culture”, without a given purpose. The necessity of such a transposition from the “first” into the “second” philosophy comes from the very need of the speculative mind , which at a certain point in time appeared in the culture of philosophy, this care for the soul, and soullessly died away in a certain condition which forced philosophy to tackle the culture, its fragments, raggedness, trash, indefiniteness, which has become a general phenomenon and means so much more than just a “discomfort in culture”. For if anything, it is no longer clear today as to in what way does the culture define the human condition

Phenomenology became established as a wide philosophical movement in the 20th century, without ever becoming unified as a direction in contemporary philosophy. The article attempts to rethink the central motivation of phenomenological thinking, which is expressed as an appeal »to matters themselves«. The main focus in this is devoted to an ear for the utterance of matters themselves, which directs us to the phenomenon of speech that allows us to talk of phenomena. Herder’s reflection on the origin of language provides possible guidance in this connection, insofar as it adopts the articulation of phenomena.

Undoubtedly, a great accomplishment of Husserl’s phenomenological philosophy lies in the fact that he was the first thinker who, by meditating on intersubjectivity, formulated the philosophical possibility through the thinking of culture in terms of intercultural encounters, and that, in this sense, he may have been one step further even from Heidegger, even though he was justifiably reproached by his student that he didn’t venture to overstep the ground of philosophical subjectivist tradition. However, Heidegger was well aware that Husserl’s concept of subjectivity is considerably different from that of the modern age. The argument speaking in favour of this is the possibility of discussing interculturality, which for modern philosophy proves unattainable in so far as it subjects the sphere of culture to the unifying form of subjectivity, without being able to consider it in terms of the constitution of the being-in-the-world– this, for example, being true for all Neo-Kantian theory of culture. By unfolding the universal horizon of the world, Husserl was, within certain limits, capable of giving thought to the relationship between the home world and foreign world as well as the possibility of mutual encounters of various cultural worlds. It is on this basis that we are trying to develop the hermeneutics of interculturality which concentrates primarily on the intermediate space of intercultural encounters and understanding