The Case of Martin Heidegger

8/17/2019 The Case of Martin Heidegger

1/17

The Case of Martin Heidegger, Philosopher and Nazi

Part 3: History, Philosophy and Mythology

By Alex Steiner

5 April !!!

We are posting today the concluding part of a series on the life and work of twentieth century

German philosopher Martin Heidegger.

Prior to a discussion of the philosophy of Martin Heidegger it seems necessary to dispose of a

possible objection. This objection can be expressed as follows: if it is true that the thought

reflects the man, and if the man is known to be morally and politically reprehensible, then the

thinking behind the man must be eually reprehensible. !f that is the case, then we are in a

position to render judgment on someone"s thinking without actually reading what he wrote.

#hen stated in this way, the absurdity of this mode of thinking becomes self$e%ident. The

problem with this type of reasoning is that it takes what is a partial truth, that indeed a thinker

does in some way reflect the man and his times, and transforms this insight one$sidedly into

an absolute dictum such that it becomes as false as it is true. !n general, the relation between

a thinker and his action is far too complex to be summed up in a well$phrased maxim.

&t the same time, we must reject the opposite, eually one$sided judgment, one that has

been championed by Heidegger apologists, that there is no relation between a thinker and hispolitics. The proponents of this %iewpoint often bring up the example of 'ottlob (rege, a

%icious anti$)emite whose politics apparently had no bearing on his technical work on logic.

*et e%en if one concedes that there are cases+particularly in technical areas remo%ed from

political and sociological concern+where theoretical work can be pursued unrelated to a

person"s biography or social status, it does not follow that such a dichotomy is present in the

work of any particular theorist. !t would be particularly surprising to find a discordance

between the political acti%ity of a man such as Heidegger and his theoriing, knowing that his

theoriing was itself intimately concerned with personal and political acti%ity.

#ere we to follow either of these false paths in relation to Heidegger, we may feel %indicated

in our judgment of the man and his politics, but we would miss an opportunity to learn

something about how his philosophy influenced or was in turned influenced by his politics. !n

particular we would be negligent in our responsibility to account for a most remarkable

phenomena of fin-de-siecle bourgeois thought+namely, how is it that a philosopher who has

been called by many the greatest thinker of the twentieth century was in fact a -ai #hat

does this conjuncture say about the kind of philosophy practiced by Heidegger and his

followers Most important of all, what does this say about the state of cultured opinion at the

dawn of the new millennium


2/17

&s an alternati%e to the pious banalities of those who would characterie Heidegger as an

innocent who /fell into error,/ we will briefly sur%ey the history of thought with which Heidegger

was engaged. !n doing so it will become clear that Heidegger was neither na0%e nor error$

prone but, as he himself had admitted, that his con%ersion to Hitlerism expressed the deepest

principles of his thought.

1roadly speaking, Heidegger appears within the framework of the 2omantic reaction to the

3nlightenment and the (rench 2e%olution. Philosophically, both the 3nlightenment and the

(rench 2e%olution had its most profound expression in the work of 'eorge (riedrich #ilhelm

Hegel. Hegel sought to o%ercome what he %iewed as the one$sidedness of the 3nlightenment

and the (rench 2e%olution while at the same time defending their work as historically

necessary for the emergence of modern bourgeois society. Marx follows Hegel as a defender

of the 3nlightenment and the (rench 2e%olution. Marx howe%er also recognied that the

ideals of the (rench 2e%olution+liberty, euality and fraternity+are incompatible with a

society based on pri%ate property. Henceforth these ideals could only be realied through the

struggle for socialism.

The year 4565 saw re%olutionary mo%ements break out throughout 3urope. The working class

took its first steps as an independent political force. This had profound re%erberations among

all strata of society. (ollowing the e%ents of 4565, the philosophical reaction against

3nlightenment rationality becomes more conscious of its aims. !f the original opposition to the

3nlightenment in the eighteenth century came from the monarchists, landholders and the

church, the nineteenth century saw a new wa%e of opposition to the legacy of the

3nlightenment emanating from those forces who felt most threatened by the emerging

bourgeois society. They looked back longingly to a mythical golden age in a medie%al past.

!n 'ermany especially where the bourgeoisie had still to establish its political hegemony, the

birth of political 2omanticism found resonance among the peasantry and the middle class,

which felt most threatened by the democratic re%olutions that began to challenge the old order

in the 3urope of the 4567s. This played into the hands of the dukes, princes and landholders

who had no desire to share political power. !n 4564, 47 years after Hegel"s death, the

Prussian authorities brought in his former roommate and philosophical nemesis, (riedrich

)chelling, to lecture in 1erlin.

#ith )chelling"s later philosophy we can say that the 2omantic reaction against the

3nlightenment found its first philosophical %oice. )chelling sought to replace the

3nlightenment"s concern with reason, political freedom and social euality with a rejection of

reason in fa%or of re%elation and elitist %alues. )chelling"s later system consecrated an appeal

to myth and authority.


3/17

8onseuent on the defeat of the 4565 re%olution, the anti$rationalist tendencies expressed in

the later philosophy of )chelling found fertile ground. The promise of the (rench 2e%olution,

which seemed to inaugurate a new era in human history, was transformed into the nightmare

of Prussian reaction. !nstead of celebrating new possibilities, the pre%ailing spirit was one of

resignation to a %ery narrowly circumscribed a%enue of political practice. The notion of freedom was redefined subjecti%ely, as an inner state that can be maintained despite the

%icissitudes of political life. This was combined with a deep pessimism toward the ability of

human agents to create a more humane society. The name of &rthur )chopenhauer will

fore%er be linked to this strand of subjecti%e idealism.

There was a fundamental change in social conditions after 4565. #hereas political

2omanticism maintained a hostility to capitalism prior to 4565, following the turmoil of that

year, which saw the working class rise as an independent political force for the first time, the

political thrust of 2omanticism, particularly in 'ermany, was turned against the working class.

&ll that remained of the anti$capitalist impulse of the earlier period of 2omanticism was a

cultural critiue of bourgeois mediocrity.

&ristocratic and elitist %alues were championed as a safeguard against the threat of the great

le%eling out of society introduced by democratic and socialist impulses. -eedless to say a

palpable fear of the working class was exponentially heightened following the e%ents of the

Paris 8ommune in 4594, in which the working class for the first time briefly took power in its

own hands. The mood of the 'erman petty bourgeois immediately following the defeat of the

Paris 8ommune was captured in a letter written by -ietsche:

Hope is possible again;


4/17

modern political and social mo%ements as threatening the aristocratic %alues for which great

ci%iliations and great people ?the o%erman@ should stri%e. He indicts 8hristianity, which he

sees as imbued with a /sla%e morality/ for setting into motion a process which culminates in

the 3nlightenment"s final unmasking of religious beliefs, an e%ent he called /the death of god./

The 3nlightenment ushers in an age in which %alues can no longer be grounded, an age of nihilism.

!t is in -ietsche that the counter$3nlightenment finds its real %oice. &nd it is to this tradition

that we should look in situating the philosophy of Martin Heidegger. Heidegger himself in fact

recognied -ietsche uite correctly as a kindred spirit. 1ut whereas -ietsche saw himself

as the prophet announcing the coming of nihilism, Heidegger sees himself as the biographer

of a mature nihilism. Heidegger"s %iews were formed in the deeply pessimistic atmosphere

engendered by 'ermany"s defeat in #orld #ar !. He was influenced by the right$wing author

3rnest =uenger, whose no%els celebrated the steadfast, resolute soldier meeting his fate in

battle. &nother important influence was


5/17

sees his task as the retrie%al of the original meaning of 1eing which has been lost. (rom this

%antage point he goes to war against the entire history of #estern philosophy following the

'reeks.

The echoes of -ietsche are here e%ident and they will become e%en more ob%ious inHeidegger"s later philosophy. Eike -ietsche, Heidegger turns away from the history of

philosophy which he %iews as hopelessly compromised by a flawed model of knowledge. His

method of practicing philosophy also retraces the steps of -ietsche. He abandons discursi%e

argumentation that try to con%ince an unbiased reader by the force of their logic in fa%or of

prophetic pronouncements and etymological sleight$of$hand that aim at o%erpowering the

reader.

!n his later philosophy, Heidegger will go e%en farther in his repudiation of the history of

philosophy. He will claim that all philosophers after the pre$)ocratics ha%e been guilty of

falsifying and concealing some kind of primal experience of 1eing. His program for retrie%ing

the original meaning of 1eing becomes transformed into a project aimed at the destruction of

metaphysics.A

!eing and "ime is preoccupied with a discussion of the meaning of death. &ccording to

Heidegger, it is the imminence of death and our knowledge of it that makes an /authentic/ life

possible. !t is only when we li%e life at the extreme, and confront our own mortality, that we

are able to set aside the inauthentic chatter of our day to day existence and come to terms

with our true sel%es. This theme, which Heidegger called our 1eing$towards$Death, is by no

means new in the history of thought. !t is closely related to the meditations of scores of

religious writers from )t. &ugustine to Gierkegaard to Tolstoy.

Perhaps more to the point, howe%er, Heidegger"s secularied meditation on the imminence of

death and the responsibilities that de%ol%e to us as a result owe more to the heroic literature

of 3rnest =uenger. !t is the soldier abo%e all who is called upon to make a decision that will

%alidate his life as he faces imminent death. Heidegger"s category of /resoluteness,/ which

becomes so important to existential philosophy, is rooted in the situation of the soldier facing

the enemy in the trenches in a hopeless struggle.

Many commentators ha%e remarked that this feature of Heidegger"s thinking, his emphasis on

the need to make critical decisions determining ones fate, illustrates the essentially apolitical

uality of Heidegger"s philosophy. )eemingly, one can choose to be either a -ai, as

Heidegger himself did, or a member of the (rench resistance, as )artre did, and still remain

faithful to the terms of an authentic existence. The completely empty character of the

categories of authenticity and resoluteness ha%e been the subject of much criticism.

Habermas, for instance, characteried it as the decisionism of empty resoluteness.ABC

Heidegger is taken to task for lacking a criteria by which to judge the worth of one decision


6/17

against another. 'i%en the accepted interpretation of Heidegger, this criticism is correct as far

as it goes. Howe%er, a remarkable book that has just been published promises to turn upside

down the body of recei%ed opinion on the philosophy of Heidegger.

!n his path$breaking work, Historical Destiny and #ational $ocialism in Heidegger%s 1eing andTime, =ohannes (ritsche demonstrates that not only are the categories discussed in !eing

and "ime not apolitical, but on the contrary, #hen one reads $ein und &eit in its context, one

sees that, as )cheler put it, in the kairos BcrisisC of the twenties $ein und &eit was a highly

political and ethical work, that it belonged to the re%olutionary 2ight, and that it contained an

argument for the most radical group on the re%olutionary 2ight, namely, the -ational

)ocialists.ABIC

(ritsche"s point is that Heidegger"s idiom and use of language were part of a shared tradition

of right$wing thought that emerged in the 4J7s in 'ermany. The political content of !eing

and "ime would ha%e been clear to Heidegger"s 'erman contemporaries. Howe%er, to

readers of the (rench and 3nglish translations that circulated a generation or two later, this

political content is completely obscured. !nstead as (ritsche mockingly puts it, *ou see in

!eing and "ime the terrifying face of the old witch of the loneliness of the isolated bourgeois

subjects, or the un$erotic groupings in their Gesellschaft BsocietyC, and you see the desire for

a leap out of the Gesellschaft.AB6C

)artre and the (rench existentialists adopted from Heidegger the themes of loneliness and

alienation as well as the corollary notion of a heroic and resolute %oluntarism in the face of an

absurd world. (ritsche maintains that whate%er the merits of their own works, the

existentialists misunderstood Heidegger. (ritsche"s argument for reading Heidegger as the

philosopher of -ational )ocialism is impossible to summarie here. !t relies on a %ery

sophisticated historical and philological analysis of the text of !eing and "ime. &fter

reconstructing the actual content of !eing and "ime, (ritsche compares it with the writings of

two other notorious right$wing authors who were contemporaries, namely Max )cheler and

&dolf Hitler. (ritsche demonstrates that the political content of !eing and "ime and Mein

'ampf are identical, notwithstanding the fact that the first book was written by a world

renowned philosopher and the second by a sociopath from the gutters of Fienna.


7/17

Dasein BHeidegger"s term for human beingC can be reached by the blows of fate only

because in the depths of its 1eing Dasein is fate in the sense we ha%e described. 3xisting

fatefully in the resoluteness which hands itself down, Dasein has been disclosed as 1eing$in$

the$world both for the >fortunate" circumstances which >comes its way" and for the cruelty of

accidents. (ate does not arise from the clashing together of e%ents and circumstances. 3%enone who is irresolute gets dri%en about by these+more so than one who has chosenK and yet

he can >ha%e" no fate.ABLC

(ritsche comments on this passage as follows:

(irst, far from being something a Dasein creates or changes or breaks, >fate" exists prior to

the Dasein and demands the latter"s subjugation. The point is not how to create or break fate

Bwhich would be a typical existentialist interpretation. &.).C. 2ather, the problem is whether a

Dasein accepts, opens itself for, hands itself down to, subjugates itself to, or sacrifices itself to

fate+which is what authentic Dasein does+or whether a Dasein denies fate and continues

trying to e%ade it+which is what ordinary, and therefore inauthentic Dasein does.ABC

-or is the fate to which authentic Dasein must subjugate itself some sort of existential angst.

(or Heidegger, fate had a definite political content. The fate of the patriotic 'erman was

identified with the (olksgemeinschaft , a term that was used polemically by the -ais to

denote a community of the people bound by race and heritage. The idea of a

(olksgemeinschaft was, in the right$wing literature of the time, often counterposed to that of

Gesellschaft , a reference to the 3nlightenment notion of a shared community of interests

based on uni%ersal human %alues. 8ontinuing his analysis of authenticity, (ritsche comments:

!n contrast to ordinary Dasein and inauthentic Dasein, authentic Dasein ...realies that there

is a dangerous situation, and relates itself to the >heritage." !n so doing, it produces the

separation between the Daseine that ha%e fate and those that do not, i.e., the inauthentic

Daseine. !n the next step authentic Dasein realies that its heritage and destiny is the

(olksgemeinschaft , which calls it into struggle.... &fter this, authentic Dasein hands itself down

to the (olksgemeinschaft and recognies what is at stake in the struggle.... (inally, authentic

Dasein reaffirms its subjugation to the past to the (olksgemeinschaft and begins the struggle,

that is, the cancellation of the world of inauthentic Dasein.AB9C

!n characteriing the struggle for authentic Dasein as a cancellation of the world of the

inauthentic Dasein,A (ritsche is being o%erly metaphorical. !n plain language, the cancellation

of the world of inauthentic DaseinA is a reference to the fascist counterre%olution. !t entails the

destruction of bourgeois democracy and its institutions, the persecution and murder of

socialists, the emasculation of all independent working class organiations, a concerted and

systematic attack on the culture of the 3nlightenment, and of course the persecution and

e%entual elimination of alien forces in the midst of the (olk , most notably the =ews.


8/17

!f (ritsche"s interpretation of !eing and "ime is correct, then it can likewise ser%e to demystify

the riddle of the relationship between Heidegger"s early philosophy and his later con%ersion to

a peculiar form of uietism. Many commentators ha%e been puled at the seemingly radical

transition from a philosophy based on acti%ism, as the typical interpretation of !eing and "ime

saw it, to one rooted in the mystical resignation to one"s fate that characteries Heidegger"slater philosophy. (ritsche has shown, howe%er, that the early philosophy was anything but

%oluntarist. The notion of man transforming his destiny in accordance with his will is a typical

3nlightenment motif that bears little resemblance to Heidegger"s %ision. 2ather, as (ritsche

has demonstrated, we do not so much transform our destiny as find what it is and submit to it.

Thus, the sense of resignation is already there in the early philosophy. The transition therefore

in the later philosophy is hardly as radical as it has appeared.

#e can add that there is nothing particularly uniue in Heidegger"s theory of authenticity as

answering the call of one"s fate. & strikingly parallel conception can be found in the work of

another contemporary intellectual who e%inced sympathy for -aism, the )wiss psychologist

8arl =ung. Eecturing in 4JIL, =ung pro%ides the following account of the relation between

indi%idual %olition and our collecti%e fate:


9/17

2omantic reaction against the 3nlightenment, to -ietsche"s pronouncement that nihilism is

the culmination of 2eason, the belief in progress and the perfectibility of mankind through

science and social e%olution was successi%ely undermined. These moods resonated among

those social forces that found themsel%es increasingly displaced and marginalied by the

industrialiation of 'ermany in the latter half of the nineteenth century. The rise of (olkischideology expressed the fears of peasants, artisans and landowners sueeed between the

pincer mo%ements of the bourgeoisie and the working class.

!deologies emerge not only from the official philosophical schools, but are also generated

through an /underground/ whose leading representati%es are often barely noticed by later

historians. Heinrich 2iehl ?45I$J9@, a man who left no trace in any history of philosophy text,

was a seminal theorist of (olkisch ideology. His book Land und Leute B )laces and )eopleC

argued that the inner character of a people is completely intertwined with their particular

nati%e landscape. 8entral to 2iehl"s thinking and to (olkisch ideology thereafter is the concept

that certain classes or ethnic groups ha%e an organic relationship to the land and are thus

/rooted/ whereas others are /rootless/ and cannot be assimilated to the (olk . The historian

'eorge E. Mosse in his definiti%e history of (olkisch ideology, pro%ides a summary of this

aspect of 2iehl"s ideas:

*et for 2iehl a third class, dangerous to the body politic and unfit to be accommodated within

Folkisch society, had come into being. This group, identified as true "proletariat," consisted of

the totally disinherited ...

#hat precluded the integration of the proletariat into the system of estates was its instability,

its restlessness. This group was a part of the contemporary population which could ne%er sink

roots of any permanence. !n its ranks was the migratory worker, who lacking nati%e residence,

could not call any landscape his own. There was also the journalist, the polemicist, the

iconoclast who opposed ancient custom, ad%ocated man$made panaceas, and excited the

people to re%olt against the genuine and established order. &bo%e all there was the =ew, who

by his %ery nature was restless. &lthough the =ew belonged to a Folk, it occupied no specific

territory and was conseuently doomed to rootlessness. These elements of the population

dominated the large cities, which they had erected, according to 2iehl, in their own image to

represent their particular landscape. Howe%er, this was an artificial domain, and in contrast to

serene rootedness, e%erything it contained, including the inhabitants, was in continuous

motion. The big city and the proletariat seemed to fuse into an ominous colossus which was

endangering the realm of the Folk ...ABJC

=ung, ha%ing been philosophically predisposed towards (olkisch mythology, expressed

sympathy with -aism in the immediate period after 4JII. Nnlike Heidegger, howe%er, =ung

did not answer the /call/ and ne%er joined the -ais. !t is perhaps not entirely coincidental that


10/17

this unflattering period of =ung"s biography, like that of Heidegger"s, although known for

decades, has only recently become the subject of critical scholarship.B47C

!t is not too difficult to see how the themes of /rootedness/ and /rootlessness/ appear in

!eing and "ime as /authenticity/ and /inauthenticity./ The (olkisch strands in Heidegger"sthought combined with the irrationalist heritage of -ietsche to produce an elouent

statement of the social position of the petty bourgeois in the period between the two world

wars. !n his study of the genesis of irrationalist philosophy 'eorge Eukacs diagnosed the

social psychology of the time that created such an opening for Heidegger"s conceptualiation:

Thus Heidegger"s despair had two facets: on the one hand, the remorseless baring of the

indi%idual"s inner nothingness in the imperialistic crisisK on the other+and because the social

grounds for this nothingness were being fetishistically transformed into something timeless

and anti$social+the feeling to which it ga%e rise could %ery easily turn into a desperate

re%olutionary acti%ity. !t is certainly no accident that Hitler"s propaganda continually appealed

to despair. &mong the working masses, admittedly, the despair was occasioned by their

socio$economic situation. &mong the intelligentsia, howe%er, that mood of nihilism and

despair from whose subjecti%e truth Heidegger proceeded, which he conceptualied, clarified

philosophically and canonied as authentic, created a basis fa%ourable to the efficacy of

Hitlerian agitation.AB44C

Thus far, we ha%e identified two strands in Heidegger"s thinking that form part of a common

substance with 'erman fascism: philosophical irrationalism and the appropriation of Folkisch

mythology. & third ideological building block of 'erman fascism was the pseudo$science of

racial theory rooted in a crude biological determinism. To be sure, Heidegger"s thought ne%er

accommodated this brand of crude racialism. (or one thing, the philosophical traditions from

which biological racial theory deri%es, )ocial Darwinism and mechanistic reductionism, were

anathema to the tradition of Leensphilosophie from which Heidegger emerges.

Leensphilosophie , particularly in the hands of its later practitioners, stressed the difference

between Eife and the natural sciences. #ith Heidegger, it de%elops a distinctly anti$scientific

animus.


11/17

for instance, Euther"s works and e%en in speeches before the 'erman 2eichstag, or

parliament.AB4C

#e may add that Heidegger was not abo%e collaborating in common projects with the %ilest of

the -ai racists, despite his rejection of their crude philosophy. #hate%er philosophicaldifferences Heidegger may ha%e had with &lfred 2osenberg, he was more than willing to

attend international conferences as a representati%e of the Third 2eich and sit on the same

dais with 2osenberg and his ilk.B4IC

philosophy" with so little foundation or coherence, so profoundly unscientific andcoarsely dilettantish to become pre%alent, what were needed were a specific philosophical

mood, a disintegration of confidence in understanding and reason, the destruction of human

faith in progress, and credulity towards irrationalism, myth and mysticism.AB46C

Perhaps then Heidegger"s biggest crime was not his enlistment in the -ai Party and

assumption of the rectorship of (reiburg. These were merely political crimes, of the sort

committed by many thousands of yes$men. Perhaps his crime against philosophy is more

fundamental. Through it he contributed in no small degree to the culture of barbarism that

nourished the -ai beast.

"anse Ma#a$re: Heidegger, Prag%atis% and Post%odernis%

This conceit which understands how to belittle e%ery truth, in order to turn back into itself and

gloat o%er its own understanding, which knows how to dissol%e e%ery thought and always find

the same barren 3go instead of any content+this is a satisfaction which we must lea%e to

itself, for it flees the uni%ersal, and seeks only to be for itself.AB4LC


12/17

re%olutionary upsurge of May$=une 4J5. Eegions of former left intellectuals began a

wholesale retreat from the 3nlightenment %ision of an emancipatory rationality. Their spirit of

despair was summed up by the late =ean$(rancois Eyotard, the founder of postmodernism:

#e can obser%e and establish a kind of decline in the confidence that for two centuries, the#est in%ested in the principle of a general progress of humanity. This idea of a possible,

probable, or necessary progress is rooted in the belief that de%elopments made in the arts,

technology, knowledge and freedoms would benefit humanity as a whole ...

There is a sort of grief in the Oeitgeist. !t can find expression in reacti%e, e%en reactionary,

attitudes or in utopias+but not in a positi%e orientation that would open up a new

perspecti%e.AB4C

Eyotard"s personal history exemplifies the political and intellectual transformation of an entiregeneration of radicals. !n the 4JL7s and 4J7s he was on the editorial board of the radical

journal $ocialisme ou !ararie. He was an acti%e participant in the e%ents of May 4J5.

(ollowing the restabiliation of the 'aullist regime after 4J5, Eyotard turned against

Marxism, which he characteried, along with the 3nlightenment notion of progress, as a

failed metanarrati%e.A

Holding the attempt to encompass in thought the terrible recent history of our time a failure, it

was not a %ery big step for the postmodernists to appropriate the irrationalist tradition that

turned its back on the 3nlightenment. This is where the Heidegerrians, postmodernists,

deconstructionists and neo$pragmatists find a common ground. &ll these trends reject what

they call the traditional conceptual thinking, PhilosophyA or )cienceA with capital letters.

#hy did these disparate philosophical traditions gra%itate to Heidegger"s notion of a thinking

that is more rigorous than the conceptualAB49C

They saw in Heidegger the intellectual apparatus that would take them beyond the now

suspect model of rationality that has been the hallmark of #estern philosophy for ,L77

years. Heidegger pro%ided the anti$foundationalist approach of Derrida, 2orty and others with

a systematic critiue of the history of philosophy. The postmodernists, deconstructionists and

pragmatists solemnly accepted Heidegger"s diagnosis of the terminal state of #estern

thought when he said, #hat is needed in the present world crisis is less philosophy, but more

attenti%eness in thinkingK less literature, but more culti%ation of the letter.AB45C

The neo$pragmatist 2ichard 2orty comes to the identical conclusion when he writes:

!f Philosophy disappears, something will ha%e been lost which was central to #estern

intellectual life+just as something central was lost when religious intuitions were weeded out

from among intellectually respectable candidates for Philosophical articulation. 1ut the


13/17

3nlightenment thought, rightly, that what would succeed religion would be better. The

pragmatist is betting that what succeeds the >scientific," positi%ist culture which the

3nlightenment produced will be better.AB4JC

!n a remarkable confession, 2orty himself explains the underlying sociological imperati%e thathas produced this sea$change in #estern thought. !n describing the malaise that has passed

o%er #estern thought 2orty writes:

!t reflects the sociopolitical pessimism which has afflicted 3uropean and &merican

intellectuals e%er since we tacitly ga%e up on socialism without becoming any fonder of

capitalism+e%er since Marx ceased to present an alternati%e to -ietsche and Heidegger.

This pessimism, which sometimes calls itself >postmodernism," has produced a con%iction that

the hopes for greater freedom and euality which mark the recent history of the #est were

somehow deeply self$decepti%e.AB7C

#e thus witness the peculiar intellectual partnership between the post 4J5 generation of

disappointed ex$radicals with the ideas of the 'erman radical right of the 4J7s. The warm

reception for Derrida and (rench postmodernism in the Nnited )tates can be explained by a

series of de%elopments in the past three decades that in many ways parallels the experiences

of the (rench intelligentsia. #e ha%e in mind the disillusionment that occurred when the

heady days of protest politics of the 4J7s and early 4J97s ga%e way to the constricted

cultural and political landscape of the 2eagan administration.

*et, what is the content of the new /thinking/ about which Heidegger, Derrida and 2orty

speculate #e will look in %ain in the works of Heidegger, 2orty, Eyotard or Derrida for an

explanation of what this new /thinking/ is and how it is /better/ than a thinking grounded in an

attempt to conceptualie an objecti%e world. &t best, we are told to look at the work of poets

and other artists whose intuiti%e aesthetic %iew of the world is offered as a new paradigm of

knowledge. This explains the later Heidegger"s abandonment of the traditional philosophical

issues in fa%or of musings on the poetry of Hlderlin. #e can discern a similar trend in the

works of the postmodernists and neo$pragmatists. Derrida for instance has sought to redefine

the philosophical enterprise as a form of literary text. 2orty champions the /good$natured/

no%elists at the expense of the sickly philosophers.B4C

Heidegger"s claim to point to a primordial /thinking/ that is in some way a return to a more

authentic, uncorrupted insight is hardly new in the history of philosophy. !t is but a %ariation of

the claim that immediate intuition pro%ides a surer basis for knowledge than the mediated

seuence of concepts that brings particulars into relation with uni%ersals. The attempt to

grasp the bare particular, uncorrupted by the uni%ersal, whether concei%ed of as /sense

perception/ or a mystical access to the di%ine, has dogged philosophy for centuries. !n his

own time, Hegel had to respond to the intuitionists who opposed critical thought. 2eplying to


14/17

these thinkers, he wrote, what is called the unutterable is nothing else than the untrue, the

irrational, what is merely meant Bbut is not actually expressedC.ABC

This comment, it seems to us, makes a perfect coda to Heidegger"s /thinking/ that is beyond

philosophy. Heidegger"s /thinking/ is not post$philosophic but pre$philosophic. #e ha%e not somuch o%ercome the history of metaphysics, as we ha%e regressed to a period in the history of

thought prior to the emergence of metaphysics, prior to the differentiation of science from

myth and religion.

The pomposity and pretentiousness of Heidegger"s return to the archaic was magnificently

punctured by one of Heidegger"s earliest and most trenchant critics, Theodore &dorno.

&dorno highlighted the hidden assumption in Heidegger"s thought, the identification of the

archaic with the genuine.A 8ontinuing this thought he wrote:

1ut the tri%iality of the simple is not, as Heidegger would like it to be, attributable to the %alue$

blindness of thought that has lost being. )uch tri%iality comes from thinking that is supposedly

in tune with being and re%eals itself as something supremely noble. )uch tri%iality is the sign

of that classifying thought, e%en in the simplest word, from which Heidegger pretends that he

has escaped: namely, abstraction.ABIC

#hat practical results ensue from this kind of /thinking/ The non$mediated perception leads

one back to the /familiar./ The /familiar/ is that which we take for granted as being self$

e%idently true. !t is the realm of historically ingrained assumptions and class biases, those

axioms of e%eryday life that are accepted by ones friends and colleagues that make up the

realm of the /familiar./ The intuitionist is thereby a sla%e to the historically rooted ideologies of

his place and time, all the while thinking that he has o%ercome all dogmas and prejudices. (or

Heidegger, the /familiar/ is hea%ily in%ested with the ideological stance of the 2adical right, its

shared mythology of a (olk ha%ing a common destiny, the betrayal of the fatherland by the

liberals and socialists, etc. (or the contemporary crop of postmodernists and neo$pragmatists,

it is possible to delineate a common set of beliefs that are considered today"s intellectual coin

of the realm. &mong these one could mention the following:

2ational discourse is incapable of encompassing the complexities and nuances of

?post@modern society. ?The fact that such a statement is itself an example of rational

discourse and is therefore self$refuting does not seem to bother proponents of this %iew.@

The notion of progress cannot be demonstrated in history. This is closely related to a deep

sense of skepticism about the possibility of harnessing technology for the benefit of humanity.

The working class cannot play a re%olutionary role. )ome postmodernists counterpose other

forces to the working class.


15/17

transformation of society.


16/17

upon that primal e+perience% from whose arren gloom this mysticism of the death of the

world crawls forth on its thousand unsightly conceptual feet. "he war that this light e+poses is

as little the eternal% one which these new Germans now worship as it is the final% war that the

pacifists carry on aout. ,n reality that war is only this/ the one fearful last chance to correct

the incapacity of peoples to order their relationships to one another in accord with therelationships they posses to nature through their technology. ,f this correcti0e effort fails

millions of human odies will indeed ine0italy e chopped to pieces and chewed up y iron

and gas. !ut e0en the haitues of the chthonic forces of terror who carry their 0olumes of

'lages in their packs will not learn one-tenth of what nature promises its less idly curious ut

more soer children who possess in technology not a fetish of doom ut a key to

happiness.AB6C

Notes:

4. -ietsche to 1aron %on 'ersdorff, =une, 4, 4594, cited in 'eorge Eukacs, "he Destruction

of 1eason. Humanities Press, 4J54, p. IL

. =urgen Habermas, "he )hilosophical Discourse on Modernity/ "wel0e Lectures , trans. (

Eawrence, 8ambridge: M!T Press, 4J95, p. 464

I. =ohannes (ritsche, Historical Destiny and #ational $ocialism in Heidegger%s 1eing and

Time, Nni%ersity of 8alifornia Press, 4JJJ, p. x%

6. =ohannes (ritsche, pp. 45$4J.

L. Martin Heidegger, !eing and "ime, trans. =ohn Macuarrie and 3dward 2obinson, -ew

*ork: Harper and 2ow, 4J, p. 6I

. =ohannes (ritsche, p. L

9. =ohannes (ritsche, p. 9

5. 8.'. =ung, 2nalytical )sychology/ ,ts "heory and )ractice, -ew *ork, Fintage 1ooks, 4J97,

p. 45I

J. 'eorge E. Mosse, "he 3risis of German ,deology/ ,ntellectual 4rigins of the "hird 1eich,

-ew *ork, 'rosset and Dunlop, 4J6, p.

47. =ung"s affinity for Folkisch mythology and anti$semitism is documented by 2ichard -oll,

"he Jung 3ult/4rigins of a 3harismatic Mo0ement , Princeton, Princeton Nni%ersity Press,

4JJ644. 'eorge Eukacs, "he Destruction of 1eason, Humanities Press, 4J54, p. L76

4. Tom 2ockmore, 4n Heidegger%s #azism and )hilosophy , p. 444

4I. Heidegger"s former student and friend, Garl Ewith met him while at a conference in 2ome

in 4JI. Ewith, a =ew by birth, had gone into exile after 4JII.


17/17

dissociating the (Qhrer, &dolf Hitler, from )treicher. BHugo

Documents

The Case of Martin Heidegger