Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Disentangling Heidegger’s transcendental questions

  • Published:
Continental Philosophy Review Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Recapitulating two recent trends in Heidegger-scholarship, this paper argues that the transcendental theme in Heidegger’s thought clarifies and relates the two basic questions of his philosophical itinerary. The preparatory question, which belongs to Being and Time, I.1–2, draws from the transcendental tradition to target the condition for the possibility of our openness to things: How must we be to access entities? The preliminary answer is that we are essentially opened up ecstatically and horizonally by timeliness. The fundamental question, which belongs to the unpublished Being and Time, I.3, and the rest of Heidegger’s path of thinking, is accessed by means of the first. In a turn of perspective, it targets that in terms of which we relate to the givenness of being. Heidegger first attempts to handle this question using the transcendental language of temporal horizon before happening upon the terminologically more fitting “event of appropriation” and thereafter criticizing transcendental terms. By reconstructing the preparatory question and its reversal, we can see that Heidegger’s later criticism of transcendence in fact relies on its initial success. The turn from timeliness to appropriation (initially by means of transcendental temporality) happens within the domain initially disclosed by the preparatory question.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. Heidegger (1989, p. 74/51–52).

  2. Crowell (2001, 2007), Dahlstrom (2001, 2005), and Malpas (2006, 2007). A more historical approach to these themes can be found in Tom Rockmore (2000).

  3. Sheehan (2001a, p. 8). See Aristotle (De Anima, 424a1 and 429b24–25).

  4. Sheehan (2001b, p. 200).

  5. Sheehan (2001a, p. 7).

  6. Sheehan (2001a, p. 9).

  7. Crowell and Malpas (2007, p. 1).

  8. Crowell (2001, pp. 9–10 and 222–243). Dahstrom (2007, p. 69). Dahlstrom elsewhere expands his list of transcendental “vestiges” (2005, pp. 45–51).

  9. Malpas (2007, p. 130).

  10. Malpas (2007, p. 133).

  11. Sheehan (2001a, p. 8).

  12. “Die Transzendenz des Seins des Daseins…,” “Sein ist das transcendens schlechthin,” “… Zeit als des transzendentalen Horizontes der Frage nach dem Sein.” Sein und Zeit (Heidegger, 2001, pp. 38–39/62–63), hereafter SZ. The phrase, “subjectivity of the subject,” occurs at SZ, p. 24/45. Citations refer first to the German followed by the English pagination (G/E). I have modified all translations to translate uniformly Heidegger’s triple, “Seiendes,” “Sein,” and “Seyn,” with “entity,” “being,” and (hyphenated) “be-ing,” respectively. In the 1930s, Heidegger introduces “be-ing” because he thinks “being” is understood by the philosophical tradition as the entityness of the entity. The term, “be-ing,” accordingly targets what Heidegger originally meant by the term, “being,” namely givenness as such. Additionally, I translate the key terms, “Zeitlichkeit” and “Temporalität,” by “timeliness” and “temporality,” respectively.

  13. To take three important commentators as examples: Michael Gelven (1989), citing a passage from the later Heidegger, does not distinguish the questions (pp. 18–19). Richard Polt (1999) registers the difference between SZ I.1-2 and SZ I.3, but he also suggests that a shortcoming of SZ I.1-2 is that it does not answer the question assigned to SZ I.3 (pp. 36 and 25, respectively). Hubert Dreyfus (1991) distinguishes them but does not relate them; he counts as anathema to the hermeneutic of Dasein that it should disclose anything like the horizon for the question of being, and so he says there can be no reversal from the first to the second question (pp. 12 and 38–39).

  14. Husserl (1998, p. 111), quoted by Heidegger (1979, p. 158n2/114n2).

  15. Husserl (1998, p. 171). Heidegger (1979, p. 157/114).

  16. Heidegger (1979, 139/101).

  17. Heidegger (1978, p. 167/133). The preparatory question thus targets what Crowell identifies as the decisive difference between Husserl and Heidegger (2002, pp. 123–140).

  18. Heidegger (1979, p. 159/115).

  19. Heidegger puts the “the fundamental question” (Fundamentalfrage) as follows: “What is meant by being? What is the being of the intentional?” (1979, p. 191/140).

  20. Because an entity can serve as our point of departure, “We do not need the specific entity of intentionality in order to awaken the question of the being of entities” (1979, p. 192/141).

  21. Heidegger (1992, 448/310).

  22. Husserl (1998, p. xix).

  23. Husserl (1998, p. 142).

  24. Heidegger (1997b, p. 476).

  25. Heidegger (1979, p. 183/135).

  26. Heidegger (1997c, p. 138, emphasis mine).

  27. Heidegger (1997c, p. 138).

  28. Heidegger (1991, p. XVI/xix).

  29. In this way, Heidegger’s 1973 preface to the text continues to recommend it as an introduction to “the horizon of the manner of questioning set forth in Being and Time” even though he now realizes “Kant’s question is foreign to it” (1991, p. XIV/xviii). Nor is this horizon of questioning something that belongs to the past: “The Kant book remains an introduction, attempted by means of a questionable digression, to the further questionability which persists concerning the question of being set forth in Being and Time” (p. XV/xviii).

  30. Heidegger (1991, p. 43/30, and compare pp. 38–39/27).

  31. Heidegger (1991, p. 224/157).

  32. Cf. Heidegger (SZ, 38/63, and 1975, p. 438/308).

  33. Heidegger (1989, p. 289/203).

  34. Heidegger (1978, p. 212/166; see also 1976, pp. 158–159/122–123).

  35. Heidegger (1978, p. 214/167).

  36. See Heidegger (1978, pp. 170/135 and 214–215/168).

  37. Earlier in the section, Heidegger puts the question more broadly:” how are ‘independent’ entities within-the-world ‘connected’ with the transcending world?” (SZ, p. 351/402).

  38. See also Heidegger (1975, p. 429/302).

  39. For Heidegger’s own defense of the term, see 1975, p. 438/308.

  40. Heidegger (1978, p. 269/208).

  41. Heidegger (1978, p. 274/212).

  42. Heidegger (1978, p. 274/211–212).

  43. “Exactly that which is called immanence in theory of knowledge in a complete inversion of the phenomenal facts, the sphere of the subject, is intrinsically and primarily and alone the transcendent” (1975, p. 425/299).

  44. On this passage, see Crowell (2001, p. 297).

  45. Heidegger (1976, p. 162n59/371).

  46. Heidegger (1975, pp. 19/15 and 21/16).

  47. Kisiel (2005) has assembled much of the evidence regarding Heidegger’s reticence.

  48. Heidegger (1991, p. 224/157).

  49. Dreyfus (1991, pp. 38–39).

  50. Heidegger (1975, p. 437/307–308).

  51. Heidegger (1975, p. 463/325).

  52. Heidegger (1975, p. 33/24, and 1978, pp. 193–194/153).

  53. Heidegger (1975, p. 26/19).

  54. Heidegger (1975, p. 33/24).

  55. Husserl (1969, p. 63/24). Crowell, despite his accurate diagnosis of the Husserl-Heidegger feud (2002), yet sides with Husserl regarding the inappropriateness of the ontic within the ontological (2001, p. 235).

  56. Heidegger (1975, p. 25/18).

  57. Heidegger (1975, p. 26/19).

  58. Heidegger (1975, p. 319/224; 1978, p. 215/168).

  59. Heidegger (1978, p. 268/208).

  60. Heidegger (1978, p. 270/208–209).

  61. Heidegger (1978, p. 271/210).

  62. Heidegger (1991, p. 189/132).

  63. Heidegger (1991, p. 196/137).

  64. Heidegger (1997a, p. 414/367).

  65. Heidegger (1976, p. 159/250).

  66. Heidegger (1967, xvi, translation modified).

  67. In his draft of the Encyclopedia Britannica article, Heidegger expresses these two transcendencies in Husserlian language as follows: “Because the being of everything that can be experienced by the subject in various ways—the transcendent in the broadest sense—is constituted in this pure subjectivity, pure subjectivity is called transcendental subjectivity” (1997c, p. 109).

  68. Heidegger (1976, p. 159/123).

  69. See Sheehan (2001a, p. 15).

  70. Heidegger (1984, p. 161/140).

  71. Heidegger (1984, p. 105/120).

  72. Heidegger (1989, p. 250/176). Dahlstrom (2005, pp. 37–44) and Malpas (2007, pp. 126–134) provide helpful overviews of Heidegger’s criticisms of transcendental philosophy in the Contributions.

  73. See Engelland (2009, pp. 183–185).

  74. See Engelland (2010, pp. 160–165).

  75. Heidegger (1976, p. 187/271).

  76. “This reciprocity of needing and belonging makes up be-ing as appropriation; and the first thing that is incumbent upon thinking is to raise the swinging of this reciprocity [die Schwingung dieses Gegenschwunges] into the simplicity of knowledge and to ground the reciprocity in its truth” (1989, p. 251/177). Sheehan (2001a) explains, “This reciprocity … between the fact that givenness needs its dative … and the dative’s belonging to givenness … is what Heidegger means by das Ereignis, and it is the central topic of his thought” (p. 9).

  77. Heidegger (1997a, p. 414/367; 1967, p. xx).

  78. Heidegger (1989, p. 20/15).

  79. Heidegger (1997a, p. 422/373).

  80. Heidegger (1991, pp. 222–224/156–157; 1989, p. 75/52; and 1983, pp. 15/21 and 25/35).

  81. Heidegger (1989, p. 250/176–177).

  82. See Engelland (2008).

  83. Heidegger (1989, p. 450/317).

  84. Heidegger (1976, p. 159/123).

References

  • Crowell, Steve. 2001. Husserl, Heidegger, and the space of meaning: Paths toward transcendental phenomenology. Evanston, Ill.: Northwestern University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Crowell, Steve. 2002. Does the Husserl/Heidegger feud rest on a mistake? An essay on psychological and transcendental phenomenology. Husserl Studies 18: 123–140.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Crowell, Steve, and Jeff Malpas (eds.). 2007. Transcendental Heidegger. Stanford: Stanford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dahlstrom, Daniel. 2001. Heidegger’s concept of truth. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dahlstrom, Daniel. 2005. Heidegger’s transcendentalism. Research in Phenomenology 35: 29–54.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dahlstrom, Daniel. 2007. Transcendental truth and the truth that prevails. In Transcendental Heidegger, ed. Steve Crowell, and Jeff Malpas, 63–73. Stanford: Stanford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dreyfus, Hubert. 1991. Being-in-the-world: A commentary on Heidegger’s ‘Being and Time’, division I. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Engelland, Chad. 2008. Heidegger on overcoming rationalism through transcendental philosophy. Continental Philosophy Review 41: 17–41.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Engelland, Chad. 2009. The Phenomenological motivation of the later Heidegger. Philosophy Today 53 (supplement):182–189.

    Google Scholar 

  • Engelland, Chad. 2010. The phenomenological Kant: Heidegger’s interest in transcendental philosophy. Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology 41: 150–169.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gelven, Michael. 1989. A commentary on Heidegger’s ‘Being and Time’, rev. ed ed. DeKalb, IL: Northern Illinois University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Heidegger, Martin. 1967. Vorwort. In Heidegger: Through phenomenology to thought, ed. William Richardson, viii–xxiii. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff.

    Google Scholar 

  • Heidegger, Martin. 1975. Die Grundprobleme der Phänomenologie (Gesamtausgabe 24), ed. Friedrich-Wilhelm von Herrmann. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann [The basic problems of phenomenology, rev. ed. (trans: Albert Hofstadter). Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1982].

  • Heidegger, Martin. 1976. Wegmarken (Gesamtausgabe 9), ed. Friedrich-Wilhelm von Herrmann. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann [Pathmarks, ed. William McNeill. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998].

  • Heidegger, Martin. 1978. Metaphysische Anfangsgründe der Logik im Ausgang von Leibniz (Gesamtausgabe 26), ed. Klaus Held. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann [The Metaphysical foundations of logic (trans: Michael Heim). Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1984].

  • Heidegger, Martin. 1979. Prolegomena zur Geschichte des Zeitbegriffs (Gesamtausgabe 20), ed. Petra Jaeger. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann [History of the concept of time: Prolegomena (trans: Theodore Kisiel). Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1985].

  • Heidegger, Martin. 1983. Einführung in die Metaphysik (Gesamtausgabe 40), ed. Petra Jaeger. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann [Introduction to metaphysics (trans: Gregory Fried and Richard Polt). New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000].

  • Heidegger, Martin. 1984. Grundfragen der Philosophie: Ausgewählte ‘Probleme’ der ‘Logik’ (Gesamtausgabe 45), ed. Friedrich-Wilhelm von Herrmann. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann [Basic questions of philosophy: Selected ‘problems’ of ‘logic,’ (trans: Richard Rojcewicz and André Schuwer). Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994].

  • Heidegger, Martin. 1989. Beiträge zur Philosophie (Vom Ereignis) (Gesamtausgabe 65), ed. Friedrich-Wilhelm von Herrmann. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann [Contributions to philosophy (From enowning) (trans: Parvis Emad and Kenneth Maly). Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999].

  • Heidegger, Martin. 1991. Kant und das Problem der Metaphysik (Gesamtausgabe 3), ed. Friedrich-Wilhelm von Herrmann Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann [Kant and the problem of metaphysics, 4th ed. (trans: Richard Taft). Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1996].

  • Heidegger, Martin. 1992. Platon: Sophistes (Gesamtausgabe 19), ed. Ingeborg Schüßler. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann [Plato’s ‘Sophist,’ (trans: Richard Rojcewicz and André Schuwer). Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997].

  • Heidegger, Martin. 1997a. Besinnung (Gesamtausgabe 66), ed. Friedrich-Wilhelm von Herrmann. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann [Mindfulness (trans: Parvis Emad and Thomas Kalary). London: Continuum, 2006].

  • Heidegger, Martin. 1997b. For Edmund Husserl on his seventieth birthday, April 8, 1929. Trans. Thomas Sheehan. In Psychological and transcendental phenomenology and the confrontation with Heidegger (1927–1931), ed. Thomas Sheehan, and Richard Palmer, 475–477. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Heidegger, Martin. 1997c. ‘Phenomenology’, Draft B (of the Encylopaedia Britannica Article), with Heidegger’s letter to Husserl. Trans. Thomas Sheehan. In Psychological and transcendental phenomenology and the confrontation with Heidegger (1927–1931), ed. Thomas Sheehan, and Richard Palmer, 107–146. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Heidegger, Martin. 2001. Sein und Zeit, 18th ed. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag [Being and Time (trans: John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson). New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1962].

  • Husserl, Edmund. 1969. Cartesian meditations (trans: Dorion, Cairns). The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff.

    Google Scholar 

  • Husserl, Edmund. 1998. Ideas pertaining to a pure phenomenology and to a phenomenological philosophy. First book: General introduction to a pure phenomenology (trans: Kersten, F.). Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kisiel, Theodore. 2005. The demise of ‘Being and Time’: 1927–1930. In Heidegger’s ‘Being and Time’: Critical essays, ed. Richard Polt, 189–214. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.

    Google Scholar 

  • Malpas, Jeff. 2006. Heidegger’s topology: Being, place, world. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Malpas, Jeff. 2007. Heidegger’s topology of being. In Transcendental Heidegger, ed. Steven Galt Crowell, and Jeff Malpas, 119–134. Stanford: Stanford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Polt, R. 1999. Heidegger: An introduction. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rockmore, Tom (ed.). 2000. Heidegger, German Idealism, and Neo-Kantianism. Amherst, NY: Humanity Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sheehan, Thomas. 2001a. Kehre and Ereignis: A prolegomenon to Introduction to metaphysics. In A companion to Heidegger’s ‘Introduction to metaphysics’, ed. Richard Polt, and Gregory Fried, 3–16. New Haven: Yale University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sheehan, Thomas. 2001b. A paradigm shift in Heidegger research. Continental Philosophy Review 34: 183–202.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Philosophy, John Carroll University, 28700 Euclid Avenue, Wickliffe, OH, 44092, USA

    Chad Engelland

Authors
  1. Chad Engelland
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Chad Engelland.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Engelland, C. Disentangling Heidegger’s transcendental questions. Cont Philos Rev 45, 77–100 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11007-011-9209-2

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11007-011-9209-2

Keywords

Search

Navigation