Tom Sheehan

The Beiträge zur Philosophie mandates a paradigm shift in Heidegger scholarship. In the face of (1) widespread disarray in the current model, the new paradigm (2) abandons Sein as a name for die Sache selbst, (3) understands Welt/Lichtung/Da as that which gives being, (4) interprets Dasein as apriori openedness rather than as being-there, (5) understands the Kehre as the interface of Geworfenheit and Entwurf, not as a shift in Heidegger's thinking, (6) interprets Ereignis as the opening of the Da rather than as appropriation, and (7) understands human finitude as what gives all forms of being and all epochs in the history of being. The conclusion alludes to the function of Mitdasein (co-openness) as die Sache selbst.

What follows is an English reading of the first edition of Martin Heidegger's inaugural lecture at Freiburg University,“Was ist Metaphysik?” delivered on Wednesday, July 24, 1929. The German text was first published in December of 1929, some five months after it was delivered, by Friedrich Cohen Verlag in Bonn, to whose heirs gratitude is expressed for the requisite arrangements. The original German publication of 1929 differs in a number of relatively minor ways from later editions -- for example, changes in wording, additions of certain phrases (and at one place two sentences), paragraphization, and the like – without any basic alteration of sense. Some of those changes are listed in an appendix at the end.

The premise is that Heidegger remained a phenomenologist from beginning to end and that phenomenology is exclusively about meaning and its source. The essay presents Heidegger’s interpretation of the being (Sein) of things as their meaningful presence (Anwesen) and his tracing of such meaningful presence back to its source in the clearing, which is thrown-open or appropriated ex-sistence (das ereignete/geworfene Da-sein). The essay argues five theses: (1) Being is the meaningful presence of things to man. (2) Such meaningful presence is the Befragtes of Heidegger’s question, not the Erfragtes. (3) Being and Time’s goal was to articulate the openness that allows for all meaningfulness. (4) Ereignis—the appropriation of ex-sistence to sustaining the clearing—is the later Heidegger’s reinscription of thrown-openness, der geworfene Entwurf. (5) Appropriated thrown-openness, as the clearing, is intrinsically hidden, i.e., unknowable.Some preliminariesI cite Heidegger’s texts by page and line (the line-number follows the period) in both the Gesamtausgabe and the current English translations where available, all of which are listed in the bibliography at the end of this issue of the journal. I cite Sein und Zeit in the Niemeyer 11th edition and in the ET by Macquarrie-Robinson.Sinn and Bedeutung are closely related, although Sinn is broader than Bedeutung. Sinn refers either to intelligibility as such or to the fact of something being intelligible, whereas Bedeutung is the specific meaning that a thing has. Sinn as intelligibility is generally interchangeable with Bedeutsamkeit and Verständlichkeit. Thus I translate Sinn as “intelligibility” or “meaningfulness.” Sinn in turn allows for Bedeutung as the particular meaning of a specific thing.I take “intellect” in the broad sense of νοῦς and in the specific sense of λόγος understood as discursive intellect, whether practical or theoretical.Dasein, Existenz, and Da-sein are all translated as "ex-sistence." The context indicates whether that is meant in an existentiel or an existential sense. The word “man” refers to human being, not the male of the species. I render das Seiende as “beings,” “things,” and “entities” ex aequo. All German words referring to ἀλήϑεια (e.g., Wahrheit, Erschlossenheit, Unverborgenheit, Entborgenheit, etc.) are translated by “disclosedness” or “openness.” Translations from the German are often my own.

The essay shows how Heidegger's understanding of physis in Aristotle lays the foundation for his understanding of Ereignis. The essay draws on Heidegger's lecture courses, published and unpublished, particularly "On the Being and Conception of Physis." After introductory remarks on how Heidegger reads Aristotle "phenomenologically" in general, the essay focuses on how Heidegger reads physis as a mode of Being (ousia) by reading kinesis as a mode of Being, specifically as energeia ateles (incomplete Being). But energeia ateles is characterized by Heidegger as Wiederholung (retrieve of possibility) and as Eignung (appropriation of dynamis for appearance). On the basis of that crucial reading of physis, the essay goes on to show how physis-as-dynamis is the foundation for Ereignis in Sein und Zeit through the radical transformation of Wiederholung in natural beings into resolve in Dasein.

Two problems continue to haunt Heideggerian scholarship and to pose needless obstacles to those who seek to enter his thought. One is the almost ritualistic repetition of the master’s terminology—especially at its most manneristic—on the part of his disciples. Another is the tendency, which is found in Heidegger as well as in his disciples, to hypostasize “being” into an autonomous “other” that seems to function on its own apart from entities and from man. Both of these problems gather around Heidegger’s key word Ereignis and therefore around his interpretation of the history of philosophy, and they obscure a clear insight into what he was trying to say.

This bibliography presents information on the English translations of Heidegger’s Gesamtausgabe as they are known to me as of September 2014. Sometimes, but not always, earlier or alternate translations are also given.Texts already published between 1910 and 1976GA 1: Frühe Schriften, ed. Friedrich-Wilhelm von Herrmann, 1978; first edition 1972; texts from 1912-16.GA 1: 1–15, “Das Realitätsproblem in der modernen Philosophie ” = “The Problem of Reality in Modern Philosophy,” trans. Philip J. Bossert, revised Aaron Bunch, Becoming Heidegger: On the Trail of His Early Occasional Writings, 1910–1927, ed. Theodore Kisiel and Thomas Sheehan, Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 2007, 20–9.[Earlier, “The Problem of Reality in Modern Philosophy ,” trans. Philip J. Bossert and John van Buren, Supplements: From the Earliest Essays to Being and Time and Beyond, ed. John van Buren, Albany: State University of New York Press, 2002, 39–48.]GA 1: 17–43, “Neuere Forschungen über Logik ..

Martin Heidegger's 1925–26 lectures on truth and time provided much of the basis for his momentous work, Being and Time. Not published until 1976 as volume 21 of the Complete Works, three months before Heidegger's death, this work is central to Heidegger's overall project of reinterpreting Western thought in terms of time and truth. The text shows the degree to which Aristotle underlies Heidegger's hermeneutical theory of meaning. It also contains Heidegger’s first published critique of Husserl and takes major steps toward establishing the temporal bases of logic and truth. Thomas Sheehan's elegant and insightful translation offers English-speaking readers access to this fundamental text for the first time

Martin Heidegger's 1925–26 lectures on truth and time provided much of the basis for his momentous work, Being and Time. Not published until 1976 as volume 21 of the Complete Works, three months before Heidegger's death, this work is central to Heidegger's overall project of reinterpreting Western thought in terms of time and truth. The text shows the degree to which Aristotle underlies Heidegger's hermeneutical theory of meaning. It also contains Heidegger’s first published critique of Husserl and takes major steps toward establishing the temporal bases of logic and truth. Thomas Sheehan's elegant and insightful translation offers English-speaking readers access to this fundamental text for the first time.