5 Hiddenness, Ereignis and the Turn
Hiddenness. Heidegger claims that disclosure-as-such – the very opening up of significance in Dasein’s being – is intrinsically hidden and needs to remain so if entities are to be properly disclosed in their being. This intrinsic concealment of disclosure-as- such is called the ‘mystery’. Since Heidegger sometimes calls disclosure-as-such ‘being itself’, the phrase becomes ‘the mystery of being’. The ensuing claim, that the mystery of being conceals itself while revealing entities, has led to much mystification, not least among Heideggerians. Being seems to become a higher but hidden Entity that performs strange acts that only the initiated can comprehend. This misconstrual of Heidegger’s intentions is not helpful.
How may we understand the intrinsic concealment of disclosure-as-such? One way is to understand the paradigm of ‘movement’ that informs Heidegger’s discussion of revealing and concealing. Taken in the broad philosophical sense, movement is defined not as mere change of place and the like, but as the very being of entities that are undergoing the process of change. This kind of being consists in anticipating something absent, with the result that what is absent-but-anticipated determines the entity’s present being. Anticipation is the being of such entities, and anticipation is determined from the absent-but-anticipated goal. For example, the acorn’s being is its becoming an oak tree; and correspondingly the future oak tree, as the goal of the acorn’s trajectory, determines the acorn’s present being. Likewise, Margaret is a graduate student in so far as she is in movement towards her Ph.D. The still-absent degree qua anticipated determines her being-a-student.
The absent is, by nature, hidden. But when it is anticipated or intended, the intrinsically hidden, while still remaining absent, becomes quasi-present. It functions as the ‘final cause’ and raison d’être that determines the being of the anticipating entity. That is, even while remaining intrinsically concealed, the absent-as-anticipated ‘gives being’ (Es gibt Sein) to the anticipating entity by disclosing the entity as what it presently is. This pattern of absence-dispensing-presence holds both for the disclosure of Dasein and for the disclosure of the entities Dasein encounters.
It holds pre-eminently for Dasein. Dasein’s being is movement, for Dasein exists by anticipating its own absence. Dasein’s death remains intrinsically hidden, but when anticipated, the intrinsically hidden becomes quasi-present by determining Dasein’s being as mortal becoming. The absent, when anticipated, dispenses Dasein’s finite presence.
The same holds for other entities. The anticipated absence determines Dasein’s finite being. But Dasein’s being is world-disclosive: it holds open the region of meaningful presence in which other entities are disclosed as being-this-or-that. Hence, the intrinsically hidden, when anticipated, determines the presence not only of Dasein but also of the entities Dasein encounters.
Therefore, the very structure of disclosure – that is, the fact that the absent-but- anticipated determines or ‘gives’ finite presence – entails that its ultimate source remain intrinsically hidden even while disclosing the being of entities. This intrinsic hiddenness at the core of disclosure is what Heidegger calls the ‘mystery’. Heidegger argued that the ‘mystery’ is the ultimate issue in philosophy, and he believed Heraclitus had said as much in his fragment no. 123: ‘Disclosure-as-such loves to hide’ (Freeman 1971: 33 ).
Ereignis. The paradigm of movement also explains why Heidegger calls disclosure-as- such ‘Ereignis’. In ordinary German Ereignis means ‘event’, but Heidegger uses it as a word for movement. Playing on the adjective eigen (‘one’s own’), he creates the word Ereignung: movement as the process of being drawn into what is one’s own. For example, we might imagine that the oak tree as final cause ‘pulls’ the acorn into what it properly is, by drawing the acorn towards what it is meant to be. This being-pulled is the acorn’s movement, its very being. Likewise, Dasein is ‘claimed’ by death as its final cause and ‘pulled forth’ by it into mortal becoming. This being-drawn into one’s own absence, in such a way that world is engendered and sustained, is what Heidegger calls ‘appropriation’. It is what he means by Ereignis.
The word ‘Ereignis’, along with the image of Dasein being appropriated by the absent, emerges in Heidegger’s thought only in the 1930s. However, this later language echoes what Heidegger had earlier called Dasein’s thrownness, namely, the fact that Dasein is thrust into possibilities, anticipates its self-absence, and so is ‘already’ involved in world-disclosure. Both the earlier language of thrown anticipation of absence, and the later language of appropriation by absence, have the same phenomenon in view: Dasein’s alreadiness, its constitutive mortality that makes for world-disclosure.
The paradigm of movement also helps to clarify Heidegger’s claim about the concealing-and-revealing, or withdrawing-and-arriving, of being itself (that is, of disclosure-as-such). In a quite typical formulation Heidegger writes: ‘Being itself withdraws itself, but as this withdrawal, being is the ‘pull’ that claims the essence of human being as the place of being’s own arrival’ (1961: vol. 2, 368 ). This sentence, which describes the structure of Ereignis, may be interpreted as follows:
The ‘withdrawal’ of disclosure-as-such
(that is, the intrinsic hiddenness of world-disclosive absence)
maintains a relation to Dasein
(which we may call either ‘appropriation’ or ‘thrown anticipation’)
that claims Dasein
(by appropriating it into mortal becoming)
so that, in Dasein’s being,
(in so far as Dasein’s being is the openness that is world)
being itself might arrive
(in the form of the relations of significance whereby entities have being- as this-or-that).
The Turn. One can notice a certain shift within Heidegger’s work beginning around 1930, both in his style and in the topics he addresses. As regards style, some have claimed that his language becomes more abstruse and poetic, and his thinking less philosophical than mystical. As regards substance, he seems to introduce new topics like ‘appropriation’ and the ‘history of being’.
The problem is to discern whether these and other shifts count as what Heidegger calls the Turn (die Kehre). Some argue that beginning in the 1930s Heidegger radically changed his approach and perhaps even his central topic. The early Heidegger, so the argument goes, had understood being itself (that is, disclosure-as-such) from the standpoint of Dasein, whereas the later Heidegger understands Dasein from the standpoint of being itself. But to the contrary it is clear that even the early Heidegger understood Dasein only from the standpoint of being itself.
Heidegger clarifies matters by distinguishing between (1) the Turn and (2) the ‘change in thinking’ that the Turn demands, both of which are to be kept distinct from (3) the various shifts in form and focus that his philosophy underwent in the 1930s. The point is that, properly speaking, the Turn is not a shift in Heidegger’s thinking nor a change in his central topic. The Turn is only a further specification of Ereignis. There are three issues here.
First, the ‘Turn’ is a name for how Ereignis operates. Ereignis is the appropriation of Dasein for the sake of world-disclosure. For Heidegger, this fact stands over against all theories of the self as an autonomous subject that presuppositionlessly (that is, without a prior world-disclosure) posits its objects in meaning. In opposition to that, Ereignis means that Dasein must already be appropriated into world-disclosive absence before anything can be significant at all.
Ereignis also means that Dasein’s appropriation by, or thrownness into, world- disclosive absence is the primary and defining moment in Dasein’s projection of that disclosure. This reciprocity (Gegenschwung) between appropriation/thrownness on the one hand and projection on the other – with the priority going to appropriation/thrownness – constitutes the very structure of Ereignis and is what Heidegger calls the Turn. The upshot of this reciprocity is that Dasein must be already pulled into world-disclosive absence (thrown or appropriated into it) if it is to project (that is, hold open) disclosure at all. In a word, the Turn is Ereignis.
Second, the ‘change in thinking’ refers to the personal conversion that the Turn demands. To become aware of the Turn and to accept it as determining one’s own being is what Heidegger had earlier called ‘resolution’ and what he now describes as ‘a transformation in human being’. This transformation into an authentic self consists in letting one’s own being be defined by the Turn.
Third, the shifts in Heidegger’s work in the 1930s – and especially the development and deepening of his insights into thrownness and appropriation – are just that: shifts and developments within a single, continuing project. Important as they are, they are neither the Turn itself nor the change in personal self-understanding that the Turn requires.
Hiddenness. Heidegger claims that disclosure-as-such – the very opening up of significance in Dasein’s being – is intrinsically hidden and needs to remain so if entities are to be properly disclosed in their being. This intrinsic concealment of disclosure-as- such is called the ‘mystery’. Since Heidegger sometimes calls disclosure-as-such ‘being itself’, the phrase becomes ‘the mystery of being’. The ensuing claim, that the mystery of being conceals itself while revealing entities, has led to much mystification, not least among Heideggerians. Being seems to become a higher but hidden Entity that performs strange acts that only the initiated can comprehend. This misconstrual of Heidegger’s intentions is not helpful.
How may we understand the intrinsic concealment of disclosure-as-such? One way is to understand the paradigm of ‘movement’ that informs Heidegger’s discussion of revealing and concealing. Taken in the broad philosophical sense, movement is defined not as mere change of place and the like, but as the very being of entities that are undergoing the process of change. This kind of being consists in anticipating something absent, with the result that what is absent-but-anticipated determines the entity’s present being. Anticipation is the being of such entities, and anticipation is determined from the absent-but-anticipated goal. For example, the acorn’s being is its becoming an oak tree; and correspondingly the future oak tree, as the goal of the acorn’s trajectory, determines the acorn’s present being. Likewise, Margaret is a graduate student in so far as she is in movement towards her Ph.D. The still-absent degree qua anticipated determines her being-a-student.
The absent is, by nature, hidden. But when it is anticipated or intended, the intrinsically hidden, while still remaining absent, becomes quasi-present. It functions as the ‘final cause’ and raison d’être that determines the being of the anticipating entity. That is, even while remaining intrinsically concealed, the absent-as-anticipated ‘gives being’ (Es gibt Sein) to the anticipating entity by disclosing the entity as what it presently is. This pattern of absence-dispensing-presence holds both for the disclosure of Dasein and for the disclosure of the entities Dasein encounters.
It holds pre-eminently for Dasein. Dasein’s being is movement, for Dasein exists by anticipating its own absence. Dasein’s death remains intrinsically hidden, but when anticipated, the intrinsically hidden becomes quasi-present by determining Dasein’s being as mortal becoming. The absent, when anticipated, dispenses Dasein’s finite presence.
The same holds for other entities. The anticipated absence determines Dasein’s finite being. But Dasein’s being is world-disclosive: it holds open the region of meaningful presence in which other entities are disclosed as being-this-or-that. Hence, the intrinsically hidden, when anticipated, determines the presence not only of Dasein but also of the entities Dasein encounters.
Therefore, the very structure of disclosure – that is, the fact that the absent-but- anticipated determines or ‘gives’ finite presence – entails that its ultimate source remain intrinsically hidden even while disclosing the being of entities. This intrinsic hiddenness at the core of disclosure is what Heidegger calls the ‘mystery’. Heidegger argued that the ‘mystery’ is the ultimate issue in philosophy, and he believed Heraclitus had said as much in his fragment no. 123: ‘Disclosure-as-such loves to hide’ (Freeman 1971: 33 ).
Ereignis. The paradigm of movement also explains why Heidegger calls disclosure-as- such ‘Ereignis’. In ordinary German Ereignis means ‘event’, but Heidegger uses it as a word for movement. Playing on the adjective eigen (‘one’s own’), he creates the word Ereignung: movement as the process of being drawn into what is one’s own. For example, we might imagine that the oak tree as final cause ‘pulls’ the acorn into what it properly is, by drawing the acorn towards what it is meant to be. This being-pulled is the acorn’s movement, its very being. Likewise, Dasein is ‘claimed’ by death as its final cause and ‘pulled forth’ by it into mortal becoming. This being-drawn into one’s own absence, in such a way that world is engendered and sustained, is what Heidegger calls ‘appropriation’. It is what he means by Ereignis.
The word ‘Ereignis’, along with the image of Dasein being appropriated by the absent, emerges in Heidegger’s thought only in the 1930s. However, this later language echoes what Heidegger had earlier called Dasein’s thrownness, namely, the fact that Dasein is thrust into possibilities, anticipates its self-absence, and so is ‘already’ involved in world-disclosure. Both the earlier language of thrown anticipation of absence, and the later language of appropriation by absence, have the same phenomenon in view: Dasein’s alreadiness, its constitutive mortality that makes for world-disclosure.
The paradigm of movement also helps to clarify Heidegger’s claim about the concealing-and-revealing, or withdrawing-and-arriving, of being itself (that is, of disclosure-as-such). In a quite typical formulation Heidegger writes: ‘Being itself withdraws itself, but as this withdrawal, being is the ‘pull’ that claims the essence of human being as the place of being’s own arrival’ (1961: vol. 2, 368 ). This sentence, which describes the structure of Ereignis, may be interpreted as follows:
The ‘withdrawal’ of disclosure-as-such
(that is, the intrinsic hiddenness of world-disclosive absence)
maintains a relation to Dasein
(which we may call either ‘appropriation’ or ‘thrown anticipation’)
that claims Dasein
(by appropriating it into mortal becoming)
so that, in Dasein’s being,
(in so far as Dasein’s being is the openness that is world)
being itself might arrive
(in the form of the relations of significance whereby entities have being- as this-or-that).
The Turn. One can notice a certain shift within Heidegger’s work beginning around 1930, both in his style and in the topics he addresses. As regards style, some have claimed that his language becomes more abstruse and poetic, and his thinking less philosophical than mystical. As regards substance, he seems to introduce new topics like ‘appropriation’ and the ‘history of being’.
The problem is to discern whether these and other shifts count as what Heidegger calls the Turn (die Kehre). Some argue that beginning in the 1930s Heidegger radically changed his approach and perhaps even his central topic. The early Heidegger, so the argument goes, had understood being itself (that is, disclosure-as-such) from the standpoint of Dasein, whereas the later Heidegger understands Dasein from the standpoint of being itself. But to the contrary it is clear that even the early Heidegger understood Dasein only from the standpoint of being itself.
Heidegger clarifies matters by distinguishing between (1) the Turn and (2) the ‘change in thinking’ that the Turn demands, both of which are to be kept distinct from (3) the various shifts in form and focus that his philosophy underwent in the 1930s. The point is that, properly speaking, the Turn is not a shift in Heidegger’s thinking nor a change in his central topic. The Turn is only a further specification of Ereignis. There are three issues here.
First, the ‘Turn’ is a name for how Ereignis operates. Ereignis is the appropriation of Dasein for the sake of world-disclosure. For Heidegger, this fact stands over against all theories of the self as an autonomous subject that presuppositionlessly (that is, without a prior world-disclosure) posits its objects in meaning. In opposition to that, Ereignis means that Dasein must already be appropriated into world-disclosive absence before anything can be significant at all.
Ereignis also means that Dasein’s appropriation by, or thrownness into, world- disclosive absence is the primary and defining moment in Dasein’s projection of that disclosure. This reciprocity (Gegenschwung) between appropriation/thrownness on the one hand and projection on the other – with the priority going to appropriation/thrownness – constitutes the very structure of Ereignis and is what Heidegger calls the Turn. The upshot of this reciprocity is that Dasein must be already pulled into world-disclosive absence (thrown or appropriated into it) if it is to project (that is, hold open) disclosure at all. In a word, the Turn is Ereignis.
Second, the ‘change in thinking’ refers to the personal conversion that the Turn demands. To become aware of the Turn and to accept it as determining one’s own being is what Heidegger had earlier called ‘resolution’ and what he now describes as ‘a transformation in human being’. This transformation into an authentic self consists in letting one’s own being be defined by the Turn.
Third, the shifts in Heidegger’s work in the 1930s – and especially the development and deepening of his insights into thrownness and appropriation – are just that: shifts and developments within a single, continuing project. Important as they are, they are neither the Turn itself nor the change in personal self-understanding that the Turn requires.
posted by WRS at 4:35 AM
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