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    Crockett - Review of Heidegger’s Contributions to Philosophy - JCRT 2.3

    On God and Being: A Review of Martin Heidegger’s Contributions to Philosophy

    Review of Martin Heidegger, Contributions to Philosophy (From Enowning), translated by Parvis Emad and Kenneth Maly (Indiana University Press, 1999).

    Clayton Crockett
    Wesley College

    Originally written between 1936 and 1938, first published in German in 1989, and finally translated into English in 1999, Heidegger’s Beitr’ge zur Philosophie is one of the most original works of twentieth-century philosophy. The translators claim that “Heidegger’s second major work” after Being and Time (1927) not only foreshadows the development of his later thinking, but “unlike Being and Time, it is the first treatise whose maturation and unfolding are not reflected in any of the lecture courses of the years 1919 to 1937.” Rather, “the singular importance of Contributions to Philosophy (From Enowning) consists in its being Heidegger’s first fundamental work in which ‘being-historical thinking’ is enacted” (xv). A careful reading and understanding of this constructive work in the context of Heidegger’s thought addresses two significant issues in contemporary Continental thought and theology. I will briefly detail the first problematic, that of Heidegger’s turn from his early to later philosophy, prior to laying out the general structure and content of the book. Finally, I will suggest the significance of the Beitr’ge for contemporary discussions of the interrelationship of God and being based on the critical interpretations of Jean-Luc Marion and Jacques Derrida.

    Hasn’t Heidegger written what he says he would have liked to write, a theology without the word being? But didn’t he also write what he says should not be written, namely a theology that is open, dominated, and invaded by the word being? [1]

    But the last god, is that not debasing god, nay the greatest blasphemy? But what if the last god has to be so named because in the end the decision about gods brings under and among gods and thus makes what is own most to the uniqueness of the divine being most prominent? (286).

    What if that domain of decision as a whole, flight or arrival of gods, were itself the end? What if, beyond that, be-ing in its truth would have to be grasped for the first time as enownment, as that which enowns what we call refusal? (285).

    Notes

    Clayton Crockett is the author of A Theology of the Sublime, and editor of Secular Theology: American Radical Theological Thought, as well as Managing Editor of the Journal for Cultural and Religious Theory. He teaches religion and philosophy at Wesley College in Dover, Delaware.

    ’ 2001 Clayton Crockett. All rights reserved.
    Updated 07/28/21.
    http://jcrt.org/archives/02.3/crockett/

    1. Leap’“The leap into be-ing” (7). The leap is the transition from the first beginning to the other beginning. The leap away from the first beginning (metaphysics) initially takes the form of an “abground,” or an abyss, as the solid ground of the first beginning disappears under one’s feet, prompting intense disorientation. The goal of the leap, however, is the other beginning, which is a grounding of the truth of being. ↩︎

    2. Echo’“The echo of be-ing as not-granting” (7). The echo refers to the call of being, which is subtle and difficult to perceive, primarily because being occurs as refusal or not-granting. Being refuses human attempts at manipulation. Human science and technology goes hand in hand with classical metaphysics, and its goal is the manipulation of beings in order to capture being itself. Paradoxically, however, the more beings are manipulated in a calculative technological grasping, the more being recedes, or refuses to show itself to human efforts. ↩︎

    3. Playing-forth’“The playing-forth is initially the playing forth of the first beginning, so that the first beginning brings the other beginning into play '”(7). The thinker who discerns the echo of being also hears the playing forth of the other or second beginning as a minor key underneath the predominant or major key of the first beginning. The tension of the playing-forth accumulates, gathering strength in preparation for the leap. ↩︎

    4. Grounding’“The grounding of truth as the truth of be-ing [is] (Da-sein)” (7). Here is the central section of the Beitr’ge, because we see that the turning is from the first beginning to the other beginning, and the grounding of the truth of being in the other beginning is accomplished in Dasein. Even in Being and Time, Heidegger was never primarily interested in human being as such, but only insofar as it provided as opening towards being itself. This is the mistake Sartre and other French existentialists make when they read Heidegger as a humanist. On the other hand, the turn away from Dasein is neither as radical nor as thorough as readers of the later Heidegger assume, because Dasein grounds the truth of being. The grounding of the other beginning is Dasein, which is the essence, or sway (wesen) of truth. The structure of truth is an essential swaying, or a projecting-open of being. “But since truth must be grounded in Da-sein, the essential swaying of be-ing can only be achieved in the steadfastness which the t/here [Da] sustains in the knowing awareness that is so determined” (202). ↩︎