A. «Anticipation of Death,» and «Resoluteness»

In his Foundations of the Entire Science of Knowledge , Fichte elaborates on all those acts of the self that do not appear among the empirical states of consciousness but rather make empirical consciousness possible. Among them is an act Fichte refers to in the sentence «The self posits itself as determined by the not-self. »1 This act gives rise to the assumption that in the self the opposite of «activity»2 is posited. Fichte calls this opposite «Leiden.» 3 In everyday language, Leiden (suffering) or leiden (to suffer) is a straightforward word

signifying experiences of pain. A person can «leiden an einer Krankheit» (suffer an illness) or «Schmerz leiden» (suffer pain), either physically or mentally. However, we mustn't think of these meanings when it comes to the acts of the self. Thus, Fichte adds a note in which he not only points to the inappropriateness of «painful feeling» with regard to pure consciousness but even declares «painful feeling» to be a mere «connotation» of Leiden.4 At a significant point, the English translators of Heidegger's Sein und Zeit , John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson, thought one should keep a phrase of Heidegger's clean of its everyday meaning. In contrast to Fichte, however, they did not use the corresponding English everyday word in order, thereafter, to cleanse it of its everyday meaning. Rather, they translated it in such a way that its everyday meaning could no longer be recognized at all. They translated as «anticipation ,» «anticipatory resoluteness ,» and «anticipation of death» (BT 349, 349, 350,

353) what in the German text reads as «Vorlaufen,» «vorlaufende Entschlossenheit, » and «Vorlaufen zum Tode» (SZ 302), or «Vorlaufen in den Tod» (SZ 305). They cannot be blamed for this, since in a note they remark on the German word «vorlaufen» and its literal meaning, «running ahead» (BT 350, n. 1). Heidegger's language is difficult even for native German speakers and even more difficult to translate into other languages. Yet, one might regret that in the English translation the emphasis has shifted or has even been reversed. «Anticipation» and «to anticipate» refer primarily to a mental activity, whereas the phrase «to run (ahead)» is primarily used for a physical motion. In German this difference is even more pronounced, for antizipieren (also vorwegnehmen and vorhersehen) exclusively designates mental activities and never physical motions, whereas «vorlaufen» is used exclusively for physical motions and never for mental ones.5

Furthermore, if one anticipates (antizipiert, vorhersieht) some situation or event, one assumes that there is a temporal difference between the moment of anticipation and the occurrence of the anticipated situation. It is this time difference that allows one to prepare oneself in thought or action for this situation in order to get out of its way or to benefit from it or even to gamer support from others. However, with vorlaufen one does just the opposite. Someone läuft vor when he leaves a group, a place, or a house he has been in so far and runs out, alone, into the open. In doing so one often exposes oneself to insecurities and dangers from which one had previously been protected by the group or house. Thus, vorlaufen is often the crossing of a line that, as in the case of the Greek city wall (the

, the

,

, the definition), provides the individual inside with shelter from, and identity in opposition to, the dangerous, undefined outside. As long as I am inside the walls, I am able to anticipate the moves of the enemy outside who beleaguers me; correspondingly, I can anticipate and strategically plan my future moves. However, as soon as I laufe vor, I deprive myself of this safety zone as well as of the time difference and expose myself immediately to the

dangers of the outside from which I had previously been protected. Thus, a Vorlaufen is an Übersetzung from one's secure place, one's

within one's own city, into the insecure and dangerous open. A Vorlaufen is by no means an anticipation of danger. Rather, I immediately expose myself to the danger precisely by abandoning the security I had hitherto relied on in my earlier acts of anticipation. To summarize: When one läuft vor, one annihilates the interval between the moment of anticipation and the occurrence of the anticipated situation; one abandons the shelter of the wall, which enabled one to anticipate dangers and to prepare oneself for them, and one runs straight ahead into the dangers outside the wall. Detractors of the security within walls and definitions, however, will say that in the moment of danger, or decision, one's

, one's proper, or authentic, place is outside where the danger is, amid the seductions and dangers of war, madness, and eros. The place within, the actual city, they say, is either boring or has already become endangered by some foe outside or inside itself. (That the inhabitants don't notice this danger is just a further proof of how threatening the situation has become.) Thus, one has to run ahead, to run out, in order to get rid of the city or in order to return and save, or reshape, the city.

Since «to anticipate» does not have the sense of physical motion, the translation forecloses the associations that could hardly have been avoided by German readers who «ran into» Heidegger's phrase in the years between World War I and World War II. «Entschlossen in den Tod vorlaufen» (to resolutely run ahead into death) was how the acts of those who were later called the «Helden von Langemarck» (heroes of Langemarck) were characterized. World War I was the first war characterized largely by trench warfare. The front lines hardened quickly. Entrenched, the armies lay opposite each other. This situation could have gone on for years and years, with sufficient materiel and Daseine as, in the later Heidegger's term, «standing-reserve [Bestand ]» (BW 298; VA 20)6 or «human resources» (BW 299; «Menschenmaterial,» VA 21). Already in November 1914, however, the «Helden von Langemarck,» young German students, most of them Freiwillige (volunteers), had stepped out of the trenches into the open and, with the German national anthem on their lips, had run toward the French trenches. In terms of military strategy, this was sheer suicide and completely counterproductive. Nonetheless, or precisely because of this, they became the paradigm—the myth in the sense of Georges Sorel's Reflections on Violence —for all other German soldiers. As one can read in books on World War I written by conservative or right-wing authors, every German soldier was supposed to be capable of doing the same and had to follow, to imitate, or to repeat the actions of these «Helden yon Langemarck» in order to become himself a «Held.» The most outstanding ones proved to be the «Helden von Verdun» (heroes of Verdun). Through their actions, these «Helden» gave rise to one of the most powerful myths of the political Right in the years of the Weimar Republic. The «Helden von

Langemarck» and the «Helden von Verdun» symbolized the resoluteness and the gallantry of «der deutsche Soldat» (the German soldier). He would have won the war if only he had received sufficient support from the «Heimat-front» (the home front). Such was the stuff of the so-called Dolchstoßlegende (the legend of the «stab in the back») according to which the Helden were not killed by French bullets coming toward them from the front, but were stabbed in the back by those at home. In this way the German loss of the First World War could be attributed to the «vaterlandslose Gesellen» (unpatriotic knaves), including communists, social democrats, Jews, and liberals, who—as those who propagated the legend of the «stab in the back» maintained—through lack of enthusiasm, subversive activities, and creeping apathy reneged upon the brave promise represented by the «Helden von Langemarck.»7

One might feel tempted to use the situation of the «Helden von Langemarck» as the methodological ideal type to interpret Heidegger's concept of resoluteness (Entschlossenheit). Yet, even without it, one cannot overlook an ambivalence of the German word Entschlossenheit that Heidegger entschlossen exploits and that many of his concepts share, namely, to have an active as well as a passive aspect. Entschlossenheit is the noun form of entschlossen (sein) (to be determined or to be resolute). Entschlossen, in turn, is the perfect participle of (sich) entschließen for instance, ins Kino zu gehen (to determine [oneself] to go to a movie, to decide to go to a movie). Entschließen consists of the prefix «ent-» and the verb «schließen» (to close, to shut, to lock, to finish, to end, to terminate). Looking back on one's decision one says, «Ich habe mich (dazu) entschlossen (, ins Kino zu gehen)» (I have decided [to go to a movie]). As the result of such a decision, «man ist entschlossen» (one is determined, one is resolved). One uses this phrase, «Ich bin entschlossen» (I am resolved) mainly to indicate that one's mind is made up. Thus, if someone doubts my decision, I reply by adding to «Ich bin entschlossen» the adverb «unwiderruflich!» (Ruf is call, thus, irrevocably! Or beyond recall; one might also say «Unwidermflich! Diese Sache ist für mich abgeschlossen.» Beyond recall! For me this issue is settled, or finished.) As already the grammar of this sequence shows, by making a decision one brings oneself into a stable state, the state of resoluteness (Entschlossenheit). Being in the state of resoluteness, that is, having made the final decision, a person manifests activity and strength. In the state of resoluteness, he can no longer be seduced by the many voices talking to him. That is, «er hat sich abge schlossen (gegen diese Stimmen).» Abgeschlossen is the perfect participle of the verb «abschließen,» which consists of the prefix «ab-» and the verb «schließen»; thus, «abschließen» is «to lock up» or «to seal off» (and also to close, to end, to terminate). Thus, «Er hat sich abgeschlossen gegen diese Stimmen» is: He has locked himself up, or closed himself off, against these voices. (One might also say, he has sich selbst verschlossen [locked up himself] against these voices; thus, he is verschlossen against them, he has become

«unzugänglich [inaccessible] to these voices.») In an old metaphor, having made the decision, the resolute person no longer belongs to the «

» as Parmenides says,8 to the two-headed mortals, the many, or the «they.» The two-headed crowd, or rather, each Dasein that has been living and continues to live in the mode of the «they» does not have the strength to make a decision. Thus, such a Dasein vacillates between being and non-being; it vacillates between several voices, now listening to this one and now to that. In the architecture and aesthetics during Nazism, Arnold Breker's sculptures were the most obvious incarnations of the resolute person. They call on the viewer to make a decision and to remain entschlossen.

As for its active aspect, Entschlossenheit testifies to strength and steadfastness as well as to the ability to remain closed to, or inaccessible to, the many promptings of the multiple voices here and there. At the same time, however, one has also opened oneself. With the decision one has become inaccessible to the many voices and has opened oneself to one particular voice. One has «sich entschlossen,» that is, opened up, or unlocked, oneself. Be-decken or zu-decken means «to cover (up),» «to shield,» or «to protect,» and ent-decken means «to discover.» Ver-schleiern, or ver-hüllen, means «to veil» or «to disguise,» and ent-schleiern, or ent-hüllen, means «to unveil» or «to reveal.»9 Thus, the prefix «ent-» often indicates an opening or uncovering. One has «sich entschlossen,» that is, «sich auf geschlossen.» «Auf-geschlossen» is the perfect participle of the composite aufschließen, which consists of the prefix «auf-» and the verb schließen. When one is in the state of Entschlossenheit, one has «sich aufgeschlossen für» (unlocked oneself for, or opened oneself for), one is «geöffnet» (opened for) or «offen für» (open for), or one has opened oneself for something; for example, Christians have opened themselves to grace; those on the political Right of the Weimar Republic had opened themselves to «die Stimme des Volkes» (the voice of the people), to the people, or even to the race. By opening oneself one becomes the receptive vessel into which mysterious entities like grace or race pour, mysterious entities calling for obedience, giving one clear directions, and providing one with the identity, spirit, and life that, consciously or unconsciously, one has lacked until one heard their call. (In fact, in these cases the perfect participles are identical in the active and the passive voice; thus, «ich habe mich entschlossen» is «I have decided/resolved/ unlocked myself»; «Ich bin entschlossen» is «I am resolved,» in the sense of «I have made up my mind,» but it might also be read as «I have been decided upon/resolved upon/unlocked [by someone for something]»; equally, «Ich bin aufgeschlossen» might be read as «I have been unlocked [by someone for something]»; as «Ich bin abgeschlossen» might be read as «I have been locked up/closed [by someone against something]»; in this sense, one might read «Ich bin offen» as «I have been opened/unlocked [by someone for something].») Thus, Heidegger's concept of Entschlossenheit might contain a promise, namely, the promise that one would get rid of the loneliness and isolation of

bourgeois subjectivity and of the necessity to make decisions for oneself, by becoming a passive vessel and member of the community of the people. It was this promise that made the Jugendbewegung (Youth Movement) and other right-wing groups so attractive.10

I commented on Heidegger's notions of «Vofiaufen in den Tod» and «Entschlossenheit» because, after an introductory paragraph, it is with an amalgam of these two notions that Heidegger begins his discussion of historicality:

We have defined "resoluteness" {Entschlossenheit} as a projecting of oneself upon one's own Being-guilty—a projecting which is reticent and ready for anxiety. Resoluteness gains its authenticity as anticipatory resoluteness {vorlaufende Entschlossenheit}. In this, Dasein understands itself with regard to its potentiality-for-Being, and it does so in such a manner that it will go right under the eyes of Death in order thus to take over in its thrownness that entity which it is itself, and to take it over wholly. (BT 434; SZ 382)

As is probably hard to imagine for readers in the United States at the end of this century, with the associations surrounding these sentences Heidegger, right at the beginning of his discussion, in a way sets the tone, creates the atmosphere, or evokes—to use one of his pet terms—the «mood» typical of conservative or fight-wing thinking about history and politics at the time. In addition, the two notions «Vofiaufen in den Tod» and «Entschlossenheit» contain, as it were, in a nutshell the fight-wing understanding of history and the individual's position in it. For reasons that will become clear, in the next sections I turn to the end of Heidegger's argument in section 74 in order then to make my way back to the beginning and into the context of section 74.

From the viewpoint of the resolute person, the two-headed crowds, with all their vacillating, are verschlossen against the call. Due to their inability and pigheadedness they are not able, or are not willing, to open themselves up and to make themselves free for the one voice they should listen to and obey, namely, that of the people. Being verschlossen to the one and real voice, they are, one might say, verfallen to the many voices.11 From their viewpoint, in turn, the resolute person might look as though he has given up his identity and autonomy, as though, in an extreme formulation, he has sacrificed himself to some «higher» entity. Anyway, as is known, Heidegger assumes that Dasein lives for the most part in the mode of the «they,» that is, as ordinary Dasein. Ordinary Dasein just takes over what parents, peer group, etc., have instilled into it. Heidegger's usage of the terms «ordinary» and «inau-thentic» seems not always to be consistent. As I will justify and elaborate in chapter 2, I use the notions with reference to the situation when the call raises its voice. Prior to the call, all Daseine are ordinary Daseine. Once the call raises its voice, some ordinary Daseine don't listen to the call or try to evade it (BT 318f., 323, 335ff., 443f.; SZ 274, 278, 289ff., 391). These Daseine become inauthentic. Other ordinary Daseine, however, listen to the call (BT

317ff.; SZ 272ff). These Daseine become authentic Daseine. How do they respond to the call? In section 74 Heidegger encapsulates his answer in a short and enigmatic sentence: «Die Wiederholung erwidert vielmehr die Möglichkeit der dagewesenen Existenz» (SZ 386; «Rather, the repetition makes a reciprocative rejoinder to the possibility of that existence which has-been-there,» BT 438). The German verb «erwidern» can have several and even contradictory meanings. Only a careful examination of the context will show what Heidegger meant.12

B. «Erwidert» («Reciprocative Rejoinder»)

In an interview with Andreas Isenschmidt for Swiss radio, broadcast on 9 October 1987, Hans Jonas remarked upon the characteristic of «authenticity» («Eigentlichkeit») as resoluteness: «You must resolve something for yourself. Resoluteness as such, not for what or against what one resolves oneself, but that one resolves oneself becomes the authentic signature of authentic Dasein. Opportunities to resolve oneself are, however, offered by historicity» (MH 201). Richard Wolin seems to give this a twist: «A philosophy of existence such as Heidegger's presupposes that all traditional contents and truths have lost their substance; and thus all that remains is naked facticity , that is, the sheer fact of existence. Thus, unlike traditional hermeneutics, which believes that the past contains a store of semantic potentials that are inherently worthy of redemption, Existenzphilosophie in its Heideggerian variant tends to be inherently destructive of tradition» (PB 32). At the beginning of his essay "History and Commitment in the Early Heidegger," Charles Guignon quotes this passage from Wolin as well as Habermas' s characterization of resoluteness as «the decisionism of empty resoluteness»13 and sets his interpretation of Heidegger's concept of action against that backdrop. According to Guignon, Wolin and Habermas assume «that Heidegger regards choice and action as resting on a kind of "leap," in a "moment of vision," cut off from all bonds to traditional social standards and moral ideals» (HC 130). Guignon, on the other hand, argues that «Being and Time is working toward a notion of what Charles Taylor calls "situated freedom," an understanding of action as nested in and guided by a range of meaningful, historically constituted possibilities, which are binding on us because they define who we are» (HC 131). He presents comments on several concepts in Heidegger and concludes with an interpretation of section 74 that consists of three passages. Two of these I quote here completely since I will refer to them several times later on. In the first passage, Guignon claims that

Heidegger's account of authentic historicity expands the conception of authentic agency by (1) showing how we draw guidance from the past, and (2) providing an account of action as the transmission and realization of a tradition.

First, the discussion of the individual's grounding in the past comes across in the description of authenticity as involving "repetition" or "retrieval." When Dasein "explicitly" grasps its indebtedness to "the way in which Dasein has been traditionally understood," according to Heidegger, it grasps its own actions as drawing on and making manifest the possibilities opened by a shared heritage. Authentic Dasein "chooses its hero" and is "free for the struggle of loyally following in the footsteps of that which can be repeated" (BT , 437). What is suggested here is that, when one understands oneself as relying on "the Dasein which has been there," one draws a role-model or exemplar from the heroes and heroines of the past and uses that model as a guide for orienting one's life. The paradigmatic stories of our predecessors provide plot-lines, so to speak, for articulating our own lives into coherent, focused happenings. This is most apparent, of course, in the way religious people draw on the lives of the saints or on Old Testament stories in defining their aims. But it is also true for people in professions (Socrates for philosophers, Florence Nightingale for nurses), for cultural groups (Sitting Bull for Native Americans, Martin Luther King for American blacks), and so on. Following the guidelines of the life of the Dasein who came before, the authentic individual finds a sense of direction and an awareness of his or her place in the wider drama of the historical culture. Only in this way, Heidegger claims, can one achieve genuine "self-constancy" and "connectedness" (BT , 439, 442).

Secondly, authentic historicity shows how our agency contributes to the transmission of a tradition. This aspect of historicity is worked out in the account of authentic historiography. Heidegger starts from the familiar observation that writing history always involves "selection," and that the ability to select what can count as historically relevant requires that we operate with some understanding of the overall outcome or impact of the unfolding course of events. For this reason, "Even the disclosure of historiography {sic } temporalizes itself in terms of the future " (BT , 447). Our ability to identify what genuinely matters in the events of the past depends on our ability to grasp history as a "context of effectiveness and development" which is seen as adding up to something as a totality—as going somewhere or making sense overall. (HC 136f.; n. 12 refers to Heidegger, Frühe Schriften [Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1972], 369)

In the second passage, Guignon comments on these two points in terms of Heidegger's reference to Nietzsche's The Use and Abuse of History for Life in section 76 (HC 137f.). In the third passage, he interprets authentic Dasein's attitude toward its present and future as follows:

Finally, authentic historiography is critical. But it is critical not in Nietzsche's sense of "judging and annihilating a past." Instead, for Heidegger, critique is aimed at the "today": authentic historiography "becomes a way in which the 'today' gets deprived of its character as present; in other words, it becomes a way of painfully detaching oneself from the fallen {sic } publicness of the 'today'" (BT , 449). As critical, authentic historiography requires a "disavowal

of that which in the 'today' is working itself out as the past," that is, a "destructuring" of the hardened interpretations circulating in the public world in order to recover "those primordial experiences in which we achieved our first ways of determining the nature of Being—the ways which have guided us ever since" (BT , 438, 44). The critical stance "deprives the 'today' of its character as present , and weans one from the conventionalities of the 'they' " (BT , 444). Heidegger's claim here is that it is only on the basis of utopian ideals together with a sense/of alternative ways of living discovered by antiquarian preservation that we can have a standpoint for criticizing calcified forms of life of the present. The present can be seen as deformed or defective only in contrast to an understanding of the potential built into our heritage and the truest aims definitive of our destiny. The account of authentic historiography in Being and Time is clearly not just a recipe for writing better history books. Rather, historiography becomes a model for authentic action. Authentic Dasein understands its fundamental task as the preservation and transmission of its historical culture for the purposes of realizing a shared destiny. As transmitters of a tradition, it is incumbent on us to seize on the defining possibilities of our common world, to creatively reinterpret them in the light of the demands of the present, and to take a stand on realizing the prospects for the future. As always, the future is primary. Just as the life of the individual is primarily defined by its "being-towards-the-end," so the community's being is defined by its directedness towards its "destiny," that is, the task of working out the basic experiences that define it. (HC 138)

Clearly, according to Guignon, Heidegger stresses the need for utopian ideals for a critique of the forms of life of the present, and, ontologically, the primacy of utopian ideals is grounded in the primacy of the future. It seems to be clear as well that there are several heroes, Socrates, Martin Luther King, Florence Nightingale, Sitting Bull, and others. However, how and from where we get the utopian ideals is not so clear. Also, Guignon's use of the singular and the plural seems to be confusing. In the second quote, he speaks first of «alternative ways of living discovered by antiquarian preservation,» then of «a tradition,» after this of «defining possibilities of our common world,» which we have to «creatively reinterpret . . . in the light of the demands of the present.» However, given the necessity of utopian ideals, Guignon's use of the singular and the plural is fully justified. Only the utopian ideals enable us to discover several alternative ways the past offers and then to choose among them that one way or that one tradition we establish as binding for ourselves. Both the utopian ideals and this single tradition we choose enable us to criticize the forms of life of the present. But Guignon's interpretation may have a second aspect, namely, that there is no single binding way, or tradition, at all. Rather, the utopian ideals enable us to «creatively reinterpret» not only the forms of life of the present but also the different ways of life of the past that still exist, albeit in calcified forms. Thus, according to one's utopian ideal one might choose not Sitting Bull, but rather Socrates as his hero. Socrates

himself, however, does not determine what use his adherent makes of him or how he interprets and, maybe, at a later time reinterprets Socrates. In this second aspect, it is clear that the utopian ideals enable us to distance ourselves not only from the present but also from the past. However, even without the second aspect the utopian ideals make our distancing from the past possible insofar as it is only on the basis of those ideals that we can see the multiplicity of possible heroes offered by the past. And only because of that can we then choose among them and select that one tradition we regard as binding for ourselves. Even if one leaves aside the process of singling out a tradition from several alternative ways of life by means of an utopian ideal and looks only at the last paragraph of the second quotation, our relationship to the tradition we transmit entails the ability to distance ourselves from its specific forms in the present and thus from the past itself. For the utopian ideals also enable us to «creatively reinterpret» the specific forms in which the tradition we transmit is alive. Thus, Guignon seems to focus on a distancing from the past as the bottom line of Heidegger's concept of historicality. In the light of our utopian ideals we distance ourselves from the present and the past as from some monolithic bloc. In so doing, we see that the past contains several different possibilities and heroes. The choice of one single hero requires that we can distance ourselves from all the other possible heroes, and we can do this only thanks to our utopian ideal. The utopian ideal, in turn, is not derived from the past but enables us to choose among all possible heroes the one who fits our ideal. Without this utopian ideal we would remain immersed in an unchallenged present or in a multifariousness of heroes without being able to distance ourselves from them and to single out the tradition we regard as binding for ourselves.

If this is a fair summary of Guignon's interpretation, he seems to interpret the very important sentence on «erwidert» («reciprocative rejoinder») preceding the one with the phrase he quotes («a disavowal of that which in the "today", is working itself out as the 'past' ») as Macquarrie and Robinson do in their translation of Sein und Zeit . Their translation reads:

Arising, as it does, from a resolute projection of oneself, repetition does not let itself be persuaded of something by what is 'past', just in order that this, as something which was formerly actual, may recur. Rather, the repetition makes a reciprocative rejoinder to the possibility of that existence which has-been-there. But when such a rejoinder is made to this possibility in a resolution, it is made in a moment of vision; and as such it is at the same time a disavowal of that which in the "today", is working itself out as the 'past'. (BT 437f.)

In the note accompanying this passage, the translators give Heidegger's German text and add their comment on the entire passage:

'Die Wiederholung lässt sich, einem entschlossenen Sichentwerfen entspringend, nicht vom "Vergangenen"überreden, um es als das vormals Wirkliche nur

wiederkehren zu lassen. Die Wiederholung erwidert vielmehr die Möglichkeit der dagewesenen Existenz. Die Erwiderung der Möglichkeit im Entschluss ist aber zugleich als augenblickliche der Widerruf dessen, was in {sic } Heute sich als "Vergangenheit" auswirkt.' The idea seems to be that in resolute repetition one is having, as it were, a conversation with the past, in which the past proposes certain possibilities for adoption, but in which one makes a rejoinder to this proposal by 'reciprocating' with the proposal of other possibilities as a sort of rebuke to the past, which one now disavows. (The punning treatment of 'wieder' and 'wider' is presumably intentional.) (BT 438, n. 1)

To be in a position of having a conversation with the past with its several possibilities that we can adopt, reject, or reinterpret presupposes that we are in a free relationship to the past, whether or not we are so only through utopian ideals. Only this position of free distance from the past, that is, one in which the past does not determine us—at least not completely—enables us to have this conversation, that is, to consider all the possibilities offered by the past, to reject several, to adopt some, and to reinterpret them.

To be sure, the first sentence on the denial of a simple recurrence of the past awakens the expectation that in the following sentence, this distance between the present and the past that cannot simply recur is further explained, stressed, and deepened. Furthermore, the German word «erwidern» seems to fit this purpose exactly. For if we are in a position to be able to make an Erwiderung (response, reciprocation, reciprocative rejoinder), we are free to reject, that is, we can choose freely between several possibilities in the sense of Macquarrie and Robinson's «conversation with the past.» However, in German, in cases like these, one uses «erwidern» not in the accusative but rather in the dative; that is, one would have expected Heidegger to write «erwidert vielmehr der Möglichkeit der dagewesenen Existenz.» For, grammatically, the recipient of an Erwiderung in this sense is the dative object of the sentence. For example, someone has told me to leave the room, but I «erwidere ihm "Nein!"» (I respond to him "No!"), «Ich erwidere ihm , daß ich den Raum nicht vedassen werde» (I respond to him that I will not leave the room). The other person, in turn, might erwidern something to my Erwiderung and so on until we reach an agreement. Thus, we would have, as it were, conversations with all the heroes and would then erwidern to all but one of them that we have considered them but have decided not to adopt them and instead will adopt another one with whom we also had a conversation and who has convinced us. However, in Heidegger's sentence the addressee of the Erwiderung is the accusative object of the sentence («erwidert vielmehr die Möglichkeit der dagewesenen Existenz»).

There is a usage of the German verb «erwidern,» not in the dative, but in the accusative that meets the expectation that in the sentence in question Heidegger heightens the distance between the present and the past and according to which this distance would be even more pronounced than is suggested in the

interpretation of Guignon and the translators who allow Dasein finally to adopt or to identify itself with some hero offered by the past. For «erwidern» in the accusative can be used in the sense of «defending oneself against» or «fighting back.» For instance, in a sports competition, party A, a soccer team or a fencer, launches an attack against party B, and if B can defend itself or even launch a counterattack against A, one might summarize this by saying, «B has erwidert A's attack.» Wolin does not comment on the sentence with «erwidert,» but he might have thought of this sentence in connection with his argument that Heidegger's philosophy of existence «tends to be inherently destructive of tradition» (PB 32). Birmingham, however, has explicitly adopted this interpretation, or rather an even stronger one, in her essay "The Time of the Political." Inserting «(Erwidert)» after «reciprocative rejoinder,» she quotes Macquarrie and Robinson's translation from «The repeating of that which is possible does not bring again . . .» to «a disavowal of that which in the "today", is working itself out as the 'past'» (BT 437-438; SZ 385-386), and comments on it as follows:

Macquarrie and Robinson's translation of Erwidert as "reciprocative rejoinder" conveys too great a sense of a return understood as identity: I reply to you in the same way that you did to me. In more militaristic terms, I return the strike in the same way that I received it. But clearly the passage above suggests. something different. The response to repeatable historical possibilities is one which disavows any notion of continuity or identity with the past. Here a reference to the preposition "wider " meaning "contrary to or against" is helpful in grasping Heidegger's sense of reply as Erwidert . The reply or response to historical possibilities is precisely that which disrupts identity and continuity. Dasein's authentic reply in the Augenblick to historical possibilities (Erwidert ), is the site of resistance and displacement. In still other words, Dasein's critical reply in the Augenblick marks the hiatus between the no-longer and not-yet, refuting the notion of history as a continuum.

Therefore, Dasein's critical reply (Erwidert ) to repeatable historical possibilities calls into question the repetitive, narrative mode of legitimation. (TP 31)14

However, these are not the only ways to use erwidern in the accusative. Most of the time, erwidern in the accusative is used in the sense of the Greek

. Someone has done me a favor, and now I'm obliged to return that favor, as the second act within the old institution of

, grace, charity, as the binding glue of each society and between different societies.15 Someone has given me a present, has sent me a letter, or has visited me. According to the rules of charity, I am obliged to give a gift, write a letter, or pay a visit in return, that is, «I will erwidern the present, letter, or visit.» Since Heidegger elsewhere talks about «Ruf» (call) and «Anruf» (appeal, phone call) and since «Anruf» is used mainly for making a phone call, one might have had one's answering machine switched on: «Ich erwidere Ihren

Anruf so bald es mir möglich ist» (I'll return your call as soon as possible) if there had been answering machines in the 1920s. Anyway, «einen Anruf erwidern» was a common phrase at that time.16 16 Or, suppose Mr. Jones has fallen in love with Ms. Smith and, hoping she would love him too, declares his love to her. However, Ms. Smith doesn't love him at all, but rather feels somewhat annoyed by his declaration and tells him so. Thus, in a narrative to her friend, Ms. Smith might use erwidern in the dative and tell her «And I erwiderte ihm "No! I'm sorry, I don't love you at all".» However, if she did love him and let him know her love, one would use erwidern in the accusative in a narrative about this: «And she erwiderte his love.» Or take the German sentence «Die Berge erwidern meinen Ruf» (the mountains erwidern my call). It is a common, somewhat poetical, German expression for «echo.» Finally, «Sie erwiderte meinen Hilferuf» (She erwiderte my call for help). One might use this sentence to summarize that when person A called for help, person B (that is, B is the one who «erwidert A's call for help») actually helped A deal with his or her predicament. This is the opposite of erwidern as counterattack and of erwidern in the dative as well. For in a counterattack one erwidert if one resists some attack or demand, defends oneself against it, or even launches an attack of one's own. In cases like the call for help, however, one erwidert this call precisely by complying with it. Heidegger's sentence does not give any indication of which sense of «erwidern» in the accusative he meant. However, as I will show in what follows, the context of this sentence rules out not only Guignon's but also Birmingham's interpretation.

C. «Repetition,» «Handing down,» and « Erwidert»

Right at the beginning of section 74, Heidegger reminds readers that «resoluteness gains its authenticity as anticipatory resoluteness. In this, Dasein understands itself with regard to its potentiality-for-Being, and it does so in such a manner that it will go right under the eyes of Death in order thus to take over in its thrownness that entity which it is itself, and to take it over wholly. The resolute taking over of one's factical 'there', signifies, at the same time, that the Situation is one which has been resolved upon» (BT 434; SZ 382f.). Concerning possible resolutions in particular cases, he then says that «we must ask whence, in general , Dasein can draw those possibilities upon which it factically projects itself» (BT 434; SZ 383). It is within this context that Heidegger writes the notorious passages on heritage, destiny, fate, struggle, and «the community, of a {sic } people» (BT 435-437; SZ 383-385),17 on which I will comment in chapters 2 and 3. However, I would like to point out already here that it is important to note that probably already «Erbe» (SZ 383; «heritage» BT 435), but at any rate surely «Schicksal» (SZ 384; «fate,» BT 435) and «Geschick,» that is, «das Geschehen der Gemeinschaft, des Volkes» (SZ 384; «destiny . . . the historizing of the community, of {the}

people,» BT 436) are something only authentic Dasein gets in touch with by detaching itself from the «they» and by running ahead toward death. Furthermore, those terms («heritage,» «fate,» «community,» «people») appear only in the singular and mainly with the definite article. The plural, «individual fates,» «our fates,» occurs only so that these individual fates can be tied back to «destiny » in the singular (SZ 384; BT 436). Finally, in this entire section on «destiny » there is not the slightest hint of any concept of an utopian ideal that is different from the past and might guide the conversation with the past. What Heidegger concretely means by «vorlaufende Entschlossenheit» (SZ 382; «anticipatory resoluteness,» BT 434), would be closer to what Hans Jonas characterizes as the «tormented self» (MH 199). Every Dasein—the ordinary, the authentic, and the inauthentic Dasein—is ecstatic and futural, and some ordinary Dasein might have some futural utopia. But ordinary Dasein is what authentic Dasein must detach itself from. However, «painfully detaching oneself from the falling {verfallenden} publicness of the "today"» (BT 449; SZ 397) authentic Dasein runs into something that in itself cannot offer any positive utopian ideals: «One's anticipatory projection of oneself on that possibility of existence which is not to be outstripped—on death—guarantees only the totality and authenticity of one's resoluteness. But those possibilities of existence which have been factically disclosed are not to be gathered from death» (BT 434; SZ 383). Therefore, either there is no utopian ideal at all, or this utopian ideal is the very past itself, the community of the people that discloses itself to authentic Dasein in Dasein's running ahead to death, and to which Dasein «hands itself down» (BT 437; SZ 385). Thus, one completely misinterprets the entire passage if one makes a distinction between an utopian ideal and the past and maintains that the utopian ideal enables one to keep a distance from the past, to criticize it, or to choose among the different possibilities it offers. Rather, the utopian ideal is the past itself, which discloses itself to Dasein in Dasein's moment of running ahead to death.

After the passage on heritage and destiny, Heidegger rephrases the relation of past and Dasein in terms of «Wiederholung» and «ßberlieferung» (SZ 385; «repetition» and «handing down» BT 437). «ßberlieferung» most often means tradition, and the loss of tradition was what haunted German intellectuals between World War I and World War II—and by no means only them. This theme has found one of its most concise expressions in a passage in Walter Benjamin's 1936 essay "The Storyteller." Using the notion of «Erfahrung» (experience) for a way of life in which, with the authority of age, the elders can pass on their experiences to the younger generation in proverbs and stories, he writes:

Experience has fallen in value. . .. With the [First] World War a process began to become apparent which has not halted since then. Was it not noticeable at the end of the war that men returned from the battlefield grown silent—not

richer, but poorer in communicable experience? What ten years later was poured out in the flood of war books was anything but experience that goes from mouth to mouth. And there was nothing remarkable about that. For never has experience been contradicted more thoroughly than strategic experience by tactical warfare, economic experience by inflation, bodily experience by mechanical warfare, moral experience by those in power. A generation that had gone to school on a horse-drawn streetcar now stood under the open sky in a countryside in which nothing remained unchanged but the clouds, and beneath these clouds, in a field of force of destructive torrents and explosions, was the tiny, fragile human body.18

Already by December 1933, in a journal edited in Prague, Die Welt im Wort , Benjamin had published an essay entitled, "Erfahrung und Armut" (Experience and poverty). It contains a passage almost identical to the one quoted above,19 and presents Benjamin's interpretation of the works of Adolf Loos, Paul Klee, Paul Scheerbart, and others as efforts «to get rid of experience.» To get rid of experience is the new «dream of human beings today,» one we can dream of by reading «Mickey Mouse.»20

For conservatives, this destruction of Überlieferung took place in the parliament of Weimar and in the big cities, notably Berlin, with their night-bars, with all their different sorts of strange Mickey Mouses, with «Asphalt-Literaten» («asphalt writers») and «Neger-Jazz» («nigger jazz»), and, of course, with social democrats and communists and Jews. It is this situation that is addressed in sections 35-37 of Being and Time —the sections on idle talk, curiosity, and ambiguity21 —and that is implicitly evoked in section 74. Prone to the distractions of the «they,» having lost stable traditions, Dasein must detach itself from the distractions of the «they» to realize its own nullity and finitude, which are ignored by the «they.» It is only this authentic Dasein that becomes the promise of a resurrection, or of a defense, of the threatened tradition:

The resoluteness which comes back to itself and hands itself down {Die auf sich zurückkommende, sich überliefernde Entschlossenheit}, then becomes the repetition of a possibility of existence that has come down to us {Wiederholung einer überkommenen Existenzmöglichkeit}. Repeating is handing down explicitly {Die Wiederholung ist die ausdröckliche Überlieferung }—that is to say, going back into the possibilities of the Dasein that has-been-there. The authentic repetition of a possibility of existence that has been—the possibility that Dasein may choose its hero—is grounded existentially in anticipatory resoluteness; for it is in resoluteness that one first chooses the choice which makes one free for the struggle of loyally following in the footsteps of that which can be repeated. (BT 437; SZ 385)

In the note, the translators comment on the German verb «wiederholen»: «While we usually translate 'wiederholen' as 'repeat', this English word is hardly adequate to express Heidegger's meaning. Etymologically, 'wieder-

holen' means 'to fetch again'; in modem German usage, however, this is expressed by the cognate separable verb 'wieder . . . holen', while 'wiederholen' means simply 'to repeat' or 'do over again'» (BT 437, n. 1). According to their view, Heidegger intends none of these meanings, however: «Heidegger departs from both these meanings, as he is careful to point out. For him 'wiederholen' does not mean either a mere mechanical repetition or an attempt to reconstitute the physical past; it means rather an attempt to go back to the past and retrieve former possibilities , which are thus 'explicitly handed down' or 'transmitted'» (BT 437, n. 1).

Whatever Heidegger concretely means by «repetition,» there is some distance, some gap, between the past and Dasein that has to be bridged so that Dasein can become the repetition. Heidegger fills this gap with a very subtle as well as nasty play with the words «Überlieferung» (SZ 385; «handing down,» BT 437) and «sich überliefernde Entschlossenheit» (SZ 385; «The resoluteness which . . . hands itself down,» BT 437). «Überlieferung» means tradition, and with the exception of liberals, leftists, and analytical philosophers avant la lettre, hardly anyone, at least at Heidegger's time, objected to sentences in which «Übeflieferung» was the active subject. In fact, conservatives liked such sentences very much, for example, «Die Überlieferung sagt uns, daß . . .» (tradition tells us to . . .) or «Übeflieferung hat uns gelehrt und fordert von uns, daß wir ihr gehorchen» (tradition has taught us and demands from us that we obey it). Only by detaching itself from the «they» and by becoming «free for its death» (BT 437; SZ 385) does Dasein become the site of the repetition of the past. Only in this moment can Dasein relate itself to the past, only now can it, so to speak, grasp the past. Dasein actively appropriates the past, «sich selbst die ererbte Möglichkeit überliefernd » (SZ 385; «by handing down to itself the possibility it has inherited ,» BT 437). The past, the «heritage» (BT 435; «Erbe,» SZ 383) that Dasein appropriates, has already disappeared or is in danger of disappearing because the ordinary Daseine have ignored and have removed themselves from this past. However, by detaching itself from the ordinary Daseine and actively appropriating the vanished or vanishing past, Dasein's activity is transformed into an act of submission to the heritage and the past. Heidegger indicates this by switching from «sich selbst die ererbte Möglichkeit über-liefernd » (SZ 385; «handing down to itself the possibility it has inherited ,» BT 436) to «sich überliefernde Entschlossenheit» (SZ 385; «The resoluteness which . . . hands itself down,» BT 437). The grammatical subject of the first sentence is Dasein («Only an entity which . . . of having been ,» BT 437; SZ 385), and that of the second sentence is its resoluteness («The resoluteness which . . . ,» BT 437; SZ 385). However, in the first sentence («sich selbst die ererbte Möglichkeit überliefernd ») the accusative object of this act is the heritage, and that to which the past is handed down (the dative object) is the Dasein and its resoluteness. In the second sentence («sich überliefernde Entschlossenheit»), however, the accusative object of the act of handing down is the Dasein

and its resoluteness, and that to which Dasein hands itself down (the dative object) is the past, which we have to add as the dative object to «sich über-liefernde Entschlossenheit.» Just because Heidegger did not explicitly insert «the possibility it has inherited,» that is «heritage,» as the dative object into the phrase «sich überliefernde Entschlossenheit» (that is, he did not write «sich der ererbten Möglichkeit übefliefernde Entschlossenheit,» «The resoluteness which . . . hands itself down to the possibility it has inherited») does not mean that it should not be added but is merely a matter of his discursive strategies. In section 74 Heidegger talks about «struggling» and «struggle.» Even if he did not, one needs a lot of Verschlossenheit against what Heidegger means by «sich überliefern.» The verb «übefliefern» is used mainly in the passive voice as participle perfect, often in impersonal constructions. «Es ist überliefert (or überlieferte Sitte), dab wir jeden Sonntag in die Kirche gehen» (It is a tradition [or a custom handed down] that we go to church every Sunday). However, the reflexive form with an accusative and a dative object, «Ich überliefere mich jemandem» (I hand myself over to someone), is used much less frequently and means simply «to surrender oneself to someone.» The expression «sich jemandem überliefern» grows into «sich an jemanden ausliefern,» «sich jemandem übergeben,» or «sich jemandem ergeben»—all of them expressions for «to deliver, surrender, subdue, hand over, subjugate oneself to someone else.»22 In its act of subjugation to the inherited possibility, Dasein itself, as Heidegger continues, becomes the Übeflieferung:

The resoluteness which comes back to itself and hands itself down {to the possibility it has inherited}, then becomes the repetition of a possibility of existence that has come down to us. Repeating is handing down explicitly . (BT 437; Die auf sich, sich {zurückkommende, selbst der ererbten Existenzmöglichkeit} überliefernde Entschlossenheit wird dann zur Wiederholung einer überkommenen Existenzmöglichkeit. Die Wiederholung ist die ausdrückliche Überlieferung , SZ 385)

Dasein surrenders itself to the past and through this act is transformed into the past. The phrase «Repeating is handing down explicitly » is explained as follows: «that is to say, going back into the possibilities of the Dasein that has-been-there {das heißt der Rückgang in Möglichkeiten des dagewesenen Daseins}» (BT 437; SZ 385). Therefore, one might say that «Wiederholung» means indeed «fetching again» some past that was ignored as long as Dasein lived ordinarily. Anyway, this aspect also presupposes the act of subjugation, or of being appropriated by the past, as it is developed in the preceding sentence («sich übefliefernde Entschlossenheit»). In this process, Dasein becomes passive and opens itself up to surrendering itself to the past. These are the two aspects of Entschlossenheit I mentioned in the first section of this chapter. It is into these aspects that the concept of resoluteness from the beginning of section 74 develops, because it «has always already» contained them.

As will become clear in chapter 3, Heidegger's usage of these terms is completely in line with that of conservatives and people on the extreme right wing of his time. He explicitly distinguishes both aspects from each other in the subordinate clause of the next sentence. In resoluteness one links and, as it were, subdues oneself to a past calling for its repetition: «For it is in resoluteness that one first chooses the choice which makes one free for the struggle of loyally following in the footsteps of that which can be repeated {denn in ihr wird allererst die Wahl gewählt, die für die kämpfende Nachfolge und Treue zum Wiederholbaren frei macht}» (BT 437; SZ 385).23 Upon becoming authentic, Dasein experiences the possibility of Treue. Prior to becoming authentic, Dasein as ordinary Dasein has already repeated, namely, it has repeated what parents, peer group, society—the «they»—have instilled into it. However, it has performed this repetition in a self-evident manner, without much thought and more often than not without enthusiasm. Upon becoming authentic, it realizes that what it has repeated is ordinary and inauthentic. The authentic possibility having been revealed to the Dasein, the latter understands that it has to dedicate itself to the former. It has to be treu, true, loyal, and devoted to what can be repeated. In other words, what can be repeated has a claim on Dasein, namely, that Dasein must actualize what can be repeated as faithfully as possible and thus must place itself at the service of what can be repeated. Therefore, from the beginning of this passage on, there is a sense of a demanding past—a past in the singular—for which Dasein has to open itself, to make itself free, and into which Dasein itself is transformed in order then to fight for this past and rerealize it.24

It is true that Heidegger speaks here of possibilities in the plural: «in Möglichkeiten des dagewesenen Daseins» (SZ 385; BT 437, «into the possibilities of the Dasein that has-been-there»). But what does this mean? The possibilities are the possibilities of an entity in the singular, namely «des dagewesenen Daseins» (SZ 385; «of the Dasein that has-been-there,» BT 437), which one has to equate with «destiny,» «Ülberlieferung,» that is, with tradition or past. The possibilities of the Dasein that has-been-there are not only those this Dasein actually lived but also those it has not yet lived but is capable of actualizing in the future. Both kinds of possibilities are meant by «Rück-gang in Möglichkeiten» (SZ 385; «going back into the possibilities,» BT 437). The reason why Dasein, detaching itself from the «they,» running ahead toward death and surrendering itself to the past, chooses and must choose options for the past that the past itself has not yet actualized is introduced in the next passage: subjugating itself to the past, Dasein has to be «free for the struggle of loyally following in the footsteps of that which can be repeated» (BT 437). The emphasis here is on «struggle.» As is well known from anthropology and sociology, a tradition confronted with a threat to its existence reinterprets itself by intensifying the distinction between friend and foe so as to give rise to the violence that can then be used in the struggle against that foe.

Thus, when in danger of being outstripped by the «they,» the past has to develop possibilities it did not need before. The past has to realize these unrealized possibilities to defend itself against those who are about to destroy it or have already destroyed it.

Thus, we arrive at the exact opposite of Guignon's thesis. According to Guignon, in the light of the utopian ideal there is no single past; rather, what we call the past contains several possibilities, some of which we can choose while rejecting others. In so doing, we dissolve, so to speak, the unity of the past. According to my interpretation, however, there is a strong single past to which we have to subjugate ourselves. The possibilities in plural are the ones for the future into which Dasein has to project itself in order to preserve the past's unity or to regain its existence in the future. Furthermore, Heidegger's passage shows already that out of the subjugation, as a passivity resulting from Dasein's act of detaching itself from the «they,» a new activity of the Dasein arises—the loyal struggle for the past.

Heidegger's text continues:

But when one has, by repetition, handed down to oneself a possibility that has been, the Dasein that has-been-there is not disclosed in order to be actualized over again. The repeating of that which is possible does not bring again [Wiederbringen] something that is 'past', nor does it bind the 'Present' back to that which has already been 'outstripped'. Arising, as it does, from a resolute projection of oneself, repetition does not let itself be persuaded {überreden} of something by what is 'past', just in order that this, as something which was formerly actual, may recur. (BT 437; SZ 385)25

To be sure, Heidegger here says that repetition, as the translators put it, «does not mean either a mere mechanical repetition or an attempt to reconstitute the physical past» (BT 437, n. 1). However, a deliberating conversation with the past in Macquarrie and Robinson's sense is not the only alternative to a «mere mechanical repetition» and «reconstitution of a physical past.» First, authentic repetition is not a «mere mechanical repetition» since ordinary Dasein constantly performs mere mechanical repetitions. Ordinary Dasein without any further thought just takes over and repeats what the «they» has instilled into it. Second, this passage may simply make explicit what, according to my interpretation, is implied in the sentence immediately preceding it, namely, that by repeating the past, Dasein has to develop all those hitherto unrealized possibilities in the past that are necessary to fight for the endangered past. This gives the past a very strong, demanding character vis-à-vis the Dasein, a demanding character Heidegger has already hinted at with the switch to Dasein that «hands itself down {to the possibility it has inherited}» and with the words «struggle» and «loyally» in the preceding sentences and will bring out more clearly through a subtle switch from the prefix «wieder» to the prefix or root, «wider.» Third, independent of this interpretation, ever since Hegel's

criticism of the romantic movement, anyone interested in any kind of resurrection of the past, return to the past, or defense of the past against progress, had to defend this project against the charge of nostalgic romanticism. Thus, Heidegger accordingly pays his due by telling readers that «repetition» does not mean a simple return to the past. Again, he will make clear the sense of this negation in the sentences on «erwidert» and «Widerruf.» However, the passage with wiederbringen and überreden has a subtext referring to the idea of the subjugation of Dasein to the past as indicated by the exchange of the two objects of «überliefernd»; this subtext will be even clearer in the subsequent sentences on erwidert and Widerruf.

The German word «überreden» (to talk a person into) is not «überzeugen» (to convince). One überredet others only if one has no good reasons with which to convince them. Now, according to Heidegger, the past does not überreden Dasein. So, might the past überzeugen Dasein? This is the option Macquarrie and Robinson chose. If one says, «I have been überzeugt by,» one regards oneself as a reasonable and autonomous person who cannot be überredet (talked into) but only be convinced by compelling arguments in a free exchange. However, as pointed out above, this would have required Heidegger to use «erwidert vielmehr» (SZ 386; BT 438) in the dative. Thus, since the past does not überzeugen us, we are not autonomous vis-à-vis the past. However, the past does not überreden us either (in that case we would be autonomous too but, so to speak, caught in a moment of inattention). What then does the past do? If überreden is in the middle, and if it is not the extreme überzeugen, it must be the other extreme: «Und bist Du nicht willig, so brauch' ich Gewalt.»26 It is precisely this violence, or command, that is at the other extreme. What Heidegger says here, then, is that the past does not überzeu-gen us, and at the same time the past is not in so weak a position that it would need the not quite kosher means of Überredung. Indeed, the past is in a much stronger position, for it has a claim on us. Therefore, the past Heidegger is writing about here is not a vanished past without any claim on us but one that is alive and has a powerful hold on us. This is the reason why Heidegger puts the word «'past'» (BT 438; «"Vergangenheit",» SZ 385) into quotation marks. It is only from the vantage point of those not interested in any sort of resurrection of the past that this past can be said to have disappeared and to have no claims on us anymore. However, this is the perspective of the «they.» From the viewpoint of authentic Dasein, this past has not disappeared at all, but is very present. It is not past at all, and it demands of us that we subjugate ourselves to it and defend or re-realize it. Thus, the way from «nicht . . . überreden» (SZ 386; «not . . . be persuaded,» BT 437) does not lead to überzeugen but rather to überwältigen (overpower, overwhelm).

This is made more explicit in the following sentence with «erwidert»: «Rather, the repetition makes a reciprocative rejoinder to {erwidert } the possibility of that existence which has-been-there» (BT 438; SZ 386). As men-

tioned above, Macquarrie and Robinson's interpretation of this sentence as proposing a deliberating conversation with the different ways of having-been-there in the past, or with the different heroes, would be right if Heidegger had used «erwidert» in the dative. Also, the transition from Dasein as «handing down to itself the possibility it has inherited» to Dasein as «resoluteness which . . . hands itself down {to the possibility it has inherited}» (BT 437) shows that there is no conversation with the past. Rather, «erwidert» means either a subjugation to the past or, as Birmingham would have it, a counterattack against the past. However, Heidegger's next sentence makes clear that he does not mean a counterattack.

D. «Erwidert» and «Widerruf» ( «Disavowal»)

The different usages of «erwidern» can be summarized in the following scheme. Person A turns to person B and proposes a to B. B turns to A (and her a ) and answers b . Thus, B erwidert or makes an Erwiderung. One uses «erwidern» in the dative in cases in which b contradicts a , as for instance, in statements about disputes, or altercations. In these cases, A and a are the dative object of «erwidern,» and b is the accusative object of «erwidern» and, most of the time, appears in a subordinate clause. Thus, «A told B to leave the room. However, B erwiderte ihm/ihr (auf seinen/ihren Vorschlag = und ihrem/seinem Vorschlag) (B responded to A [and to A's proposal]) that B would stay in the room.» Or, «A told B that A loved B. However, B erwiderte ihm/ihr (auf seinen/ihren Antrag) (B responded to A [and to A's proposal]) that B didn't love A.» Also in the case of «erwidern» in the accusative in the sense of «to fight back» b contradicts a . For A attacks B and wants B to be defeated, but B fights back. However, the opposite is the case concerning «erwidern» in the accusative in the sense of «to return a favor» or «to comply with a request.» B erwidert A's call for help only if B actually helps A; that is, if B complies with A's call and thus b is in agreement with a . In other words, one uses «erwidern» in the sense of «to return a favor» or «to comply with a demand» when one talks about an act in which B identifies himself or herself with A's intention. However, whenever B acts counter to A's intention and thus distances herself from A, one uses «erwidern» in the dative or in the sense of «to fight back.» Since B distances herself from A, the phrase, «B erwiderte ihm/ihr,» is an incomplete sentence. It must be followed by a subordinate clause or some other phrase indicating the b that B responds to A. Similarly, a story usually does not end with the sentence, «A attacked B. B erwiderte A's attack.» For one is curious to know what happened next. B might have even defeated A, or A might have launched a second attack. However, since in the case of «erwidern» in the sense of «to return a favor» b harmonizes with a and meets A's expectation, the phrase «B erwidert A's a » can indeed be a complete sentence (as is Heidegger's sentence: «Rather, the repetition erwidert the possibility of that

existence which has-been-there»). In some cases, it can also close a story, and nothing more is expected. In fact, anything in addition would be just annoying. Therefore, the sequence, «A declared his/her love to B. And B erwiderte A's love» in fairy tales is usually followed only by, «And they lived happily ever after.» If Heidegger thought of «to fight back,» or «to defend oneself successfully,» Birmingham is fight. If «B erwidert A's love» is Heidegger's paradigm, then he proposes some happy union between the past and the authentic Dasein. If «B erwidert A's call for help» is Heidegger's paradigm, there would be a union between the past and authentic Dasein, albeit not yet an undisturbed and happy one. Rather, he would say that once one has chosen «the choice which makes one free for the struggle of loyally following in the footsteps of that which can be repeated,» Dasein gets captured by the past, has surrendered itself to the past, or has transformed itself into the medium, or the agent, of the past. This might entail a strong, positive emotional bond, some love or deep affiliation. However, Dasein can not yet really enjoy this love. For this identification, or repetition, is not a mere mechanical repetition of the past without any resistance. Nor is it a reconstitution of a physical past, since, at least for now, the past calls Dasein at the same time into a situation of struggle—struggle against the danger to the past, against the false present that threatens the past's existence or has already destroyed it. The struggle is against the false present ordinary Dasein lives in as long as it has not yet made the choice, the false present that exercises its influence even upon authentic Dasein as long as the latter has not yet destroyed it. That this second option, the Erwiderung of a call for help in a situation of danger, is actually Heidegger' s paradigm is clear from his next sentence: «But when such a rejoinder is made to this possibility in a resolution, it is made in a moment of vision; and as such it is at the same time a disavowal of that which in the "today", is working itself out as the 'past'» (BT 438; SZ 386). As already mentioned, in their accompanying note Macquarrie and Robinson give the German text as well as their interpretation of it as a conversation with the past (BT 438, n. 1). In their note, the German version of the last sentence quoted above reads: «'Die Erwiderung der Möglichkeit im Entschluss ist aber zugleich als augenblickliche der Widerruf dessen, was in {sic } Heute sich als "Vergangenheit" auswirkt'» (BT 438, n. 1). The «in» instead of «im» is obviously a misprint. The reader should keep in mind that double quotation marks (for instance, «"today",» BT 438) are neither a misprint nor Heidegger' s. As the translators explain, «our single quotation marks represent Heidegger's double ones. But we have felt free to introduce double ones of our own wherever we feel that they may be helpful to the reader» (BT 15). Furthermore, in other places Heidegger uses «Heute» (today) with double quotation marks, as for instance in: «Unständig als Man-selbst gegenwärtigt das Dasein sein "Heute"» (SZ 391; thus, Macquarrie and Robinson have: «With the inconstancy of the they-self Dasein makes present its 'today',» BT 443). Macquar-

rie and Robinson «have chosen the third edition (1931) as typical of the earlier editions, and the eighth (1957) as typical of the later ones» (BT 15). So far, I have quoted the German text from the twelfth edition (1972), which is a reprint of the seventh edition. The translators will perhaps excuse the following train of thought: As they mention in the preface, Heidegger's revisions in later editions of Sein und Zeit «went beyond the simple changes in punctuation and citation which Heidegger mentions in his preface» (BT 15). In addition to the misprint in the above quotation, there is also one in the sentence «it becomes a way of painfully detaching oneself from the falling publicness of the 'today"» (BT 449), where an opening single quotation mark has been used instead of the correct double one (see SZ 397). Given all this, one might get the idea that concerning the sentence with Widerruf the translators, typesetters, and proofreaders somehow mixed up all these quotation marks, and that up to the third edition Heidegger might have used «today» with quotation marks and/or «past» without quotation marks, while in later editions he used «today» without quotation marks and «past» with quotation marks. After all, Guignon in his quotation of this sentence left out Heidegger's quotation marks, that is, the single quotation marks of the English translation, at «past,» and he put «today» in single quotation marks: «As critical, authentic historiography requires a "disavowal of that which in the 'today' is working itself out as the past"» (HC 138). Naturally, readers familiar with the Macquarrie and Robinson translation will conclude that the single quotation marks at «today» represent one of the quotation marks added by the translators, while readers not familiar with Macquarrie and Robinson's translation will assume that they represent Heidegger's quotation marks. In addition, both kinds of readers will assume that Heidegger used «Ver-gangenheit» (past) without quotation marks. In other words, on the basis of Guignon's citation we would expect Heidegger's text either to contain no quotation marks at all or to read as follows: «was im "Heute" sich als Vergangenheit auswirkt.»27 However, the first edition agrees with the eighth and the ninth editions, namely, «was im Heute sich als "Vergangenheit" auswirkt» (SZ 386). Thus, in this sentence in all the editions Heidegger used «Heute» (today) without his quotation marks and «"Vergangenheit"» («'past'») with his quotation marks.

Now I must apologize to the readers for this digression. It was prompted by the fact that Heidegger makes his point not only by means of the very subtle sequence Wieder-holung (wieder-holen), Er-widerung (er-widern), and Widerruf (wider-rufen) but also, as the readers might already sense, by a very subtle, if not tricky, use of quotation marks. Note that in section 74 up to the sentence with Widerruf Heidegger always uses as the object of «repetition» and similar nouns and verbs either the phrase «the possibility of that existence which-has-been-there» (or, «a possibility that has been») without quotation marks, or he uses «des "Vergangenen"» (SZ 385; «something that is 'past',» BT 437) (or,

«das "Überholte"» [SZ 386], «that which has already been 'outstripped» [BT 437]) with quotation marks. In the sentence with Erwiderung, he uses the former expression (the repetition erwidert «the possibility of that existence which has-been-there,» BT 438; SZ 386), and he also does so in the first part of the sentence with Widerruf («But when such a rejoinder is made to this possibility . . .» [BT 438; SZ 386]). However, with regard to the object of the Widerruf he doesn't use any of those expressions, but rather for the first time the phrase, «dessen, was im Heute sich als "Vergangenheit" auswirkt» (SZ 386; thus, since the translators use single quotation marks for Heidegger's double ones, and since they prefer double quotation marks for «today,» their sentence reads: «of that which in the "today", is working itself out as the 'past'» [BT 438]). For Birmingham, there is obviously no difference between Heidegger's «erwidert» and his «disavowal» («Widermf»).28 Now, she might be right if Heidegger had said «Widerruf der Vergangenheit» («disavowal of the past») or «Widerruf der gewesenen Möglichkeit» («disavowal of the possibility that-has-been-there»). Each phrase might have been the climax in the sequence beginning with «But when one has . . .» (BT 437; SZ 385), and might have entitled us to read «erwidert . . . die» in «erwidert vielmehr die Möglichkeit der dagewesenen Existenz» (SZ 386; BT 438) as one of those instances of «erwidern» in the accusative meaning «to fight back» or «to launch a counterattack.»

The entire passage would then say: repetition does not simply repeat the past; rather, it fights back, defends itself against the past («erwidert»), and it even fights back and cancels, destroys, the past («disavowal»). However, if that is what Heidegger wanted to convey, it would have been necessary for him to make unambiguously clear that the object of the Erwiderung and the object of the Widerruf is one and the same. Regarding the sentence with Widerruf, this would have required two things. First, he would have had to use a conjunction clearly indicating that the sentence with Widerruf intensifies the sentence with erwidert. Quite naturally, the conjunction «ja, sogar» (nay) (or only «sogar» [even]) would have recommended itself. However, Heidegger doesn't use «ja, sogar» or a similar expression. Rather, he uses the conjunction «aber zugleich» («But . . . at the same time»), which most of the time introduces a new point or a counter move to the one in the preceding sentence. Second, in an extremely relaxed mode of writing «aber zugleich» might indeed be used in the sense of «nay.» However, in the case of «ja, sogar» and especially in the case of «aber zugleich» in the sense of «ja, sogar» Heidegger would have had to use as the objects of erwidern and Widerruf the same expression or sufficiently similar ones to make sure that the readers understand that the object of Widerruf is identical with the object of erwidern. He could have easily done so by saying, for instance, «der Widerruf eben dieser Möglichkeit» («the disavowal of that very/same possibility [we have talked about in the sentence with erwidert and the phrase with Erwiderung]»). However, Heidegger says no such thing.

Rather, he uses «aber zugleich,» and he uses the phrase «Widerruf dessen, was im Heute sich als "Vergangenheit" auswirkt» (SZ 386). This use shows that the object of the «Widerruf» («disavowal») differs from the object of the Erwiderung in the sentence with «erwidert.»29 Now, the «Heute» is the present as seen by authentic Dasein.30 If the object of «erwidert» is the past as heritage and community of the people, and if the object of «erwidert» differs from the object of the «Widermf,» the object of the «Widerruf»—that is, that «was im Heute sich als "Vergangenheit" auswirkt»—is, as I will elaborate further in chapters 2 and 3, not «destiny» or «community, of {the} people» (BT 436; SZ 384), but Dasein as ordinary or what determines ordinary Dasein or the past with reference to which ordinary Dasein legitimates its way of life. This past has to be destroyed by the authentic Dasein, since this past is not the «real» one. Heidegger uses «Heute» without quotation marks and «"Vergangenheit"» with quotation marks because this past is not the real past but rather what ordinary or inauthentic Dasein regards as the real past.31 This train of thought might be paraphrased as follows: Having been recalled from ordinary existence, and having made oneself free for destiny, people, and community of the people—that is, having transformed oneself into the echo of this «real» past, namely, community of the people and destiny—one is called upon to destroy the present, or that «false» past or tradition that has replaced the «real» past. The «false» past or tradition has established itself as the «real» past and as the «real» present with reference to which ordinary and inauthentic Daseine legitimate their way of living. In resoluteness, Dasein experiences the demanding call of the «real» past, which has been destroyed by the «false» past and present. The «real» past calls upon Dasein to rerealize it. This requires that the «false» past and present must be destroyed to make room for the rebirth of the «real» past.

The same point can be made without reference to the quotation marks. «Erwidern» is an ambiguous term; first, it can be regarded as an act of negation of any claim the past might have on me, a very strong negation, as in Birmingham; second, the translators and Guignon pluralize, so to speak, the claims in question and thus, as it were, soften the character of this negation. Within the conversation with the past that has become pluralized by Dasein's utopian ideals, several possibilities are rejected and one is adopted. Since the adoption of one possibility presupposes the refusal of all the others and since the plurality of offers made by the past is the result of Dasein's capacity to distance itself from the present and the past as it lives on in the present, this second interpretation too emphasizes the aspect of negation, as distancing, despite the fact that, in contrast to Birmingham's interpretation, it assumes that, finally, Dasein positively identifies itself with some possibility offered by the past. Third, «erwidert vielmehr» means not some act of negation of the past, but rather the submission to the past. «Widerruf,» however, is unambiguously an act of negation. It is a stronger negation than «erwidern» and

is, in fact, the strongest and most intense expression of negation in academic discourse, calling to mind that a Widerruf was required of Galileo and other heretics if they wanted to avoid being sentenced to death.

Thus, a Widerruf is a complete cancellation of the object of this Widerruf. What has to be disavowed must be canceled completely, never resurface again. Since «Widerruf» is a stronger negation than «erwidert,» one might say that both refer to one and the same possibility offered by the past. However, as was said above, in that case Heidegger would have had to apply the two mentioned devices, in the ways described above, to make sure that readers understand that the object of the Widerruf is identical with that of the Erwiderung.

Therefore, one must not conflate the object of «erwidert» and that of «Widerruf.» Rather, authentic Dasein «erwidert» (to) a and makes a «Wider-ruf» of b , with b being different from a . Guignon makes this distinction when he interprets «erwidert» as referring to possibilities within the past and interprets as the object of the «Widerruf» the present in which Dasein has lived while it was still ordinary and did not yet relate to the past as a pool of choices for authentic Dasein:

Instead, for Heidegger, critique is aimed at the "today": authentic historiography "becomes a way in which the 'today' gets deprived of its character as present; in other words, it becomes a way of painfully detaching oneself from the fallen {sic } publicness of the 'today'" (BT , 449). As critical, authentic historiography requires a "disavowal of that which in the 'today' is working itself out as the past," that is, a "destructuring" of the hardened interpretations circulating in the public world in order to recover "those primordial experiences in which we achieved our first ways of determining the nature of Being—the ways which have guided us ever since" (BT , 438, 44). The critical stance "deprives the 'today' of its character as present , and weans one from the conventionalities of the 'they'" (BT , 444)-(HC 138)

Being capable of going «right under the eyes of Death» (BT 434; SZ 383), I realize that the past offers several heroes. In the light of my utopian ideal I choose, not Socrates or Martin Luther King, but rather Sitting Bull (HC 137). This act includes that I disavow, not Sitting Bull, but rather, say, my career on Wall Street, which my family and my peer group have prompted me to engage in before I ran «right under the eyes of Death» (BT 434; SZ 382), turned back, and realized that there were several heroes to choose from. Guignon developed his interpretation of «erwidert» since he wanted to argue against the «"deci-sionism of empty resoluteness"» (HC 130) that would result if Dasein «erwidert» in the sense of «negates» and makes a «Widerruf»; that is, he wanted to argue against an interpretation in which Dasein, as in Birmingham, exclusively negates, regardless of whether the objects of the two acts of negation are the same or not. Though one might say that the two sentences them-

selves don't exclude the possibility that Dasein, in this or that way, negates («erwidert») something and disavows («Widerruf») something else, Guignon is right in implicitly rejecting this interpretation. For, as I will show in chapters 2 and 3, the context of these two sentences precludes their interpretation as two negations. However, Guignon's own interpretation cannot be right because, as mentioned above, his version of «erwidert» requires the dative. Thus, since «Widerruf» is unmistakably a negation, one is left with «erwidert» not as negation but rather as submission. Since—pace Birmingham—the object of the Erwiderung differs from the object of the Widerruf and since—pace Guignon as well as Birmingham—Dasein submits itself to the past, Dasein submits itself to the suppressed or vanished «real» past, and Dasein cancels all the possibilities of the present it has lived in complacently before the call. The call demands that Dasein hand itself over to the call—that is, to «the possibility of that existence which has-been-there»—and cancel the possibilities Dasein has lived in while still in the mode of the «they,» that is, cancel «that which in the "today" is working itself out as the 'past'» (BT 438; SZ 386).

In his discussion of guilt Heidegger rejects the model of pre-Christian

grace, and the model of just exchange as being the ordinary, or inauthentic, interpretation of guilt.32 Furthermore, the use of «erwidern» in the accusative in the sense of «to fight back» usually indicates that there may be some sort of violence or coercion at work. Leaving aside the echo,33 since it refers to inanimate beings, one might say that all the other examples of «erwidern» in the accusative do indeed show some sort of obligation but only a relatively weak one. In a somewhat frivolous interpretation of «erwidern» in the accusative, one might even say its paradigmatic use is in the following casual34 situation: On the street, en passant person A looks at person B, and, en passant, B looks back at A, just for some sort of tiny flirtation. In German, one would refer to this situation by «erwidern» in the accusative: «B erwiderte A's glance.»35 Thus, in that case «erwidern» in the accusative means some small exchange in passing, enjoyable for both parties, or it means some sort of weak obligation. Therefore, one must not insinuate, as I did, that in Heidegger it would mean violence, subjugation, and the like. However, I might erwidern, one also uses the phrase «B erwidert A's glance» if this is, as the saying goes, «dove at first sight.» Nonetheless, one might erwidern, love—whether sexual, erotic, agapic, or anything else and whether lukewarm or as passionate as imaginable—is not an issue, neither in Being and Time in general nor in the chapter on historicality in particular. However, I might erwidern, do we really know what was at work in Heidegger's love for the Black Forest and the Volksgemeinschaft? In his love for the «Volksgemeinschaft»—the composite of «Gemeinschaft, des Volkes» (SZ 384; «the community, of {the} people,» BT 436)—the word commonly used on the extreme Right? Furthermore (in order that in this exchange of Erwiderungen—to translate word-for-word a German phrase—«I have the

last word»): First, as in the case of «überreden,» the possible negations of

not only lead to a level of obligation lower than that in the usual institutions of grace. Heidegger is great at intensifying the meanings of words by their context, great in producing a Stimmung (mood) that pervades the entire text without being in any particular single word. Second, even if one takes only the passage in question, «erwidert» receives additional intensity due to the «Widerruf» following it. For, as mentioned above, in academic discourse, of all the words for an act of negation, Widerruf is the most intense and forceful. Third «er-widert» and «Widerruf» accrue additional force from the surrounding «struggle» and so forth, which in turn get intensified by the entire sequence of sections 72-77 and its context, which I turn to in the next chapter. «Period! No Er-wider-ung! (or: No Wider-rede! No Wider-spruch!) At least for the time being.»36

A. On the Run

In Being and Time Heidegger elucidates the structures and activities of Dasein that make it possible for Dasein to be in a world. In the conventional metaphysical fashion, Heidegger develops a hierarchical order of these structures according to different degrees of primordiality. Within this hierarchy, the level of historicality is the most primordial one, that is, historicality is the ultimate level. In accordance with this hierarchical order, Heidegger unfolds a drama, the drama of Dasein's historicality. Again in quite a conventional fashion, the drama consists of three acts. There is a first act, in which the necessary conditions of the dramatic conflict are set up. In the second act, a critical situation emerges that calls for a dramatic solution. In the third act, finally, we witness the solution of the crisis Heidegger recommends. This third act of the drama is section 74. In this sense, the entire book Being and Time , as Rockmore says, «as a whole culminates in» the section on historicality.1 The privileged position of section 74 within the hierarchical as well as the dramatic order shows that, indeed, as Rockmore puts it,

Heidegger's conception of ontology commits him, as a condition of thinking through the problem of the meaning of "Being," to a political understanding of human being, that is, to an idea of the person as mainly inauthentic but as possibly authentic in a concrete fashion. The very concern with fundamental ontology requires a political turn since an authentic thought of Being can only arise on the basis of concrete authenticity. Heidegger's concern with the problem of the meaning of Being is not apolitical; nor is it indifferent to theory and

practice in virtue of its concern with the Seinsfrage . Rather, the concern with "Being" is itself intrinsically political.2

In chapter 1, I examined two of the three parts of the solution of the drama presented in section 74, the first part, the «anticipatory resoluteness» (BT 434; SZ 382) and then the end of the third part—the passage on erwidern and Widerruf—and the entire third part. As I have already shown there, the solution of the drama consists in authentic Dasein stepping out of the world in which it has been living so far as ordinary Dasein and then turning back to this world and canceling it. It does so because it has been called upon by the past to rerealize the past, which has been pushed aside by the world in which Dasein as ordinary Dasein has been living, and the past cannot be rerealized without ordinary Dasein' s world being canceled. This motif suggests that Heidegger's concept of historicality is informed by a temporalized version of a metaphysics of falling and recovering. There was a state in which the origin was properly realized. However, then a development began in which the world of the Daseine fell away from that state. A new world emerged in which the origin is no longer present or is present only in a distorted way. At some point in this downward plunge, the origin raises its voice and demands that the Daseine disavow and destroy the new world and replace it with a world in which the origin is once again properly present.

As to the metaphysical aspect of this theory, one must keep in mind several important points, however. Traditional metaphysics—maybe with the exception of Plato in Syracuse—and, for that matter, Christianity never presumed to fully realize the origin here on earth. Heidegger's metaphysics definitely transgresses this limit of traditional metaphysics. Furthermore, one must keep in mind that in the twenties of this century fundamental ontology and metaphysics were definitely not the only philosophical options. That is not to say that Heidegger's philosophy was prone to Nazism because of the old metaphysical motifs continued in his philosophy. Rather, Heidegger revitalized a radicalized or distorted version of metaphysics at a time when there was certainly no need for doing so. Furthermore, we could also leave out the notion of metaphysics. For, as will become clear in chapter 3, Heidegger's concept of historicality is identical with the right-wing one of history and politics. As to the genesis of this latter concept, however, it doesn't seem very reasonable—to me at least—to regard it as a manifestation of the epoch of metaphysics in the way Heideggerians use that term. Moreover, as I will explain in more detail in chapters 3 and 4, one must keep in mind that the right-wing concept of history is not teleological in the same sense the development of a plant through its different phases might be considered teleological. There is nothing in the new world, which is now canceled, that is necessary for the proper rerealization of the origin. Correspondingly, there is nothing in the new world that deserves to be preserved in the world of the

properly realized origin. If it happens that the world of the properly realized origin takes on features of the world that is canceled, this is merely a matter of convenience and generosity on the part of the origin. In this section of this chapter 2, I examine several more general concepts of Heidegger's in Being and Time —those of origin, primordial temporality, authenticity, and whole-ness—and their dynamics in regard to the concept of historicality. In section B, I take up passages and concepts from Division One of Being and Time 3 as well as from the section on historicality preceding section 74—those of the work of ambiguity and the different meanings of the terms «world» and «history»—by means of which Heidegger makes clear that, indeed, at the-beginning of section 74 we are in the second part of the drama of historicality. In section C, I show that in the second part of section 74—the section on heritage, fate, etc.—the second part of the drama is briefly summarized and the third part begins to unfold whose end in the third part of section 74 I have already discussed in chapter 1.

In section 73 Heidegger develops what he calls «the ordinary understanding of history, and Dasein's historizing» (BT 429; SZ 378); section 74 is entitled "The Basic Constitution of Historicality" (BT 434; SZ 382). De facto, Heidegger develops authentic historicality in this section. In the last paragraph of section 74, Heidegger leads into section 75 by saying that we have to study «Dasein's inauthentic historicality» (BT 439; SZ 387) in order to complete the exposition of the ontological problem of history. Thus, in section 75 ("Dasein's Historicality, and World-History," BT 439; SZ 387) he elucidates inauthentic historicality. Already from this brief outline we might expect that in the entire passage Heidegger describes something like a crisis, a

in the Greek sense, namely, a separation or a decision or the decisive turning point in a political development or in the course of a disease. The combatants—political parties opposed to each other or the «forces of life» versus the «forces of death»—are pitted against each other in the decisive battle. Within ordinary Dasein's historizing as developed in section 73 there is a more or less hidden potential or conflict that gives rise to the two opposite modes of Dasein, its authentic and its inauthentic historicality. This is the aspect I want to focus on.

However, a few preliminary remarks are necessary. In the first four paragraphs of section 72 («All our efforts . . . when we learn not to take problems too lightly,» BT 424-425; SZ 372-373), Heidegger exposes the problem of the «'connectedness of life'» (BT 425; «"Zusammenhang des Lebens",» SZ 373). In the next three paragraphs («What seems 'simpler' . . . 'between' birth and death will break down,» BT 425-426; SZ 373-374), he characterizes the ordinary interpretation of the connectedness of life. In the two paragraphs after that («Dasein does not fill up . . . ontological understanding of historicality,» BT 426-427; SZ 374-375), he presents his concept that «Dasein is stretched along and stretches itself along » (BT 427; «erstrecktes Sicherstrecken,» SZ 375) as the proper approach to the problem of the connectedness of life. He then

continues toward the formulation of his thesis that Dasein «exists historically and can so exist only because it is temporal in the very basis of its Being {im Grunde seines Seins }» (BT 428; SZ 376), and outlines what is to follow. The sections 72-77, and especially the first four paragraphs of section 72, are replete with references to inauthentic Dasein and authentic Dasein and to «Dasein's authentic potentiality-for-Being-a-whole» («das eigentliche Ganzseinkönnen des Daseins»), «its authentically Being-a-whole » («seines eigentlichen Ganz-seins »), or «Dasein's totality» («Daseinsganzheit,» «Ganzheit des Daseins»). Moreover, Heidegger uses «ursprünglich» («primordial») several times.

«Ursprünglich» is an adjective to the noun «Ursprung» (origin) (whose abstract noun, «Ursprünglichkeit,» as Hildegard Feick rightly says in her Index to Being and Time, «runs through» the entire book4 ). It has been pointed out often enough that Heidegger understands Dasein neither as a substance nor as a subject, each of which has being independent of its activities and relations to others. Rather, Dasein is a set of structured activities, or motions, that already include the Being-with-others. For that reason, many interpreters claim that Being and Time is not a philosophy of origin; a claim that depends entirely on how one defines such a philosophy. I agree with those who maintain that from Division Two on (BT 274ff.; SZ 231ff.), if not already earlier, the discourse on Dasein's activities gets overdetermined by what one cannot help calling a kind of philosophy of origin, along the lines of a Neoplatonist or, for that matter, Christian discourse on the relation of the One and the many.

Heidegger uses «ursprünglich» («primordial»), or its comparative form «ursprünglicher,» in reference to his project, that is, his interpretation of Dasein as well as in reference to the object of his interpretation. An interpretation is the more «ursprünglich» the more «ursprünglich» its object is (SZ 231ff.; BT 274ff.). Concerning the claim that Being and Time is not a philosophy of origin, it is often pointed out that «Ursprung» or «ursprünglich» has a new meaning in Heidegger completely different from the traditional one. Ursprung is no longer a primary being essentially at rest and out of which other beings originate. Rather, Ursprung is the original leap, the first leap, as an activity that no longer depends on an Ursprung in the traditional sense. Consider, however, the following passage: «If, therefore, we demonstrate that the 'time' which is accessible to Dasein's common sense is not primordial, but arises rather from authentic temporality {nicht ursprünglich und vielmehr entspringend aus der eigentlichen Zeitlichkeit}, then, in accordance with the principle, "a potiori fit denominatio ", we are justified in designating as "primordial time " {ursprüng-liche Zeit } the temporality which we have now laid bare» (BT 377; SZ 329). As the reference to a sentence developed within metaphysical ordo-thinking already indicates, this statement assumes a hierarchical structure. Here the Ursprung as a leap is the emergence of the time that is accessible to Dasein's common sense. This leap, however, presupposes something out of or from which it emerges and without which it could not emerge, namely, authentic

temporality. Because of this ranking, Heidegger labels authentic temporality «ursprüngliche Zeit,» that is, primary, primordial time, the first, or origin out of which other beings or structures and activities «entspringen» (arise).

To be sure, this first principle, or origin, is not a substance at rest. Rather, it is the structure of the basic activity by means of which Dasein is open to other beings, the basic act of transcendence; it is this structure and this activity itself. Furthermore, this «ursprüngliche Zeit» temporalizes itself in the «equiprimordiality» (BT 378; «Gleichursprünglichkeit,» SZ 329) of the three ecstases past, present, and future. However, all this, as is well-known from Neoplatonism and Christian philosophy, can easily go hand in hand with ordo, with a hierarchy of several entities that, in this or that way, entspringen (arise) from the first origin. One finds in Heidegger also the ambivalence concerning what entspringt from the first origin in this kind of philosophy of origin. On the one hand, what entspringt is the manifestation of the origin itself. It is the origin's way to realize itself and to rule over its manifestations.5 On the other hand, what entspringt from the origin removes itself, or deviates, from the origin. As the power of the origin weakens, the origin loses its ruling power until finally what ist entsprungen, has jumped out of/from the origin comes close to being nothing or even covers up its relation to the origin and that origin itself. Being and Time is rich in sentences about this double aspect of what ist entsprungen from the origin.

Heidegger may have chosen «entspringen» because of the ambiguity inherent in the verb itself. It denotes the aspect of manifestation, of strength and ruling of the origin over its manifestations, just as water entspringt (from) its source and is thus the manifestation of this source or is this origin itself. For pointing to the water flowing out of its source one also says, «The source entspringt»; that is, the flowing water is the source itself in its process of manifestation. At the same time, however, what entspringt (ent-leaps, ent-jumps), leaps out of and leaves the dominion of the origin just as a rivulet silts up as soon as the source has exhausted itself and vanished. This is the other aspect of entspringen, namely, a separation from the origin. The German prefix «ent» often indicates an act of separation. In section A of chapter 1, I already mentioned the acts of separation inherent in an Entscheidung (Ent-separation, decision, Ent-parting) and in Entschlossenheit (resoluteness).

There are many German words consisting of the prefix «ent-» and a verb indicating movement; generally they refer to a separation or loss and emphasize that, at least from the vantage point of the origin, of what is left behind, the separation is involuntary or illegitimate. Something «ent-gleitet (ent-glides, ent-slides, ent-slips, escapes) meinen Händen,» that is, it «slips from my hands.» Some inconsiderate remark «ent-gleitet,» or «ent-fährt (ent-drives, escapes) meinem Mund, meinen Lippen,» that is, «slips from my mouth, my lips.» Some fact «ent-zieht (ent-draws, ent-pulls, ent-tucks, escapes) sich meiner Kenntnis (knowledge),» that is, «it is unknown to me.» Or something

«ent-schwindet (ent-dwindles, ent-wanes) meinem Blick,» that is, «vanishes from my sight.» Or, using the perfect participle of «entspringen,» namely, «entsprungen,» one might say, «However, the flea ist mir wieder entsprungen» as the ending of a story about the unsuccessful hunt for a flea in which I had already grasped the critter between my fingers, but it managed to jump away. Similarly, prisoners who have escaped from jail are referred to as «die entsprungenen Häftlinge.» Of course, these prisoners do not want to be seen again by the origin, the place they came from and its agents. They want to hide themselves and their relation to the origin from the origin itself, from other Daseine, and from themselves as well insofar as by their flight from prison they maintain that this origin has no claim on them. In this regard, one might also point to the composite of «ent-» and the root of the verb discussed in section A of chapter 1 above, namely, «ent-laufen» (ent-run). Dogs, slaves, teenagers, and prisoners «entlaufen ihrem Herrn, ihren Eltern, dem Gefäng-nis,» that is, «run away from their master, their parents, the prison» and thus «ent-ziehen (ent-draw, ent-pull, ent-tug, ent-haul, escape) sich deren Herrschaft,» that is, «put themselves out of their control, domination.» The prisoner's jailbreak is referred to as «sie sind dem Gefängnis entsprungen» or «sie sind aus dem Gefängnis entlaufen.» (they have jumped out of prison, have escaped prison). On the news you might hear that «die entsprungenen Häftlinge sind immer noch auf der Flucht,» or «die entsprungenen Häftlinge sind immer noch flüchtig» (The escaped prisoners are still on the run).

In section 68, in the subsection entitled "The Temporality of Falling {des Verfallens}" (BT 396; SZ 346), Heidegger uses these terms to characterize the temporality of the ordinary and inauthentic mode of curiosity, and he puts «entspringen» in quotation marks (rendered in the translation as single quotation marks) to indicate the sense of the forbidden leaping away. I will quote only some of the several occurrences of «entspringen» with quotation marks in this context: «The Present 'arises or leaps away' {"entspringt"} from the awaiting which belongs to it, and it does so in the sense of running away from it, as we have just emphasized {in dem betonten Sinne des Entlaufens}. . . . This 'leaping away' {Das "Entspringen"} is rather an ecstatical modification of awaiting, and of such a kind that the awaiting leaps after {nachspringt } the making-present» (BT 397-398; SZ 347).6

This «nachspringt» means that curiosity cannot catch, cannot keep up with, what it wants to catch. Thus, what curiosity wants to catch entspringt curiosity; that is, it backs out of curiosity' s grasp and its memory: «In the 'leaping away' {Im "Entspringen"} of the Present, one also forgets increasingly» (BT 398; SZ 347)- Going back to the entsprungene or entlaufene (escaped) prisoners, one might say that if they manage to escape the police, they have managed «sich dem Blick der Polizei zu entziehen» (to hide from the police's sight). As to death, authentic Dasein, as already quoted, «will go right under the eyes of Death» (BT 434; SZ 382). Ordinary and inauthentic Daseine, however, behave

like these escaped prisoners: «As a mode of temporalizing, the 'leaping-away' {"Entspringens"} of the Present is grounded in the essence of temporality, which is finite . Having been thrown into Being-towards-death, Dasein flees—proximally and for the most part—in the face of this thrownness, which has been more or less explicitly revealed {flieht . . . vor . . . dieser . . . Geworfenheit}» (BT 399; SZ 348).7 Thus, it flees its «Ursprung»: «The Present leaps away from {entspringt} its authentic future and from its authentic having been, so that it lets Dasein come to its authentic existence only by taking a detour through that Present. The 'leaping-away' of the Present—that is, the falling into lostness—has its source in that primordial authentic temporality itself which makes possible thrown Being-towards-death {Der Ursprung des "Entspringens" der Gegenwart . . . ist die ursprüngliche, eigentliche Zeitlichkeit selbst}» (BT 399; SZ 348).8

The tone of this passage is highly derogatory. In my brief digression on the several uses of «ent-,» I left open whether the prisoners might manage to escape the police. Heidegger, however, presents the actions of curiosity as very clumsy and not promising of a successful outcome. At the same time, the last sentence quoted shows that Heidegger, as Guignon rightly points out, works with the old model of a «mythos of pristine beginnings, a time of "falling," and a final recovery of origins» (HC 141).9 Heidegger could have used a different vocabulary, for instance, «sich entwickeln aus,» «entstehen aus,» «sich konkretisieren als,» «sich ableiten yon,» «sich darstellen als,» or something similar. However, that terminology would not have allowed him to phrase his project rhetorically in terms of basic motifs of metaphysical thinking; that is, in terms of an origin that is left behind or forgotten in an illegitimate act, so to speak, and that demands obedience, punishes the leap away from it, and brings Dasein back to its origin. To summarize, what entspringt (arises) from something as from its origin is a manifestation of the origin, or even the origin itself. At the same time, however, it is a weak manifestation of, a desertion or apostasy from, and a distortion of the origin. It covers up its relation to the origin and pretends to be something in its own right. It is this double aspect of what entspringt combined with what is also familiar from Neoplatonism and Christian philosophy, namely, the demand to represent in thought and in one's conscience the relation to one's origin in an undistorted manner that taints the sphere of ordinary Dasein's historizing with that twilight that is critical and calls for a decision. Ordinary Dasein is living in the twilight of arising from and depending on a past that, at the same time, this ordinary Dasein denies. Thus, the origin, the past, calls upon ordinary Dasein to no longer deny its origin but to acknowledge it in present Daseine, in the sphere of the «they,» and to struggle for its revitalization in the sphere of Being-with-others.

Heidegger was no Platonist or Neoplatonist. Neither was he a believer in the official God of the Catholic Church. When he wrote Being and Time , he

had already sich entzogen dem (withdrawn from) Catholicism (Entziehungskur = detoxification treatment).10 Being is essentially temporal. There is no eternity, no being beyond time. This, however, does not prevent Heidegger from, so to speak, temporalizing the basic structures of metaphysics. As I have already suggested in chapter 1 and as I will elaborate also in this and the following chapters, the One Heidegger assumes is the Volksgemeinschaft, which is within time and whose sempiternity is in danger. A similar usage of temporalized metaphysics can be found in his treatment of Ganzheit (being a whole). In his discussion of death in sections 46-53, Heidegger refers to the metaphysical concept of Ganzheit of temporal beings as it was developed based on the distinction between eternity (beyond time) and time or temporal beings. A temporal being has achieved Ganzheit if it has realized all the characters it is capable of realizing or has to realize due to its nature. However, it does not do this prior to its death. In and after death, however, as Heidegger rightly points out, this being no longer exists, at least those who do not believe in the immortality of the soul say that it no longer exists. Thus, one might expect Heidegger to give up Ganzheit (so to speak, to leap out of metaphysics into postmodern fragmentation) or to develop a concept of Dasein that allows for Dasein's continuous striving for Ganzheit but that does not require that this Ganzheit of Dasein, as the primordial existentiale, already preexists Dasein's endeavor to achieve it. However, Heidegger temporalizes Ganzheit, which in this case means that Ganzheit is always already present within Dasein's being, to the effect that achieving Ganzheit does not mean to produce something new but rather to get in touch with something already given.

Ordinary or inauthentic Dasein covers up its origin, death, and thus does not achieve Ganzheit, whereas authentic Dasein does achieve it by bringing itself into the proper relation to its origin, to death, which is then no longer covered up. By doing so and by relating itself to its «real» origin, that is, to «heritage» and «destiny» (BT 435f.; SZ 383f.), Dasein enters the state of «Eigentlichkeit» («authenticity») or «eigentliche Existenz» («authentic existence») in which it no longer vacillates. All those who maintain that, as «Ursprünglichkeit» in general, «Eigentlichkeit» in particular does not mean primarily a state but rather an activity, namely, Dasein' s activity of appropriating the structures at work in its existence, can hardly claim that Heidegger has chosen his terms carefully. For, as I already discussed in section A of chapter 1 with regard to «Entschlos-senheit» («resoluteness»), the German suffix «-keit,» or «-heit,» indicates a state or condition. For instance, «Beweglichkeit» (mobility, the condition of being able to be moved [by oneself], movableness; also used metaphorically) is that state—or in Aristotelian terms,

—that enables one to move oneself or be moved by others easily. Looking at German translations of Plato or Aristotle from any period shows that words with the suffix «-keit,» or «-heir,» (Gerechtigkeit, Schönheit, Tapferkeit, etc.) are used as translations of Plato's ideas or, in terms of Aristotle's Categories , as translations of instances of sec-

ondary substances or of one of the other nine categories whenever Aristotle abstracts from their being present within a primary substance. Heidegger could have used other expressions. He could have said, «die Tätigkeit des sich zu Eigen Machens» (the activity of appropriation), «das Sich-zu-eigen-machen» (ditto), «die Aneignung» (the appropriation) or something similar, or he could have commented on Eigentlichkeit in terms of these phrases. Thus, if he had wanted to focus on an activity, his terminology is completely misleading. It is thus more likely that «Eigentlichkeit» refers primarily to a state or habit and only secondarily to the activities necessary to achieve this state or those concomitant with it.11

B. Anschwellender Bocksgesang

At the beginning of section 73 Heidegger points to an ambiguity in the term «history» («this term may mean the 'historical actuality' {"geschichtliche Wirklichkeit"} as well as the possible science of it»), stating that «we shall provisionally eliminate the signification of 'history' in the sense of a "science of history" (historiology)» (BT 430; SZ 378). That is, in sections 73-75 Heidegger is talking about Dasein's historical actuality, and only in sections 76-77 does he discuss the science of this historical actuality. If Dasein's authentic historicality is characterized by the act of repetition, we might expect that inauthentic Dasein does not repeat. This is implied in section 74 and is explicitly stated in the penultimate paragraph of section 75 («In inauthentic historicality, . . . the "they" evades choice. Blind for possibilities, it cannot repeat what has been, . . . it seeks the modern. But when historicality is authentic, it understands history as the 'recurrence' of the possible, and knows that a {die} possibility will recur only if existence is open for it fatefully, in a moment of vision, in resolute repetition» [BT 443f.; SZ 391f.]).12 If «repetition» and «the modern» make up a clear contrast, we might say that to perform a «repetition» and to seek the «modern» are the outcome of the crisis that is potentially present within ordinary Dasein's historizing. Heidegger likes metaphors of vertical movement («Fallen, fall,» «Absturz, downward plunge»), and in terms of spatial imagery, he would see authentic Dasein moving upward, inauthentic Dasein moving downward. We move upward only if we have to bridge a distance to a higher level. Thus, ordinary Dasein has already fallen and is still falling. However, it does so in a different way than inauthentic Dasein. In a horizontal image, authentic Dasein would move backward while inauthentic Dasein proceeds forward along the time line. Heidegger's vertical image might be inappropriate because it is too reminiscent of the metaphysical framework of time and eternity and of the efforts of metaphysical philosophers to transcend time and to return to, or assimilate themselves to, the One, or God. The horizontal image isn't appropriate either because even for the Heidegger of sections 72-77 «time goes by,» and no

Dasein can physically move backward in time. However, we can remove the flaw from the horizontal image and, at the same time, integrate the temporalized vertical image, that is, its temporalized hierarchical structure, if we assume that the return to the past is not a physical but rather a mental step—one toward the past as present in the present time and which will lead to the past being rerealized in the future.

However, I would like to briefly touch upon two additional points before discussing sections 72-77. In section 73 Heidegger says that a particular «world is no longer» (BT 432; SZ 380), and in section 74 he characterizes the «possibilities of existence which 'circulate' in the 'average' public way of interpreting Dasein today» in the following way: «These possibilities have mostly been made unrecognizable by ambiguity; yet they are well known to us» (BT 435; SZ 383).13 By «world» («Welt»), Heidegger means the third of the four senses of the word developed in sections 14ff. The first two refer to entities that are not Daseine and to their being (BT 93; SZ 64). In the third meaning, the term signifies «that 'wherein ' a factical Dasein as such can be said to 'live'. "World" has here a pre-ontological existentiell signification. Here again there are different possibilities: "world" may stand for the 'public' we-world, or one' s 'own' closest (domestic) environment {Umwelt}» (BT 93; SZ 65). A world in this sense is not something present-at-hand or ready-to-hand. Rather, it is the result of all those practices of Dasein, or of a group of Daseine, that enable them in their average everydayness to encounter other beings within a framework or within a horizon that relates all these beings to each other and to the Dasein and provides them with significance for the Dasein or for a group of Daseine. Or a world is that entity, or Being, that determines how Daseine can encounter other beings. As he says a few pages later, «the world itself is not an entity within-the world; and yet it is so determinative for such entities that only in so far as 'there is' a world can they be encountered and show themselves, in their Being, as entities which have been discovered» (BT 102; SZ 72). These worlds can and, in fact, do change. However, according to Heidegger, all these worlds share some basic structures that make a world as such possible. For this, Heidegger uses the term «worldhood» («Weltlichkeit»), the fourth meaning of «"world",» namely: «the ontologico-existential concept of worldhood . Worldhood itself may have as its modes whatever structural wholes any special 'worlds' may have at the time; but it embraces in itself the a priori character of worldhood in general» (BT 93; SZ 65).

In the remaining chapters of Division One, Heidegger elaborates the existentiales that make a world possible.14 With reference to situations such as a craftsman hammering in his workshop or a writer writing books at his desk, Heidegger develops the existentiale «involvement and significance» (BT 114ff.; «Bewandtnis und Bedeutsamkeit,» SZ 83ff.). As to the second point—the «possibilities of existence which 'circulate' in the 'average' public way

of interpreting Dasein today»—in chapter 4 (BT 149ff.; SZ 113ff.) he emphasizes that Dasein is not a subject existing independently of others but rather that «Dasein in itself is essentially Being-with» (BT 156; SZ 120). To be sure, in his analysis of the mode of the «they» (BT 163ff.; SZ 126ff.) Heidegger is not necessarily contemptuous of that mode. Each group of Daseine needs the mode of «they» as the «who» of Dasein. Heidegger acknowledges this, for instance, in his analysis of the craftsman. There is nothing wrong with the craftsman living in the mode of the «they,» and there might not be anything wrong with Heidegger's analysis except that Heidegger's description leaves out the average everydayness of the work of workers. However, already in his analysis of the «they,» a tone of crisis can be heard, of some unstable and critical situation, that the «they» covers up. Consider the following: «Overnight, everything that is primordial {Alles Ursprüngliche} gets glossed over as something that has long been well known. . . . The "they" is there alongside everywhere [ist überall dabei], but in such a manner that it has always stolen away whenever Dasein presses for a decision {wo das Dasein auf Entscheidung drängt}» (BT 165; SZ 127).

At the same time, Heidegger hints at a «eigentliche Verbundenheit» (SZ 122 to «become authentically bound together,» BT 159) in contrast to the everyday modes of being. His tone becomes more urgent in chapter 5, section B. Here, Heidegger elaborates on the existentiales of section A as they are present in average everydayness, that is, he elucidates «the everyday kind of Being of discourse, sight, and interpretation» (BT 210; SZ 167). In the entire section B, and especially in section 37, entitled "Ambiguity" ("Die Zweideutigkeit"), one can hear what a German writer, drawing on Heidegger, recently has chosen as the title of an essay in which he announced his turn to the political right, namely, "Anschwellender Bocksgesang."15 There is a buzzing sound in the air announcing something else, something new. Several times, Heidegger speaks of «what "they" have surmised and scented» concerning possible «deeds» (BT 218; «was man ahnte und spürte . . . Tat,» SZ 173). However, by «disguise or distortion» (BT 219; «Verstellung und Verdrehung,» SZ 175), «the publicness of the "they"» (BT 210; SZ 167) performs a double operation. It neutralizes possibilities for the Dasein, notably those of «taking action and carrying something through» (BT 218; SZ 174) by stamping them «as something merely subsequent and unimportant» (BT 218; SZ 174). Thus, in effect, it «becomes impossible to decide what is disclosed in a genuine {echtem} understanding, and what is not» (BT 217; SZ 173). At the same time, however, the publicness of the «they» disguises this difference itself or, more important, presents as «genuine» or authentic what is not, and presents as inauthentic what is genuine, or authentic: «Everything looks as if it were genuinely {echt} understood, genuinely taken hold of, genuinely spoken, though at bottom {im Grunde} it is not; or else it does not look so, and yet at bottom it is» (BT 217; SZ 173). Furthermore, «It

{curiosity} seeks novelty only in order to leap from it {abzuspringen (which is, so to speak, the comparative to the negative side of entspringen, J. F.)} anew to another novelty. In this kind of seeing, that which is an issue for care does not lie in grasping something and being knowingly in the truth. . . . not tarrying alongside what is closest. . . . {It} seeks restlessness and the excitement of continual novelty and changing encounters» (BT 216; SZ 172).

All this is more than, so to speak, the regular fallenness of everydayness in the workshop of the carpenter, and thus Heidegger labels it «Verfallen» (SZ 175; «"falling",» BT 219 with the note referring to two other notes on the difference between «Fallen» and «Verfallen») and sees it as a «"downward plunge " [Absturz]» and «turbulence [Wirbel]» (BT 223; SZ 178).16 Regarding the cause of this intensification of «fallen» into «verfallen,» Heidegger merely says that this is «a primordial kind {ursprüngliche Seinsart} of Being of Dasein» (BT 210; SZ 167). Anyway, on the most ursprünglich level of historicality, it turns out that those possibilities of deeds for authentic Dasein that the «they» scents and covers up can be found only in the past. Since in these passages Heidegger identifies the past with a vanished world, one might summarize this by saying that up to t ₁ a world w ₁ was present. After t ₁ , w ₁ begins to vanish, and at t ₂ , it has already almost completely vanished. It is at this point t ₂ that Heidegger situates ordinary Dasein's historizing, and historicality. To be sure, according to Heidegger's concept of Dasein and world, no Dasein can live without this or that word. Thus, one might say that from t ₁ on, a different world, w ₂ , has begun to emerge that is more or less fully developed at t ₂ , and in which ordinary Dasein is living. Living in w ₂ , ordinary Dasein looks back to the time before t ₂ .

Heidegger finds four «significations {Bedeutungen}» (BT 431; SZ 379) in the ordinary understanding of history. His aim in presenting these four significations is to point out that «'the past' has a remarkable double meaning» (BT 430; SZ 378) and «the remarkably privileged position of the 'past' in the concept of history» (BT 431; SZ 379). The first signification «may well be the pre-eminent usage» (BT 430; SZ 378). Something is regarded to be history in the sense of «something past » when we say «that something or other "already belongs to history". Here 'past' means "no longer present-at-hand", or even "still present-at-hand indeed, but without having any 'effect' on the 'Present'"» (BT 430; SZ 378). However, the saying, «"One cannot get away from history"» (BT 430; SZ 378), indicates the opposite, namely, that the past has some claim and effect on us. Thus, Heidegger finds a «remarkable double meaning»:

We have in view that which is past, but which nevertheless is still having effects. Howsoever, the historical, as that which is past, is understood to be related to the 'Present' in the sense of what is actual 'now' and 'today', and to be related to it, either positively or privatively, in such a way as to have effects upon it. Thus, 'the past' has a remarkable double meaning; the past belongs irretrievably to an

earlier time; it belonged to the events of that time; and in spite of that, it can still be present-at-hand 'now'—for instance, the remains of a Greek temple. With the temple, a 'bit of the past' is still 'in the present'. (BT 430; SZ 378)

The second meaning of «history» as past is «derivation [Herkunft ] from such a past» (BT 430; SZ 378), the third focuses on the difference between history and nature (BT 430f.; SZ 379), and the fourth is «whatever has been handed down to us {das Überlieferte als solches } . . ., whether it is something which we know historiologically {historisch erkannt}, or something that has been taken over as self-evident, with its derivation hidden» (BT 431; SZ 379).

Heidegger summarizes these four meanings by saying «that history is that specific historizing of existent Dasein which comes to pass in time, so that the historizing which is 'past' in our Being-with-one-another, and which at the same time has been 'handed down to us' and is continuingly effective, is regarded as "history" in the sense that gets emphasized» (BT 431; SZ 379). Ordinary Dasein, however, is not capable of realizing the specific way in which the past is past as well as present within ordinary Dasein's present time. Characterizing «what is primarily historical . . . Dasein» and «secondarily historical . . . equipment ready-to-hand . . . but also the environing Nature as 'the very soil of history'» (BT 433; SZ 381), Heidegger says that one can show «that the ordinary conception of 'word-history' arises precisely from our orientation to what is thus secondarily historical» (BT 433; SZ 381). Ordinary Dasein treats past Dasein as present-at-hand of which it maintains that it no longer exists and that, as present-at-hand, it is no longer of any significance for ordinary Dasein's present. Against this reduction of the past to a vanished past without any significance for the present, Heidegger utilizes his concept of «world»:

What is 'past'? Nothing else than that world within which they {items of equipment} belonged to a context of equipment and were encountered as ready-to-hand and used by a concernful Dasein who was-in-the-world. That world is no longer. But what was formerly within-the-world with respect to that world is still present-at-hand. As equipment belonging to a world, that which is now still present-at-hand can belong nevertheless to the 'past'. But what do we signify by saying of a world that it is no longer? A world is only in the manner of existing Dasein, which factically is as Being-in-the-word. (BT 432; SZ 380)

And he refers back to his concepts «da-gewesen » or «Gewesenheit, » which he has developed in section 65:

However, can Dasein be past at all, if we define 'past' as 'now no longer either present-at-hand or ready-to-hand '? Manifestly, Dasein can never be past, not because Dasein is non-transient, but because it essentially can never be pres-ent-at-hand . Rather, if it is, it exists . A Dasein which no longer exists, however, is not past, in the ontologically strict sense; it is rather "having-been-there "

[da-gewesen ]. . . . It may be shown further that when one designates a time as 'the past', the meaning of this is not unequivocal; but 'the past' is manifestly distinct from one's-having-been {Gewesenheit }, with which we have become acquainted as something constitutive for the ecstatical unity of Dasein's temporality. This, however, only makes the enigma ultimately more acute; why is it that the historical is determined predominantly by the 'past', or, to speak more appropriately, by the character of having-been, when that character is one that temporalizes itself equiprimordially with the Present and the future? (BT 432f.; SZ 380f.)

Heidegger solves this enigma in section 74. However, he does so not by showing that gewesenes Dasein, the past, does not determine the present at all, but rather by showing that gewesenes Dasein is present in, and determines, ordinary Dasein's present in a much stronger way than ordinary Dasein is able or willing to admit. It is not necessary to see in Heidegger's «da-gewesen» his ironic appropriation of Hegel's «"gewesen"»17 and of Hegel's insistence that the Wesen has to realize itself to understand this point. Whatever merits Heidegger's analysis of death and birth might have—on the level of historicality death and birth obviously have the function of guaranteeing that the past is not only, in this or that way, ontically present within ordinary Dasein's present but rather co-present as the ontological origin of ordinary Dasein's present. Heidegger writes:

Understood existentially, birth is not and never is something past in the sense of something no longer present-at-hand; and death is just as far from having the kind of Being of something still outstanding, not yet present-at-hand but coming along. Factical Dasein exists as born; and, as born, it is already dying, in the sense of Being-towards-death. As long as Dasein factically exists, both the 'ends' and their 'between' are , and they are in the only way which is possible on the basis of Dasein's Being as care . Thrownness and that Being towards death in which one either flees it or anticipates it, form a unity; and in this unity birth and death are 'connected' in a manner characteristic of Dasein {In der Einheit yon Geworfenheit und flüchtigem, bzw. vorlaufendem Sein zum Tode "hängen" Geburt und Tod daseinsmäßig zusammen}. As care, Dasein is the 'between'. (BT 426f.; SZ 374)

Ordinary Dasein does not acknowledge the presence of the past, or of what-has-been-there (Gewesenheit), in ordinary Dasein's present. Or, it scents the presence of what-has-been-there and the latter's call for a deed, but it works on all these ways of the past's presence only in order to neutralize them and to keep them reduced to something present-at-hand, that is, to something that has no significance for Dasein. In this way, it renders them unrecognizable, insignificant for only as long as it is able to do so can ordinary Dasein continue in its way of life. This is the critical situation that calls for a decision. Some Daseine will break through ordinary Dasein's work of ambiguity, will

recognize the possibilities covered up by ordinary Dasein as the authentic ones, and will turn them against ordinary Dasein. These Daseine become authentic. Other Daseine, however, will continue to try to get rid of the past, of what-has-been-there, and its presence in ordinary Dasein's present, and thus they will become inauthentic.

C. The Crisis

It is important to note that the movement of authentic Dasein starts not from a point somewhere beyond and independent of ordinary Dasein but rather from within ordinary Dasein's world. As discussed above, in section 74 Heidegger begins with «vorlaufende Entschlossenheit» (SZ 382; «anticipatory resoluteness,» BT 434). He points out that the act of resolutely running forward into death guarantees «only the totality and authenticity of one's resoluteness» and that the possibilities of authentic existence cannot be gathered from death (BT 434; SZ 383). However, these very possibilities are present in the very same world in which ordinary Dasein lived before it resolutely ran forward into death. Resolutely running forward does not disclose a new world. Rather, it simply enables authentic Dasein to see the same world with new eyes, to see through and no longer go along with the work of ambiguity ordinary Dasein has performed. As Heidegger explains:

As thrown, Dasein has indeed been delivered over to itself and to its potentiality-for-Being, but as Being-in-the-world . As thrown, it has been submitted to a 'world', and exists factically with Others. Proximally and for the most part the Self is lost in the "they". It understands itself in terms of those possibilities of existence {Es versteht sich aus den Existenzmöglichkeiten} which 'circulate' in the 'average' public way of interpreting Dasein today. These possibilities have mostly been made unrecognizable by ambiguity {durch die Zweideutigkeit unkenntlich gemacht}; yet they are well known to us. The authentic existentiell understanding is so far from extricating itself from the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us, that in each case it is in terms of this interpretation {aus ihr}, against it {gegen sie}, and yet again for it {für sie }, that any possibility one has chosen is seized upon in one's resolution. {Das eigentliche existentielle Verstehen entzieht sich der überkommenen Ausgelegtheit so wenig, daß es je aus ihr und gegen sie und doch wieder für sie die gewählte Möglichkeit im Entschluß ergreift. } (BT 435; SZ 383)

These sentences mark the beginning of the crisis at the end of which authentic Dasein will subjugate itself to the past («erwidert»), and will cancel the sphere of ordinary and inauthentic Dasein («Widerruf»). Thus, in this opening movement with its three steps «aus,» «against,» and «for» the sphere of inauthentic Dasein, the second and third steps anticipate the sentences on erwidert and Widerruf. By choosing its hero, Dasein turns «against» the sphere

of ordinary Dasein and destroys the world of ordinary Dasein that, for authentic Dasein, has become inauthentic after Dasein has resolutely run forward into death. That authentic Dasein does so «for» inauthentic Dasein is the conservatives' and rightists' understanding of their «Berufung» (vocation), another noun containing «Ruf»; the implication was that the right-minded Daseine will save the «they» by destroying the world of the «they» and by replacing it with one that is ensouled by the properly present origin. Thus, «against» and «for» seem to be clear. However, «aus» and, correspondingly, the phrase «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us {überkommenen Ausgelegtheit}» (to which «this interpretation {aus ihr}» refers) are ambiguous. «Aus» has several meanings. It can mean «out of» in the sense of «to get out of this place»—I go «aus dem Haus,» that is, I leave the house. Thus, Heidegger's «aus» may mean the place or the possibilities authentic Dasein will leave. In this case, the phrase «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us» refers only to a subset of all possibilities present within the world of ordinary Dasein, namely, only to those ordinary Dasein practices as its own positive possibilities. I'll call these «inau-thentic possibilities.» However, these are not the only possibilities available to Dasein. Rather, there are all the possibilities that have been «made unrecognizable» by ordinary Dasein and that, therefore, ordinary Dasein doesn't recognize as significant possibilities anymore. Instead ordinary Dasein distances itself from those «unrecognizable» possibilities by keeping them reduced to something present-at-hand. Since these are the possibilities authentic Dasein will seize, I'll call them «authentic possibilities.»18 A second meaning of «aus» is «out of» or «from.» I take an apple aus, that is, out of, a basket. In this sense, the phrase «way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us» would define, so to speak, a pool containing the inauthentic as well as the authentic possibilities, and the «aus» would indicate that authentic Dasein takes from this pool its possibility or heroes. This too, fits the sequence «aus,» «against,» and «for.» Authentic Dasein selects «aus (from)» the pool containing authentic as well as inauthentic possibilities. Authentic Dasein acts «against» either the inauthentic possibilities or against the entire pool as this strange mixture within which the authentic possibilities as part of the pool have been made unrecognizable by ordinary Dasein (or it acts «against» the way in which the authentic possibilities are present for ordinary Dasein, that is, it cancels the work of ambiguity performed by ordinary and inauthentic Dasein). Authentic Dasein acts «for» the inauthentic possibilities in the sense mentioned above, and/or for the authentic possibilities. Or, authentic Dasein acts «for» the entire pool since it acts for the sake of the present world. In any case, it also and mainly acts for the past since authentic Dasein is struggling for the sake of the authentic possibilities and the past's rebirth. In all these renderings, the world in which ordinary Daseine live and which they try to keep unambiguous is in fact freighted with possibilities, the

resolute grasping of which leads to the destruction of ordinary Dasein' s world. Both meanings of «aus» are meanings of the Greek

,

, as well, and the second meaning of «aus,» «from,» already comes close to a third meaning of aus as the main meaning of the Greek

,

. By definition, a principle is that aus (out of, from) which the other beings come, while it itself doesn't come out of/from anything else as Aristotle says in Physics 1:5, 187 a 27-28, and it is that aus which something consists (ibid., 1:7, 190 b 17-20).

This polysemous particle «aus» renders the entire section 74 difficult. However, before discussing this in detail, I would like to remind readers that, as the second of the long quotes from Guignon I presented close to the beginning of chapter I, section B, already shows, Guignon and I agree that Heidegger's concept of historicality contains a move against the present. Both Guignon and I regard this to be the content of the sentence about disavowal (Widermf). For me and maybe also for Guignon, this move against the present is also indicated by the «against» («gegen») of the sentence discussed from the beginning of this section on. Consider the following passage in section 74 shortly after the one quoted at the beginning of this section:

Only by the anticipation of death is every accidental and 'provisional' {"vor-läufige"} possibility driven out. Only Being-free for death, gives Dasein its goal outright and pushes existence into its finitude. Once one has grasped the finitude of one's existence, it snatches one back from {reißt aus} the endless multiplicity of possibilities which offer themselves as closest to one—those of comfortableness, shirking, and taking things lightly {Behagens, Leichtnehmens, Sichdrückens}—and brings Dasein into the simplicity of its fate [Schicksals ]. This is how we designate Dasein's primordial historizing, which lies in authentic resoluteness and in which Dasein hands itself down to itself, free for death, in a possibility which it has inherited and yet has chosen {Damit bezeichnen wir das in der eigentlichen Entschlossenheit liegende ursprüngliche Geschehen des Daseins, in dem es sich frei für den Tod ihm selbst in einer ererbten, aber gleichwohl gewählten Möglichkeit überliefert }. (BT 435; SZ 384)

(Note in passing that the German expression «sich drücken» especially is extremely derogatory.) One might wonder whether authentic Dasein can go back to the possibilities characterized by «comfortableness, shirking, and taking things lightly.» One might imagine that some person experiences some event and behaves in such a way that Heidegger might call this proper resoluteness. After this experience, however, he goes on as usual. Nonetheless, his attitude toward his possibilities has changed. He will no longer grumble about his fellow citizens or himself, but he will be thankful to God, destiny, or whomever that he is still alive, and he will appreciate and enjoy life. Thus, he will see his ordinary life, though nothing has changed externally, «with new eyes.» Or, consider many philosophers, especially in late antiquity (if they may count as authentic Daseine). They maintained to know better than

the many; they knew that the gods, or God, were not what public opinion considered them to be. Those philosophers nevertheless followed the public practices with the private caveat that, philosophically, they didn't agree with these possibilities. Or, the phenomenon of camp might point to the possibility that one indulges in exactly the same things and activities as inauthentic Dasein; however, through a special «kick» one has given one's attitude, one signals one's distance and authenticity. However, the tone of the quoted sentence as well as the sequence of «aus,» «gegen,» and «für» and the passage on disavowal show that, according to Heidegger, authentic Dasein will not return to the possibilities ordinary and inauthentic Dasein have chosen; on this Guignon and I agree. (Thus, the «aus» in «snatches one back from . . . » indicates, as the tone of this sentence already suggests, not a provisional but rather a final «out of this place» with no possibility of return.)

«Überkommene Ausgelegtheit» («the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us») is the first of a series of four concepts in section 74. It is followed by «Erbe» («heritage»), «Schicksals» («fate»), and finally by «Geschick» («destiny,» which is explained in terms of «Gemeinschaft, des Volkes,» «community, of {the } people»). In sections B and D of chapter I, I mentioned Birmingham's interpretation of the sentences on erwidert and Widerruf. According to her, authentic Dasein does nothing but negate or distance itself from possibilities offered by the past and does not identify itself with any possibility proposed by the past. From the perspective of this interpretation of «erwidert» and «Widerruf,» one might feel tempted to interpret the sequence from «überkommene Ausgelegtheit» to «Geschick» in the same way, all the more so since obviously right from its beginning this passage is pervaded by a strong sense of «aus» as «out of this place,» «out of this possibility.» She quotes completely from Macquarrie and Robinson's translation the passage beginning with «But if fateful Dasein,» containing the sentence, «destiny is not something that puts itself together out of individual fates,» and ending with «Only in communicating and in struggling does the power of destiny become free» (BT 436; SZ 384), and comments on it as follows:

Two points must be noted. First, when Heidegger writes, "our fates have been guided in advance," he means no more and no less than that Dasein is always already implicated, immersed in historical happenings and events. Second, the event of destiny emerges only in the shared (Mitgeschehen ) realm of speech and action. The event of destiny is situated in the Augenblick , which we have seen is an historical conjunction of traditions, discourses, and practices. The taking over of destiny is located, taking place only by acting with and upon the actions and discourses of others through communication and struggle: "But if fateful Dasein , as being-in-the-world, exists essentially in being-with-others, its historizing is a co-historizing and is determinative for it as destiny (Geschick). This is how we designate the historizing of the community, of a people [Volk]" (SZ, 384/436). This passage calls into question any interpretation of the "we"

(Mitgeschehen ) as the "we" of a homogeneous totality. Indeed, this passage suggests that Heidegger thinks Volk only in terms of Mitgeschehen : the heterogeneity of historical actors who constitute the event of destiny through their critical, agonal response to historical possibilities.

There is here a clear distinction between destiny and tradition. The critical response (Erwidert ) to shared historical possibilities frees the historical space of destiny to be something different from what has been. (TP 30; after this she quotes the passage on erwidert and Widerruf and comments on it as quoted above in section B of chapter I.)

Her usage of «fate» seems unclear. Either she means by it all those traditions in which each Dasein is always already implicated and with which authentic Dasein breaks since authentic Dasein has an «agohal response to historical possibilities» (TP 30) and «disrupts identity and continuity . . . refuting the notion of history as a continuum» (TP 31). Or she means that fate is the critical response itself to the tradition in which each Dasein is implicated. Similarly, Birmingham's use of «destiny» («Geschick») isn't quite clear. It is either the event that, constituted by the Daseine, turns against tradition (and fate) and excludes it, or it is tradition (and fate) itself in its moment of being overruled by the struggles of different Daseine.

However, even prior to a discussion of possible differences between the terms, native speakers of German would intuitively say that both Schicksal and Geschick designate something that cannot be overruled by a Dasein. These terms do not name something that by definition gets overruled or is the event of overruling itself. Though some Dasein might manage to avoid its fate for some time, its fate will ultimately «es einholen,» catch or get hold of it. Furthermore, speakers of German would also say that it is not the Dasein—nor a group of Daseine—that constitute destiny or fate but rather the other way round: destiny and fate determine the Dasein. There is not the slightest hint in the entire passage indicating that Heidegger uses the notions of destiny and fate ironically, or that he uses them in a meaning different from their meaning in everyday language and in philosophical language. Instead, he uses them precisely the way they were used by conservatives and right-wingers at the time (see chapter 3). Thus, he did not mean that Dasein overrules destiny and fate or that destiny is the break with any tradition. (If he had wanted to advance an argument like the one Birmingham reads into this passage, he might have used his term «co-historizing,» but then he would not have commented on this in terms of «und bestimmt als Geschick .») Furthermore, in ordinary language «wird frei» (becomes free) refers to something that exists prior to this becoming free and that remains free after becoming free. Again, Heidegger would not have used this phrase (or would have used it only with a further comment) if he had wanted to describe an event that is constituted by several Daseine in such a way that it takes place just to disappear again or to eliminate tradition and fate. Furthermore, Birmingham does not explain in

what way her statement «historical actors who constitute the event of destiny» can be seen as not contradicting one of Heidegger's sentences she herself quotes, namely, «Destiny is not something that puts itself together out of individual fates» (BT 436; «Das Geschick setzt sich nicht aus einzelnen Schicksalen zusammen,» SZ 384). One might pass over these flaws in her interpretation of this passage, or perhaps Birmingham might justify them in some way. However, as I will show in this section, the idea that «destiny» in Heidegger is an event disrupting any identity and continuity can be maintained only with utter disregard for the context of this passage.19

Guignon is more moderate insofar as, according to him, authentic Dasein ultimately identifies itself with possibilities offered by the past, or tradition—though, in the end, the difference may not count for much, since Guignon believes that what Dasein chooses is determined not by some offer of the past but by the utopian ideal of the choosing Dasein. He also does not distinguish among the four terms in Heidegger's series of «überkommene Ausgelegtheit» and «fate, » « heritage,» «destiny, » which is explained as «community, of {the} people»; to him they all seem to be merely different names for the one pool from which authentic Dasein can draw its choice. Consider, for example, the following passage contained in the second of the long quotes presented close to the beginning of section B of chapter I: «The present can be seen as deformed or defective only in contrast to an understanding of the potential built into our heritage and the truest aims definitive of our destiny» (HC 138). Here, «heritage» seems to be equivalent to «überkommene Ausgelegtheit.» Turning back to «überkommene Ausgelegtheit,» authentic Dasein recognizes that among other possibilities there is something—in Guignon's words, built into this «überkommene Ausgelegtheit»—that authentic Dasein, in contrast to the inauthentic one, will choose. Thus, «heritage» is the «überkommene Aus-gelegtheit» itself viewed from the perspective of authentic Dasein, which regards it as the pool from which it can draw its choices, whereas ordinary and inauthentic Daseine don't realize the different possibilities within the «überkommene Ausgelegtheit» since they don't turn back and don't look at it in the light of some utopian ideal, or they do so but decide to stick to their possibilities. Or consider a passage prior to this:

As thrown, Heidegger reiterates, Dasein "understands itself in terms of those possibilities which 'circulate' in the 'average' public away {sic !} of interpreting Dasein today" (BT , 435). There is no exit from the understanding of things deposited in the public language and embodied in the practices of our current world. But, in the context of this discussion of historicity, Heidegger points to a different manner in which we might encounter those public possibilities. As authentic, he says, one can encounter them as a "heritage" (Erbe ). Dasein's resoluteness "discloses current possibilities as from the heritage which resoluteness, as thrown, takes over " (BT , 435). (HC 135)

This seems to be the same idea as in the earlier quote with «built in.» «Heritage» is the same as «überkommene Ausgelegtheit,» the only difference being that authentic Dasein regards «überkommene Ausgelegtheit» as the pool, and thus as heritage, from which it can and must make its choice, whereas inauthentic Dasein does not turn back to the pool and does not make a choice. Yet, even if Guignon distinguishes between «überkommene Ausgelegtheit» and the other concepts, he regards—as I explained in section B of chapter I—the past as the pool that contains several possibilities, none of them binding in itself but each receiving its meaning only in the light of a utopian ideal.

However, there is a big difference between «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us» on the one hand and «heritage,» «fate,» and «destiny» on the other.20 Maybe already «heritage, but certainly «destiny» is no longer identical with «überkommene Ausgelegtheit,» but is rather that possibility that authentic Dasein catches, or by which it is caught, and that Dasein in the next step turns against the «überkommene Ausgelegtheit,» that is, against the world of ordinary Dasein. In other words, «überkommene Ausgelegtheit» contains the inauthentic possibilities as well as the authentic ones. Destiny, however, is no longer this pool containing both kinds of possibilities. Rather, it comprises only the authentic possibilities, the specific choices authentic Daseine have selected from the pool and in the name of which they will turn «against» ordinary Dasein and its mode of interpreting and being in the world, that is, against «überkommene Ausgelegtheit.» Thus, destiny is no longer some neutral pool, filled with a plurality of possibilities, but a reality that imposes itself onto Dasein and does not leave Dasein any choice; it does not allow Dasein to distance itself from it. Not to see this difference between überkommene Ausgelegtheit on the one hand and destiny on the other might indeed turn Heidegger's concept of historicality into a politically neutral one or, perhaps, even into a philosophy of Riß, as Birmingham puts it (TP 37). However, to see the distinction Heidegger made here is to realize that, as I will show in chapters 3 and 4, Heidegger used «destiny» the way it was used by the political Right.

I said, «but certainly destiny» because there is some ambiguity about «heritage,» or at least the impression of ambiguity since Heidegger seems to use the preposition «aus» («in terms of the heritage {aus dem Erbe} which that resoluteness, as thrown, takes over» [BT 435; SZ 383]) in the same meaning he uses «aus» in the sentence on «überkommene Ausgelegtheit.» However, «aus» in the phrase with «heritage» acquires a new meaning due to the different character of the container of possibilities to choose from. Those who can listen to language as Heidegger does already expect the new meaning once they read the word «heritage» as the new word for the container to choose from, especially since Heidegger says in the same sentence that authentic Dasein «discloses» (BT 435; «erschließt,» SZ 383) the relevant possibilities.21 Those who are not that good at listening to language realize the new

meaning at the latest after reading the entire paragraph beginning with the sentence on heritage. To put it differently, similarly to his punning on «Wieder,» «erwidert,» and «Widerruf,» in the entire passage with its several «aus» Heidegger is punning on the different meanings of «aus» which are the same as the different meanings of the Greek word

. He does so because in this way the master of listening to language is again able to situate his project within the different meanings of a prominent preposition in the Greek language; the language that is «along with German . . . (in regard to its possibilities for thought) at once the most powerful and most spiritual of all languages» (IM 57; EM 43). In the passage beginning with «in terms . . ., against it, and yet again for it,» these different meanings enable him to switch from «aus» as «from which,» or «out of which,» to «aus» in the sense of «that out of which something consists» so as to establish heritage, destiny, and fate as that entity to which authentic Dasein has to subjugate itself since the former is its origin, is what provides Dasein with its identity and stability22

Heidegger writes: «The resoluteness in which Dasein comes back to itself, discloses current factical possibilities of authentic existing, and discloses them in terms of the heritage which that resoluteness, as thrown, takes over {aus dem Erbe, das sie als geworfene übernimmt}» (BT 435; SZ 383). In chapter 1, I already pointed out the contrast between Guignon's interpretation and mine. Guignon understands the past here as something whose seeming unity is dissolved by the different Daseine interpreting it in the light of their various utopian ideals. As I will elaborate in chapter 4, when Guignon applies his interpretation to political choices, the conclusion is that different Daseine choose different heroes who oppose each other and who struggle against each other. One Dasein chooses a communist hero, another a liberal, and so on. Needless to say, in the realm of politics every one is everyone else's opponent or foe. Thus, according to Guignon, «heritage,» or «community, of {the} people,» is in itself not a determining factor. Rather, resoluteness reveals that heritage in itself entails several contradictory possibilities, and different authentic Daseine will choose different heroes from those possibilities. These choices are not determined by the heritage but by the different utopian ideals.

In contrast, my interpretation is that «heritage» and «community, of {the } people» present a strongly unified entity that imposes itself onto the authentic Dasein. This unity leaves room for, and requires, several different ways of being in it—in Heidegger's terms, different Schicksale (fates). However, these different Schicksale, or the different Helden, do not oppose each other or struggle against each other but are united by the common heritage or Volk (and thereupon fight against ordinary and inauthentic Daseine). The power of the origin is that it allows and requires several different members who do not oppose each other but are united by and within the unity of the origin. That this idea of past and heritage is at work in section 74 and not Guignon's is shown already by the passage under discussion. To be sure, the phrase «aus

dem Erbe » looks like the phrase «aus den Existenzmöglichkeiten» or «aus ihr.» Furthermore, in both cases the «aus» designates some sort of pool from which authentic Dasein can make its choice. However, the pool is no longer the same. This is clearly indicated by the formulation as well as by the steps following it. It is indicated by the formulation itself insofar as the «aus» designates exclusively something from which authentic Dasein chooses, whereas in the context of «überkommene Ausgelegtheit» the «aus» has the double meaning of «from which (one chooses)» and «(the place) out of which (one gets by the choice) and against which (one turns one's choice).»

The same is shown by the following sentence on «everything 'good'» and «'goodness'.» Heidegger writes: «Wenn alles "Gute" Erbschaft ist und der Character der "Güte" in der Ermöglichung eigentlicher Existenz liegt, dann konstituiert sich in der Entschlossenheit je das Überliefern eines Erbes» (SZ 383f.). Macquarrie and Robinson translate: «If everything 'good' is a heritage {Erbschaft}, and the character of 'goodness' lies in making authentic existence possible, then the handing down of a heritage {Erbe} constitutes itself in resoluteness» (BT 435). The translation is inaccurate or at least misleading in three ways. Today it might require some effort to recognize the meaning of Heidegger's sentence. However, at Heidegger's time probably no one familiar with the political discourse of the conservatives and right-wingers would have had much difficulty. First, in the first part of the subordinate clause the translation has an indefinite article in front of «heritage» while the German «Erbschaft» has neither a definite nor an indefinite one. Second, the translators use the same word, namely «heritage,» as in the sentence with «in terms of {aus } the heritage {Erbe }.» However, while in the sentence with «in terms of {aus } the heritage » Heidegger uses «Erbe,» in the subordinate clause with «everything 'good'» he uses «Erbschaft.» The usage of «Erbe» and «Erb-schaft» in German is somewhat intriguing. Both notions can be used interchangeably. If both occur in the same sentence or context as they do here in Heidegger, the speaker most of the time wants to make a distinction between two perspectives. An individual or group A inherits some X from B. Since in Being and Time «heritage» is used for the German «Erbe» as well as «Erb-schaft,» I avoid in what follows the notion of heritage and call X «estate.» The estate is handed down by B to A. In German, B is said to «hinterlassen eine Erbschaft,» to bequeath an Erbschaft, to A, and A is said to «ein Erbe zu empfangen,» to inherit an Erbe, from B . That is, from the perspective of B the estate is called an Erbschaft while from the perspective of A the estate is called an Erbe. However, the notions are also used the other way round. To elaborate the second usage, by definition a proletarian leaves nothing behind besides his or her children. Other people leave an Erbe, an estate, to their children. Each of the children «macht/bekommt/erhält/tritt an eine Erbschaft,» inherits his or her, as I translate, «inheritance,» that is, his or her share in the estate. Thus, a property is labeled an Erbe, an estate, when one focuses on

the identity of an estate over several generations or when one looks upon the act of handing down from the perspective of its respective owner, while the same property and Erbe is called Erbschaft when one looks upon the act of handing down from the perspective of the heirs of an estate.

Heidegger employs the notions in the second way. Resoluteness discloses current factical possibilities of authentic existence «in terms of the heritage { aus dem Erbe }» (BT 435; SZ 383). This Erbe contains «the possibilities that have come down to one» (BT 435; SZ 383), of which Heidegger speaks in the next sentence. That is, the Erbe comes from the past and contains possibilities that come down to us from the past. Coming from the past, the Erbe is an estate and can be taken over by authentic Daseine. Heidegger introduces this latter perspective in the relative clause: «in terms of the heritage {aus dem Erbe } which that resoluteness, as thrown, takes over {übernimmt}» (BT 435; SZ 383). Since, from the perspective of the Daseine that take it over, the Erbe can be called an «Erbschaft,» Heidegger uses «Erbschaft» in the sentence beginning with «If everything 'good' is a heritage {Erbschaft}» (BT 435; SZ 383). This step from «Erbe,» estate, to «Erbschaft,» inheritance, is reasonable, for after introducing the estate as well as the one who takes it over it is useful, if not even necessary, to focus on the relation of the heirs to the estate they inherit. The passage is a good instance of the power of a principle, be it Plato's ideal state, an Aristotelian form, a conservative Gemeinschaft, a right-wing Volksgemeinschaft, or «the proletariat.» It is one and the same Erbe that provides for different slots, different Erbschaften. The different heirs to one and the same estate know that they owe their property to the same estate, and they don't fight against each other but work for the preservation and benefit of the estate and of the group owning the estate. This is the conservative idea of Erbe, and Erbe functions that way as long as family values and a good sense of the value of traditions are still in place. As I will discuss in chapter 3, in the passage on destiny and fate Heidegger rephrases the same relation of the one to the many in terms of destiny and fate. Destiny is the Erbe that provides for and requires several individual slots, fates, in order for it to be faithfully transmitted and actualized by several Daseine. The Daseine know themselves to be united in their common destiny and committed to preserve and actualize their destiny. This requires that they are willing to fight against a common enemy of their Erbe. In order to express the common relation of the different Erbschaften («Wenn alles "Gute" Erbschaft ist,» SZ 383) and their commitment to one and the same Erbe, Heidegger gathers the different Erbschaften under the short title «alles 'Gute'» (SZ 383; «everything 'good',» BT 435) and subsumes them under the singular «Erbschaft» without any article.23 The English translation, however, definitely contributes to Guignon's interpretation of section 74. For by translating both «Erbe» and «Erbschaft» with the same word, «heritage,» and by adding an indefinite article before «Erbschaft» Heidegger's «Erbe» can be

equated with the «überkommenen Ausgelegtheit» (SZ 383; «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us,» BT 435). Both are the same, the only difference being that, in contrast to inauthentic Dasein, authentic Dasein looks upon «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us» as a pool containing several possibilities for its choice. On this account, each of these possibilities can indeed be labeled «a heritage» (BT 435), one estate among many different estates. In this way, the unity of the estate in Heidegger is dissolved into a multiplicity of different and opposed small estates, as it were. In fact, none of them is even an estate any longer. For, according to Guignon, none of them is in itself binding for authentic Dasein as the latter's choice depends on its utopian ideal. By using «Erbe» in the singular and by reducing «everything 'good'» to «Erbschaft» in the singular, however, Heidegger emphasizes the unity of the estate and the obligation for the heirs to take it over. This becomes more clear if one considers the other aspects of the sentence in question.

In the subordinate clause, Heidegger makes a clear distinction, de-cision, or separation. He makes a statement on «everything 'good',» namely, that «everything 'good' is heritage {Erbschaft}.» From the sentence that everything «good» is Erbschaft it follows logically that nothing that is not Erbschaft or that has no Erbschaft is good. In addition, the sentence that everything «good» is Erbschaft does not allow the inference that the Erbe only contains good possibilities. However, the second part of the subordinate clause—the phrase «and the character of 'goodness' {Güte} lies in making authentic existence possible» (BT 435; SZ 383)—is obviously meant to establish by definition, or by listening to language, that the Erbe exclusively contains good possibilities24 Quite obviously, Heidegger makes a distinction between what is good and what is not good, and he makes this distinction in terms of the notion of Erbe. The notion of Erbe qualifies some possibilities as good—all those that are inherited, are Erbschaft, since they are a share in the Erbe—and disqualifies others as not good, namely, all those that don't partake in the Erbe. In addition, this distinction corresponds to the distinction between authentic Dasein on one side and ordinary and inauthentic Dasein on the other. The good possibilities are chosen by authentic Dasein, and the bad ones are those in which ordinary and inauthentic Daseine live. One has to take over the Erbe, since this is the only way of acquiring something good and thus of being good. Furthermore, the distinction quite obviously takes up the distinction with regard to «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us» (BT 435; SZ 383), namely, that this way contains the inauthentic possibilities as well as the authentic ones. Ordinary Dasein has no access to the Erbe and is therefore not good. Or rather it prevents itself, or is prevented by the «they,» from access to the Erbe since the «they» covers up by the work of ambiguity the authentic possibilities; the ones in which the Erbe is present. It is only upon becoming authentic that Dasein has access to the

Erbe and becomes good. Thus, the notion of «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us» (BT 435; SZ 383) and the notion of «heritage» in «in terms of {aus } the heritage {Erbe }» (BT 435; SZ 383) are not identical. The former contains all the available possibilities, namely, the inauthentic as well as the authentic ones. The latter, however, contains only the authentic possibilities. By drawing on the authentic possibilities, authentic Dasein will act «against» (BT 435; «gegen,» SZ 383) «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us» (BT 435; SZ 383); that is, authentic Dasein will replace the possibilities or the world of ordinary and inauthentic Dasein with authentic ones, with the authentic world.

The difference between «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us» and the «heritage {Erbe }» (BT 435; SZ 383) is further elaborated in the second part of the subordinate clause, namely, the phrase «and the character of 'goodness' {Güte} lies in making authentic existence possible» (BT 435; SZ 383). «Goodness» sounds like the abstract noun for «good.» In Platonic terms, something is good because it partakes in goodness. According to my experience, English readers tend to assume that Heidegger has in mind here something like an idea of the good, derived from Plato or another philosophical tradition; an idea that serves as a criterion for evaluating political constitutions and the empirical political life in a given society. Though Guignon doesn't discuss this sentence, he might have had it in mind. Authentic Dasein has its specific utopian ideal, because authentic Dasein assumes this ideal is the best, fits best the idea of the good (or is itself the good). With the idea of the good and its utopian ideal in mind, authentic Dasein turns back and realizes that «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us» (BT 435; SZ 383) is the «Erbe» that contains several possibilities (BT 435; SZ 383). It screens all these possibilities in order to pick out the one that fits its utopian ideal and thus the idea of the good best. It chooses this possibility and rejects all the others. In this way, Guignon might have found textual support for his distinction between an utopian ideal and the various possibilities included in the «Erbe»; a distinction that at the same time makes readers identify the «Erbe» authentic Dasein takes over (BT 435; SZ 383) with «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us» (BT 435; SZ 383). However, Heidegger does not make such a distinction between a pool containing various possibilities and a universal criterion enabling authentic Dasein to screen the pool and to reject all but one possibility. The German word «Güte» normally doesn't denote a universal criterion for ethical and political choices. (It can be said, for instance, that the «Güte» of an action consists in realizing a «Gut,» a good, a value; in that case, however, the criterion is the Gut, and the action has Güte only because it conforms to that criterion.) Rather, «Güte» often denotes a certain property that only things that are an Erbschaft have and that things that are not Erbschaft lack.25 Thus, in the second part of the subordinate clause Heidegger further elaborates on

the notion of Erbe and its obligatory character and does not make a distinction between Erbe and a criterion in the light of which the Erbe loses its obligatory power.

As was said, the entire sentence reads: «If everything 'good' is a heritage {Erbschaft}, and the character of 'goodness' {Güte} lies in making authentic existence possible, then the handing down of a heritage {Erbe} constitutes itself in resoluteness {dann konstituiert sich in der Entschlossenheit je das Überliefern eines Erbes}» (BT 435; SZ 383f.). Note that in the main clause Heidegger returns to the word «Erbe» (estate). In resoluteness the handing down of the Erbe constitutes itself. Only authentic Dasein has access to the Erbe. By obeying the call to turn back to the Erbe, Dasein no longer covers up the Erbe. Instead, it acknowledges its Erbschaft, that is, its share in the Erbe, and becomes authentic and good, whereas all those ordinary Daseine that don't listen to the call become inauthentic Daseine and remain deprived of any good. (Perhaps it can be said that ordinary Daseine are deprived of any good, while inauthentic Daseine are evil.) In this way, the handing down of the Erbe constitutes itself. Note that Heidegger does not say that heritage constitutes itself, but that «the handing down of» the Erbe «constitutes itself.»26 This is a further indication that Heidegger quite self-evidently assumes that Erbe, destiny, and fate exist prior to the one who receives, or takes over, the Erbe, destiny, or fate. As I will show in chapters 3, 4 and 5, this is the common understanding of these notions in everyday language as well as in philosophical texts. For conservatives and rightists, destiny or fate governed history, while liberals and leftists maintained that destiny and fate were notions without reference, and that, instead, reason or the means of production governed history. According to Heidegger, Dasein becomes authentic only through receiving the Erbe as its Erbschaft. Furthermore, in resoluteness the handing down of the Erbe constitutes itself. If Heidegger had left out the first claim and if, instead of the second one, he had said that in resoluteness the Erbe or an Erbe constitutes itself, one might have thought that he talks about an act in which someone establishes out of the blue, as it were, a new tradition for the following generation. However, since Heidegger says that only an Erbschaft makes authentic Dasein possible and that in resoluteness the handing down of the Erbe constitutes itself, Erbe exists prior to authentic Dasein and prior to the moment in which the handing down of the Erbe constitutes itself, as is already implied in the notion of Erbe. According to Birmingham, in section 74 authentic Dasein breaks with each and any tradition. If Heidegger had wanted to say this, he would certainly not say that only an Erbschaft makes authentic Dasein possible. He would also not say that authentic Dasein is about the handing down of the Erbe. Finally, he would not use a sentence whose grammatical subject is not authentic Dasein but rather the handing down of the Erbe. «Konstituieren» means «to set up, to establish, to form, to compose.» Not only Heidegger would say that, quite

literally, it means—like the Latin verb constituere, con-statuere—«to place at some location, to put together, to put together/to join several things at some location.» Thus, «sich konstituieren» means «to put oneself together, to place and join one's parts at some location.»

One can hear on the news a sentence such as: «Heute hat sich in Bonn der neue Bundestag konstituiert» (Today, the newly elected parliament has constituted itself in Bonn); or, «Heute trat in Bonn der neue Bundestag zu seiner konstituierenden Sitzung zusammen» (Today, the newly elected parliament assembled for the session in which it constituted itself). (Note that the second sentence even contains two formulas of «putting itself together.») Three points are important about such usages of «sich konstituieren.» First, the new parliament doesn't come out of the blue. Rather, its members only gather because they have been elected and thus have the right and the duty to work for the new parliament. They do not break with any tradition but rather continue a tradition, for the new parliament succeeds the preceding parliament and was elected according to the rules of the old parliament. (Even if, after a revolution, a «ver-fassungsgebende Versammlung sich konstituiert» [a constitutional assembly constitutes itself], it does so only because it was preceded by deliberations and decisions to constitute a verfassungsgebende Versammlung.) Second, though the individual members represent their electorate, they must not work for the private advantage of themselves or their electorate but rather for the well-being of the state and the German people. Third, in light of the first two points the phrase «sich konstituieren» means that an entity that exists prior to its constitution but does so in such a way that it cannot yet fully act comes out into full existence in order, to put it somewhat sloppily, to step out and «get the job done,» as Patrick Ewing and his colleagues used to say. (They say so not because they gather spontaneously but rather because their employer makes the team put itself together, actualize itself, at a certain time to play the Chicago Bulls. The Bundestag exists prior to its constitution as the new Bundestag; according to Aristotle, the productive power included in the male seed, the form, exists prior to the moment in which it begins to work, that is, to inform female menstruation; the explosive power in a bomb exists prior to the moment the bomb explodes; the bomb couldn't explode without the material capable of exploding, and the material is present in order to be capable of exploding at the requested time; several recently developed bombs explode upon contact between two or more materials in the bombshell; that is, the bomb puts its parts together, as the new Bundestag does when its members assemble in Bonn. For an Aristotelean the species puts its parts, a male being and a female being, together to come out again as a newborn individual of the same species. In other words, the phrase «konstituiert sich» (constitutes itself) borrows its intelligibility mainly from the traditional metaphysical logic of potentiality and actuality. The new Bundestag is the «actualization» of the Bundestag, the latter being an entity that has «potential existence,» and this potential existence in

turn presupposes a prior actual Bundestag or a verfassungsgebende Versammlung. However, the new Bundestag exists only because the Bundestag intends its actualization as the new Bundestag, as each entity existing in potentiality «strives for» actuality. Something that exists in potentiality is not nothing; rather your capacity to practice medicine exists in you and it «strives for» being actualized or actualizing itself, that is, you strive to work as a physician.) In cases such as the Bundestag its individual members have the duty to make it happen that the Bundestag comes out of its potential existence so as to work in actuality.27

Incidentally, what Heidegger means can best be explained by a phrase Reiner Schürmann uses in the acknowledgment of his 1987 book Heidegger: On Being and Acting —From Principles to Anarchy : «While working on the original French edition {published in 1982} of this study, I published several sections in the English language. These pieces not only suffered from being taken out of their systematic context, but all of them were also preliminary versions, later reworked. Nevertheless I wish to thank the directors of the following publishing houses and journals for their permission to resettle in its native habitat material first printed in diaspora.»28 Indeed, the publication of Heidegger: On Being and Acting establishes a new tradition of Heideggerian scholarship and thinking. However, it doesn't come out of the blue. Rather, the new tradition established by the publication of the English book has already existed prior to its establishment through the publication. For it has existed as the French original, Le Principe d'anarchie: Heidegger et la question de l'agir , and as some papers published here and there in English journals. In addition, it has already existed even in Heidegger's writings, since Schümann's book is an interpretation of Heidegger's writings. Thus, no new Erbe or tradition is established through the publication of the English book. Rather something that has already existed prior to the publication of the English book enters a context in which it has previously been absent, and it begins to have an influence in that context. Or it was already present in that context but only as the few papers here and there in various English journals behind which only those who already knew the French original could recognize the whole project. In the publication of the English version the whole project, so to speak, puts itself together, gathers itself, constitutes itself, out of its fragmentary existence scattered into the various papers living in the diaspora. It is similar in Heidegger. By definition, the Erbe exists prior to its heirs. As long as the prospective authentic Dasein has not yet made the choice, the Erbe exists only in a scattered way, namely, in some possibilities hard to recognize. For ordinary Dasein has covered up by the work of ambiguity all the ways in which the Erbe is present in the world of the «they.» In authentic Dasein's choice, the Erbe constitutes itself; that is, it puts itself together out of its dismembered parts, and enters a context in which it has been previously absent or in which it has been present only in a scattered way.

According to postmodernists, modernists would say that Schürmann wanted to replace the discourse on Heidegger prior to 1987 with his book, while post-modernists themselves would say that Schürmann wanted to «enrich» the existing discourse on Heidegger. Be this as it may in Schürmann's case—the phrase «gegen» (SZ 383; «against,» BT 435) already indicates that in Heidegger the Erbe is polemical against the world of the «they.» As I already elaborated in chapter I, at the end of the drama authentic Dasein even cancels the world of the «they» in order to rerealize the past or the Erbe.

Why does Schürmann say that the English papers were printed in the diaspora, and that the publication of the English translation resettles them in their native habitat? I don't know whether, for Schürmann, missionaries live in a diaspora or not. However, even if they do, after successful conversions the missionaries and their church don't resettle themselves in their native habitat. Rather, the missionaries have «conquered» new land—in Schürmann's case, the English readers—for their church in addition to the native habitat of their church and its members—in Schürmann's case, the French original of his book and the French audience. According to the strict notion of diaspora, the original habitat was indeed lost, because one was driven out of it by an enemy that has taken over the native habitat. In that case, Schümann would present the expansion of the original territory as an act in which one regains the lost original territory, and prior to which one had no territory at all, since the original territory was lost. Why does Schürmann present his missionaries from French territory into the English language as though their native habitat, the French site, had been destroyed and taken over by an enemy? Only on this assumption can the English papers be said to be resettled in their native habitat through the publication of the English book. Schürmann's Heidegger in Heidegger: On Being and Acting is, so to speak, a very «cool,» a very Foucauldian Heidegger. Still, in Heidegger: On Being and Acting as well as in his posthumously published work29 Schürmann remains faithful to the basic tenet of Heidegger's philosophies from the thirties on; the fascination of «the Greeks» shared by many German intellectuals since Winckelmann. In the pre-Socratics, Being was present in the primordial way. With the beginning of metaphysics, Being withdraws. From that moment on, Being as well as the humans are, so to speak, in the diaspora, and only a few individuals, Meister Eckhart or Hölderlin, have an experience of Being in its primordial way. However, their writings are covered up by the work of ambiguity. At the end of metaphysics, primordial Being raises its voice, and it is possible and necessary to repeat the primordial experience of Being in the pre-Socratics. Schürmann's commitment to this crucial feature in Heidegger is obviously the reason for his peculiar attitude toward the fortune of his book on its way into the English language. However, the same motif is already present in Being and Time , though with different actors. As was mentioned above, in the drama of the entire book Being and Time at the end of Division

One, in large parts of Division Two, and at the beginning of section 74 ordinary Dasein has fallen away from its original world and is living in a new world. In addition, the constant strife for something new, for the modem, plus the forgetting of what was left behind are the mark of curiosity practiced by ordinary and inauthentic Daseine. Ordinary Dasein looks forward without looking backward and without taking over the Erbe. At the end of chapter 3, it will be clear that ordinary Dasein has fallen away from Gemeinschaft (community) and is living in Gesellschaft (society). At some point in the downward plunge away from community, community, the Erbe neglected by ordinary Dasein, raises its voice and demands to be recognized. Prior to this moment, the Erbe has remained, so to speak, in the background or in the diaspora; it has been present only as the possibilities covered up by ordinary Dasein's work of ambiguity. Thus, the Erbe exists prior to all ordinary Daseine, those that become authentic as well as those that become inauthentic. In addition, the Erbe is not identical with «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us» (BT 435; SZ 383). Rather it is the estate «in terms of {aus }» (BT 345; SZ 383), or from which, authentic Dasein receives its appropriate share, inheritance, and which is only one set of all the possibilities in the pool of «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us» (BT 435; SZ 383), namely, all those possibilities that ordinary Dasein covers up to go on living in its fallen world, in Gesellschaft, and in the possibilities coming along with Gesellschaft. The Erbe provides authentic Daseine with identity and thus enables them to «become authentically bound together» (BT 159; «eigentliche Verbundenheit,» SZ 122) or to have «primordial Being-with-one-another» (BT 219; «das ursprüngliche Miteinandersein,» SZ 174). Being authentically bound together through their common origin, the Erbe, the authentic Daseine don't fight «against» (BT 435; SZ 383) the Erbe or each other. Rather they fight «against» (BT 435; SZ 383) ordinary Daseine and inauthentic Daseine; that is, against all the Daseine that live in «deficient modes of solicitude» (BT 158; SZ 120).30 The being-with-one-another of the «they» is the opposite of «[being] authentically bound together» (BT 159; SZ 122): «Being-with-one-another in the "they" is by no means an indifferent side-by-side-ness in which everything has been settled, but rather an intent, ambiguous watching of one another, a secret and reciprocal listening-in. Under the mask of "for-one-another" {Füreinander}, an "against-one-another" {ein Gegeneinander} is in play» (BT 219; SZ 175).31 Being authentically bound together, the authentic Daseine fight «against» (BT 435; SZ 383) the ordinary and inauthentic Daseine and the world in which the ordinary and inauthentic Daseine live; that is, the authentic Daseine fight against «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us» (BT 435; SZ 383) in order to replace that world with one in which the Erbe is properly rerealized. The authentic Daseine do so «for» (BT 435; SZ 383) «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us» (BT 435; SZ 383) since through the

repetition of the Erbe not only the Erbe but also the ordinary and inauthentic Daseine are resettled in the native habitat, in world w ₁ as I called it above, since world w ₂ is a diaspora from the viewpoint of w ₁ . Thus, the sentence that in authentic Dasein's choice «the handing down» of the Erbe «constitutes itself,» means that the Erbe has existed prior to all the ordinary Daseine; that it «puts itself together» out of its scattered existence as fragments covered up by the work of ambiguity; that it enters a context in which it has previously not been present, or in which it has been present only as scattered and inactive fragments; and that it begins to be active in that context as a unified force and power. The Erbe doesn't enter the scene without authentic Daseine taking it over. However, by being called upon and by uniting themselves and subduing themselves to the Erbe the authentic Daseine become the means, or the missionaries, of the Erbe. Appropriately, they are no longer the subject of Heidegger's sentence. Instead, they are just the site on which and through which «the handing down of» the Erbe «constitutes itself» (BT 435; SZ 383). That the handing down of the Erbe puts itself together means that the Erbe enters the scene and becomes active. Thus, the ultimate subject is the Erbe, as it becomes even more clear in the following sentences.32

As I already pointed out, in the following paragraphs Heidegger determines the Erbe as destiny and fate. In the passage on the Erbe he says that authentic Dasein acts «against» (BT 435; SZ 383) «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us» (BT 435; SZ 383). In the penultimate sentence of the passage on destiny and fate, Heidegger adduces the appropriate noun. He says that «only in communicating and in struggling {im Kampf} does the power of destiny become free {wird frei}» (BT 436; SZ 384). As I already pointed out, the phrase «wird frei» («becomes free») does not mean that something is created anew but rather that something previously in bonds, so to speak, becomes free. In terms of the prisoners I talked about in section A of this chapter, ordinary Dasein has run «aus» («out of» in the sense of «illegitimate flight») Gemeinschaft, w ₁ . In the new world of ordinary Dasein, in w ₂ , the ordinary Daseine have imprisoned the remnants of w ₁ or all the missionaries of w ₁ occurring at the time of the Bocksgesang preceding the end of w ₂ . Some ordinary Daseine, however, listen to the call of the imprisoned Daseine and of destiny speaking through them. These Daseine and the prisoners are the authentic Daseine; those who understand themselves «in terms of {aus } the heritage » (BT 435; SZ 383) the «aus» in this case indicating the source of their identity and strength. Through the heritage, the prisoners and the Daseine that have liberated them become authentically bound together, and they take up the fight «against» the «they,» against Gesellschaft, which has imprisoned the messengers of destiny. They do so not for the sake of selfish interests but as missionaries of the Erbe.33

Even Guignon might admit that, at this point, «heritage» is not just «überkommene Ausgelegtheit» («the way of interpreting Dasein which has

come down to us,» BT 435; ST 383) viewed from the perspective of authentic Dasein but only the authentic possibilities that thereafter are turned against «überkommene Ausgelegtheit.» However, this passage cannot be reconciled with his assumption that authentic Dasein maintains distance to the past so that it can reject some possibilities and choose others. Note that already here the subject has changed. Like the passage on repetition I discussed in section C of chapter I, the first sentence of this paragraph has, if not a Dasein, then at least a resoluteness (of a Dasein) as its subject («The resoluteness {Die Entschlossenheit} in which Dasein comes back to itself, discloses . . ., » BT 435; SZ 383). In the sentence, «If everything 'good' . . . the handing down of a heritage constitutes itself in resoluteness,» however, the «handing down of a heritage,» and by this, «heritage» is the active subject that imposes itself onto authentic Dasein. Thus, by this point, the Dasein that at the beginning seemed to be highly active since it ran forward becomes passive in the sense I explained in regard to the notion of Entschlossenheit in section A of chapter I. As a result of this change, in the following sentences one cannot find anything indicating Dasein's sovereign ability to reject some offers of the past, much as one might like to. Heidegger insists that heritage brings Dasein «into the simplicity of its fate » (BT 435; ST 384), that heritage enables or even forces Dasein to unequivocality by which «every accidental and 'provisional' {«vorläufige»} possibility {is} driven out»34 (BT 435; ST 384) and that in all this Dasein gets its «Ziel schlechthin» («goal outright») (BT 435; ST 384). All this, of course, in this paragraph as well as in many others in Being and Time , is intended as the opposite of ordinary and inauthentic Dasein, which chooses now this, now that, and indulges in «comfortableness, shirking, and taking things lightly» (BT 435; SZ 384). Furthermore, death, and heritage, «pushes {stößt}» and «snatches» authentic Dasein «back from {reißt aus . . . zurück}» (BT 435; ST 384) the possibilities ordinary Dasein indulges in. All this rules out the idea that authentic Dasein has a conversation with the past in which it rejects several offers and adopts others. Thus, what Heidegger says is the opposite: authentic Dasein has no choice, so to speak, to deliberate with heritage. Rather, heritage catches Dasein and puts it under heritage's command.

Thus, what authentic Dasein does is execute the act of separation. Dasein, or heritage,

, de-cides, separates. In the twilight of ordinary Dasein there are inauthentic possibilities, and there are authentic possibilities the latter being covered up by ambiguity. Authentic Dasein draws on the latter. It chooses «aus (from)» all the possibilities in the twilight those that have been made unrecognizable by ordinary Dasein, and it does so in order to get «aus (out of)» ordinary Dasein and its world and to then turn its choice «gegen (against)» ordinary Dasein and its world. This ambiguity of «aus» in the passage on «überkommene Ausgelegtheit» is, as I have discussed, resolved in the first passage on «heritage» insofar as Heidegger there uses «aus»

exclusively in the sense of that from which authentic Dasein draws its choice without leaving this place it has reached in its decision and choice. Correspondingly, the «aus» in the passage on «Being-free for death» snatching «one back from {aus}» the endless possibilities of comfortableness, shirking, and taking things lightly (BT 435; SZ 384) exclusively means «to get out of» those possibilities without ever returning to them. Heritage is that place «aus (from)» which the authentic possibilities are derived that ordinary Dasein covers up. As such heritage is the site that provides authentic Dasein with identity and the strength to turn the authentic possibilities «against» ordinary Dasein's world. This site, heritage, imposes itself onto authentic Dasein and enables authentic Dasein to resolve the twilight of ordinary Dasein into the opposition between authentic Dasein living in heritage and inauthentic Dasein living outside the realm of heritage.

The last sentence of that paragraph also shows that it is heritage that catches Dasein and not the other way around. That sentence explains the notion «the simplicity of its fate » and summarizes the entire paragraph. It reads: «Damit bezeichnen wir das in der eigentlichen Entschlossenheit liegende ursprüng-liche Geschehen des Daseins, in dem es sich frei für den Tod ihm selbst in einer ererbten, aber gleichwohl gewählten Möglichkeit überliefert » (SZ 384). Macquarrie and Robinson have translated this as: «This is how we designate Dasein's primordial historizing, which lies in authentic resoluteness and in which Dasein hands itself down to itself, free for death, in a possibility which it has inherited and yet has chosen» (BT 435). The relative clause at the end, «in dem . . . üiberliefert » («and in which . . . yet has chosen»), is rather cryptic. German speakers know that it can be difficult to find the antecedent a personal pronoun or reflexive pronoun refers to if several nouns of the same gender as the pronoun occur in the context. Usually only minor measures are required to avoid such inconveniences for the readers. The personal pronoun «ihm» in «ihm selbst» («to itself») is the dative masculine and neuter personal pronoun. «Dasein» («Dasein's»), «Tod» («death»), and «dem» (the «which» in «in which,» referring to the neuter «das . . . Geschehen des Daseins») are all masculine or neuter (that is, none are feminine in which case the dative personal pronoun would be «ihr»). Thus, the dative object «ihm» in «ihm selbst» («to itself») can refer to «dem» (which refers to «Geschehen,» that is, «primordial historizing»), or to «es» («itself») (which refers to «Daseins»), or to «Tod» («death») as well. Heidegger could easily have avoided this inconvenience for the reader. He could have just replaced «ihm selbst» with «dem Tod,» «diesem selbst,» or «diesem,» «dem Dasein selbst,» «sich selbst (to Dasein itself),» or «dem Geschehen selbst,» if he had wanted the dative object of handing down to be clear and unambiguously refer to «death,» «Dasein,» or to «primordial historizing.» However, he chose the enigmatic «ihm.» The translators have chosen to refer «ihm selbst» to the Dasein (the «to itself» in «in which Dasein hands itself down to itself, free for death»). Guignon, I suppose, read the sen-

tence in the light of later ones in section 74, which I discussed in chapter 1, particularly the one with «kann, sich selbst die ererbte Möglichkeit üiberliefernd » (SZ 385; «by handing down to itself the possibility it has inherited ,» BT 437) as well as in the light of his interpretation of the sentence with «erwidert » (SZ 386; «reciprocative rejoinder, » BT 438). If Dasein hands something down to itself, that is, if Dasein is the active subject as well as the recipient of this handing down, Dasein is active and regards everything from its own vantage point. Thus, Guignon reads the relative clause as an anticipation of Dasein's capacity to freely choose out of the several possibilities offered by the past the one that fits its particular utopian ideal. In fact, up to and around the middle of the nineteenth century, one could have said, «Dasein überliefert sich ihm selbst,» if one wanted to refer the dative personal pronoun to «Dasein.» However, in such cases Heidegger seems to use the current «sich,» as a sentence at the beginning of the paragraph in question shows («Die Entschlossenheit, in der das Dasein auf sich selbst zurückkommt,» SZ 383; «The resoluteness in which Dasein comes back to itself,» BT 435). Since, therefore, Heidegger did not write «dem Dasein selbst,» nor «sich selbst,» the phrase «ihm selbst» cannot refer to Dasein. Since death doesn't provide Dasein with authentic possibilities (BT 434; SZ 383), one can rule out the case that Heidegger wanted to say that Dasein hands itself down to death. Therefore, one is left with «primordial historizing» and thus with «fate» and «heritage» to which Dasein hands itself down. Clearly, then, this sentence and indeed the entire paragraph anticipates what is later on explained in terms of repetition, including the switch to «sich überliefern» as subjugation, which I discussed in section C of chapter 1.

However, perhaps Heidegger intentionally left the sentence open to several interpretations. In this case, one would have not only Guignon' s notion of the choosing Dasein. Within the context of the entire section 74, the sentence would still anticipate the step concerning Dasein's subjugation to the past. Or perhaps Heidegger wanted to express within his syntax and grammar that Geschehen he is talking about. In this case, the «ihm selbst» would be, so to speak, the Whitsuntide of heritage, fate, death, and Dasein. However, even based on this assumption, one cannot find anything in this paragraph that indicates Dasein's autonomy and independence toward the heritage in Guignon's sense, much as one would like to. In fact, this aspect that, theologically, might be designated as Whitsuntide is operating implicitly in the entire sentence whether one relates «ihm selbst» to one of the three nouns or to some, so to speak, grammatical supersubject resulting from the movement described in the entire paragraph and its last sentence. Despite the objections regarding Heidegger's usage of «sich,» one might reasonably refer «ihm selbst» to «es» (= «des Daseins»). However, this Dasein is then no longer the choosing Dasein at the beginning of its choice. Rather, it is the Dasein as transformed by the choice, or, in Heidegger's terms, it is the «ursprüngliche, unverlorene . . . Erstrecktheit der ganzen Existenz» (SZ 390; «the whole of existence stretched

along . . . in a way which is primordial and not lost» BT 442) that has to be grasped and achieved by the empirical Dasein in order for the latter to become authentic. As was mentioned, Heidegger could have written «sich selbst» to refer to Dasein. (In order to avoid a possible inconvenience for the readers in regard to the dative object and the accusative object, he might have rearranged the words, and he might have used an «an» with the accusative: «in dem es, frei für den Tod, sich an sich selbst in einer ererbten, aber gleichwohl gewählten Möglichkeit überliefert.») However, this would not have sufficiently emphasized that he is talking here about three different aspects of Dasein or about three different Daseine in one and the same Dasein. The «Dasein» («es»), the subject of the relative cause, is Dasein on its way to authenticity. On this way, it hands «itself» («sich»), the accusative object, down; the «itself» refers to Dasein as ordinary Dasein or to Dasein as the Dasein that, as each Dasein, is open for both authenticity and inauthenticity (BT 68; SZ 42f.). It hands itself down «to itself» («ihm selbst,» the dative object); as to itself in the sense of «the whole of existence stretched along . . . in a way which is primordial and not lost» (BT 442; SZ 390). The expression «ihm selbst» is a somewhat pathetic formula indicating the radical difference between Dasein prior to its choice and Dasein after the choice. Dasein can achieve authenticity or «the whole of existence stretched along . . . in a way which is primordial and not lost» (BT 442; SZ 390) only by being snatched «back from» (BT 435; «aus . . . zurück,» SZ 384) the «they» and by being brought «into the simplicity of its fate » (BT 435; SZ 384).35 Thus, Dasein hands itself down to fate and what fate entails, namely, heritage, which makes fate possible. The phrase «ihm selbst» designates the slot destiny has allotted to a given Dasein, and which that Dasein has to take over in order to become authentic. As the terminology already indicates, there is an aspect of violence in this; however, it is a purifying violence. «To have fate,» as Heidegger puts it in the following paragraphs, is a good state, and it was a desirable state for all those young people in the Youth Movement whom I mentioned in section A of chapter 1 and to whom I will refer again in chapter 3. Anyway, what on the level of «being-towards death» (BT 279ff.; SZ 235ff.) was «coming back to itself» as nullity reveals itself on the more «ursprüngliche» level of historicality as identification with and subjugation to a fate representing heritage and all the richness contained in it. In the entire section 74, Heidegger is not talking about a free choice, that is, a choice in which the subject chooses freely and remains free and autonomous during and after the choice, as the bourgeois subject claims to be in his acting and choices since the subject is subject only to reason but not to tradition, destiny, or fate. Rather, Heidegger talks about a choice that transforms Dasein. He clearly indicated this also by the «gleichwohl» («yet») in «yet has chosen» (BT 435; ST 384). Though freedom of individual choice is no longer an issue in authentic Dasein, the choice has been Dasein' s free choice since, after all, the Dasein ran forward into death. As I will explain in more detail in chapter 3, in these passages Hei-

degger calls upon the bourgeois subject to replace its framework of mason, subjectivity, individuality, and autonomy with that of fate and community. However, this replacement has to be an act of bourgeois autonomy itself, otherwise authentic Dasein would be haunted by a bad conscience. In other words, the resignation of the autonomous subject must be an act of the autonomous subject himself, otherwise it would be too «they»-like, too ordinary, and too proletarian. This act of subjugation to heritage and, as it turns out, to Volk, however, is—in its structure—nothing other than the notion of sacrifice demanded by the extreme Right or fascism.

Authentic Dasein does not leave the world of ordinary Dasein, and it does not criticize the world of ordinary Dasein from a vantage point beyond ordinary Dasein's world. Rather, authentic Dasein turns around, or reevaluates, ordinary Dasein's world from within this world. Or it turns ordinary Dasein's world upside down. Authentic Dasein recognizes that the possibilities that «have mostly been made unrecognizable by ambiguity» (BT 435; SZ 383) are, once the work of ordinary Dasein is seen for what it is, the authentic possibilities that bring authentic Dasein into the proper relation to its origin, to heritage, destiny, and Volksgemeinschaft. With this activity authentic Dasein produces a separation between the Daseine. In the next paragraph Heidegger clarifies this difference in terms of that between the Daseine that have fate (the authentic Daseine) and those that do not (the inauthentic Daseine):

Dasein can be reached by the blows of fate only because in the depths of its Being Dasein is fate in the sense we have described {weil es im Grunde seines Seins in dem gekennzeichneten Sinne Schicksal ist }. Existing fatefully in the resoluteness which hands itself down {Schicksalhaft in der sich überliefernden Entschlossenheit existierend}, Dasein has been disclosed as Being-in-the world both for the 'fortunate' circumstances which 'come its way' and for the cruelty of accidents. Fate does not first arise from the clashing together of events and circumstances. Even one who is irresolute gets driven about by these—more so than one who has chosen; and yet he can 'have' no fate {Durch das Zusammenstoßen von Umständen und Begebenheiten entsteht nicht erst das Schicksal. Auch der Unentschlossene wird von ihnen und mehr noch als der, der gewählt hat, umgetrieben und kann gleichwohl kein Schicksal "haben"}. (BT 436; SZ 384) 36

Several points are noteworthy here. First, 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. Rather, 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 evade it—which is what ordinary, and therefore inauthentic, Dasein does. Second, this passage shows that fate, and thus heritage, is all-pervasive. Even the inauthentic Dasein

that believes itself to be outside of the realm of fate has to acknowledge that it is «im Grunde seines Seins» («in the depths of its Being») fate and heritage. In the passage following this, Heidegger, in his peculiar way, makes clear what is implied already here, namely, that ordinary Dasein's world is dependent on heritage and Volksgemeinschaft, that is, that the way from w ₁ to w₂ , as I called it before, is by no means one in which w ₁ and its origin, i.e., Volksgemeinschaft, is completely annihilated; rather, «in the depth of» (BT 436; SZ 384) world w ₂ the origin of w ₁ remains present or, at any rate, begins to represence itself in the Bocksgesang. Ordinary Dasein has not left behind heritage and Volksgemeinschaft, it has merely fallen away from them and has made unrecognizable all those ways in which the «real» origin remains present within the verfallene world of ordinary Dasein. Thus, there is only one world. Ordinary Dasein's world is not a new world but just a verfallene version of a world in which the origin is properly present. Authentic Dasein understands this and reestablishes the origin in an undistorted way so that as a result authentic Dasein «so erst der Gewesenheit ihren eigentümlichen Vorrang verleiht» (SZ 386; «for the first time imparts to having-been its peculiarly privileged position,» BT 438). Thus, we have an asymmetrical situation. Ordinary Dasein claims that its world is independent of the one vanished in the past. Authentic Dasein, however, claims that this is not at all the case. Rather, according to authentic Dasein, ordinary Dasein's world is just a verfallene version of the world of the past and has to be canceled to make room for the reestablishment of that past world. 37 Third, there is an ambiguity in the sentence «und kann gleichwohl kein Schicksal "haben"» (SZ 384; «and yet he can 'have' no fate,» BT 436). This sentence may mean that it is impossible for inauthentic Dasein to have fate. It may also mean that inauthentic Dasein is not capable of having fate. And it can mean that it is possible that inauthentic Dasein does not have fate, since it evades fate. It has no fate, but it should have one, since «in the depths of its Being» (BT 436; SZ 384) it is fate. Thus, one might infer that what Heidegger means is that inauthentic Dasein can be forced to have fate, that is, in the struggle for the rerealization of the past authentic Dasein can force inauthentic Dasein into its fate, which inauthentic Dasein by itself cannot, or does not want to, reach. This is in line with my interpretation of «Widermf» and of the «gegen» and «für» as an activity of authentic Dasein in which it replaces inauthentic Dasein's world for the sake of the latter. In the paragraphs on conscience, this motif is anticipated in the sentence: «Das entschlossene Dasein kann zum "Gewissen" der Anderen werden» (SZ 298; «When Dasein is resolute, it can become the 'conscience' of Others,» BT 344).

As this shows, the separation that authentic Dasein carries out, namely, that between authentic Dasein and ordinary Dasein—which in this separation becomes inauthentic Dasein—is a situation that calls for what is termed «Kampf» («struggle») in the subsequent passage. In this part, I have discussed the emergence and the unfolding of the crisis. In the twilight there emerges

the anschwellende Bocksgesang that calls for the separation. In contrast to ordinary Dasein and inauthentic Dasein, authentic Dasein sees the present in the light of «Heute» («"today"»), realizes that there is a dangerous situation, and relates itself to the «heritage.» In so doing, it produces the separation between the Daseine that have fate and those that do not, i.e., the inauthentic Daseine. In the next step authentic Dasein realizes that its heritage and destiny is the Volksgemeinschaft, which calls it into struggle. I will discuss this step in chapter 3. After this, authentic Dasein hands itself down to the Volksgemeinschaft and recognizes what is at stake in the struggle. This is the passage on repetition I discussed already in chapter 1. Finally, authentic Dasein reaffirms its subjugation to the past and to the Volksgemeinschaft and begins the struggle, that is, the cancellation of the world of inauthentic Dasein. This is the passage on erwidert and Widerruf I discussed in chapter 1. There, the phrase «was im Heute sich als "Vergangenheit" auswirkt» (SZ 386; «that which in the "today", is working itself out as the 'past',» BT 438) refers to «überkommenen Ausgelegtheit» (SZ 383; «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us,» BT 435) as follows: «that which in the "today", is working itself out as the 'past'» is the remnant of «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us» after authentic Dasein has made the separation. By seeing the Volksgemeinschaft as the suppressed origin in and of the possibilities that ordinary Dasein has made unrecognizable in its work of ambiguity, authentic Dasein realizes that it has to cancel the world of inauthentic Dasein, that is, «that which in the "today", is working itself out as the 'past'» (BT 438; SZ 386) in order to make possible the rebirth of a Gemeinschaft, community, in which its origin, the Volk, is properly present.

By the end of chapter 3, it will be clear that what authentic Dasein destroys in the name of Volksgemeinschaft is the Gesellschaft, that is, liberal society and the political institutions coming with it. As I will show in the following chapter, for Scheler at the beginning of World War I «our German fate took its stand before us,» and he heard «just one single answer resounding from all German souls» (PPS 11). Heidegger demands that authentic Dasein «erwidert» (SZ 386) the call of the past. Scheler urges us to «hear God's call for a turning back» (PPS 646). What Heidegger labels «that which in the "today", is working itself out as the "past"» (BT 438; SZ 386) is called by Scheler «rubbish {Abfall, literally "fall-down-and-away-from"}» (RE 166; UW 140). In the kairos of World War I and the Weimar Republic, «we» recognize that our Gesellschaft is rubbish, a fall-down-and-away-from Gemeinschaft. What Heidegger calls «a disavowal» (BT 438; SZ 386) occurs in Scheler as the demand that Europe «expels from its blood like a foreign poison» (PPS 153) Gesellschaft. «We» have to destroy Gesellschaft in order to rerealize Gemeinschaft.

A. Fate, Community, and Society

All political concepts, images, and terms have a polemical meaning {einen polemischen Sinn}. They are focused on a specific conflict and are bound to a concrete situation; the result (which manifests itself in war or revolution) is a friend-enemy grouping, and they turn into empty and ghostlike abstractions when this situation disappears. Words such as state, republic, society {Gesellschaft}, class, as well as sovereignty, constitutional state, absolutism, dictatorship, economic planning, neutral or total state, and so on, are incomprehensible if one does not know exactly who is to be affected, combated, refuted, or negated by such a term. 1

These sentences in Carl Schmitt's The Concept of the Political , published in 1927, by no means mark an extravagant insight, difficult to come by, and peculiar to Schmitt. Rather, he explicitly formulated and generalized a common practice and self-understanding of many authors of his time. In this chapter of the book, I will deal with a cluster of notions, one of which occurs on Schmitt's list of examples, namely, Gesellschaft, society. Already by the end of the eighteenth century, the notion of society and the one Heidegger uses in section 74 of Being and Time , namely, that of Gemeinschaft, community (BT 436; SZ 384) had entered a constellation that became more and more polemical. From the perspective of fight-wing authors, society was a realm, or a form of a synthesis of individuals, in which isolated persons act for the sake of their selfish interests. In this view, the only bond between individuals in society is the common assumption that each individual acts on behalf

of his or her selfish interests, while regarding other individuals exclusively as a means in the pursuit of his or her interests. Thus, this bond is not a «real» bond, since the individuals are connected only in a superficial or—as it has often been put—in a mechanical way and are therefore not really united at all. Right-wing authors at Heidegger's time maintained that liberal parties, left parties, and labor unions do not transcend the realm of selfishness, but are merely means to pursue selfish ends more efficiently. In contrast to society, community and the different communities—family, the village or small town, the Volk, the nation, for some also the state—provide individuals with a stable identity through traditions, customs (Sitte), and feelings uniting individuals on the «deep» level of «positive» emotions. These feelings and attitudes enable the individual to transcend selfishness and to regard himself or herself as part of a larger whole that is not mechanically put together but, like an organism, has a life of its own, exists «prior» to the individuals, and enables them to display «positive» emotions—trust, love, care, awe—both toward the community as well as toward the other members of the community. 2 Related to the notion of Gemeinschaft is that of Volk, people. In section 74 of Being and Time , Heidegger identifies «Gemeinschaft,» «community,» and «Volk,» «people», which are designated by the concept of Geschick, to which that of Schicksal is related:

But if fateful {schicksalhafte} Dasein, as Being-in-the-World, exists essentially in Being-with-Others, its historizing is a co-historizing and is determinative for it as {bestimmt als} destiny [Geschick ]. This is how we designate the historizing of the community {Gemeinschaft}, of {the} people {des Volkes}. Destiny is not something that puts itself together out of individual fates {Schicksalen}, any more than Being-with-one-another can be conceived as the occurring together of several Subjects. Our fates have already been guided in advance, in our Being with one another in the same world and in our resoluteness for definite possibilities. Only in communicating and in struggling does the power of destiny become free. (BT 436; SZ 384) 3

In right-wing discourse, the notion of Vorsehung (providence) is related to Schicksal (fate) and Geschick (destiny). Gesellschaft, Gemeinschaft, Volk, Volksgemeinschaft, Geschick, Schicksal, Vorsehung—each of these concepts has its specific history in which it acquired different meanings and polemical functions. However, in the 1910s and 1920s a peculiar constellation of these notions emerged that was exclusively used by authors on the political Right. For my purposes, I can proceed, so to speak, according to the German saying, «Rechts ist, wo der Daumen links ist» (the right side is [that hand] where the thumb is [on the] left [side of the hand]). In the first two decades of this century, authors were «politically Right» if they explicitly argued against (classical) liberals and if, at the same time, they also argued against leftist authors. «Liberals» were all those authors who advocated a liberal

society, in other words, those who—relying on Adam Smith's «invisible hand»—proposed a free capitalist economy, in which the state did not interfere, and who also argued for parliamentary democracy. All those authors who maintained that the capitalist economy and society had to be transformed, either by a peaceful evolutionary process or by a revolution, into a socialist economy and society, whose major feature was the absence of private property of the means of production, were «leftists.» (In between liberals and leftists were those who wanted to keep the capitalist economy and society but also wanted to integrate the institutions of social welfare, etc. into it. Early in the century, many people maintained that the actual politics of the social democrats clearly showed that this was their intention.) In arguing against liberals and leftists, rightists made the following assumptions: (1) It is not reason or the development of the means of production that «governs» or «rules» history, but rather Geschick, Schicksal, or Vorsehung; (2) One must break with liberal society, because liberal society is either not «good» in itself or it is not «good» because, sooner or later, it will lead to a socialist society; (3) Liberal society is an aberration from, or has done away with, the «real» forms of life, with Gemeinschaften or with Gemeinschaft; (4) The Gemeinschaft can be rerealized through a destruction of liberal society.

As the song of the Social Democrats ("Brüder, zur Sonne, zur Freiheit!" [Brothers, onward to the sun, onward to freedom!]) already indicated, for social democrats as well as for liberals the development of society—the enormous advance of the means of production in capitalist economy and the progress of parliamentary democracy—was a step upward and forward. For right-wingers, however, this advance was actually a fall, even a downward plunge, that had to be «corrected» by canceling society and by rerealizing community. To cancel society meant to eliminate parliamentary democracy, but for many rightist authors it did not mean to exclude but rather to keep private possession of the means of production, that is, a capitalist economy. Canceling society, as far as its economy was concerned, meant purifying the Gesinnungen, the mentality, attitudes, and sentiments of all individuals involved in the capitalist economy of their alleged selfishness, since it was only this Gesinnung that was harmful and produced crises. Once that Gesinnung is removed, it will be clear that private property and modem technology are not a hindrance but rather the best means for promoting the development of the community. While some right-wing authors, among them the nostalgic, or conservative, romantics wanted a return to a pretechnological community, those I am interested in here adhered to the scheme outlined above. I will illustrate these assumptions with reference to two authors, Adolf Hitler and Max Scheler, who explicitly and in public declared themselves politically on the Right. However, authors who did not explicitly argue against liberals and leftists also must be considered rightists if they shared the above-

mentioned premises that enabled rightist authors to condemn the liberals and leftists and if one finds in their works no premises or passages that could identify them as advocates for liberals, social democracy, or communism or from which one might be led to either of the latter positions. It is along these lines that I will infer from the fact that Heidegger's notion of historicality is identical with the positions of Scheler and Hitler that Heidegger's concept of historicality is also politically on the Right. In chapter 4, I will present leftist notions of decision in order to illustrate more concretely both concepts of decision, that of the Right and that of the Left.

Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf consists of two volumes. The first, published in 1925, has 406 pages and includes his autobiography from his youth to the first successes of the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei in Munich in 1920. In the second volume, published in 1927 and 376 pages long, Hitler explicates the program of the party in the context of his interpretation of history in general and of political history in particular, especially from the Kaiserreich up to November 1926. He presented the main points of the second volume already in the first one since he believed one had to repeat the main points again and again to hammer them home. In both volumes, it is Schicksal (fate), Vorsehung (providence), and God that govern history. In the first volume, fate is present from the first sentence on. He thanks fate for having allocated to him Braunau on the Inn as his birthplace:

Als glückliche Bestimmung gilt es mir heute, daß das Schicksal mir zum Geburtsort gerade Braunau am Inn zuwies. Liegt doch dieses Städtchen an der Grenze jener zwei deutschen Staaten, deren Wiedervereinigung mindestens uns Jüngeren als eine mit allen Mitteln durchzuführende Lebensaufgabe erscheint! (MK 1)

Today it seems to me providential that Fate should have chosen Braunau on the Inn as my birthplace. For this little town lies on the boundary between two German states which we of the younger generation at least have made it our life work to reunite by every means at our disposal. (MKe 3)

Reading the English translation, one could get the impression that Hitler by himself made up as his life's work the reunification of Germany and Austria and that fate comes into play only as a power placing the individual into circumstances that are either favorable or not favorable for the individual's realization of the lifework he has set for himself. In the first case, he will deplore fate, in the latter, however, he will thank fate, as Hitler does here. At that time, however, German readers would have read those two sentences differently. They would have taken for granted that fate, in the first place, has given Hitler his life's work, and that Hitler thanks fate for having placed him into circumstances that made it relatively easy for him to recognize what task fate

has given him. 4 Still, to become aware of such an extraordinary mission as his is not easy, and he had to go to some lengths before he was able to recognize his fate. 5 The young Hitler wanted to become a painter and later on an architect. However, as he realized in November 1918, it was his fate to become a politician. He had been wounded at the western front in France in World War I and had been brought to a hospital in Pommern, East Prussia, where he heard of the revolution in Germany:

In the days that followed, my own fate became known to me {wurde mir auch mein Schicksal bewußt}. I could not help but laugh at the thought of my own future which only a short time before had given me such bitter concern. Was it not ridiculous to expect to build houses on such ground? At last it became clear to me that what had happened was what I had so often feared but had never been able to believe with my emotions.

Kaiser William II was the first German Emperor to hold out a conciliatory hand to the leaders of Marxism, without suspecting that scoundrels have no honor. While they still held the imperial hand in theirs, their other hand was reaching for the dagger.

There is no making pacts with Jews; there can only be the hard: either—or. I, for my part, decided to go into politics {Ich aber beschloß, Politiker zu werden}. (MKe 206; MK 225) 6

It is not quite clear whether his suspicion or fear, now vindicated, refers to Kaiser William II, the revolution, or his decision, or to two or all three of them. If it refers to his decision too, the passage also testifies that his fate is hard, but that it is only a great «person» («Person») that can have a great fate because the tenets of Marxism and liberalism to the contrary notwithstanding, history is made by the great person and the great race (e.g., MKe 382ff.; MK 419ff.). At any rate, this passage is one of the shorter examples among many statements in which he expounds upon what he considers crucial in his life and his understanding of world history. His decision to become a politician does not come about as the culmination of a process in which, independent of anything or anyone else, the individual has freely imagined and considered several possibilities for his life and then, for this or that reason, adopted one of the options. Rather, here the individual simply becomes aware of his fate, which is not produced by him, or the individual—to use a formula of Heidegger's in regard to Plato—«only responded {entsprach} to what addressed itself to him {was sich ihm zusprach}» and what the individual himself «did not bring about» (BW 299; VA 21). The individual does not create his fate. Instead, his fate exists prior to him and, at some point, explicitly raises its voice. It is in this moment that the individual becomes conscious of his fate and has the choice to obey, take on, and realize his fate or not to do so. This choice, however, is not an arbitrary one. The individual does not express his personal freedom by deliberating on his own whether or not he

should take on his fate. On the contrary, he proves his freedom by obeying the compelling call of fate, for it is his «sacred duty {heilige Pflicht } to act in this way » (MKe 640; MK 725).

There is no choice, for I can't not do what is my duty. This in no way diminishes the greatness of the individual—quite the contrary. Obeying the call proves the greatness of the person who is capable of recognizing the enormous duty to save the Germans and the entire world. Only a coward, or an inauthentic Dasein, shies away from the task fate has ordered him to carry out. Obeying the call, however, is also already the first step toward the rerealization of the Aryan race, for the strong sense of duty and the willingness to sacrifice oneself for the community of the people and the race are both indications and effects of the superiority of the Aryan race, whose political domination over the entire world has to be reestablished (e.g., MKe 296ff.; MK 325ff.). The «Jew» is the opposite of the «Aryan.» While the Aryan's blood was originally pure but later became contaminated, the Jew kept his blood pure and contaminated the blood of other people. While the Aryan has the strongest sense of self-sacrifice for the sake of the Volksgemeinschaft, the Jew has the strongest sense of individual self-preservation, and he always acts for the sake of his selfish interests (MKe 300ff.; MK 329ff.). In liberalism and parliamentary democracy, it has become manifest that the Jew has spoiled the blood of the Aryan. Social democracy and Marxism are just means for the Jew to achieve dominion over the entire world. One of the leitmotifs of Hitler's book is the often repeated assumption that, no longer guided by the common good but rather by their selfish private interests, the bourgeois individuals and their parties—the liberals as well as the conservatives—compromise and «bargain» with the political enemy to the extent that they are no longer capable of seeing the enemy as enemy, just as in the passage quoted above, their emperor was no longer able to do. Hitler characterizes this as «the steadily increasing habit of doing things by halves {Halbheit in allem und jedem },» no «sense of joy in responsibility {Verantwortungfreudigkeit},» no «will,» no «force of decision {Entschlußkraft}» (MKe 236f; MK 258). Caring only about themselves and having only one God, namely, «money» (MKe 406; MK 449), these bourgeois people want to avoid any clear either-or; they don't want to have fate for fate in decisive moments does not operate like merchants and moneymakers. The bourgeois and the social democrats in their internationalism try «to deny the entire past . . ., to make it bad or worthless, which shows either inferiority or even an evil intention,» since the meaning and the purpose of revolutions does not lie in the destruction of the works of the past but in the effort «to remove what is bad or unsuitable and to continue building on the sound spot that has been laid bare» (MKe 261; MK 286). 7 Having no sense for and actively denying the only source of a meaningful future, that is, the past, and lacking force of decision, the bourgeois certainly has no sense for the future (e.g., MKe 29, 398; MK 29, 440). 8

The second and crucial chapter of the first volume is entitled "Years of Study and Suffering in Vienna" (MKe 19; "Wiener Lehr- und Leidensjahre," MK 18). The title is an allusion to Goethe's famous novels Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre and Wilhelm Meisters Wanderjahre . In fact, the first volume follows the pattern of a Bildungsroman, a novel about a character's intellectual or spiritual development, in style, organization, and also in Hitler's efforts to imitate the language of such novels. In other words, here too the individual leaves his place of birth, goes out into the world to experience all the Mächte des sittlichen Lebens, powers of the ethical life, to which he has to establish a relationship. The ideal of the bourgeois Bildungsroman was, as Hegel put it in a formulation that is as polemical and ironic as characteristic of his entire philosophy, the «Einbildung» («building of . . . into»).9 The free individual bildet sich, forms or molds himself by, so to speak, molding, or merging, himself into the powers of the ethical life. In this process, the individual transcends his particularity and abstract freedom and becomes general or universal. By the same token, the powers of the ethical life bilden the individual by bilden themselves ein into the individual, that is, by molding themselves into the individual. In this way, the powers of the ethical life realize and affirm their actuality in the free individuals. Hitler rejected this model of the Bildungsroman. For he did not acknowledge the powers of the ethical life prevalent during his time. However, he also rejected the second type of the Bildungsroman, namely, that the individual, either triumphantly or in resignation, does not recognize himself in the powers of the ethical life, withdraws from them, and leaves them as they are. For Hitler was serious about the demand that individuals have the right to recognize themselves in the powers of the ethical life as well as about the demand that the powers of the ethical life must be proper manifestations of the ideal common good. In his view, none of the powers of the ethical life in existence at that time could live up to these standards. Thus, all of them had to be thoroughly transformed or pushed aside. Therefore, the title of the first volume is utterly un-bourgeois, namely, "A Reckoning" (MKe 1; "Eine Abrechnung," MK n.p.). In the course of his Bildung, Hitler encountered all the powers of the ethical life prevalent in the literature on community and society, and he encountered them in the order in which they are discussed there. Hitler begins with the small-scale communities of the family and the villages or small towns, in his case Braunau. He was privileged by fate to be able already there to encounter the large-scale communities, especially the people, for he experienced the Slavic people and the threat they posed to Germany. He then moves on to society, the big city, in his case Vienna. Here he encountered capitalist society and the associations related to it, such as the unions and the political parties. In Vienna he also got to know more thoroughly the large-scale communities, namely, the nation, the people, the race, and the state. Later on in the book, he also discusses the issue of the different German Stämme, tribes. 10 However, in none of these societies and communities can he find the common good realized. Society is the realm of self-

ish interests, more or less openly in the hands of the Jews. The large-scale communities have fallen prey to the modus operandi of society. For because of their inability to make decisions and their creeping liberalism the bourgeois and the social democrats in their internationalism have fallen prey to the Jews who use them to pursue their dominion of the world. Thus, all these groups have to be canceled or thoroughly transformed in order to make room for the rebirth of the proper community, namely, the Volksgemeinschaft, the community of the people, of the Germans, acting as the proxy of the Aryans whose dominion over the world has to be reestablished.

Duplicating the pattern of the literature on Gesellschaft and Gemeinschaft, however, Hitler's position in it is a distinguished one not only because he makes a case for something not all of the literature advocated, namely, the Volksgemeinschaft, but also because, in contrast to most of the literature on Gemeinschaft, Hitler depicts the small-scale Gemeinschaften not so much as a stable realm threatened only by society. Rather, according to him, they are threatened and about to dissolve first and foremost because of the Slavic people and their blood, who are in the process of taking over the Hapsburg monarchy. This is the epistemological and emotional advantage fate gave him so as to facilitate his task of becoming conscious of his enormous fate. For, outside the Kaiserreich and having lived under the threat of the Slavic blood already as a child, Hitler could learn a lesson that, being busy with making colonies and building up a navy, the Germans of the Kaiserreich were in a position to learn only after World War I, namely, «what it means to be forced to fight for one's nationality {für sein Volkstum kämpfen zu müssen}» (MKe 11; MK 9). Already as a kid he «became a nationalist.» And, in addition, already as a kid he «learned to understand and grasp the meaning of history {Geschichte ihrem Sinne nach verstehen und begreifen}» (MKe 10; MK 8). Throughout his political career, he would unpack the notion of history he had learned from Dr. Leopold Pötsch:

Even today I think back with gentle emotion on this gray-haired man who, by the fire of his narratives, sometimes made us forget the present; who, as if by enchantment, carried us into past times and, out of the millennial veils of mist, molded dry historical memories into living reality. On such occasions we sat there, often aflame with enthusiasm, and sometimes even moved to tears. (MKe 14; MK 12f.) 11

The way back into the past is not such that it can lead one to forget the present. Rather, Dr. Leopold Pötsch taught his students the relevance of the past for the present, and that transformed Hitler into a revolutionary:

What made our good fortune all the greater was that this teacher knew how to illuminate the past by examples from the present, and how from the past to draw inferences for the present. As a result he had more understanding than

anyone else for all the daily problems which then held us breathless. He used our budding nationalistic fanaticism as a means of educating us, frequently appealing to our sense of national honor. . . . And indeed, though he had no such intention, it was then that I became a little revolutionary. (MKe 14f.; MK 12f.)

To be a fervent nationalist already as a little kid was the gift of a fate that ensured that Hitler on his way through life would not fall prey to Gesellschaft. After the death of his mother, Hitler could not live on his orphan pension. Thus, he moved to Vienna to earn a living. Fate itself sent him there. Already prior to his settling in Vienna, fate removed one obstacle on his way to recognize his fate, for he had already failed to receive admission to the art school. Thus, the first sentence of the second chapter reads: «When my mother died, Fate, at least in one respect, had already made its decision {Als die Mutter starb, hatte das Schicksal in einer Hinsicht bereits seine Entscheidung getroffen}» (MKe 19; MK 18). It was a hard time in Vienna, «five years of hardship and misery» (MKe 21; MK 20), with «hunger» as the only «faithful bodyguard» (MKe 21; MK 20). However,

what then seemed to be the harshness of Fate {Härte des Schicksals}, I praise today as wisdom of Providence {Weisheit der Vorsehung}. While the Goddess of Suffering took me in her arms, often threatening to crush me, my will to resistance {Wille zum Widerstand} grew, and in the end this will was victorious.

I owe it to that period that I grew hard and am still capable of being hard. And even more, I exalt it for tearing me away from the hollowness of comfortable life; for drawing the mother's darling out of his soft downy bed and giving him 'Dame Care' {Frau Sorge} for a new mother; for hurling me, despite all resistance, into a world of misery and poverty, thus making me acquainted with those for whom I was later to fight. (MKe 21; MK 20)

As the context and the other quotations in this section show, with «my will to resistance grew,» Hitler does not at all mean that his will to resist fate grew. Quite the opposite. Fate puts to the test the one it has chosen for higher ends in order to bring to the fore his ability to live up to his fate and to harden him for the mission before him. As one says in German, «sich seines Schicksals würdig erweisen» (to prove oneself worthy of one's fate), or «sich einer Aufgabe würdig erweisen» (to prove oneself worthy of a task) is what persons of character or what «Kämpfer » (MK 10; «fighters, » MKe 12) do, while only cowards or «die Lauen » (MK 10; «the lukewarm, » MKe 12) lose heart in face of the odds fate confronts them with. 12 Thus, his «will to resistance» and the hardness he has achieved are the will to resist the odds fate tests him with and also the will to resist the future odds he will have to overcome to carry out his life's work fate will reveal to him. The will to resistance is part of the training of his capacity to listen to and to comply with fate so as to

prove himself worthy of fate when fate will reveal his life's work to him. He came to know those for whom he would fight later on, namely, the betrayed German workers, and he came to know their enemies, whom he would fight against, for he got to know «Marxism and Jewry» (MKe 21; «Marxismus und Judentum,» MK 20). Hitler maintains that on his arrival in Vienna he was unbiased toward society and the powers of ethical life related to it. He even enjoyed the struggle of the social democrats for the general right of the secret vote, as this seemed to contribute to the breakdown of the Austrian state. He also appreciated the social democrats' and the unions' pretension to work for the improvement of working conditions (MKe 37f., 46f.; MK 39f., 48f.). As for the Jews, he had adopted the attitude of his father, who in the course of his life «had arrived at more or less cosmopolitan views . . ., despite his pronounced national sentiments» (MKe 51; MK 54). He did not even recognize Jews as Jews (MKe 52; MK 54), and at the beginning of his time in Vienna the tone of the Viennese anti-Semitic press still seemed to him «unworthy of the cultural tradition of a great nation» (MKe 52; MK 56). Moreover, he had «a certain admiration» for the English parliament as «the most sublime form of self-government of a people» (MKe 76; MK 82). Thus, «it required the fist of fate {Faust des Schicksals} to open my eyes to {all the} betrayal of the peoples» (MKe 38; MK 40). Or, as he put it, in Vienna «fate itself became my instructor» (MKe 46; MK 48). As to parliamentarism, he felt he had to «be more than thankful to Fate for laying this question before me while I was in Vienna.» For if he had first encountered «this absurd institution known as 'parliament' in Berlin,» he might just have become a regular follower of the emperor (MKe 79; MK 85). All this is supposed to convey the idea that it was truth itself that forced him to cleanse his soul of the prevalent misjudgments and attitudes and to develop into the gift of fate and divine providence. Fate enabled him to see the truth. In the third book, he summarizes his political experiences and thinking of his time in Vienna. The penultimate paragraph reads:

I do not know what my attitude toward the Jews, Social Democracy, or rather Marxism as a whole, the social question {soziale Frage}, etc., would be today if at such an early time the pressure of destiny {Druck des Schicksals}—and my own study—had not built up a basic stock of personal opinions within me. (MKe 125; MK 137)

Even prior to the first chapter, readers are informed that Hitler's philosophy of history is one of a «wieder» («re-»), of the return of a vanished past. In his "Dedication," he lists the names of all those who fell «on November 9, 1923, at 12.30 in the afternoon, in front of the Feldherrnhalle» (that is, during the unsuccessful putsch through which Hitler and his party wanted to take over the rule of Bavaria). They did so «with loyal faith in the resurrection of their people» (MKe n.p.; «im treuen Glauben an die Wiederauferstehung ihres

Volkes,» MK n.p.). Probably, there is no other book with as many occurrences of «wieder» («re-»). Just consider this example, representative of numerous similar passages:

Through his physical strength and dexterity, he must recover {wiedergewinnen} his faith in the invincibility of his whole people. For what formerly {einst} led the German army to victory was the sum of the confidence which each individual had in himself and all together in their leadership. What will raise the German people up again {wieder emporrichten} is confidence in the possibility of regaining {Wiedererringung} its freedom. (MKe 411f.; MK 456f.)

The pervasive terminology of bodily infection, from which the Volkskörper, the body of the people, has to be cured drives home the same point. The body had been healthy, but then it fell ill. The sickness must be removed to restore the body to its healthy state. Sickness is a fall from health, and this fall must be reversed. At the very beginning of the chapter "Causes of the Collapse" (MKe 225ff.; "Ursachen des Zusammenbruchs," MK 245ff.), in which Hitler examines the causes of the defeat of Germany and Austria in World War I, he writes:

The extent of the fall of a body is always measured by the distance between its momentary position and the one originally occupied. The same is true of nations {Völker} and states. A decisive significance must be ascribed to their previous position or rather elevation {Höhe}. . . . This is what makes the collapse of the Reich so hard and terrible for every thinking and feeling man, since it brought a crash from heights which today, in view of the depths of our present degradation, are scarcely conceivable. . . .

So deep is the downfall of the Reich and the German people, . . . . so blinded by the sublime {of the former Reich} {are the people} that they forget to look for the omens of the gigantic collapse which must after all have been somehow present.

Of course, this applies only to those for whom Germany was more than a mere stop-over for making and spending money, since they alone can feel the present condition as a collapse, while to the others it is the long-desired fulfillment of their hitherto unsatisfied desires. . . .

The cure of a sickness can only be achieved if its cause is known, and the same is true of curing political evils. (MKe 225f.; MK 245f.)

For many conservatives, the «re-» of history was about the reestablishment of the Kaiserreich. However, for Hitler the very fact that it had lost the war is sufficient indication that fate has something different in mind. 13 At the end of the chapter, he repeats that the «deepest and ultimate cause» was the «failure to recognize the racial problem and its importance for the historical development of peoples» (MKe 283; MK 310). This is the myth of the original purity of the Aryan race and its dominion over the world. This past has to be

rerealized. For when the Aryan race conquered other people, its blood no longer remained pure but became mixed with inferior blood. This is the infection that has dragged mankind into the fall. Liberalism and parliamentary democracy are its latest steps in the downward progression. However, the fall is by no means already at its end. Rather,

the Western democracy of today is the forerunner of Marxism which without it would not be thinkable. It {Western democracy} provides this world plague with the culture in which its germs can spread. In its most extreme form, parliamentarianism, it created {In ihrer äußeren Ausdrucksform, dem Parlamentarismus, schuf sie sich noch} a 'monstrosity of excrement and fire' {quote from Goethe's Faust , part 1, v. 5356}, in which, however, sad to say, the 'fire' seems to me at the moment to be burned out. (MKe 78; MK 85. Instead of «In its . . . created,» it should read «In its {democracy's} outer manifestation, namely parliamentarianism, it {democracy} even/at the end created. . . .»)

Marxism, in turn, culminates in bolshevism. Both are the means for the Jews to dominate the world, and bolshevism is the most advanced of the two (e.g., MKe 621ff; MK 700ff; Marx wrote Capital to provide the practice of the Jews with a theory, e.g., MKe 215; MK 234; even the social democrats are already lead by Jews, MKe 60; MK 64). Once bolshevism has taken over Europe entirely, everything will be lost.

However, prior to the end of the downward plunge—at a time when it is still possible to reverse its course—fate, arranged by God, interferes. Or it changes its mode of guiding history and adds thunderstorms and the call to reverse the downward plunge to its constant silent presence in history. For many, World War I was such an occasion. Prior to 1914 Hitler had felt that the entire world was becoming «one big department store» with the English as merchants, the Germans as the administrative officials, and the Jews as owners (MKe 157; MK 172). The fact that he was born into this period and not a hundred years earlier, at the time of the Wars of Liberation against the French, the fact that his «earthly pilgrimage . . . had begun too late,» in a «period 'of law and order',» he regarded as «a mean and undeserved trick of Fate» (MKe 158; «eine unverdiente Niedertracht des Schicksals,» MK 173). In this situation, the Boer War was «like a summer lightning,» and the Russo-Japanese War found him «considerably more mature» (MKe 158; MK 173). Still, fate, or rather Heaven, had decided to take some years to clean the air and to provide the Germans with an opportunity to get rid of the mentality of department stores and of their supposed owners:

Since then many years have passed, and what as a boy had seemed to me a lingering disease, I now felt to be the quiet before the storm. As early as my Vienna period, the Balkans were immersed in that livid sultriness which customarily announces the hurricane, and from time to time a beam of brighter light flared up, only to vanish again in the spectral darkness. But then came the

Balkan War and with it the first gust of wind swept across a Europe grown nervous. The time which now followed lay on the chests of men like a heavy nightmare, sultry as feverish tropic heat, so that due to constant anxiety the sense of approaching catastrophe turned at last to longing: let heaven at last give free rein to the fate which could no longer be thwarted {der Himmel mäge endlich dem Schicksal, das nicht mehr zu hemmen war, den freien Lauf gewähren}. And then the first mighty lightning flash struck the earth; the storm was unleashed and with the thunder of Heaven there mingled the roar of the World War batteries. (MKe 158; MK 173) 14

However, the war was lost. World War I and its outcome could not merely be the deplorable end of the Kaiserreich. It had to have a deeper meaning. Hitler maintains that fate brought about World War I and its consequences so as to make the disease visible and thus warn the Germans while there was still time for them to cure themselves and the world:

For the German people it must almost be considered a great good fortune that its period of creeping sickness was suddenly cut short by so terrible a catastrophe, for otherwise the nation would have gone to the dogs more slowly perhaps, but all the more certainly. The disease would have become chronic, while in the acute form of the collapse it at least became clearly and distinctly recognizable to a considerable number of people. (MKe 232; MK 253)

«Man» was able to master the plague because it comes in terrible waves. «Man» was not able to master tuberculosis because it comes along slowly and stealthily (MKe 232; MK 253).

Exactly the same is true of diseases of national bodies. If they do not take the form of a catastrophe, man slowly begins to get accustomed to them and at length, though it may take some time, perishes all the more certainly of them. And so it is a good fortune—though a bitter one, to be sure—when Fate resolves to take a hand in this slow process of putrefaction {wenn das Schicksal sich entschließt, in diesen langsamen Fäulnisprozeß einzugreifen} and with a sudden blow makes the victim visualize the end of his disease. For more than once, that is what such a catastrophe amounts to. Then it can easily become the cause of a recovery beginning with the utmost determination {Ursache einer nun mit äußerster Entschlossenheit einsetzenden Heilung werden}. (MKe 232f.; MK 254)

He continues:

But even in such a case, the prerequisite is again the recognition of the inner grounds which cause the disease in question.

Here, too, the most important thing remains the distinction between the causes and the conditions they call forth. This will be all the more difficult, the longer the toxins remain in the national body {Volkskörper} and the more they become

an ingredient of it which is taken for granted. For it is easily possible that after a certain time unquestionably harmful poisons will be regarded as an ingredient of one's own nation or at best will be tolerated as a necessary evil, so that a search for the alien virus is no longer regarded as necessary. (MKe 233; MK 254)

In the mixing of blood, that of the German people did not retain a unified racial nucleus and did not achieve another unity, even a lower one. This is a disadvantage, as it has prevented the Germans from confronting the common enemy in the moment of danger as a «solid front of a unified herd» (MKe 396; «geschlossene Front einer einheitlichen Herde,» MK 437). 15 However, this was, so to speak, the cunning of fate, as it is this very fact itself that makes the recovery possible:

Today our people are still suffering from this inner division; but what brought us misfortune in the past and present can be our blessing for the future. For detrimental as it was on the one hand that a complete blending of our original racial components did not take place, and that the formation of a unified national body was thus prevented, it was equally fortunate on the other hand that in this way at least a part of our best blood was preserved pure and escaped racial degeneration. (MKe 397; MK 438f.)

In contrast to the widespread ignorance, especially in the era of liberalism, and the commonly held assumption that all human beings are of equal value («in völliger Gleichwertung»),

today we know that a complete intermixture of the components of our people might, in consequence of the unity thus produced, have given us outward power, but that the highest goal of mankind would have been unattainable, since the sole bearer, whom Fate had clearly chosen for this completion {den das Schicksal ersichtlich zu dieser Vollendung ausersehen hat}, would have perished in the general racial porridge of the unified people.

But what, through none of our doing, a kind Fate {ein gütiges Schicksal} prevented, we must today examine and evaluate from the standpoint of the knowledge we have now acquired. (MKe 397; MK 439)

The «highest goal of mankind» is «ca peace . . . based on the victorious sword of a master people, putting the world into the service of a higher culture» (MKe 396; MK 438).

Once upon a time, the Aryans had been pure. Fate allowed for or even arranged for their fall. At a certain point in their fall—when it was still possible to restore purity and the lost supremacy—fate interfered in order to allow the Germans to become aware of the fallenness. For fate has chosen the Germans as the saviors of mankind. At the same time, fate has provided them with the means to restore their purity. Fate has brought about World War I

and the Weimar Republic in Germany for the purpose of creating a crisis or a «great turning point» (MKe 406; «große Zeitenwende,» MK 450). Now it is possible to «halt the chariot of doom {Wagen des Verhängnisses} at the eleventh hour» (MKe 373; MK 409). Or, as Hitler put it regarding himself and his fellow Nazis, «today we are a reef; in a few years Fate may raise us up as a dam against which the general stream will break, and flow into a new bed» (MKe 667; MK 758). It is, as he says of the beginning of World War I, the site «where all playing is at an end and the inexorable hand of the Goddess of Destiny { die unerbittliche Hand der Schicksalsgöttin} begins to weigh peoples and men according to the truth and steadfastness of their convictions {Gesinnung}» (MKe 163; MK 178). It is the moment of the either-or: «And assuredly this worm is moving toward a great revolution. The question can only be whether it will redound to the benefit of Aryan humanity or to the profit of the eternal Jew » (MKe 427; 475). Or, as he puts it close to the end of the book, «Germany will either be a worm power or there will be no Germany » (MKe 654; MK 742).

Indeed, at this point what individuals do really matters. It depends on their reactions whether fate will be realized or not. The fate of the German people, Russia, and, ultimately, the entire world, is in their hands. In this sense, the individuals or people become fate, or agents, on whose behavior the «fate» of all people depends. Many don't want to hear the call of fate, as, for instance, in spring 1923: «With the occupation of the Ruhr, Fate once again held out a hand to help the German people rise again. . .. When the Frenchman carried out his threats, . . . a great decisive hour of destiny had struck for Germany {eine große, entscheidende Schicksalsstunde geschlagen}» (MKe 675-677; MK 767-769). For no one in Europe had an interest in a stronger France and would have opposed if the Germans had fought back. However, the parliamentarians missed the opportunity of resolute resistance and of building up military power (Mke 677ff.; MK 769ff.). Those who listen to the call realize that it will take centuries to restore the purity of blood and race (MKe 562; MK 629). However, it needs only six years of resolute National Socialist education and gymnastics to ready the Germans for war (MKe 633; MK 716). This is important, since the Germans need land and should take it from Russia, as Hitler explains at length in the last two chapters. «Here Fate itself seems desirous of giving us a sign» (MKe 654; MK 742), for the Russian revolution, lead by «the Jew,» has done away with the «intelligentsia {Intelligenz}» that built the Russian state. This intelligentsia, however, goes back, not to the Slavs, but rather to the Germans (MKe 654f.; MK 742f.). Indeed, in the «great turning point» (MKe 406; «große Zeitenwende,» MK 450) the «hand of the world clock . . . is loudly striking the hour in which the destiny of our nation must be decided in one way or another {in der unseres Volkes Schicksal so oder so entschieden werden muß}» (MKe 663; MK 752).

The fate of the Germans, and thus, of the world, depends on the individual Germans. Indeed, the «great turning point» brings freedom, action, and responsibility for the individuals. As it has become clear, however, the freedom of the individual does not consist in freely choosing among possibilities he has created by himself. Nor does it consist in freely choosing among several possibilities that the past, having become multiplied under the eyes of authentic Dasein and its utopian ideal, offers to authentic Dasein. And it does not consist in authentic Dasein breaking with the past or with all the possibilities in the past. Rather, in the «great turning point» all the different possibilities in which Dasein has lived so far become null and void in relation to the one fate imposes on the Daseine. Their freedom is the freedom of either not listening to fate or doing so, that is, submitting to fate, and realizing the command fate reveals. The first means that the chariot of history will irrevocably go down the drain, the second might lead it back to former heights, which fate has revealed in the «turning point.»16 It has already become clear that the logical structure of Hitler' s concept of history and the «turning point» is identical to that of Heidegger's concept of historicality. Thus, in Hitler one finds numerous sentences showing the same logic as Heidegger's sentence on erwidert and disavowal (BT 438; SZ 386). For Heidegger, in the moment of crisis authentic Dasein erwidert, responds to, the call for help of fate and of a past world which is being pushed aside but which demands to be repeated. Authentic Dasein hears the message that, in order to repeat the past world, it has to push aside what is now pushing the past aside or has already done so, that is, authentic Dasein must cancel, or widerrufen, Gesellschaft. Consider, for example, just the following two quotes: «If we understand that the resurrection {Wiedererhebung} of the German nation represents a question of regaining {Wiedergewinnung} our political will for self-preservation, it is also clear that this cannot be done by winning elements which in point of will at least are already national, but only by the nationalization of the consciously anti-national masses» (MKe 333; MK 366). The antinationalism of the masses (and the indecisiveness of the bourgeois parties) has pushed aside the German nation. Authentic Dasein erwidert the call for the Wiederholung of the German nation. Hearing the call, authentic Dasein realizes that it cannot wiederholen the German nation without a Widerruf of that mentality, that mode of the «they,» that has pushed aside the German nation. The «wider-» of the Widerruf cancels the «wider-,» that is, the «anti-» of the antinationalism of the masses or, in general, of the alleged hostile stance of society against community. Or, as Hitler put it on the next page:

Historically it is just not conceivable that the German people could recover {noch einmal einnehmen} its former position without settling accounts with those who were the cause and occasion of the unprecedented collapse which

struck our state. For before the judgment seat of posterity November, 1918, will be evaluated, not as high treason, but as treason against the fatherland {Landesverrat}.

Thus, any possibility of regaining {Wiedergewinnung} outward German independence is bound up first and foremost with the recovery {Wiedergewinnung} of the inner unity of our people's will. (MKe 334; MK 367f.)

The reestablishment of the inner unity of the people's will is achieved by a Widerruf of the mentality of those who have destroyed it or—in terms of Hitler's architectural metaphor quoted above—by the demolition of what they have built in order to lay bare the sound foundations for the rebuilding of the National Socialist state.

As to the political aspect of Gesellschaft, it has already become clear from the few passages I have quoted here that Hitler develops an antiparliamentary and thoroughly illiberal domestic policy and an imperialistic foreign policy agenda that foreshadows the policy put to work in 1933. Of course, nothing else can be expected from someone who constantly stresses that peoples as well as individuals belonging to one and the same people are unequal and of different value, as for instance in the following passage:

In the state the folkish philosophy {völkische Weltanschauung} sees on principle only a means to an end and construes its end as the preservation of the racial existence of man. Thus, it by no means believes in an equality of the races, but along with their difference it recognizes their higher or lesser value and feels itself obligated, through this knowledge, to promote the victory of the better and stronger, and demand the subordination of the inferior and weaker in accordance with the eternal will that dominates this universe. Thus, in principle, it serves the basic aristocratic idea of nature and believes in the validity of this law down to the last individual. It sees not only the different value {den verschiedenen Wert} of the races, but also the different values of individuals. From the mass it extracts the importance of the individual personality, and, thus, in contrast to disorganizing Marxism, it has an organizing effect. But it cannot . . . for in a bastardized and niggerized world. . .. Anyone who dares to lay hands on the highest image of the Lord {i.e. the Aryan race, the Germans, and their leader} commits sacrilege against the benevolent creator of this miracle and contributes to the expulsion from paradise. (MKe 383; MK 421; see also MKe 442ff.; MK 492ff. and passim)

Moreover, a person who maintains that already in August 1914 it was the duty of the German government to «exterminate mercilessly» (MKe 169; «unbarmherzig auszurotten,» MK 185) the leaders of the Social Democratic Party and the Jews, was probably ready and willing to use violence, even to the point of physical annihilation, against all those who refused to exchange their mentality for that of National Socialism or who had been declared the eternal racial foe of the Germans.

As to the economic aspect of Gesellschaft, Hitler's diagnosis is that, indeed,

in proportion as the economic life grew to be the dominant mistress of the state, money became the god whom all had to serve and to whom each man had to bow down. More and more, the gods of heaven were put into the corner as obsolete and outmoded, and in their stead incense was burned to the idol Mammon. A truly malignant degeneration {Entartung} set in; what made it most malignant was that it began at a time {in the Kaiserreich} when the nation, in a presumably menacing and critical hour, needed the highest heroic attitude {heldische Gesinnung}. (MKe 234; MK 256)

However, this is not a result of private property and capitalism. Rather, it is a result of the fact that through international finance and stock exchange capital, the Jews have taken over the German economy and initiated class-struggle (MKe 313; MK 344f. and passim). One has to distinguish between capital itself and the Jewish international capital. This distinction «offered the possibility of opposing the internationalization of the German economy without at the same time menacing the foundations of an independent national self-maintenance by a struggle against all capital» (MKe 213; MK 233). In fact, private property and competition is the best means to promote the Volksgemeinschaft and the Aryan race since it is in accordance with the general law of nature, namely «Kampf» («struggle») as «Auslese» («selection») of the strongest and best (MKe 245; MK 267 and passim). To put the economy into the service of the Volksgemeinschaft will renationalize capital by a Widerruf of its denationalization, and it will restore the sense of duty and sacrifice in the capitalists as well in the workers by a Widerruf of their deheroification. In this way, private property and competition will contribute strongly to the flourishing of the Volksgemeinschaft (MKe 596; MK 670ff.).

I have mentioned several ways in which fate becomes active in the moment of crisis. There is, however, one more. The last paragraph of the third chapter, following the one with «the pressure of destiny» as quoted above, reads:

For if the misery of the fatherland can stimulate thousands and thousands of men to thought on the inner reasons for this collapse, this can never lead to that thoroughness and deep insight which are disclosed to the man who has himself mastered Fate only after years of struggle {der selber erst nach jahrelangem Ringen Herr des Schicksals wurde}. (MKe 125; MK 137; the phrase «der selber . . . Herr des Schicksals wurde» is literally «who has himself become master of Fate»)

Just as the phrase «the will to resistance» does not mean «the will to resist his fate,» the phrase «Herr des Schicksals» or master of fate does not mean that he has successfully resisted fate and even has become its master in the sense that it is now he who rules over and determines fate. In its brevity,

«Herr des Schicksals sein oder werden» (to be or become master of fate), the phrase is somewhat unusual. The phrase, «Er ist sein eigener Herr» (he is his own master) refers to a person mature enough to take care of himself or if used ironically, to a stubborn person. The phrase «Er ist seines eigenen Schicksals Herr» (he is the master of his own fate) is used—though not very frequently anymore—to refer to a mature, independent, and autonomous person. As the insistence on «own» shows, probably this expression goes back to atheist liberals, just like the saying «Jeder ist seines eigenen Glückes Schmied» (everyone is the smith of his own fortune = everyone is the architect of his own fortune). However, «Er ist (wurde) seines Schicksals Herr» (he is [became] master of his fate) describes someone who managed not to break down under «the pressure of his fate» but endured in dignity and thus realized his fate properly. Similarly, «Er wurde der, Aufgabe Herr» (he mastered/became master of the task) means that someone managed to properly carry out a task given to him. It is with a view to these latter usages that Hitler says of himself that he became «master of fate.» Only cowards and the lukewarm break down under the test of fate and don't want to, or are not able to, take over their fate. For English readers, it might perhaps be surprising that Hitler uses a word of mastery and domination to describe what is actually a being subsumed by fate. However, he is not alone in the usage of expressions of mastery for acts of submission. It is one of the strategies of the right wing to polemically redefine for its purposes the liberal vocabulary of autonomy and freedom.17

In this case two additional ideas made it very easy and expedient for Hitler to use this formulation. By proving worthy of his fate and by anticipating the accomplishment of the task fate has given him, Hitler has become the master of the fate of Germany and the world. By listening to fate, he is going to reverse the downward course of Germany and the world and thus be their fate in the sense mentioned above. This leads to the idea that he is the «master of fate» in the sense that he is the «master» of Germany and the world, sent by fate to save them. It is precisely the brevity of the phrase «master of Fate» that allows it to take on the sense of «the master whom Fate has sent» («Eine gute Gabe Gottes» = a good gift of God = a good gift God has given). Hitler is fate's Geschenk or its Gabe, fate's gift, to the word in the moment of crisis, and to him the world must submit. Hitler explicitly says so more than once. In the chapter "The Strong Man is Mightiest Alone" (MKe 508; "Der Starke ist am mächstigsten allein," MK 568, a quote from Schiller's play Wilhelm Tell , act 1, scene 3), he writes:

Yes, it can come about that centuries wish and yearn for the solution of a certain question, because they are sighing beneath the intolerable burden of an existing condition and the fulfillment of this general longing does not materialize. Nations {Völker} which no longer find any heroic solution {heroische

Lösung} for such distress can be designated as impotent while we see the vitality of a people, and the predestination for life guaranteed by this vitality {die Lebenskraft eines Volkes und die durch sie noch verbürgte Bestimmung zum Leben}, most strikingly demonstrated when, for a people's liberation from a great oppression, or for the elimination of a bitter distress, or for the satisfaction of its soul, restless because it has grown insecure—Fate some day bestows upon it the man endowed for this purpose, who finally brings the long yearned-for fulfillment {wenn ihm . . . vom Schicksal eines Tages der dafür begnadete Mann geschenkt wird, der endlich die lang ersehnte Erfüllung bringt}. (MKe 510; MK 570; see also MKe 116, 581, 606; MK 126f, 651, 682)

B. Scheler in War

Scheler was one of the very few contemporary philosophers whom Heidegger appreciated. In fact, «Max Scheler was, aside from the sheer scale and quality of his productivity, the strongest philosophical force in modem Germany, nay, in contemporary Europe and even in contemporary philosophy as such,»18 as Heidegger said when he interrupted his lecture course, The Metaphysical Foundations of Logic , in summer 1928 to give an obituary on Scheler shortly after the latter's death. In 1915 Scheler published a book entitled Der Genius des Krieges und der Deutsche Krieg (The genius of war and the German war) (in PPS). Before the end of 1915 a second edition came out, followed by a third edition only one year later. The book's dedication reads, «Meinen Freunden im Felde» («For my friends in combat»), and its motto is a verse by Friedrich Schiller: «Aber der Krieg hat auch seine Ehre,/der Beweger des Menschengeschicks» («War also has its honor/the mover of the Geschick of humans»).

In World War I several German philosophers and intellectuals wrote for the cause of the Germans. Some of them perhaps felt some sort of social pressure to do so. However, to have finished a book of 443 pages (in its editions in the 1910s) as early as «the first half of November 1914» (PPS 10; the date of the preface), that is, three months after the beginning of the war, was more than, so to speak, even the German Emperor could have asked for. I will discuss only the three features of Scheler's hymn on the war and the Germans that are pertinent to my purposes here, namely, the contrast between Gesellschaft and Gemeinschaft, the step out of Gesellschaft into Gemeinschaft, and the status of Schicksal.

Scheler has two visions. The first is «the most horrible imagination can depict» (PPS 153). There are three empires, the Japanese regime in Asia, the Russian empire that has expanded to the West, and a «more or less mechanized America» (PPS 153). England is the servant of Russia. Germany, France, and Italy have been pressed down to the level of Spain (PPS 153). In his second vision, Scheler conceives the victory of Germany and Austria (PPS 153)—like

Hitler—with a metaphor of bodily disease caused by a virus from outside that has entered the body: «A Europe that expels from its blood like a foreign poison Anglo-American capitalism and the concomitant Calvinistic-puritanistic devastation of Christianity, and at the same time turns the expansion from east to west back into an expansion from west to east» (PPS 153; «ein Europa, das englisch-amerikanischen Kapitalismus und dazugehörige calvinistisch-puritanische Verödung der Christlichkeit aus seinem Blute wie ein fremdes Gift ausscheidet und gleichzeitig die ost-westliche Expansionsbewegung in eine west-östliche wieder zurückverwandelt»). This Europe will «keep forever the spiritual leadership of the world» (PPS 217)—«under Germany's military leadership against the East» (PPS 216f.). For Scheler, England is the main enemy in Word War I since it has been the vanguard of capitalism—a mentality he calls «English cant.»19 Liberalism, Enlightenment, and «English cant» are all the same. In addition, social democracy, Marxism, and socialism by no means represent a mentality that has overcome «English cant.» Rather, it is the same mentality developed further, and it is the «truth» behind Enlightenment and «English cant.»

Let me begin with a passage that includes all three relevant aspects. Scheler has pursued his reflections to a point where he can reveal «the core of the great ethical paradox of war» (PPS 76). Those who argue against the war—the «modems and liberals» (PPS 76)—do so «in the name of "universal love for mankind," in the name of "humanity"» (PPS 76; «Im Namen einer "allgemeinen Menschenliebe," im Namen der "Humanität"»). In Scheler's view, however, by doing so the modems and liberals «abuse the noble name of "love"» (PPS 76; «mißbraucht man den edlen Namen der "Liebe"»). Indeed, they use the notion of love for what has been the modem project of liberal capitalist society, namely, for the «clever dovetailing of private interests such that the promotion of each of their parts also promotes the other parts» (PPS 76; «solche kluge Verzahnung der Privatinteressen, daß die Förderung jedes ihrer Teile die anderen Teile mitfördert») to the effect that this system «economically "saves," puts aside, what is divine in man, namely, love, sacrifice, duty, even spirit itself to the point that all spirit becomes superfluous» (PPS 76; «was die edelste Kraft im Menschen, das Göttliche in ihm, was Liebe, Opfer, Pflicht, ja am Ende Geist überhaupt so lange ökonomisch "spart", bis aller Geist überflüssig wird.» «Saves» here in the sense of, as it were, «to take money out of circulation, to put it into a savings account, and thereupon to forget about the existence of this savings account,» or «to maximize profit by downsizing,» that is,—in Heideggerian terms—to de-cide, to sort out, to eliminate love, etc.). The modems and liberals reduce man to what he has in common with animals. They deny love, sacrifice, duty, highest values, religion, art, philosophy, Sittlichkeit, state, right, and essence. In brief, they deny that the idea of man «represents itself only in a multitude of characteristically different national units and units of Volk» (PPS 76f.). The attempt to isolate

and universalize any one specific and personal value amounts to a blindness concerning the totality of highest spiritual values and reduces all values to the lowest level of values, the one of sensual pleasure and pain (PPS 77). Thus, here we have the paradox of war, which is a paradox only for moderns and liberals, for true love of mankind and humanity one finds «not prior to the war, neither after the war, but precisely only in war itself» (PPS 77). Thus, according to this reversal of the relation between peace and war, Scheler maintains that if in history there is progress in regard to the «soulfulness and depth of the unity of mankind,» it is due to «not peace of the world, but rather to war and the everlasting moral effects on the human soul that accumulate and flow out of war's traditions and deep memories» (PPS 77). It is not peace but war that is «the constructive force of this uniting process» (PPS 77).

Scheler continues in this vein, but I will quote only three more sentences from this context. The fact «that war counteracts the forces that separate the minds and disintegrate Gemeinschaft and that are at work in the civilization and Gesellschaft of peacetime only {die gemüterscheidenden und gemeinschaftszersetzenden Kräfte, die in bloßer Friedenszivilisation und -gesellschaft wirksam sind}, can be regarded as the vehicle of ethical progress» (PPS 77). The pacifists forget that the nations as we know them are the results of war. They forget «that the nations have been welded together by wars, and that the common memory of war is at the core of their community of fate {Kern ihrer Schicksalsgemeinschaft}» (PPS 77). To be sure, peace also develops unions. However, except for matrimony, family, and some sects, all these unions «are always only associations for particular ends and interests , organized according to laws and contracts, but not communities of life united by love {durch Recht und Vertrag geordnete Zweck- und Interessengesellschaften , nicht aber durch irgendeine Art der Liebe zusammengefaßte Lebensgemeinschaften }» (PPS 77).

Another passage concerns the issue of a «(just war» between England and Germany. Again Scheler points out that the war did not occur as a result of intrigues or mistakes by some diplomats. Rather, England's colonial politics and imperialism and the building up of the German navy all were «a necessity» (PPS 121). «We» rightfully no longer adhere to Fichte's and Bismarck's politics, and «we» began a politics with regard to colonies that was meant to provide «us» with that «"place in the sun"» («"Platz an der Sonne"») that is demanded «peremptorily» («gebieterisch») «already by the rapid growth of our population and by the lack of space for expansion in our own country» (PPS 121).

In doing so, we have followed the call of a fate that is as unshakable and as firmly built into the entire German history up to now as England's fate is into England's history! The fates of both people had to clash! They can be decided ultimately only in an all-out war. {Da sind wir dem Rufe eines Schicksals

gefolgt, das genau so ehern und festgefügt ist in der ganzen bisherigen deutschen Geschichte wie das Schicksal Englands! Diese Schicksale beider Völker mußten zusammenstoßen! Sie können nur in einem radikalen Kriege entschieden werden.} If the current war does not decide them, it will be another war, or an entire series of such wars. (PPS 121)

An individual, or a group, does not create its fate. Rather, its fate exists already prior to it and calls upon the individual and the group in a situation in which the individuals, the moderns and liberals, want to forget about fate. The pacifists, moderns, and liberals want not to have fate. Scheler goes on:

In a letter to Gerhart Hauptmann, Mister Romain Rolland wrote: "The French man doesn't believe in fate. Fate is the excuse of the weak ones." In this sentence he unknowingly uncovered the principle of the impudent and unholy arbitrariness that has governed French history from the French revolution on, when it became classical. The opposite is true: Only the strong and great man has a true "fate." Similarly, only that Volk has a true fate that is strong and great and that has deep respect for the inner necessities of its history and follows the profound orders of its inner makeup beyond all transient opportunistic ends and the possible arbitrariness of its government and its diplomats. (PPS 121; Wie nur der starke und große Mensch ein echtes "Schicksal" hat, so auch gerade das starke, große vor den inneren Notwendigkeiten seiner Geschichte ehrfürchtige, und den tiefen Weisungen seiner inneren Konstitution über alle momentanen Opportunitätszwecke, etwaige Regierungs- und Diplomatenwillkür hinaus folgende Volk.)

This is what justifies the war and makes it a «just war»: «Precisely the fact that the war between England and Germany is ordained by fate {Schicksalsmäßigkeit} makes this war a "just" war» (PPS 121).

For Plato, Aristotle, and the philosophers of the Middle Ages the basic axiom of causality was that the cause of an effect must be at least as great as the effect. Modern physics has challenged this axiom and its metaphysical presuppositions. Thus, modern philosophers joke about small causes having great effects—the notorious fly that in the morning harasses the king who at noon declares war on this or that country. Scheler follows the medieval way in his thinking: «What is boundless requires a source that is boundless» (PPS 99).20 This war is a great and sublime event; indeed, the «most sublime {erhabensten} event since the French revolution» (PPS 9), and therefore, its cause must be great and sublime as well. With this notion he rules out chance, mistakes, or intrigues on the part of this or that government or its diplomats as well as the usual suspect adduced by the Marxists (PPS 106ff. and often elsewhere). Thus, what remains as the only possible cause of war and what definitely is the cause, is fate. He quotes Dostoyevsky who spoke concerning the Russians of the

necessity of remaining steadfast on the problem of the Orient {that is, to conquer Constantinople in order to control access to the Black Sea and to gain access to

the Adriatic Sea} and of pursuing with determination this politics, which our entire history has set before us as our duty {die uns unsere ganze Geschichte zur Pflicht gemacht hat}. . .. In this question lies our definitive clash . . . with Europe . . .. {To conquer Constantinople} is almost our entire fate {unser ganzes Schicksal} for the future. . .. Is it possible that Europe already understands the significance for our entire life, ordained for us by fate, that lies in the resolution of this question {diese ganze, uns vom Schicksal bestimmte Lebensbedeutung, die für uns in der Entscheidung dieser Frage liegt}? (PPS 108f.)

Two pages later, Scheler summarizes: «As great and as all-encompassing for all the spheres of Russia's life the push {Drang} toward Constantinople is, so great and all-encompassing is also the power of fate that pushes us {Germans} to resist it» (PPS 110; «die Schicksalskraft, die uns zum Widerstande dagegen treibt!»). In fact, Scheler uses the concept of fate throughout, beginning with the very first line of his introduction. I quote only the following passage as a summary. The introduction begins with this sentence:

When, at the beginning of the month of August, our German fate {unser deutsches Schicksal} took its stand before us like a single immense dark question {wie eine einzige ungeheure dunkle Frage} and shook each individual to the core—the same fate that only a few weeks ago lay before us like a straight and well-built path and that simply embraced us without being noticed {unempfunden} and with the insouciance and self-evidence of the space around us—it was just one single answer that echoed from all German souls {nur eine Antwort, die aus allen deutschen Seelen zurucktonte* }, one raised arm {ein einziger erhobener Arm}: Forward to sword and to victory! {Zu Schwert und zum Siege!} (PPS 11)

Making its demand, fate does away with all the previous disagreements and separations. Scheler continues:

In the holy demand of the hour {In der heiligen Forderung der Stunde} along with all the quarreling of the parties {Parteiengezänk} the greatest differences between our worldviews have also been drowned. With the amazement of a generation for whom the state of peace had gone as unnoticed as the atmosphere, we all saw and felt that the call for serious deeds {Forderung emster Tat} unifies anything and anyone formerly separated by their opinion on war and the interest in war and peace. (PPS 11)

Fate leaves the individual no choice and does not allow any «bargaining.» Scheler continues:

{We all saw and felt}, clear as daylight and without any ambiguity, how a conscience confronted with a deed can and must answer {ein vor die Tat gestelltes Gewissen antworten kann und muß} in a situation where only a moment before the thoughts on war in general and the avoidability of this war in particular differed widely and were worlds apart. (PPS 11)21

In these hours, we realize that it is fate that has brought about everything, and that determines each individual. Scheler continues:

The fact that in these hours we actually perceived that a specific national fate reaches down into the core of each individual, of the lowliest and the grandest, and that by this fate it is preordained and codetermined what each of us is and what the value of each of us is, and what will become of each and his life's work—this fact was the most public and universal and at the same time the most intimate {das Heimlichste} and the most individual of what these generations of peace could experience. (PPS 11)

We are no longer alone, we are no longer isolated bourgeois subjects; as Scheler puts it in the following sentence:

All of a sudden, the wide and great path of the world and the most intimate aspiration of each soul saw each other tied together and in a miraculous way interdependent in their development. We were no longer what we had been for so long: alone {Allein}! All of a sudden, the living connection between the individual, the Volk, the nation, the world, and God, which had been torn asunder, was reestablished, and the powers {of the individuals, the Volk, the nation, the world, and God} swing to and fro {between the individuals, the Volk, the nation, the world, and God} more powerfully than previously any poetry, any philosophy, any prayer, and any cult could evoke. However, . . . this miracle best remains unspoken and in the heart alone. (PPS 11)22

With this tactful remark, Scheler concludes this passage and introduces the «paradox» (PPS 13) he will solve in the 438 pages to come.

C. Scheler's Formalism in Ethics

For liberals, World War I was the breakdown of everything they believed in and fought for.23 For Scheler, however, World War I is the proof that his ethical theories as already developed prior to World War I are true. In modernity, «English cant» has taken over. For Scheler, World War I proves that things cannot go on that way and that the «real» forces in history are the powers of Schicksal, Gemeinschaft, and love as they have reemerged in World War I. In the preface of Der Genius des Krieges , he points out that he often refers to his other writings to allow readers to inform themselves about the «basic notions and axioms» («Grundbegriffe und Grundsätze») he uses in Der Genius des Krieges (PPS 10). In 1915 Scheler published a collection of essays, Abhandlungen und Aufsätze , in the preface to which he emphasizes that all the essays were written prior to Word War I (UW 7) and comments as follows: «In what way the enormous event in the moral world occasioned by the war, which now overshadows and shapes the new thoughts of the time, seems to powerfully pull the European forms of Dasein precisely into the

direction of development that prior to the war these essays {in Abhandlungen und Aufsätze } have conveyed the author has recently shown in his book Der Genius des Krieges und der Deutsche Krieg » (UW 8).24 Similarly, in the preface to the first edition of The Formalism in Ethics , published in 1916, Scheler stresses that its first part was already published in 1913 and that the second part was already finished in manuscript form in the same year (FEe xvii; FE 9). Even in the preface to the second edition of The Formalism in Ethics , written in 1921, Scheler simply states without further comment: «Concrete application of my principles of general ethics to a number of specific problems and to questions concerning our own time will be found in my books Vom Umsturz der Werte (2d ed. of Abhandlungen und Aufsätze ) and Genius des Krieges , in my essay Ursachen des Deutschenhasses , and in my forthcoming book Schriften zur Soziologie und Weltanschauungslehre » (FEe xxii; FE 14).

Thus, Scheler maintains that what he wrote prior to World War I was proven true by the war. World War I and his argument in Der Genius des Krieges are the desired and logical consequences of his philosophy. In the preface to Der Genius des Krieges , Scheler makes use of Plato's simile of the cave:

While the first part {of Der Genius des Krieges , "The Genius of War," the part on war in general} proceeds in such a way that what appears is only the shadow of the war that surrounds us, the shadow the war projects by virtue of the light from the eternal world of ideas, onto the wall of Being; the second part {"The German War"} shows the very same ideas completely immersed into concrete life, into action {Tat} and dictates of the hour {Forderung der Stunde}. (PPS 9)

This is a convenient metaphor for the relationship of his prewar writings to Der Genius des Krieges . The prewar writings deduce the «necessity» of war and anticipate its occurrence, the first part of Der Genius des Krieges gives a fuller picture of the deduced idea of war, and the second part shows the realization of the idea. The metaphor is analogous to the sentences with «erwidert » and «Widerruf » (SZ 386; BT 438) in Heidegger's Being and Time . Prior to the war, liberals stare at their phantasms of liberal society on the walls of their caves. A shadow falls onto those walls and phantasms, but liberals are unable, or unwilling, to recognize what is heralded by this shadow and instead try to cover up the shadow by the work of ambiguity in order to keep those liberal phantasms alive. However, the authentic Daseine see through this work of ambiguity. They erwidern the call of the ideas, which announces itself in the shadow, and they widerrufen the phantasms of liberal society. They extinguish those phantasms and replace them with a proper realization of the ideas that have announced themselves in the shadow and that now take over the place formerly occupied by those liberal phantasms, or as

the war approached, by the twilight of those liberal phantasms and the shadow of war. The realization of these ideas is a rerealization. Actually, what is at stake, as Scheler puts it in the preface to the second edition of Abhandlungen und Aufsätze , is the «resurrection of the eternal order of the human heart, which has been toppled by the bourgeois-capitalist spirit {Wiederaufrichtung der durch den bürgerlich-kapitalistischen Geist umgestürzten ewigen Ordnung des Menschenherzens}» (UW 9).

For Scheler there is no question that modernity is a turning away, or falling away, from the realm of objective values, to which the communities and Christian philosophy in early Christianity as well as in the Middle Ages had been properly related. In the unfinished essay "Christliche Demokratie" (Christian democracy), written in 1919 (PPS 698), Scheler uses a gesture one could call the foundational gesture of metaphysics proper and which allows one to dismiss entire epochs with one fell swoop. Distinguishing between two kinds of «democratism of sentiment» («Gesinnungsdemokratismus»), which in itself has nothing to do with political freedom and equality (PPS 679), he writes:

The first {kind of Gesinnungsdemokratismus} is present in the combination of the Christian idea of love with the theory of objective ranks of values and—corresponding to this theory of objective ranks of values—with the theory of estates {Stand} and professions formulated by Christian philosophy and teaching ("ordo amoris"). The second {kind of} democratism of sentiment has been, in my mind, the root of all those humanitarian movements that pit the love of humankind and the love of God against each other and the love of humankind against that of the fatherland; this second kind of democratism of sentiment wants to promote the welfare of human beings by renouncing the acknowledgment of an objective world of values and truth {unter Verzicht auf die Anerkennung einer objektiven Güter- und Wahrheitswelt } that has to be recognized and actualized within the human realm, that is, {in contrast to early Christianity up to the Middle Ages, modernity maintains that} no longer is the salvation of a person to be placed above his or her spiritual education and morality, and no longer do these two values have to be ranked above health, strength, and welfare, or the vital values above utility and pleasure; rather, {in modernity} the material happiness of the greatest number (Bentham) replaces the objective world of values. (PPS 680)

As is known, in Formalism in Ethics Scheler presents a realm of values that exists independently of human beings. Unlike the Marburg Neo-Kantians, Scheler maintains that human beings don't produce the values but only partake in them; in other words, human beings are only the «bearers of values» (FEe 85; «Wertträger,» FE 103). Values do not exist in their realm in an undifferentiated conglomeration. Rather, they are placed in a clear hierarchic order: «In the totality of the realm of values there exists a singular order, an "order of ranks " {"Rangordnung "} that all values possess among themselves. It is because of this that a value is "higher " or "lower " than another one. This order lies in the

essence of values themselves, as does the difference between "positive" and "negative" values. It does not belong simply to "values known" by us» (FEe 86f.; FE 104). We actualize the differences with regard to the level of the values in a specific act; Scheler calls this «preferring » (FEe 87; «"Vorziehen ",» FE 105), and this must not be confused with «conating, choosing, and willing» (FE 87; «Streben, Wählen, Wollen,» FE 105). The fact that the «being higher» is given «in» our preferring must not lead us to infer that «being higher» means «to be preferred.» For «if the height of a value is given "in" preferring, this height is nevertheless a relation in the essence of the values concerned. Therefore, the "ordered ranks of values " {"Rangordnung der Werte "} are absolutely invariable , whereas the "rules of preferring" {"Vorzugsregeln"} are, in principle, variable throughout history (a variation which is still very different from the apprehension of new values)» (FEe 88; FE 105f.).

Different values are grouped according to what Scheler calls systems of «value-modalities» and their «a priori relations of rank» (FEe 104ff.; «apriorische Rangbeziehungen zwischen den Wertmodalitäten,» FE 122ff.) Scheler develops four such modalities. The lowest system are the values «ranging from the agreeable to the disagreeable » (FEe 105; «Angenehmen und Unangenehmen ,» FE 122). The second lowest are the values of «vital feeling » (FEe 106; FE 123). Above them are the «spiritual values » (FEe 107; FE 124), and at the top of the hierarchy are the values of the «holy» and «unholy»:

4. Values of the last modality are those of the holy and the unholy {des Heiligen und Unheiligen }. This modality differs sharply from the above modalities. It forms a unit of value-qualities not subject to further definition. . .. "Faith" and "lack of faith," "awe," "adoration," and analogous attitudes are specific reactions in this modality. However, the act through which we originally apprehend the value of the holy is an act of a specific kind of love . . .. The order is this: the modality of vital values is higher than that of the agreeable and the disagreeable; the modality of spiritual values is higher than that of vital values; the modality of the holy is higher than that of spiritual values. A more detailed attempt to found {nähere Begründung} these propositions cannot be undertaken at this point. (FEe 108-110; FE 125f.)

One can easily see what, according to Scheler, has happened in modernity. But first let me add further distinctions in Scheler's Formalism in Ethics , which are also important for his use of the terms Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft. After distinguishing between several kinds of values, he adduces the distinction between

g. Individual Values and Collective Values. . .. If one turns to values of oneself, such values may be individual values or collective values proper to one as a "member" {"Mitglied"} or "representative" of a "social rank," "profession," or "class"; or they may be values of one's own individuality. This holds also for values of the other. 74 . . . {In the case of the individual values} we have differences among

bearers of values that lie in the whole of an experienced "community ," {"Gemeinschaft "} by which we mean only a whole experienced by all its "members" {"Gliedern"}. Such a life-community is not a factually existing (more or less) artificial unit of mere elements which act among each other objectively and conceive their unit as a unit. We shall call this latter unit of human beings a society {"Gesellschaft "}. Now, all "collective values" are "values of society ." Their bearers form not experienced "wholes" but majorities of a conceptualized class. Life-communities {"Gemeinschaften"}, however, may also function as "individual " vis-à-vis "collectives," e.g. an individual marriage, a family, a community, a people {Volk}, etc., as opposed to the totality of marriages or families or communities of a country or the totality of peoples, etc. (FEe 102f.; «only» in «we mean only» has the force of «exclusively»; instead of «rife-community» and «rife-communities» read «community» and «communities»; FE 119f.)

The accompanying note 74 reads:

Thus love (in the Christian sense) is always individual love , both as self-love and love of the other , which is also called love of one's neighbor, but not as love for one who is a member of the class of workers, for example, or a "representative" of a collective group. The "social consciousness" of the working class {für den Arbeiterstand} has nothing to do with "love of one's neighbor." The latter pertains to the worker, but only as a human individual . (FEe 102, n. 74: FE 119f., n. 1)

As so often in Scheler, these sentences also lack a «more detailed attempt to found» them, which is to say there is no attempt to give them a foundation. In fact, in these passages Scheler has hardly given any reasons for any of his propositions, and in German the formulation, «A nähere Begründung of these propositions cannot be undertaken at this point» (FEe 110; FE 126), is most often used as a euphemism for cases in which the author hasn't made the slightest attempt to present arguments for his statements. As often in the literature on Gesellschaft and Gemeinschaft, such sentences represent the crossroads between the political Right and Left. For right-wingers, the realm of society is no longer an object of erotic and reasonable interests. Rather, «marriage, a family, a community, a people» have become the exclusive object of love, and society is experienced as a threat to family, community, and people. As will become even clearer in what follows, Scheler's statements amount to two theses. The first is that the material circumstances of the proletarians are not the top priority for those believing in authentic Christian love of one' s neighbor. The second thesis is that the individuals engaged in the parties of the working class—at the time mainly. social democrats who had fought for and won minimal social security, voting rights, and education for the workers-by no means transcend their selfish interests and move toward love for their neighbors or other higher values but are just as selfish and concerned about the lowest values as the liberal bourgeois subjects. Scheler's claims are

simply a more abstract formulation of a thesis he still maintained in his writings after the war, for instance, in the essay "Christlicher Sozialismus als Antikapitalismus" (Christian socialism as anticapitalism), written in 1919:

Thus, we have to state as a matter of principle {grundsätzlich}: In none of its variants does the Marxist socialism of the fourth estate represent a true opposition against capitalism, against capital and its root, namely, the capitalist spirit. Instead, it merely represents the material interests of its class within the capitalist society, the interests of the manual laborers, and these only insofar as those laborers are ensouled by the same capitalist spirit as the entrepreneurs and the bourgeois. (PPS 634f.)25

At the end of the chapter on value-modalities, Scheler poses the question

how one can obtain from {the four kinds of value-modalities} . . . the pure types of communal forms of togetherness {die reinen Typen der Gemeinschaftsartenen }, such as the community of love {Liebesgemeinschaft} (plus its technical form, the church), the community of law {Rechtsgemeinschaft}, the community of culture {Kulturgemeinschaft}, and the life-community {Lebensgemeinschaft} (plus its technical form, the state), and the mere forms of so-called society {der sog. "Gesellschaft"}. (FEe 109f.; FE 126)26

Scheler gives an answer in the chapter entitled "The Person in Ethical Contexts" (FEe 476ff.; FE 469ff). In it, Scheler distinguishes between four kinds of social units. The «lowest» one is the «mass » (FEe 526; FE 515 «"Masse "»). With regard to the other three units, he follows a scheme familiar in its general outlines since Hegel (who did not use it for rightist purposes). There are the small Gemeinschaften, in the first place, as in Hegel, families. Furthermore, there are, so to speak, large-scale Gemeinschaften, the state, people, nation, and the church, and there is Gesellschaft. The second social unit after the mass is the «life-community » («"Lebensgemeinschaft "») (FEe 526-528; FE 515-517). Following that is the Gesellschaft. Scheler defines it negatively as that unity in which, in contrast to «life-community ,» there is no primordial «"living-with-one-another"»:

3. The social unit of the society {Gesellschaft } is basically different from the essential unit of the life-community. First, the society, as opposed to the natural {natürlichen } unit of the life-community, is to be defined as an artificial {künstliche } unit of individuals having no original "living-with-one-another" {"Miteinandererleben"} in the sense described above. (FEe 528; FE 517)

Instead, in society each individual is the center of his or her experience, and the individual's relationships to others are contractual:

Rather, all relations among individuals are established by specific conscious acts that are experienced by each as coming from his individual ego, which is

experientially given first in this case , as directed to someone else as "another." . . . Moreover, common cognition, enjoyment, etc., presuppose some criteria of the true and the false, the beautiful and the ugly, which have been agreed upon beforehand. Every kind of willing together and doing together presupposes the actus of promising and the phenomenon [Sachgebilde ] of the contract that is constituted in mutual promising—the basic phenomenon of all private law. (FEe 528f.; FE 517f.)

Due to the nature of synthesis in society, trust, for instance, is not possible: «Just as boundless trust in one another is the basic attitude in the life-community, unfathomable and primary distrust of all in all is the basic attitude in society» (FEe 529; FE 518). Finally, at the top of the hierarchy is the «love-community,» which has been preferred for the first time in history in early Christianity:

4. From the essential types of social unity thus far mentioned, namely, mass, society, and life-community, we must distinguish the highest essential type of social unity, with whose characteristics we began this chapter: the unity of independent, spiritual, and individual single persons "in" an independent, spiritual, and individual collective person {Die Einheit selbständiger, geistiger, individueller Einzelpersonen "in" einer selbständigen, geistigen, individuellen Gesamtperson }. We assert that this unity, and it alone, is the nucleus and total novelty of the true and ancient Christian idea of community, and that this Christian idea represents, so to speak, the historical discovery of this unity. In quite a peculiar manner, this idea of community unites the being and indestructible self-value of the individual "soul" (conceived in terms of creation) and the person (contrary to the ancient theory of corporation and the Jewish idea of "people") by means of the idea of the salvational solidarity of all in the corpus christianum , which is founded on the Christian idea of love (and which is contrary to the mere ethos of "society," which denies moral solidarity). (FEe 533; FE 522)

As this passage already shows, the love-community—though not a result of the life-communities and society but having priority over them—preserves the main features of both life-community and society. In life-community, each individual has coresponsibility for the whole, and its self-responsibility is based on that coresponsibility because in this kind of community the individual is not yet valued in its own right (FEe 529f.; FE 518f.). In society, however, all responsibility is based on self-responsibility, and there is no longer any coresponsibility (FEe 526ff.; FE 515ff.). The love-community gathers together several collective persons (Gemeinschaften, so to speak, above society), and here we find both individual persons and responsibility for the whole:

If one takes a look at the relation of this idea of the highest form of social unity—as the idea of a solidary realm of love of individual, independent spir-

itual persons in a plurality of collective persons of the same character (this unity of collective persons among themselves, as well as the unity of the individual person and the collective person, is possible in God alone)—to the ideas of life-community and society , one can see that life-community and society as essential forms of social unity are subordinated to this highest essential social form, and that they are determined to serve it and to make it appear, but, to be sure, in different manners {ways}. Although the idea of the highest form of social unity is not a "synthesis" of life-community and society, essential characteristics of both are nevertheless co-given in it: the independent, individual person, as in society; and solidarity and real collective unity, as in community. (FEe 538f,; FE 527)

In the realm of values the lowest values, those of the agreeable and the useful, are relegated to the level of society. The values of the noble and vulgar, the spiritual values, etc., belong to the domain of various small-scale and large-scale communities, while the values of the holy and unholy have their place in the highest community, the love-community, which is, however, also concerned with all values, as the lower social units are subordinated to the highest unit and serve the latter (FEe 551ff, FE 539ff.).

Scheler writes: «As a whole, the essential social unit of society is not a special reality outside or above individuals. It is simply an indivisible {unsichtbares} fabric of relations that represent "conventions," ¹⁸¹ "usage," or "contracts," depending on whether they are more explicit or more tacit» (FEe 529; FE 518; read «invisible» instead of «indivisible»; the accompanying note 181 reads: «Hence conventions {Konvention} and mores {Sitte resp. Brauch}, like fashions {Mode} and costumes {Tracht}, must be sharply distinguished. Conventions and fashions belong entirely to society; mores and costumes, to the life-community.»). This is the crucial difference between society and the small-scale Gemeinschaften and the large-scale Gemeinschaften, as communities of both types do indeed have a reality above and beyond the individual (FEe 523, 527, 544; FE 513, 517, 532). This is another expression for the basic assumption that in society there is no solidarity' and no responsibility except for oneself (FEe 529; FE 518). At the same time, this statement supports the thesis that, empirically, there is no society without community whereas communities can exist without a society:

Yet there are interconnections of a quite determinate character between society and life-community {Gemeinschaft} (as essential structures of social unity). The basic nexus is this: there can be no society without life-community (though them can be life-community without society). All possible society is therefore founded through community. (FEe 531; instead of all three occurrences of «life-community» read «community»; FE 520)

Scheler illustrates his thesis by maintaining that the duty to keep a contract «does not have its source in another contract to keep contracts. It has its

source in the solidary obligation of the members of the community to realize the contents that ought to be for the members. A so-called contract without this foundation would be nothing but a fiction» (FEe 531; FE 520). The thesis that a society is impossible without being grounded in communities is not new. However, what is distinctive about the way rightist authors use this thesis is their distorted notion of society. In modern times at any rate, the concept of society has been closely connected to that of reason, Vernunft. The universality of reason as posited in Enlightenment thinking and in Kant allowed for the procedures and processes of Bildung, education, formation, of one's will and person so that one transcends the limits of the self and can see oneself from the viewpoint of others and see each other individual not only as a means but also as an end in himself or herself. Classical liberalism assumed that the pursuit of one's own self-interest would simultaneously promote the interests of the others and that this was the best way to promote the common good. After the waning of classical liberalism, the assumption of the universality of reason still served as the imperative to realize consciously what, as Adam Smith called it, the invisible hand by itself could not realize, that is, reason grounded classical liberalism as well as later liberalism and social democratic politics.

Like many others who would like to rerealize the «original spirit» of Christianity, Scheler downplays the role of reason. In fact, the concept of reason as developed by Kant is his main target from the outset. Unlike Kant, Scheler maintains that human reason is by no means synthetic and productive. Moreover, according to him, the other faculties and activities—to will, to love, to hate—do not become ethical only by virtue of being determined by reason (FEe 63ff.; FE 82ff.). Thus, in Scheler reason is no longer a faculty that determines others but only accompanies their activities. Certainly to regard reason as fruitful and indispensable in the realm of politics does not require subscribing to a strong concept of reason. Scheler, however, rejects both the «strong» as well as the «weak» concept of reason. As he points out regarding Kant, Hume, Spencer, and Comte, one misses the «peculiar nature of community as an essential kind of social unity,» if one refers to the idea of contract in order «to explain the origin . . . of all social structures of the spirit . . .; and in order to have a standard by which to assess the legal order and the degree of the development of any extant social structure» (FEe 539; FE 527). Or, some pages earlier: «We must reject the theory of a contract in any of its three possible forms: as a genetic theory, as a theory of origin, or as a theoretical standard (according to which only the type of order of a community is to be assessed against the idea of a contract)» (FEe 524; FE 513f.).

It is only this step of ruling out reason as a relevant faculty that allows Scheler to dismiss classical liberalism as well as social democracy and to maintain that both are identical to or further developments of what he calls

«English cant,» which in Scheler's view is nothing more than a theory of the selfish individual, regarding himself or herself as free of any responsibility for others and looking upon others as mere means to his own ends. With this step, Scheler participates in the process of—in Carl Schmitt's terms—intensifying a tension or an opposition by destroying any possibility of mediation between the opposites. Anticipating the scenario Schmitt develops in the last part of the Political Theology , Scheler writes on reason in the essay "Soziologische Neuorientierung und die Aufgabe der deutschen Katholiken nach dem Krieg" (Sociological reorientation and the task of the German Catholics after the war):

{Reason} only has the choice between a subordination to that meaning {Sinn} which the whole of religious revelation {religiöse Gesamtoffenbarung} gives to life and thus to reason itself—a subordination that is free and that results from reason's insight into its own dependency and limits—or an enslavement, slowly progressing and compulsory, to the life of the instincts and drives {Triebleben}, which darkens and sultries the light of reason more and more. (PPS 409)

As was already indicated, Scheler's overall project, which places him on the political Right, is the revitalization of the proper «order of the human heart,» that is, of the original Christian community by means of the destruction of «English cant,» that is, of society, which has taken over in modernity and which therefore has to be destroyed or to be expelled «from {Europe's} blood like a foreign poison» (PPS 153) to make room for the revitalization of the Christian community. This is the same gesture as in section 74 of Being and Time . Both «Schelerians» and Heideggerian authentic Daseine repeat something—original Christianity or Volksgemeinschaft—by redeeming it from its state of fallenness, of being impure or destroyed; that is, both perform an Erwiderung. Both Schelerians and Heideggerian authentic Daseine do so by canceling society, as society has toppled original Christianity or Gemeinschaft. In other words, both perform a Widerruf. This is a de-cision in Heidegger's sense. In order to separate the two opposites the mixture must be purified through a purification of both opposites. In order to be reduced to its supposed original and pure state the «good» opposite, Christianity, must be cleansed of any of its later developments. The «bad» opposite, society, is purged of any reason and is reduced to, as Scheler puts it, «English cant» (PPS 218ff. and often). These two purifications «expel» any possibility of mediation between the opposites, and they also expel any dialectical tension within one opposite—as, for example, the dialectical mediation between universality and individuality in classic liberalism—that makes possible a process of self-reflection resulting in such institutions as social welfare.27 The two reductions provide the ground for the cancellation of the «bad» opposite in

order to rerealize the «good» opposite as the last and crucial step in the decision. In Scheler this motif represents his general political agenda and also forms the heart of his book, Formalism in Ethics . Scheler quite literally reifies the thinking, prevalent at his time, in terms of the methodological device of ideal types, Idealtypen. He reifies the ideal types insofar as they become the ideal social units existing independently of human beings in the realm of values.28 The social units, then, are used in order to reduce each empirical phenomenon, such as a political movement, to just one principle. Liberalism and social democracy can have only one principle, just as Christianity can have only one principle, and this one principle has to be cleansed of any impurities it has acquired over the years. In these reductions, Scheler is partial. In his criticism of Nietzsche in Ressentiment , Scheler admits that in its history Christianity was often an expression of ressentiment (RE 67, 71, 99; UW 57, 61, 84). However, in the realm of values and also in the first instance when it was preferred in history, Christianity, though only for a short time, was the proper and unadulterated realization of the highest values. Thus, in Scheler Christianity is «upgraded.» Liberalism and social democracy, however, are «downgraded» even though from the outset active reason was part of them. This move is already a decision, and it alone allows for the final decision between Christianity on the one hand or liberalism and social democracy on the other, for the purification of Christianity from any liberal or social democratic elements, for the purification of liberalism and social democracy from any reason, and for the cancellation of society in order to revitalize Christianity. However, as Tillich emphasized in 1933, each individual as well as each political group lives—prior to the fact that each of them partakes in several social units and prior to the problems of compromises and alliances in everyday politics—in tension between several principles or demands. In other words, each principle is never simply one principle. As Hegel realized when he turned away from his aspirations to revitalize «the Greeks» or early Christianity and, finally, developed a «theological» as well as a «reasonable» justification of bourgeois society, it is theoretically wrong and morally unjust to reduce a phenomenon to one principle whose purity one has established by a decisive reduction. In this way, Tillich deploys principles in a way one could label post-metaphysical; in contrast, the authors on the Right reinvent a reductive metaphysics of a primordial state, a falling, and a return and apply it and all its reductions to the realm of human politics.

Scheler completely instrumentalizes reason. However, the Christian community preserves the «individual person, as in society» (FEe 539; FE 527). Thus, a liberal might assume that in Scheler's idea of a love-community there is nothing that speaks against liberal purposes. As long as the individual person is preserved in the love-community, any addition to Gesellschaft might sim-

ply be welcomed. Furthermore, historically freedom and equality of the individual has been an achievement of modem reason. However, it may not be necessary to ground these two values in reason. Given Scheler's sloppy standards of providing evidence and arguments for his statements and the. complete absence of any reasoning at crucial points, another philosopher might have assumed, just for the sake of the argument, a realm of values independent of human beings and might have easily found freedom and equality not only among those values but indeed at the pinnacle of the hierarchy of values. However, Scheler does not even see equality as one of the values. In Scheler, equality is not a value but a criterion that God and «we» use when «we» assess individuals and peoples or nations in their acts of preferring values. Scheler's notion of a person not only allows for but indeed explicitly demands that persons are unequal as far as the higher values are concerned. He begins with a more factual statement: «Every man is, as we saw, an individual and therefore a unique being, distinct from all others to the same degree that he is a pure person. And, similarly, his value is a unique value» (FEe 508; FE 499). According to Scheler, this holds true also for people: «This, of course, also pertains to both the individual person and the collective person, e.g., the Greek or Roman people» (FEe 508; FE 499). At the latest, postmodern sensibility would recommend resisting any effort of ranking individuals and people in their respective values. However, for the metaphysician and premodern Scheler the sheer fact of differences implies different ranks and inequality: «Hence all ultimate bearers of moral value, to the degree that they are conceived as pure persons, are different and unequal not only in their being but also in their value» (FEe 509; FE 499). This is simply true, independent of our capacities to recognize the persons and peoples in their different values: «It remains to be seen how and to what extent the extant differences and differences in value among persons can be shown as given or even be "established." If this were not possible, such differences would in any case be present before the idea of an all-loving and all-knowing God» (FEe 509; FE 500; note that Scheler means that it remains to be seen whether we individuals down here on earth can recognize the different values of different empirical persons and peoples). For it is a misunderstanding to assume that before God we are all equal: «Persons and their individual values must be considered different precisely "before God." We must not assume any so-called equality of souls before God, which some interpret to be the teaching of historical Christianity—though, we believe, without justification.¹⁴⁷ » (FEe 509; FE 500; the accompanying note 147 reads: «Such a doctrine could be explained as a distortion produced by Stoic philosophy,» ibid.).

This principle has important implications. The values the state is concerned with are higher than those of society. Thus, Scheler demands that the state must no longer remain liberal with respect to the economy. Rather, from the

a priori relationships between value-modalities it follows that the person as social person and as «subject of private law » as well as the person as «economic subject » must be «subordinated » to the person as citizen «because the state achieves the highest meaning of its existence in the rational regulation of the will to live and the reasonable distribution of the goods of life (of a community, of a people {einer Volksgemeinschaft})» (FEe 511; FE 501f.).

In this generality, social democrats would agree with Scheler. However, liberals and social democrats would not link this thesis to the assumed inequality and to the notion of Volksgemeinschaft. In particular, they would strongly disagree with Scheler's second formulation of this thought. He maintains that with regard to the lowest level the tasks and goods «ought to become more equal for men. They ought to become more equal, for precisely because of this , men's differences do not remain concealed and hidden with regard to absolute or less relative values of being and with regard to the higher goods and tasks connected with faculties of higher value» (FEe 510; FE 500)29 In the accompanying note, Scheler explains that he «cannot develop the many important applications of this principle to theories of society, politics, and law» (FEe 510, n. 148; FE 500, n. I).

However, already here it becomes clear that these applications are illiberal as well as anti—social democratic, that is, that they are rightist. Scheler states that philosophers during the Enlightenment said precisely the opposite. For,

men and their values are to be regarded all the more equal, the more their being approaches the absolute level of being (as "rational entity") and the more their values are compared to values of the highest rank (salvation and spiritual values); and they and their values should (or at least may) appear all the more unequal , too, the more their being approaches sensible states of the lived body and the more their values are compared to values of the lowest rank. (FEe 510; FE 501)

This assumption is the «exact opposite » of Scheler's, and it has its philosophical basis «in the premise of one so-called supra-individual transcendental reason» (FEe 510; FE 501). Liberal theory has assumed the equality of all human beings, and it has assumed that the participation of all human beings as equals in the political realm, as in parliamentary democracy, would provide them with the possibility to discuss freely and rationally all the political and social problems, including existing inequalities in the economic sphere. Scheler rejects the presupposition, namely, the unity of reason in all human beings, and he rejects political equality as well. At a later point, in a discussion of the task of the state with regard to culture, he writes that

the state will do a better job in its task, which belongs essentially to it, of realizing culture, the less it claims autonomous guidance and leadership in cultural

activities, the less it claims to inspire this activity, the less it follows a direct cultural policy (instead of a policy of power) toward other states, and the less it orders the relations of power among people living in its life-communities according to cultural points of view (propagation of education) rather than the point of view of justice. (FEe 553; in German «rather than the point of view of justice» is in parentheses; FE 541)

The occurrence of the word «justice» in parentheses is remarkable, for in Scheler's entire book of no less than 659 pages, the word itself hardly shows up more than a handful of times. It is an amazing phenomenon that in an extremely long and systematic book on ethics the author makes not the slightest effort to develop at least a basis for a theory of justice, not to mention a theory of justice itself. It is all the more amazing since, in this book as well as in his other writings, the author addresses social and political questions, and since, due to the full emergence of capitalism («the social question»), social and political problems have developed into a form previously unknown. The only theoretical statements on justice occur in passing during his discussion of reprisal and punishment, in which he argues mainly against Kant: «Therefore "reprisal" does not follow as a consequence from the demand that justice ought to be. Justice orders and governs only the impulse of reprisal by adding the idea of proportion, like for like, to the demand for reprisal (in some more determinate way)» (FEe 361; FE 361). Two pages later, he says that one «falls victim to another basic misconception of the essence of the idea of reprisal and the idea of punishment when one attempts to derive them from purely moral values and demands, especially the demand for "justice"» (FEe 363; FE 363). For «insofar as the pure essence of justice is understood, justice does not require the repayment of evil with evil. Only from that part of the essential core of justice according to which it is good and proper that under the same value conditions the same behavior of willing persons should occur does it follow that—if there is to be retaliation—this retaliation must be the same for deeds of equal value. However, the demand for "retaliation" as such does not follow from justice.» .30

As to the old distinction between arithmetical justice and proportional justice, in the first of the three quotes Scheler seems to use the terms «justice» and «like» either as «proportional justice» or in such a way that they cover both arithmetical and proportional justice. In the third quote, he says that arithmetical justice is demanded by only one part of the essence of justice. This statement allows for and even requires a continuation such that in all the other parts of the essence of justice, proportional justice is required. Stated in this way, arithmetical justice has always been a special case of proportional justice. According to proportional justice, persons of different values (e.g., a slave and a freeman) are punished differently for equal wrongdoings, that is, in inverse proportion to their values, or political honors and rights are distributed in proportion to the different values of the individuals and groups (with the result

that, for instance, slaves don't have any political honors and rights). This entails that persons of equal values (e.g., two free citizens) are punished for equal wrongdoings equally, and that persons of equal value have equal political honors and rights. Scheler seems to assume proportional justice as the essence of justice. According to Scheler, arithmetical justice is appropriate with regard to the low values. Equality with regard to the low values even enhances the process of manifestation of inequality of different persons with regard to higher values. Political values are higher values. Liberalism has always stood staunchly behind the tenet that all persons are free and equal, that is to say, all persons have to be treated according to arithmetical justice. Scheler revokes this. In fact, in the note to the sentence on state and culture quoted above Scheler explains: « I.e., the state must give life-communities equal or unequal {political} rights {gleiche, resp. ungleiche politische Rechte} according to their degree of significance with respect to the whole of the state» (FEe 553, n. 222; FE 541, n. I). This sentence clearly presupposes proportional justice with regard to the political, as the phrase «equal or unequal {political} rights» can only mean «equal rights to groups of equal value, and unequal rights to groups of unequal value,» if this distribution is supposed to be just. Again, one might wonder why in a huge book on ethics at the beginning of the twentieth century an author refers to such an important issue only in a dismissive way. However, one might also say that Scheler need not expound further on this issue. Once one assumes that a realm of values exists independently of human beings, that there are a priori relations between the values such that there are higher and lower ranks of values, that the sphere of the political embraces relatively high values, that persons and peoples are not only different but of different value and are themselves ranked according to the rank of the values, that not only God, but humans too are in a position to recognize the different values of persons and peoples, and that in our social and political organizations we have to «mirror» the ranking of the different persons and peoples, then it follows that we have to abandon arithmetical justice in the realm of the political. Scheler makes all the above-mentioned assumptions. Thus, it is only logical that he abandons arithmetical justice in politics. Probably the above quoted note immediately refers to the topic, much debated at the time, of the rights of the churches in the educational system. However, the statement is a general statement. In 1919, that is, during and after the establishment of the Weimar Republic, Scheler fervently attacked parliamentary democracy, as I will show in the following section.

D. Scheler on the Genesis and Future of Capitalism

A history of the «historical variability and differences in moral value-estimation among different peoples and races {volks- und rassenmäb ige Verschiedenheit } » (FEe 295; FE 300) in the spirit of Scheler's project does not pri-

marily investigate the different notions of, say, «love and justice» at different times in different peoples and races. Rather, the crucial dimension for Scheler' s project are changes taking place in peoples' and races' empirical acts of preferring in regard to the ranking of the values themselves. Thus, a history of ethics will investigate «the great typical forms of ethos itself i.e., the experiential structure of values and their immanent rules of preferring, which lie behind both the morality and the ethics of a people (primarily those of the large racial groups) . . . {it will investigate} the rules by which such values themselves were preferred or placed after» (FEe 302; FE 306). Such a history does not succumb to relativism. It is just the opposite. According to Scheler, the assumption of the realm of values existing independently of human beings combined with the assumption of individuals, peoples, and races of different values, who realize these values down here on earth, is the only theory that can avoid relativism. Scheler compares the moral history of the different peoples and races to a huge canvas. All other theories can see in it only a «palette daubed with paint.» His theory, however, enables one to look at it «from a correct distance and with proper understanding» such that one sees «the interconnection of sense of a grandiose painting, or at least of the fragments of one. And in this painting, one =will be able to see mankind, mixed as it is { so bunt gegliedert sie (= die Menschheit) ist}, beginning to take possession, through love, feeling, and action, of a realm of objective values and their objective order, a realm that is independent of mankind as well as of its own manifestations; and one will be able to see mankind draw this realm into its existence, as happened in the history of knowledge, e.g. the knowledge of the heavens» (FEe 297; FE 301). .31

This history is the «inner history of the ethos itself i.e., the central history in all history» (FEe 305; FE 309), which is to say—as he develops in the book Formalism mainly with regard to liberalism, and as he develops with regard to Marxism, social democracy, and liberalism as well in his other writings—that, with respect to its causes, it cannot be explained by the means offered by liberalism, Enlightenment, or Marxism, but only in terms of peoples, races, and their different blood. According to Scheler, a history of «the central history in all history» has to take into account «five strata,» of which I mention only the first and the second:

First, there are variations in feeling (i.e., "cognizing") values themselves, as well as in the structure of preferring values and loving and hating . Let us take the liberty of calling these variations as a whole variations in the "ethos. "

Second, there are variations which occur in the sphere of judgment and the sphere of rules of the assessment of values and value-ranks given in these functions and acts. These are variations in "ethics" (in the broadest sense of the term). (FEe 299; FE 303)

(The variations in the first stratum make up «the great typical forms of ethos itself » mentioned in a passage quoted close to the beginning of this section;

they «lie behind both the morality and the ethics of the world of the peoples,» that is, they determine, most of the time unconsciously, the contents occurring in the strata 2 through 5, though it might happen that conscious assumptions on the level of stratum 2 are not in accordance with the preferences on the level of stratum I; a discrepancy between stratum I and stratum 2 that will become crucial in his theory of disavowing capitalism, or capitalistic mentality.) There is a hierarchy of values, which are preferred and ranked by human beings in their acts of realizing them down here on earth. Thus, according to an authoritarian and belligerent Christian, Platonist, and foe of modernity like Scheler, there are two basic possibilities with regard to changes in the ethos. A new ethos, or a new state of the same ethos, either provides an empirical image of the ranking in the realm of values itself that is more proper than the ethos it supersedes, or it provides a worse image. The first can happen either as an adjustment of existing preferences or as the discovery of values ranked higher than the ones preferred so far. A discovery of higher values «occurs in the movement of love ,» and «it is to the moral-religious genius that the realm of values opens up,» Jesus' Sermon on the Mount being the most grandiose example (FEe 305; FE 309). If the resulting image is worse than the former, the ethos is one of «deceptions , » «falsifications , » and «overthrows »:

There are also in history all those forms of value-deceptions {Täuschungen } and deceptions in preferring, as well as falsifications {Fälschungen } and overthrows {Umstürze } which are founded on such deceptions and which pertain to {durch sie begründeter Fälschungen und Umstürze von} earlier forms of ethical assessment and standards that had {already} conformed to the objective rank of values. I discovered one such deception in my study of ressentiment . (FEe 306; note that the German text is more clear and direct than the English translation might sound: value-deceptions in preferring cause acts in which we falsify—or even alter fraudulently—and overthrow earlier forms, etc.; FE 310)

Hitler's notion of history combines two motifs. On the one hand, there is Kampf as the basic phenomenon of life and as the way in which selection is at work. His notion of Kampf is the modem notion of progress cleansed of any implications connected with the modem notion of reason. On the other hand, there are the axioms concerning race. There is a pure race that is the highest race, the Aryan race. In addition, there are other races, less high or noble. At the bottom is the Jewish race. According to Aristotelianism and most medieval philosophers, under normal circumstances each cause produces something similar to itself, that is, no cause can produce something ontologically «higher» than itself. Similarly in Hitler, the pure race reproduces itself as a pure race. Each of the lower races, left to itself—just as every other cause—just reproduces itself. That is to say, it is incapable of producing by itself something higher than itself, or it is incapable of developing itself into

something higher. Thus, progress—or decadence—occurs through mixture, the mixture of races. The highest race loses its purity and its highest state by mixing, or being mixed, with lower races. The lower race gains a higher place, not by reproducing itself, but by mixing with a higher race. In this way, it «partakes in» the higher qualities contained in the higher race, and, at the same time, it drags down the higher race, as now the higher race contains in itself elements of the lower one. In this way, the hierarchy of beings and the axioms concerning causality in medieval thinking are made to serve a modem notion of progress gone astray, and the modern notion of progress deprived of reason is put in the service of medieval thinking; together this amounts to a materialistic Platonism with a perverted idea of the good. The Jews are demonized prime matter. They strive for participation, drag down what they participate in, and at the same time remain in all their activities unaffected by their participation. It is part of the perfidy of the Jews that they don't mix with other races. They don't allow their women to marry non-Jews. However, the male Jews spoil the blood of the other races. Thus, they themselves remain pure while they make impure and drag down the other races (MKe 386ff., 661f. and frequently; MK 425ff., 751f.). The pure is more efficient and «stronger» than the impure. Since only the lowest race has remained pure, it will gain dominion over the entire world. Fortunately, however, God and his hand, fate, interfere and call upon some chosen Daseine to reverse the process and to «halt the chariot of doom {Wagen des Verhängnisses} at the eleventh hour» (MKe 373; MK 409); or, as is said not only by soldiers of almost any sort of rescue mission, «den Karren aus dem Dreck ziehen» (to pull the cart out of the muck, to clear up the mess). Fortunately, God does so at a time when the rescue mission is still possible. Though impure, the Germans are still such that six years of gym will enable them to conquer Russia. Also, there are pure remnants of the pure race, and one can spot them and stop the Jews from spoiling the German blood. It is the combination of these two elements—a certain version of the modern notion of progress, stripped of reason by being reread in terms of the struggle of races, and the Aristotelian and medieval notion of causality reread in terms of the struggle of races—that turns both elements of the mixture—the notion of progress as well as Aristotelianism—into utter violence.

The same logic found in Hitler is also at work in Scheler's writings. There are the highest values, and they were once realized in the proper way, namely in early Christianity up to the Middle Ages. Individuals and peoples full of resentment—due to their race or, in consequence of mixtures, due to infection—act like the Jews. They partake in the higher values by undermining the order of values. In this way, they spoil the higher values and drag them into the muck and do not transform themselves at all through their activities since they use, or instrumentalize, everything as a means in the service of

their low values and do not enjoy the higher values in order to bilden, to educate and transform themselves. I have already pointed to what is perhaps the most obvious and most stunning manifestation of the medieval aspect of Scheler's thinking, namely, his version of Descartes's proof of God's existence32 Also, I have already shown how the theoretical framework in Scheler's major work, Formalism in Ethics , is tailored to and possibly—in its entirety—hardly allows for anything else but a thinking in terms of dragging-down, of mixture, and the reversal, the de-cision; a thinking of an objective order, which has been properly realized, but thereafter gets spoiled and overthrown by, as he puts it, «English cant,» and which has to be rerealized by expelling the «English cant» out of one's blood «like a foreign poison.» For Scheler, as for Hitler, war is «the constructive force» (PPS 77) of history. As in Hitler, this is due to the expulsion of reason from the notion of development and progress. A distinctive achievement of the modern age was a concept of progress according to which, in contrast to the Aristotelian and medieval notion of causality, the end does not preexist its own beginning. In cosmology as well as in history and morality, this allowed for the assumption, culminating in Freud's notion of sublimation, that an entity, or drive, of «low» value, sexuality or selfishness, can transform itself into a state of «higher» value. Scheler points to the modern notion of development only to dismiss it as utterly wrong (RE 114ff.; UW 99ff. and passim) and to reduce the activity of modernity to acts of overthrowing and deception. According to Scheler, resentment is the result of two opposing factors. On the one hand, there is the incapacity to realize the higher values and the impulse of revenge, hate, and envy toward those who have successfully preferred them. On the other, there is the experience of powerlessness, of the lack of power to immediately take revenge and do away with the «higher» values and their bearers. This tension results in a repreferring of the values. The virtues of premodernity, so resentment says, are bad, one' s own mediocre values are good. Resentment also results in a suppression of one's feelings of revenge, etc. Resentful persons prove their resentfulness precisely because in their understanding of themselves they harbor no resentment (RE 68—72; UW 59—63, and prior). This allows for the logic of suspicion and «revealing.» A person's own statement about the issue and reasons for a judgment do not matter. According to Scheler,

it goes without saying that genuine moral value judgments are never based on ressentiment . This {Nietzsche's} criticism only applies to false judgments founded on value delusions and the corresponding ways of living and acting. Nietzsche is wrong in thinking that genuine morality springs from ressentiment . It rests on an eternal hierarchy of values , and its rules of preference are fully as objective and clearly "evident " as mathematical truth. There does exist an ordre du coeur and a logique du coeur (in Pascal's words) which the moral genius gradually uncovers in history, and it is eternal—only its apprehension

and acquisition is «historical.» Ressentiment helps to subvert this eternal order in man's consciousness, to falsify its recognition, and to deflect its actualization. (RE 72f.; UW 63)

In his essay on resentment, Scheler kills three birds with one stone. He refutes Nietzsche's thesis on Christianity; he refutes Marx concerning the causes of capitalism, and in the process he prepares the ground for his thesis that private property is an important feature of an authentic community. Concerning his criticism of Nietzsche, I just mention in passing two things. Though Scheler cannot but acknowledge that already in Luke (RE 99; UW 84) and also in one sentence in St. Paul (RE 71; UW 61)—not to mention Tertullian (RE 67; UW 57)—resentment takes over, the original idea of Christian love has its roots in a completely different site. Scheler sees the original Christian idea of love as a gesture of self-expression, a spontaneous overflow, which is by no means directed toward the other as its end. This allows for the dismissal of those Christians who allied themselves with the social democrats (RE 83—113; UW 70—93). Modernity is nothing but deception and overthrow. By implication, what preceded the modem era was good. Scheler explains this by means of a simplistic and violent theory of epochs that serves as a means to, and is constituted by the same gesture as, his philosophy of values and modernity, namely, the gesture of producing unity and purity by expelling «the other.» Though, as he stresses, ethics in antiquity differed from Christian ethics, and though Aristotle got it wrong with regard to the value of persons (FEe 524; FE 514), Aristotle can serve as an authority if he fits Scheler' s reactionary bill. Everyone knows that Aristotle maintained that some human beings by their nature are slaves and others by their nature are free. Everyone also knows that, making his case, Aristotle argued against those who had denied the thesis (Politics 1:3, 1253 b 14ff.). Thus, when it comes to this issue Scheler adds the qualifier «true» («echte») to «antiquity.» It is not the case that in antiquity some maintained a and others maintained non-a. Rather, the «true antiquity» maintained a (RE 128; UW 108), and who maintained non-a was simply not part of «true antiquity.» Thereafter, he explicates Aristotle's opinion on slavery in order to then even forget his gesture of exclusion by saying:

For the ancients {Der antike Mensch} it is axiomatic that equal rights are in any case unjust. Only opportunism can bring them about, and they always conceal a "just" inequality of rightful claims by the different groups. It is true that Christianity destroys this point of view, but only by making an even greater qualitative distinction between men, which penetrates much more deeply into the ontological depths of the person. (RE 128; UW 108)

The idea of equality of human beings (equal reason, equal claims for salvation, equal abilities, equal innate ideas) «was added to Christian ideology at an early date, but has not grown from its living roots» (RE 129; UW 109). Indeed,

this idea and the idea of a «reasonable sphere» below the sphere of grace gained full victory in Thomas Aquinas. However, these conceptualizations «represent the first incursion of the young bourgeois ideals into the ideological system of the Christian Church» (RE 188 n. 28; UW 109 n. 1) .33 This is the same gesture of de-cision as found in Hitler and Heidegger. Instead of prudently balancing demands, promises, and possibilities that have been there from the beginning or have arisen in history, Scheler purifies the mixture by reestablishing the supposed pure entity and by «downgrading» the «value» of the others or completely abandoning them. There are several different phenomena in the modem age. However, those that don't fit into his picture are left out, and all the others are reduced to resentment. Aspirations, intrinsically boundless, and desire for progress («Grenzenlosigkeit des Strebens,» «"Fortschrittsstreben"») as a perversion of means and ends (RE 56; UW 48), «modern universal love of man » (RE 114; «moderne allgemeine Menschenliebe » UW 96), «value of things self-earned and self-acquired» (RE 138; «Der Wert des Selbsterarbeiteten und -erworbenen,» UW 115) as opposed to what one has by nature, race, and tradition, «subjectivization of values» (RE 144; «Die Subjektivierung der Werte,» UW 122) as the denial of the objective realm of values and their hierarchy, «elevation of the value of utility above the value of life» (RE 149; «Erhebung des Nützlichkeitswertes über den Lebenswert,» UW 126) and related phenomena—they all go back to resentment. Before the modern era, in the vertical hierarchy of offices, every individual—«from the king down to the hangman and the prostitute»—was aware that his or her office was fate, that is, assigned to him or her by God and nature, and that to meet the requirements of it was his or her duty. Each individual compared himself or herself only to individuals of the same rank, and each individual was «"noble" in the sense that he considers himself irreplaceable» in his or her office (RE 56; UW 48). In the modem era, all this was overthrown and replaced with limitless motions forward, in which mere means become ends, and in which objective ranking among values in themselves as well as among the empirical human beings is denied. Indeed, as Scheler summarizes right at the end,

the spirit of modern civilization does not constitute "progress" (as Spencer thought), but a decline {Niedergang } in the evolution of mankind. It represents the rule of the weak over the strong, of the intelligent over the noble, the rule of mere quantity over quality. It is a phenomenon of decadence, as is proved by the fact that everywhere it implies a weakening of man's central, guiding forces as against the anarchy of his automatic impulses. The mere means are developed and the goals are forgotten. And that precisely is decadence! (RE 174; UW 147)

Since it is not necessary for my purpose, and since he does not give masons but just appeals to intuitive evidence when it comes to his thesis that all this

goes back to resentment, I won't go into the details, but just present a passage close to the end in which Scheler summarizes several of his themes with the concepts of community and society. In modern times, «the principle of summation» is at work, according to which the whole is nothing but the sum of its parts and is subordinate to them. In the realm of values, the whole is prior to its parts and allots each of them its place:

Thus the principle of summation is in contradiction with the principle of {Christian, not socialist} solidarity. Both in idea and feeling, it entails a fundamentally different relation between the individual and the community {Gemeinschaft}. Under the sway of the principle of {Christian} solidarity, everyone knows and feels that the community as a whole is inherent in him—he feels that his blood is the blood which circulates in the community, that his values are part of the values which permeate the community. Here all values are based on solidarity of feeling and willing. The individual is the community's organ and at the same time its representative, its honor is his honor. This material inherence in the community is now replaced by the notion that the community is only the product of the interaction between the individuals. The communal values are supposedly created by adding up the values invested in the individuals. The individual values circulate merely through conscious communication and instruction, or by conscious recognition and "agreement." To put it more simply: The "community" {"Gemeinschaft"} and its structure is replaced by "society" {"Gesellschaft"}, in which men are arbitrarily and artificially united by promise and contract.

In fact, "society" is not the inclusive concept, designating all the "communities" which are united by blood, tradition, and history. On the contrary, it is only the remnant , the rubbish {Abfall, literally "fall-away-from"} left by the inner decomposition of communities. Whenever the unity of communal life can no longer prevail, whenever it becomes unable to assimilate the individuals and develop them into its living organs, we get a "society"—a unity based on mere contractual agreement. When the "contract" and its validity ceases to exist, the result is the completely unorganized "mass" {"Masse"}, unified by nothing more than momentary sensory stimuli and mutual contagion. Modern morality is essentially a "societal morality " {"Gesellschaftsmoral "}, and most of its theories are built on this basic notion. . .. negation of all primary "co-responsibility. " . . . The state, language, and custom are inventions. . . .

Here again, the feelings and ideas of those elements the old "community" had cast aside (its pariahs) have determined the general image of man and his associations. Even marriage and family . . . were artificially more and more degraded to a matter of civil contract.

Wherever a "community" existed, we find that the fundamental forms of communal life were endowed with a value far superior to all individual interests, to all subjective opinions and intentions. . .. Thus marriage . . . is a "sacrament." Wherever there is a real community, the forms of life have an intrinsic value on which individual interests, joys, and sufferings have no bearing. This

valuation disappears with the rise of "society"! . . . Instead of respecting them, one feels free to change them arbitrarily .

Another consequence of this basic attitude is the predominance of the principle of majority in politics and the state. In the communities, the will of the whole is manifested and revealed in the will of those who are the "noblest" by birth and tradition. Now, however, the will of the majority supposedly constitutes the will of the state.

All this shows the victory of ressentiment in morality. . . . . Such a postulate can only be established by those who feel that they are worthless and who want to pull the others down to their level. Even if a man is nothing at all, he is still "one"! (RE 165—168; UW 139—142)

Resentment is a psychological habit. From the thirteenth century on, it has been at work continuously and in silence in order to eruptively burst out in the French Revolution, «the greatest achievement of ressentiment in the modern era» (RE 196 n. 54; UW 145 n. 2). Due to their nature and social position, some groups, for instance women, are very prone to resentment (RE 60ff.; UW 51ff.), whereas «the soldier is least subject to ressentiment » (RE 65; UW 56). What was it that brought about resentment on a large scale such that resentment could topple the right order? It must have been a change of natures and cannot have been the usual suspect adduced by the Marxists; a change of natures that goes back to an infection. At the time, many German sociologists, philosophers, and intellectuals had already devoted a remarkable amount of intellectual energy to refuting Marx. In Der Bourgeois , Scheler sides with Sombart:

Sombart traces the "bourgeois spirit" ultimately to a bio-psychic type {biopsychischen Typus }, which can be explained only as a result of blood mixture {der nur auf Grund der Blutmischung verstanden werden kann}. It is precisely at this most dangerous place in his work—where it is most open for the attack of those who regard "true" and "demonstrable" as identical—that we must fundamentally agree with him. Those who—-being familiar with many basic types of humankind and having a firm and clear mental picture of them—have seen and felt the spiritual unity of this very type {i.e., the bourgeois type} in all of its manifestations will not let themselves be talked into buying the notion that this type is a product of the "milieu," of "education," of adaptation and habit. Still, even Sombart himself will admit that he hasn't given a strict "proof" of his thesis. (UW 356) .34

Such is Scheler's theory on the genesis of capitalism. Capitalism has emerged because the Jews infected the body of the people and spoiled its blood. Scheler's theory of the genesis of capitalism is mirrored in his theory of the future of capitalism. Some readers might be wondering how Scheler can argue against liberals as well as leftists and at the same time demand that Europe «expel out of its blood like a foreign poison Anglo-American capitalism and the Calvinist-puritanistic obliteration of Christianity» (PPS 153). It has already

become clear, however, that the emphasis is on «blood,» «Anglo-American,» and the «Calvinistic-puritanistic obliteration of Christianity,» and not on «capitalism.» Scheler distinguishes between «'capitalist' spirit» and «industrialism» («Industrialismus»). The latter has nothing to do with the former, and it is only from the former and not the latter, that we have to liberate our minds, souls, and hearts (PPS 194f.). If Marx is wrong and Sombart right, «capitalism» is not a matter of the property structures in production, but a matter of spirit or ethos, as Scheler already said in Formalism in Ethics . The values and also their realization here on earth are largely independent of goods and also of relations between individuals mediated by the possession of goods. In fact, once the bourgeois spirit is expelled from our blood, private property of the means of production itself is beneficial to and necessary for the community. In the essay on resentment, Scheler criticizes Locke, Smith, and Ricardo. In their theories, private property becomes a matter of functional expediency. Scheler, however, maintains, again without giving any reason: «But just as all moral activity takes place within the framework of moral existence {Seins }, all labor on objects presupposes their ownership {Eigentum}» (RE 140; UW 118; quite obviously, he is so preoccupied with private property that he does not even notice that the sentence as it stands might equally well serve the workers as a slogan to expropriate the owners of private property). In the manuscript, "Christlicher Sozialismus als Antikapitalismus" (Christian Socialism as Anti-Capitalism), written in 1919 (PPS 697), Scheler maintains that, as a matter of principle, the Christian notion of property forbids socialization of the means of production. Only if certain ends cannot be achieved by private property is socialization allowed. Especially the private property of the middle class has to be preserved (PPS 663ff.). As to the problem of the replacement of the bourgeois ethos with a communitarian ethos, he maintains that private property of the means of production does not exclude social ethos and production for actual needs. Psychologically and sociologically, the entrepreneurial spirit of initiative and free responsibility is independent of egoism and selfishness. It can have other motives such as honor, respect in the community, and «enjoyment of being capable» («Könnensfreude») (PPS 672ff.). One might also assume that, once the Gesinnungen are cleansed of «English cant,» the institution of private property provides individuals with the necessary means to display the different rankings of their values. In this way, private property follows from the aristocratic principle, which he constantly stresses, and which liberalism, in his view, has perverted:

Even the last remnants of a social hierarchy—as a meaningful selection of the best and an image of the aristocracy that pervades all living nature—are cast overboard, and society is atomized in order to free the forces required for doing better business. The "estate" {"Stand"}—a concept in which noble blood and tradition determine the unity of the group—is replaced by the mere "class"

{"Klasse"}, a group unified by property, certain external customs ruled by fashion, and "culture." (RE 159; UW 135)

Still, one has to expel the bourgeois ethos. Scheler's model of the genesis of capitalism out of a mixture of blood and infection and the general framework of his theory of history also determine his thoughts on how to expel it. Though the pure has been overthrown, something of it has remained. For «the core of Christian theory and practice remained free from those phenomena. . . Christian philosophy as well remained basically free from the "dualism" of soul and body» (RE 135; UW 114). Also at the bottom of the hierarchy nothing essential has changed. In all its activities, resentment has not gebildet and transformed itself, and by definition it cannot do so. Rather, it has remained what it was from the beginning. Scheler acknowledges that things have become more complicated than at the time of the emergence of capitalism (RE 172; UW 145). He also insists that one has to distinguish between genetic causes and causes related to the maintenance of the already existing entity (UW 347). However, the former thought is not developed at all, and the latter is adduced only because it fits into Scheler's refutation of Marx. At the beginning of "Die Zukunft des Kapitalismus" (The future of capitalism), written in February 1914 (UW 385), Scheler quotes in Latin a further axiom of medieval thinking on causality that was used especially in the theory of creation and motion and was overthrown by modern physics. By doing so he indicates that, not only concerning the genesis but also the future of capitalism, he adheres to the same reductionism he has practiced with regard to the genesis of capitalism. It is not a matter of prudently working on individual aspects of capitalism in order to somehow overcome its shortcomings. Rather, one has to focus on the one and only cause. This approach allows him to exclude leftist, liberal, as well as conventional conservative politics, and to develop a right-wing position that, in its spirit, is more strongly antileftist and antiliberal than other parties on the Right. In fact, it provides the rationale for a militant anti-Semitism. Since the passage also shows a certain resolute antibourgeois tone typical of antibourgeois bourgeois intellectuals like Scheler (though other passages do so much better), I will quote the entire beginning of the essay:

Capitalism is, in the first place, not an economic system of distribution of property, but rather an entire system of life and culture . This system originated from the objectives and value-preferences of a certain biopsychic type of man , namely, the bourgeois, and it is sustained by the tradition of these preferences. If this assumption is right, which we share with Sombart, then we can—according to the axiom: cessante causa cessat effectus {If the cause disappears, the effect will also disappear}, and to the equally valid one that a change (decrease) of the effect can be expected only from a change (decrease) of the cause—hope for a decline of capitalism only if, and to the extent that, precisely this type of man loses his power, either because he carries the seeds of his extinction in his

own nature and its immanent developmental tendencies or because his ethos at least will lose its power to the ethos of a different type of man. (UW 382)

It is already this «result of the research into the causes of the genesis of capitalism» that excludes the expectation of capitalism's disappearance «from any change, of any kind, of the existing order of property, production, and distribution of the economic goods (as all the socialist parties demand and hope for)» (UW 382). Proletarians and their parties as well as liberals have been deprived of reason by Scheler. Therefore, they cannot bilden, educate, refine, themselves. Thus, they remain selfish. In consequence, the disappearance of capitalism is not to be expected «by a mere increase in number of the proletariat as an economic class and by a corresponding increase of its political power and rights» (UW 382f.).

For the same reason, not even a «lowering» of the capitalist ethos can be expected from social welfare run by the state (UW 383f.). If, by reduction, the proletarians as well as the liberal entrepreneurs are just selfish, one cannot hope for an overthrow of capitalism by allying oneself with them. All that is left is that one might hope for precapitalist residues among the bourgeoisie. Scheler has formulated the ontological presupposition of this in Formalism in Ethics :

Principles of value-judgment in an age, in the sense of a dominant or acknowledged "ethics, " {assumptions on the level of stratum 2} can rest on such deceptions {in stratum I}; and they can be overtaken {nachgeredet} and judged accordingly {nachgeurteilt} by those whose ethos {that is, stratum I } did not fall victim to such deceptions. (FEe 306; FE 310)

The conservatives are «the only groups whose bio-psychic type and historical traditional values can still be expected to put up a resolute fight against capitalism» (UW 385). However, they too have fallen prey to the capitalist ethos (UW 384f.) .35 At this point, Scheler steps out of the realm of ordinary conservatism, as it were, and opens up the space for an anti-Semitic politics of de-cision and expulsion. He develops the latter along two lines. First, Sombart is praised for having pointed to the «only possible final solution {die einzig mögliche endgültige Lösung} » of the question, namely, the «problem of population {Bevölkerungproblem }» (UW 387). However, in Scheler's view, Sombart didn't pose the problem correctly, for it is not just a matter of the quantity of the population, but rather its «qualitative» aspect (UW 387f.). The proletarians and conservatives don't present the active core of the bourgeois ethos, though they have been so thoroughly infected by it that their politics remain completely in its domain. At the core of the bourgeois ethos, in its active bearers, Scheler discovers its decline. For, it is

an inner law of the bourgeois type itself that, to the degree of their presence, precisely those properties that enable him to succeed as entrepreneur, trader,

etc., in the capitalist order, carry along as their consequence his diminished procreation and, by this, a diminution of the transmission of those characterological hereditary values that make up the aptitude for the capitalist spirit. . .. In consequence of precisely this attitude of calculating {Rechenhaftigkeit } follow at the same time economic prosperity and the diminished will for procreation, that is, the decrease of numbers of children of the calculating elements. According to what was said previously, beyond any doubt the aptitude to this attitude of calculating itself is a hereditary value and is bound to a vital type of lower value. (UW 388)

If, according to what was said previously, the «good old world» was free of capitalism, and if capitalism came about as the result of a mixture of blood, the German liberal entrepreneurs are not the ultimate cause. Rather, their hereditary values themselves are the result of the mixture of blood, which brought about capitalism, and which was initiated by someone else, who smuggled into them the bad genes. The ultimate cause are the Jews, and they should, and will, die out. One can hardly avoid getting the impression that this latter thought silently underlies Scheler's thinking, or that those interested in such a way of reasoning might assume it to be the underlying thought, when Scheler adds to the passage just mentioned: «There is an index, widely visible, of the slow dying out of the bourgeois type, namely, the fact of the dying out of the German Jew , as established recently by F. A. Teilhaber, in proportion to their gaining leading positions in capitalism and, at the same time, stepping out of the mysterious protective sphere of the Jewish tradition of family» (UW 389). As also in other passages, here the «type» is clearly grounded in what one calls «race,» and the view of the Jews is that they should die out. In the next sentence, Scheler adds that they will be the first to die out, and he reminds his readers of Zionism:

It is with regard to this Jewish type—today, with the inner right of the worthiness of being preserved of this great, gifted people the courageous and noble Zionism brusquely confronts it {= this Jewish type} with a different type and presses him deeply down into his honor and his conscience; often bloody and yet justly—that in time first and on a small scale the tragique destiny {das tragische Geschick } executes itself, which will execute itself with the bourgeois type in general; namely, that in the midst of the increasing gaining of capitalist power it {= the bourgeois type } will perish with all of its hereditary faculties, and it will fall prey to the increasing elimination {Ausschaltung} from history. (UW 389)

Certainly, by maintaining that war is «the constructive force» (PPS 77) of history, Scheler is virtually disempowering other elements in his theory, which might prevent those interested in such a way of thinking from speeding up «the increasing elimination» of the Jews «from history» by supporting Zionism or, if the Jews don't want to leave voluntarily, by throwing them out of

Germany. The second line, complementary to the first, relates to «one of the most important tendencies governing the entire world-historical development of this system of culture» (UW 385), and it pertains also to the political aspect of the bourgeois ethos, namely democracy—or, as he puts it, «"democratistic" value-preferences ("demokratistischen " Wertschätzungen )» (UW 385). According to him, democracy is no longer the preference of the majority. Rather, it has become the preference of the ruling minority. This follows from his theories in Formalism in Ethics and the essay on resentment. For, if democracy were still the preference of the majority, one could not speak of democracy as «a slave insurrection.» However, by Scheler's definition democracy is a slave insurrection. Thus, democracy must be the preference of a minority, which somehow for some time managed to give the semblance of representing the majority:

If these democratistic morals had remained the morals of the ruled "large number" and would not have become precisely the morals of the ruling "small number," one would never be entitled to talk of a slave insurrection in morals, that is, of an uprising of the inferior systems of value-preferences above the superior systems of value-preferences. For, always and ever it is the necessarily "small number" of the ruling individuals that determines which systems of value-preferences become the ruling ones. It is only the fact that the ethically and biologically inferior systems of value-preferences become the ones of the ruling minority that renders "revolution" something like a constant feature in the course of the modern development of states. (UW 387)

Only in a state of affairs where by means of democratism the vital type of inferior value has taken over, as in the modern era, does there exist a right of revolution (UW 387). Thus, one must not walk into the trap of taking the actors' words at face value. Rather, one has to hear that they are actually saying precisely the opposite of what they explicitly proclaim, and what they actually say is precisely what follows from Scheler's theoretical construction. Doing so, one hears that the cry for a revolution calls for precisely the opposite of what it explicitly demands. For, actually it calls for a cancellation of the democratic values: «The deepest soul of these movements is not the cry for "freedom and equality," which just lies on the surface; rather, it is the search for a minority which is worthy of ruling {over the members of the movements and the entire Gemeinschaft}» (UW 386).

The various voices are not taken with all their ambiguities and contradictions. Rather, they are reduced to the prejudice of the philosopher. In the movements outside of the economic realm, Scheler sees in the German youth, as well as in the French youth, the emergence of the new that is precisely the reemergence of the vital type that was toppled by the modern era: «In {these movements} a new type of man raises its head—still somewhat diffident—that type that has been suppressed by the epoch of capitalism» (UW 390).

Scheler points to the phenomena of the Youth movement: one turns away from the socioeconomic opposition between «"poor and rich"» and focuses on the questions of «vitality , and psychic and physical health of the Volk and the race» (UW 391). There is a «new love of nature and sport» and other phenomena (UW 391). In the first place, however, there is the concern about «questions regarding the choice of one's partner. . . . Historically, one of the roots of capitalism was the indiscriminate mixing of the noble vital type with the base type, whether for reasons of utility or for the sheer thrill of it» (UW 392). This is the second aspect of possible discrepancies between preferences in stratum I and preferences in stratum 2. According to Scheler, the young people have already realized that they did not mean equality, freedom, and the social question when they talked about democracy, and they have already replaced the old liberal or social democratic judgments in stratum 2 with the ones that conform to their antibourgeois preferences in stratum I and that present properly the reemergence of the old vital type, pushed aside by capitalism and now reemerging in stratum 1.

Scheler dwells on this theme for the rest of the essay (UW 390-395) and links it to «the best» in the countries in Asia. Despite all the noise about the universalization of capitalism, they know that in its center, in Western Europe, the bourgeois ethos «is already in the process of slowly dying out. . . . The time is not far off when {the story of progress in science} is believed only by Australian niggers» (UW 394f.). (Scheler claims of the Youth movement that those changes permeate «all classes with their new spirit» [UW 391]. Certainly it is more accurate to say that the Youth movement was mostly, if not exclusively, a bourgeois phenomenon. However, for the structure of his reasoning this doesn't matter.) Scheler maintains that «each ethical and political orientation concerning the ought, which might speed up the process of the disappearance of the capitalist ethos, can have its meaning only within the frame of this process {= the dying out of the Jews and the active bearers of the bourgeois ethos}, which is necessary , and which is not a matter of our conscious will» (UW 390).

Each political relation to the individuals who are supposed to be the promoters of the bourgeois ethos has to be based on the supposed biological fact that they will die out. The individuals are addressed not with regard to their logos, but with regard to their biology, which makes them die out, and they are not considered as individuals but only in reductive terms of biology and race. Only in some passages does Scheler distinguish linguistically between the ethos and the individuals as bearers of an ethos, though even here the distinction is more implicit (if present at all, for he talks not about the proletarians, but about the proletariat «qua "proletariat"» [UW 383]). However, when the «old world,» the world of capitalism, is toppled by the «new world,» which is the reemergence of the world capitalism had toppled, proletarians

qua proletarians, liberals qua liberals, and conservatives qua conservatives have to disappear anyway. If one considers the entire course of Scheler's essay, one sees immediately that it is the same as in section 74 of Heidegger's Being and Time . Ordinary Daseine live in the mode of the «they»; they live their lives as proletarians, liberals, or conservatives. In the stifling atmosphere of the late Kaiserreich and in the busy noise of the Weimar Republic something else announces itself, and something new arises. Still, ordinary Dasein covers this up and sticks to the «they»-like mode of life. However, a situation arises, for instance, with the beginning of World War I, that definitely calls for a decision. Some evade the call of fate and remain in their «they»-like modes. They become inauthentic. Others see through the work of covering up and obey the call. They become authentic. They realize that they are called upon to leave behind the «they»-like mode of parliamentarism and democracy. They are called into the Kampf, in which they recognize the real agent and the real foe. They realize that they are called upon to rerealize Gemeinschaft, that is, to erwidern its call for help, and they realize that they can do so only by expelling that which has pushed aside Gemeinschaft; that is, they are called upon to make a Widerruf of Gesellschaft.

I have already pointed out that for Scheler to expel capitalism does not mean to expel private property. Rather, if properly put in the service of the Gemeinschaft, private property of the means of production is a vital feature of it. As is already clear, for Scheler parliamentarism and democracy are not a feature of Gemeinschaft. Rather, they have to be expelled. Already in his book Formalism , Scheler indicated this in several passages, some of which I have already mentioned. After the passage on deceptions, falsifications, and overthrows as quoted above, Scheler gives an example of the ramifications of his theory:

Norms that come from vital values alone undoubtedly require in principle {prinzipiell, here a shorthand for «in accordance with the relations between values in the hierarchy of values as they exist independently of human beings»} an aristocratic structure of society, i.e., a structure in which noble blood {das edle Blur} and character-values of heredity belonging to such noble blood possess political prerogatives. But norms coming from values of utility dictate an equalization of biological value-differences among groups. Values of utility taken by themselves at least tend toward political democracy. (FEe 306f., FE 310f.)

Here too, Scheler gives no argument for his thesis. After the war, Scheler takes up this idea, for instance, in the essay "Christliche Demokratie" (Christian democracy) of 1919. I have already quoted a major passage that shows that the logic of de-cision is also at work in this essay. Modem democracy is

the result of the denial of the objective realm of values and, thus, has to be replaced with a revitalized Christian democracy. Christian democracy means that pace their differences in race, etc., human beings are equal before God, but only insofar as they are all children of the same father and thus brothers in the same family of God. This equality does not exclude inequalities in the realm of values and down here on earth. God has offered each human being grace—«though in accordance with the individuality of the soul a different measure of grace to each» (PPS 680f.). The ruler and the ruled have to conceive of their roles as a service to God (PPS 681). The paradigm of Christian democracy is the Catholic Church as the proper realization of the hierarchy of values. Power runs from above downward, not the other way around. It is democratic insofar as no one is excluded from being considered worthy of entering the ladder and moving upward (PPS 681ff.). Modern democracy has perverted the order of values. It regards freedom rather than the realization of the eternal order to be the end of history. It regards all forms in which human beings live together as produced by themselves and, thus, human beings can also dissolve them. This too runs counter to the eternal order. In modern democracy, the order of values is freedom, equality, and brotherliness. In Christian democracy, it is different. First comes truth, second goodness, and third brotherliness. Only then follow freedom and equality. Freedom goes before equality because of the notion of justice as already mentioned (PPS 683). This is in line with Scheler's interpretation of autonomy in Formalism in Ethics , one crucial aspect of which is the following:

But morally valuable obedience {Gehorsam} exists whenever, despite the lack of insight into the moral value of a commanded state of affairs which characterizes obedience as obedience, the insight into the moral goodness of willing and willing persons (or their "office") is evidentially given, the goodness becoming manifest in the making of the commandments or (in concreto ) in the ordering of the orders. In this case there is autonomous and immediate insight into the moral value of commanding, heteronomous and mediate insight into the value of the commanded value-complex, and at the same time complete autonomy of willing in rendering obedience. (FEe 500; FE 491)

The paradigm of this concept of autonomy is obedience to God (FEe 500; FE 491). Of the numerous passages in which Scheler praises the sense of sacrifice suppressed by Gesellschaft, I quote only one from the essay on resentment:

We do believe that life itself can be sacrificed for values higher than life, but this does not mean that all sacrifice runs counter to life and its advancement. . . . We have an urge to sacrifice before we ever know why, for what, and for whom! {Es drängt uns, zu opfern —ehe wir wissen, warum und wofür und für wen!} (RE 89; UW 75f.)36

This was written shortly before World War I. Scheler had hoped that World War I was the rerealization of the Gemeinschaft, which had been toppled by modern society and parliamentarism. However, World War I turned out to be disillusioning.37 In addition, it was lost, and consequently a full-blown modern democratic constitution took over. In February of 1919, the National Assembly released a provisional constitution and elected as president the Social Democrat Friedrich Ebert. In July 1919, the Weimar Republic was inaugurated with a Social Democratic president and the Social Democrats as the strongest party. In the speech, "Christlicher Sozialismus als Antikapitalismus" (Christian socialism as anticapitalism) in April 1919 (PPS 697f.), Scheler summarizes his criticism of Marx and his own theory on capitalism and history (PPS 624f.) and elaborates on the issue in eight points. At the end of the third, he formulates the opposition between Hegel, Marx, and the social democrats on the one hand and himself on the other, again employing metaphors identical to those Hitler used: «Not progress, but development and falling-down-and-away-from and re-naissance» (PPS 628; «Nicht Fortschritt, sondern Entwicklung und Dekadenz und Wiedergeburt»). «Progress» was the catchword of liberals as well as—according to Scheler—of Hegel, Marx, and social democracy. The progressive development of Gesellschaft would realize freedom, for liberals within a liberal, for social democrats within a socialist, and for Marxists within a communist society. For Scheler, this project of liberals and leftists is a falling-down-and-away-from, a de-cadence, which must be countered by a renaissance of the proper order of the human heart, which has to overthrow the capitalism that has toppled it. The «lower» entities are devoid of reason, and too thoroughly infected by «English cant.» They themselves cannot achieve «higher» values. Thus, we are in need of, in Scheler's terms, a new «moral-religious genius.» It is a very moving as well as very frightening passage:

All history of religion and church has its main phases—its soul—in new religious men: Benedict, St. Bernard, St. Francis, Ignatius, Luther, Calvin, etc. History of religion is the soul of history. The soul of history of religion in turn is the history of the souls of the saints. . . . We can only wait and hope, prepare the way and believe that God is gracious and will one day send us such a soul. Again, here one can "do" {"machen"} nothing; very unpleasant for the new-German belief in deed and power, but unfortunately unchangeable. However, as a matter of fact, we see that at the beginning was not the deed, as Kantians and Fichtians believe, but rather the Logos and love; however, not the impersonal Logos, as Hegel believed, but rather the person capable of spirit and love, namely, the man, whom one believes—without reasons; believing first and foremost in his being and the specific nearness of this being to God; the man, who—as we Christians believe—would know to reproduce {reproduzieren} the Savior {Heiland} anew; however, not externally copying him, but rather from within; from the depths of his divine mind and character. We know one thing:

he would have to combine, like no other, and concentrate within himself the entire uncurable illness and sin of this time—just as, on the cross, the Savior "was completely sin." Thus, we definitely will not find him (1.) among the healthy ones, (2.) among politicians, (3.) among the correct bourgeois individuals. In all his utmost concentration of sin in his heart, he must, however, at the same time carry in his heart an equally strong will for salvation {zum Heile} and for recovery—not only for himself, but for all—in the extreme exertion of co-responsibility—such that he only just—I say only just—looked beyond sin; the one who would objectify sin as sin and, by this, would become its free lord and master. Everything else he might be is only his concern, not ours. How could we be in a position to prescribe how he is supposed to be? How could we do so as, indeed, we hope to experience from him what we have to be and do? For the time being, as we have not the slightest idea of such a thing, we Christians believe only one thing, namely, that he would be a Christ {ein Christ} according to the broad and noble definition our faith gives to this word. (PPS 645f.)

E. Heidegger's Being and Time , Section 74

After the last passage quoted, Scheler goes on to say that in order for us to recognize the new savior's arrival when he comes, we must hear the «great preach of recent history with the inner ears of our faith and our love»; we must hear not only the words «but rather the call of God to turn back {diesen Umkehrruf Gottes} in the things, in history itself. Everyone has to try to turn himself, every human being, every family, every group. It is only in a total loyalty {Gesamttreue} that this evil gaze onto the world, which has led to the dominion of mammon, can melt» (PPS 646).

In the context of a concept of history as development, falling-down-and-away-from, and renaissance, one can take all the metaphors literally. People move along with the development of society. Many believe that it will lead upward toward the sun, to a liberal society or to socialism. However, for right-wingers the road leads away from the sun, down into a desert of ice. As in Scheler's formulation of 1915—we have to expel Anglo-American capitalism «from {our} blood like a foreign poison» (PPS 153)—and as in Heidegger's sentence on Widerruf (BT 438; SZ 386), society must be canceled. The political structure of society will simply be expelled when the new Christ comes. As for the economic structure of society, leftists would say of Scheler's proposal that that structure remains unchanged since Scheler does not want the institution of private property to be sublated. For, according to Scheler, capitalism is not a matter of private property. Thus, the expulsion concerns the capitalist Gesinnung or mentality that has to be replaced with a communitarian Gesinnung. «Everyone» (PPS 646) has to be prepared so he does not miss this event. Everyone can prepare himself by listening to the «call of God to turn back» in the things, and in history itself, a call the liberals and

leftists don't want to hear. Umkehren is «to turn back.» I move forward on the road, and then I kehre um, that is, I turn around and move back into the direction I came from. For a Christian, it is at the same time a move upward, toward God. Listening to the call, we realize that we are moving down into a desert of ice, that the promised land is where we came from, what we have fallen away from, and that we have to make an «authentic repetition of a possibility of existence that has been» (BT 437; SZ 385). Since we are already in the icy desert, the repetition is not a simple one but rather an Erwiderung that, as such, is a Widerruf of society (BT 438; SZ 386). In the section on conscience, Heidegger writes:

In calling forth to something, the "whence" of the calling {das Woher des Rufens} is the "whither" to which we are called back {das Wohin des Zurückrufens}. When the call gives us a potentiality-for-Being to understand, it does not give us one which is ideal and universal; it discloses it as that which has been currently individualized and which belongs to that particular Dasein. We have not fully determined the character of the call as disclosure until we understand it as one which calls us back in calling us forth {als vorrufender Rückruf}. (BT 325f.; SZ 280)

We are engaged in some project and move forward on the timeline toward the future. In our project, we happily enjoy, or at least have given in, «to be subsumed under the idea of a business procedure that can be regulated» (BT 340; «Idee eines regelbaren Geschäftsganges,» SZ 294; one of Heidegger's terms for Gesellschaft). The call doesn't stop our forward movement on the timeline, for it does not physically kill us. It does call us back, however, from the project we are engaged in. Calling us back, it calls us «vor auf das Schuldigsein » (SZ 291; «forth to Being- guilty,» BT 337), and by this it opens up «the very possibility of taking action » (BT 340; «die Möglichkeit zu handeln ,» ST 294) for us. Heidegger need not add «authentically.» His emphasis, the entire sentence, and the entire paragraph make sufficiently clear that he is talking about Daseine who, as he says in the last sentence of the paragraph, «hear it authentically » (BT 341; «im eigentlich hörenden Anrufverstehen,» SZ 294). As Scheler's metaphors, Heidegger's can be taken quite literally. The call calls us forth, that is, calls upon us to step out of the crowd that plods forward on the road called downward plunge. Understanding the call, authentic Daseine realize that it calls them back to the site of the call itself, from where the call calls. As one can see already in these passages, Heidegger's notion of the call of conscience is directed against an interpretation of conscience in terms of universal reason. It is also directed against the concept of just exchange, which in the modern era is closely related to that of reason. In fact, what Heidegger criticizes as inauthentic interpretation of conscience, and what he calls upon us to leave behind, is Gesellschaft and a thinking in terms of Gesellschaft. The other aspect of Gesellschaft, the public

sphere, Berlin, Weimar, and the mass media, Heidegger criticizes in the section B entitled "The Everyday Being of the 'There', and the Falling {Ver-fallen} of Dasein," as «idle talk,» «curiosity,» «ambiguity» (BT 210ff.; SZ 166ff.). In society, we are in the «downward plunge » and «turbulence » (BT 223; «Absturz » and «Wirbel ,» ST 178). We have fallen into Gesellschaft out of the world of the craftsmen, the world of the

, where we encounter beings as «equipment» (BT 96; SZ 68). In some ways, Heidegger's Being and Time has the same structure as all the literature on Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft. We begin in Gemeinschaft and somehow we end up in Gesellschaft. In Gesellschaft, we are lonely, either not caring about others or even antagonistic to them: «Dasein maintains itself proximally and for the most part in the deficient modes of solicitude. Being for, against, or without one another, passing one another by, not "mattering" to one another—these are possible ways of solicitude. And it is precisely these last-named deficient and Indifferent modes that characterize everyday, average Being-with-one-another» (BT 158; SZ 121). However, as was already mentioned,38 the downward plunge is not yet over. For, somehow, the deficient mode of solicitude turns into a positive mode of solicitude, namely, socialism or social democracy as the «truth» of Gesellschaft. In it, the subjects lose the kind of fake freedom and autonomy they enjoy in the liberal Gesellschaft. «The Other» becomes the object of social welfare work, in which «the Other can become one who is dominated and dependent, even if this domination is a tacit one and remains hidden from him» (BT 158; SZ 122). It is at this point, under the threat of socialism, that it becomes possible to turn around the downward plunge. For, there is another positive mode of solicitude, one Heidegger only hints at darkly after his description of Gesellschaft:

A Being-with-one-another which arises [entspringt] from one's doing the same thing as someone else, not only keeps for the most part within the outer limits, but enters the mode of distance and reserve. The Being-with-one-another of those who are hired for the same affair often thrives only on mistrust. On the other hand, when they devote themselves to the same affair in common, their doing so is determined by the manner in which their Dasein, each in its own way, has been taken hold of. They thus become authentically bound together, and this makes possible the right kind of objectivity [die rechte Sachlichkeit], which frees the other in his freedom for himself. (BT 159; SZ 122)39

Though I would disagree, one might say that in the section on conscience Heidegger still leaves open whether the step out of Gesellschaft leads to the political Right or the political Left.40 Even if, however, the section on historicality stood alone and were not preceded by the sections on falling and on conscience and solicitude, one sees easily that Heidegger' s concept of historicality is identical to Hitler's and Scheler's ideas of history and, thus, politically on the Right. Before I summarize Heidegger's notion and present some

concluding remarks, I would like to address the two general problems of the political Right I mentioned in chapters 1 and 2.

As is already clear from my discussion of Hitler's and Scheler's works, one problem of the political Right was which of the different pasts one had to repeat. Should people just go back to the Kaiserreich and rerealize it? Or, via the Renaissance in Italy—the «country where the lemons grow,» as Goethe had said—could it turn out that the Germans too had the great personalities whom Nietzsche admired so much? Should the world of the knights with their Minnesang, minnesong be repeated? Maybe, however, what ought to be rerealized is the hierarchy supposedly developed by Thomas Aquinas, who had been declared the official theologian of the Roman Catholic Church as recently as 1879. Or perhaps one needs to go back even farther and rerealize the German people of early history when they were still living in the dark forests. Or are the Greeks to be included among the real Germans and Aryans, as Hitler also acknowledged?41 The other problem was whether the past to be rerealized should be rerealized the way it was lived out when it was present, or whether its rerealization should incorporate the major achievements of modern times, namely, private property of the means of production on a large scale and modern technology? From the viewpoint of Hitler, Scheler had given an answer that was doubly naive. First, Scheler wanted to rerealize the early Christian love community. Second, he wanted the rerealization of this very community he distinguished so sharply from Protestant ethics and even from Luke to incorporate modern technology. For Scheler maintained that the Germans should be prepared for an entire series of wars against England (PPS 121). However, he also has another reason for this. The basic principle of his philosophy is that «for value-personalism, all history {alle Gemeinschaft und Geschichte} has its goal in the being and activity of persons » (FEe 505; FE 496; read «all community and history»). Another sentence seems to be incompatible with this basic principle, however: «in the course of history the driving forces behind historical change were to shift more and more from persons to the masses» (FEe 505; FE 496). However, these sentences don't contradict each other, according to Scheler, but the second one even supports the basic principle (FEe 505; FE 496). This «singular nexus» allows for another principle:

All positive values that can be realized by extra personal and extras piritual powers ought to be so realized. Or, more briefly, everything that can be mechanized ought to be mechanized. Needless to say, this proposition does not coincide with the orientation of thinking in positivistic ethics, e.g., the ethics of H. Spencer, which sees in the progressive exclusion of love, sacrifice, conscience, duty {Liebe, Opfer, Gewissen, Pflichtzwang}—and finally the person and spirit in general—a growing "progress" in history. But this proposition does establish a clear boundary between all truly ethical personalism and idealism and their truly reactionary and "romantic" copies {Scheinformen}, which would

artificially maintain and fix the personal principle at the expense of a possible mechanism, e.g., love and sacrifice at the expense of a possible solidarity of interests, spiritual personal activity at the expense of a possible collective organization and mechanism. These copies do not serve to liberate the personal in men; on the contrary, they serve to maintain the servitude of the personal. Here we will not elaborate on the range of applicability of this principle but will only point out that it is valid for all forms of personal spirit, not only singular but also collective forms, for instance, for nations in relation to the international mechanism of civilization. Increasing mechanization in actualizing values that are at all mechanizable lifts the peculiarity and self-value of personal forms of spirit to ever purer heights; it does not destroy them, as both positivism and false personalism assume, though with opposing assessments. (FEe 506; FE 496f.)

Hitler has only contempt for those who promote «romantic copies.» He polemicizes against those who sport «flowing beards and primeval Teutonic gestures» (MKe 462; MK 517), and praises the Prussian state for having «adapted to the modern world and put into organized form» the «German army's instinct of self-preservation and self-defense» (MKe 647; MK 734). Also, «our» politics must not just repeat old ways. Adherence to the «alliance with the Hapsburg state cadaver» out of «sentimentality for the fantastic conception of the Nibelungen» has been «the min of Germany» (MKe 630; MK 712). In Heidegger's terms, such efforts mix up the third meaning of «world» («that 'wherein ' a factical Dasein as such can be said to 'live'») with the first meaning of «word» («the totality of those entities which can be present-at-hand within the world») (BT 93; SZ 64f.).42 After the past has been overthrown by Gesellschaft worldwide, or at least in Europe, one cannot just repeat the past in Germany the way it supposedly was at this or that time. The rerealization of the past world in the sense of «that 'wherein ' a factical Dasein as such can be said to 'live'» must abstract from its former realization on the level designated by the first meaning of «world.» Only then is the rerealization strong enough to incorporate modern technology as an achievement of, but by no means identical with, the Gesellschaft that has to be disavowed in order for the past Gemeinschaft to be rerealized. Hitler labels the «romantic copies» a «mechanical restoration of the past» and claims that «with the founding of the NSDAP, for the first time a movement had appeared whose goal did not, like that of the bourgeois parties, consist in a mechanical restoration {mechanischen Restauration} of the past, but in the effort to erect an organic folkish state in place of the present senseless state mechanism» (MKe 534; MK 598; see also MKe 649ff; MK 735ff. and passim).

These thoughts also guide the choice of the flag. One must avoid any allusion to a specific historical state, for this would promote the misunderstanding of reducing the Aryan race to just one, already more or less fallen, his-

torical state. It also would fill people's minds with the concrete modes of that past world, and thus prevent them from being modern and able to cope with the French and the Britons and to conquer Russia. For that reason, the flag of the National Socialists must not be the flag of the Kaiserreich or of some of the individual German states, whether present or past. On the other hand, the flag must contain the colors of the flag of the Kaiserreich, black, red, and white, as they are the German colors and thus are the proper protest against the colors of the flag of the Weimar Republic, black, red, and gold. The spirit of the past, in the sense of the third meaning of «world» in Heidegger, has to be cleansed of any of its former concrete realizations, for each of them would just prevent the rerealization of the past from incorporating the achievements of the modern era. Only if there is no reference to any concrete past, can the rerealization of the past incorporate modern technology and the necessary attitudes. Also, only then is the past sufficiently present in the present time, which has overthrown it, and is sufficiently omnipresent so that it becomes impossible to ridicule it by pointing to, for instance, the «flowing beards» of the old Germans or the mustaches of the officials of the Kaiserreich (MKe 492ff; MK 551ff.). In this way the swastika was chosen: «In red we see the social idea of the movement, in white the nationalistic idea, in the swastika the mission of the struggle for the victory of the Aryan man, and, by the same token, the victory of the idea of creative work, which as such has always been and always will be anti-Semitic» (MKe 497; MK 557).43

It has often been said that Division Two of Being and Time in general and the section on historicality in particular is not well argued and rather unclear. One can say so only if one isolates Heidegger's text from its historical context and fails to recognize, in Carl Schmitt's terms, its polemical situation; both of these moves are an invitation to, and already a part of, deconstructive interpretations such as Birmingham's. Rather, one should acknowledge that section 74 of Being and Time is a brilliant text and also very clear. In just five pages, Heidegger here concisely summarizes the common motif uniting the parties on the revolutionary political Right in their fight against romantic right-wingers, liberals, and leftists. In the mid-1920s, many Germans were no longer enthusiastic about war, but had «fallen» into the Gesellschaft of a democratic republic. It is here that the Daseine are called upon by the Volksgemeinschaft. They have to get out of Gesellschaft. They cannot do so by relating positively to the Other in the way social democrats transcend Gesellschaft. For the right-wingers know that this leads only deeper into Gesellschaft. In addition, any direct collective effort to get out of Gesellschaft would just be too proletarian and heteronomous. The decision must not result from a debate with social democrats, who finally convince people. Rather, it must be the autonomous and eigenste act of the bourgeois subject, alone with himself and with his authentic Dasein. Only then will people not fall prey to

the social democratic society, but will reestablish the true community. Heidegger cannot refer to models such as Augustine's conversion. As he himself would be the first to point out, not everyone on the Right considered himself a Christian and thus not everyone would appreciate this allusion to our Christian values and humanistic traditions. In addition, systematically such references to Christianity don't serve the purpose. Augustine, as well as most Christians, insisted that Christians leave earthly political matters as they are and explicitly forbade themselves to turn back and to widerrufen the respective societies in order to realize heaven here on earth. Furthermore, Augustine's weibisches Geschluchze, womanish sobbing, in the garden in Milan and also his talkativeness is anachronistic and does not allow for the «reticence» (BT 318; «Verschwiegenheit,» SZ 273) and the «hardness of the will»44 required for the struggle to widerrufen society. Each eigentlicher philosopher has called upon us to distance and detach ourselves from worldly matters, to cleanse our minds of the worldly forms, which shape us in our everyday life. In addition, one of the few motifs Hegel adhered to in the transition from the «young Hegel» to the «late Hegel» was that death—the threat of death, which the soldier takes upon himself—is an appropriate means to de-form oneself.45 Furthermore, having lost so much property in the war, in inflations and economic crises, people should realize that, indeed, death is the only property no one can take away from a given Dasein.46 It is not through some collectivity, but rather through what is our ownmost that the turn has to be brought about. Finally, World War I and the remembrance of it was a common cause of all right-wingers, whether they were fighting for the Kaiserreich or for the rerealization of some other community. At the same time, an allusion to World War I already hints at the reward we will finally get for our courageous act of giving up everything and facing what is our ownmost. Thus, Heidegger evokes the «Helden von Langemarck» as the telos of the step out of society: «Resoluteness gains its authenticity {Eigentlichkeit} as anticipatory resoluteness {vorlaufende Entschlossenheit}. In this, Dasein understands itself with regard to its potentiality-for-Being, and it does so in such a manner that it will go right under the eyes of Death in order thus to take over in its thrownness that entity which it is itself, and to take it over wholly» (BT 434; SZ 382).

World War I and the Weimar Republic were experienced by many, if not all, rightists as, in Hitler's terms, the «great turning point» (MKe 406; MK 450). In the preface to the third edition of Formalism in Ethics , Scheler labeled the «great turning point» the «kairos , i.e., the call of the hour of our human and historical being and life» (FEe xxxi; FE 23); the decisive moment in the course of a sickness, at which alone it is possible for the physician to interfere and to restore the body to its healthy state before it is definitely too late. I have discussed passages in Hitler and Scheler that testify to the peculiar

feeling that existed at the beginning of World War I, namely, that something new had raised its voice and was calling upon people to make a decision. Already prior to that, something strange, uncanny, had cast its shadow over people's ordinary way of living, and they have somehow felt that there was something in the air heralding something new. Rightists claimed that people should realize that there was something wrong with the way of life and assumptions they had taken over from their parents and fellow citizens and had been repeating in their ordinary way of Dasein according to the «they.» According to rightists, «we» somehow feel that behind the forms of ordinary Dasein's life, behind Gesellschaft, something else is emerging that is covered up by them. In Scheler's terms,47 «>we» become aware that under our ethos on stratum 2 a new ethos on stratum 1 is emerging, or has always already been there, and that both do not conform to each other; that underneath our explicit judgments and ways of life of our ordinary Dasein something else begins to raise its voice, our eigentliches ethos. The call of the new tells us that «we» have to cancel our ordinary Dasein and replace it with an ethos 2 that conforms to our eigentliches ethos. «We» should do so because it benefits not only ourselves but all of us to get rid of Gesellschaft, even though those who adhere to Gesellschaft claim the opposite and want us to assume not only that our ordinary Dasein is better than our eigentliches ethos but also that there is no eigentliches ethos behind our ordinary Dasein, and that the conflict between our ethos and our eigentliches ethos is reactionary propaganda. Our ethos has become antagonistic. Some ordinary Daseine want to cover up the new emergence of what-has-been-there. They become inauthentic. Authentic Daseine have to realize the new against the inauthentic Daseine. Heidegger encapsulates this in the paragraph on the work of ambiguity ending with the formula: «The authentic existientiell understanding is so far from extricating itself from the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us, that in each case it is in terms of {aus} this interpretation, against {gegen} it, and yet again for {für} it, that any possibility one has chosen is seized upon in one's resolution» (BT 435; SZ 383). Authentic Daseine take the eigentliches ethos «from {aus}» «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us,» because the eigentliche ethos is contained in the latter, though covered up by the ordinary Daseine. Authentic Daseine turn the eigentliches ethos «against» «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us,» because they cancel the latter, that is, Gesellschaft. Authentic Daseine do so «for» «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us,» because they bring ordinary Daseine back to their origin, that is, Gemeinschaft.48

Starting in our ethos 2, our ordinary Dasein, and obeying the call of our eigentliches ethos, «we» begin to see that our ordinary Dasein is a forgetting. We realize that our ordinary Dasein is a falling-down-and-away from a past

and that at the same time it has forgotten about the fall and even interprets it as progress. We also realize that our eigentliches ethos draws its identity and strength from the forgotten past. This is the paragraph in which Heidegger states: «If everything 'good' is a heritage, and the character of 'goodness' lies in making authentic existence possible, then the handing down of a heritage constitutes itself in resoluteness» (BT 435; SZ 383). Relating itself to the past, or being taken over by the past, authentic Dasein can step out of ordinary Dasein and the latter's vain possibilities, and can realize that it owes its eigentliches ethos and identity to the past, which was brought down. Thus, it gets snatched back from «the endless multiplicity of possibilities» in society into what it recognizes as «the simplicity of its fate » (BT 435; SZ 384). It recognizes its fate. It recognizes that its autonomy and its pride in what it believed to have acquired and achieved in society by itself are a vain pretension, and that it instead depends on powers and circumstances it has not produced and these determine its life, that is, they are its fate. Its fate is simple, because in contrast to the «endless multiplicity of possibilities» in society, Volk, being an organic entity, does not allow for all the detractions and all the Firlefanz, gewgaws, gimcrackery, of society, and because it calls the Dasein into a situation of a clear either-or and a clear distinction between the foe and the völkische. In this moment, the antagonism becomes an antagonism between all those who recognize their fate, obey the call, and submit to their fate, and those who don't want to do so. The latter don't submit to their fate and don't take it over. They miss the opportunity to become, in Hitler's terms, «master of their fate,» and, thus, they are tossed around and pushed into irrelevance like the liberals at the beginning of World War I. Thus, this part ends with the sentence: «Even one who is irresolute gets driven about by these—more so than one who has chosen; and yet he can 'have' no fate» (BT 436; SZ 384).49

Recognizing its fate, authentic Dasein understands that the past, to which it owes its eigentliches ethos and identity, is an entity that was pushed aside by Gesellschaft, and that the past allows for positive relations to the Other in contrast to the loneliness and instrumental relations to the Other in Gesellschaft, that is, in contrast to solicitude in its deficient mode as well as in the first of its positive modes. Regardless of the differences between them, all rightists have used as the term for the past and the real power in Gesellschaft and history the notion of Gemeinschaft. Thus, Heidegger writes: «But if fateful Dasein, as Being-in-the-world, exists essentially in Being-with-Others, its historizing is a co-historizing and is determinative for it as destiny (Geschick ). This is how we designate the historizing of the community, of {the} people» (BT 436; SZ 384).50 Heidegger need not develop the notion of Volksgemeinschaft. In the polemical and kairos situation of the twenties it is clear that it functions as polemical to Gesellschaft and reason as employed

by liberals and leftists as principles of history. One can give a description of Volk that contrasts it to Gesellschaft and reason, and one can even, as Scheler did, give an account of a realm of values and social units that contains the Volksgemeinschaft. However, one cannot «rationalize» a Volk. In fact, it is part of the rightist polemics against reason and understanding as the principles of «English cant,» Enlightenment, and subjectivity to point out that such entities like Volk cannot be understood by the means employed by subjectivistic thinking or by finite individuals who are part of the embracing entity Volk in its mysterious life. Furthermore, for the same reason Heidegger need not mention the name of the social unit to which Gemeinschaft is polemical, and which, as Gemeinschaft calls upon us to do, «we» have to overthrow, since it earlier ousted Gemeinschaft. For even those who have not read Scheler have learned about this polemical opposition somehow, perhaps from the books of Jünger or Hitler, or just from the atmosphere of the kairos. In addition, in the following sentence Heidegger himself elaborates on both concepts, Gesellschaft as well as Gemeinschaft, in a way that can be found in all books on the topic. According to Scheler, the «principle of summation» guides liberalism and all thinking in terms of Gesellschaft. Liberalism assumes that a social unit is a whole that is not more than the sum of its parts, that is, that the social units are constituted, or «put together» («zusammengesetzt»), by the autonomous subjects so that they can pursue their selfish interests. In reality, however, a Gemeinschaft has priority over the individuals. Again according to Scheler, along with the «principle of summation» goes the assumption that the autonomous subject makes his life by himself, relies only on what he achieves by himself, and does not allow any authority over and above reason to determine his life. In reality, however, it is Gemeinschaft that determines the life course of the individual. Heidegger formulates these two thoughts in the sentences immediately following the sentence on the Volksgemeinschaft:

Destiny is not something that puts itself together out of individual fates {setzt sich nicht aus einzelnen Schicksalen zusammen}, any more than Being-with-one-another can be conceived as the occurring together of several Subjects. Our fates have already been guided in advance, in our Being with one another in the same world and in our resoluteness for definite possibilities. (BT 436; SZ 384)51

In the kairos, right-wingers experience that the time of the ordinary way of Dasein—«English cant» in Scheler, «endless discussion» in Schmitt, «'business'» (BT 336; SZ 289), as the ordinary interpretation of conscience, or the era of «reckoning up claims and balancing them off» (BT 328; «im Sinne des ausgleichenden Verrechnens von Ansprüchen,» SZ 283; italics mine, J. F.),52 as Heidegger correctly summarizes a major principle of parliamentary democracy—is over. As for Scheler at the beginning of World War I,

and as for Hitler in the kairos of the Weimar Republic, fate, or destiny, itself has brought about a situation in which «we» have to replace liberalism with a communitarian ethos in order to rerealize Gemeinschaft, as in the same moment fate has called upon us to do. Up to that point, fate has been silent, either withdrawn or present, but covered up by the liberals' work of ambiguity. Now, it raises its voice to call upon us to expel liberalism and to rerealize Gemeinschaft. It comes to the fore and demands this realization in a resolute fight. Heidegger goes on: «Only in communicating and in struggling {im Kampf} does the power of destiny become free» (BT 436; SZ 384).53 Obeying the call of fate, «we» become the agents of fate, which in this way steps out of the background, where it has been covered up by the work of ambiguity, and enters the scene explicitly. The task allotted to us by fate, the repetition of the past, is not a simple repetition of the past. A simple repetition of some past is what ordinary Dasein does all the time by just taking over and repeating the assumptions and attitudes «which 'circulate' in the 'average' public way of interpreting Dasein today» (BT 435; BT 383). Also, a «romantic copy» of the past would be a simple repetition, because it does not take into account the changed circumstances in which the eigentliche past, that is, its spirit, or the past in the third sense of «word,» has to be repeated. Thus, Heidegger explains: «The repeating of that which is possible does not bring again [Wiederbringen] something that is 'past', nor does it bind the 'Present' back to that which has already been 'outstripped'. Arising, as it does, from a resolute projection of oneself, repetition does not let itself be persuaded of something by what is 'past', just in order that this, as something which was formerly actual, may recur» (BT 437f.; SZ 385f.).54 For authentic Dasein repeats the past in a situation in which the past has been overthrown, or is about to be overthrown, and authentic Dasein knows that it must not make a «romantic copy» of the past. Dasein listens to the call for help and defends, rescues, and rerealizes the past against what has already overthrown it, or is in the process of doing so. Thus, authentic Dasein does not repeat, but rather «erwidert the possibility of that existence which has-been-there» (BT 438; SZ 386). As it realizes in the kairos, in the moment of danger and decision, it can rerealize the past only if it makes a «disavowal » (BT 438; SZ 386) of what has overthrown Gemeinschaft; it disavows, cancels, Gesellschaft, the world in which it has lived as ordinary Dasein and in which inauthentic Daseine still live.55 As I have already mentioned, the «"today"» («Heute») in the sentence, «disavowal of that which in the "today", is working itself out as the 'past' {sich als "Vergangenheit" auswirkt}» (BT 438; SZ 386) is the present as seen by authentic Dasein.56 In the kairos, authentic Dasein realizes that life is a mixture that has to be purified, that what it has constantly repeated as ordinary Dasein is not the «real» life, and that it is called to enter the struggle for cleansing. In the kairos, authentic Dasein real-

izes that its ordinary way of existence, liberalism, which has developed since the thirteenth century, is a past, but not the real past. Thus, Heidegger puts «past» into quotation marks. The ordinary mode of Dasein, liberalism, goes back to a principle or is a world. Thus, authentic Dasein cancels not the entire present, but rather its principle or its world, that is, «that which in the "today", is working itself out as the 'past' {sich als "Vergangenheit" auswirkt}» (BT 438; SZ 386), in Schelerian terms, the bourgeois ethos, which has to be expelled out of Europe's blood like a foreign poison in order to make the rerealization of Gemeinschaft possible. Thus, «we» are entitled to take over into the rerealization of Gemeinschaft all we regard as indifferent toward Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft, or all we regard to be necessary for the rerealization, for instance, private property of the means of production and modern technology. The Erwiderung that is at the same time a disavowal calls us back from our march forward on the road of Gesellschaft and progress and affirms the primacy of the past—or, in Heideggerian terms, of what-has-been-there—pitted by rightist authors against the «denigration» and «falsification» of the past in Enlightenment, liberalism, and on the political Left. Thus, it is only this Erwiderung that «for the first time imparts to having-been {Gewesenheit } its peculiarly privileged position in the historical» (BT 438; SZ 386).57 Since only such a repetition will be successful in contrast to a «romantic copy,» at the end of section 75 Heidegger can summarize the result of the decision between inauthentic and authentic Daseine just by using the term «Wiederkehr» («recurrence») without any qualifications. Inauthentic Dasein, liberals and social democrats, live in a false past, the ethos of Gesellschaft, and by projecting it onto the past they misinterpret and neglect the «real» past. As in Scheler, authentic Dasein knows of this and keeps itself open for the advent of the «real» past. Even if Heidegger had not extensively used the vocabulary of falling throughout the book, his notion of history is identical with the one in Hitler and Scheler and with formulations in Scheler such as «Not progress, but development and falling-down-and-away-from and renaissance» (PPS 628):

When, however, one's existence is inauthentically historical, it is loaded down with the legacy of a 'past' which has become unrecognizable, and it seeks the modern. But when historicality is authentic, it understands history as the 'recurrence' {"Wiederkehr"} of the possible, and knows that a possibility will recur {wiederkehrt} only if existence is open {offen} for it fatefully, in a moment of vision, in resolute repetition {in der entschlossenen Wiederholung}. (BT 444; SZ 391f.)58

It has often been said that, working in his Hütte, the Denker and Gelehrte Heidegger was aloof from politics and didn't know what he was doing when he stumbled into Nazism. According to my interpretation, Heidegger's notion

of historicality is identical with the notions of history and politics as developed by the revolutionary rightists and as exemplified here in regard to Hitler's and Scheler's works. It is hard to imagine that this is coincidental. Heidegger's text is just too excellent a summary of the revolutionary rightist notion to be the result of a somnambulistic thinking whose author didn't know what the significance of his writings would be in the world outside his Hütte and outside his book.59 In addition, it is not fate—«fate» in the «truly German» sense as I have «repeated» it here by «disavowing» the misinterpretation of the notion in Heidegger under the spell of the spirit of the American self-made man—that drove Heidegger into Nazism. As Scheier observed, at the beginning of World War I the majority of German intellectuals were liberals opposed to the war (PPS 12), and in the twenties Scheier himself changed his politics dramatically and became a liberal after the end of classic liberalism or even a social democrat.60 The rightists had enough foes—liberals, social democrats, and Communists—among intellectuals. In addition, as the differences between Hitler and Scheler show, there were strong disagreements among the revolutionary rightists themselves in regard to the question of which community had to be repeated. In light of these disagreements, Heidegger's formula of «the community, of {the} people» (BT 436; SZ 384) is truly remarkable, as I will show in the remainder of this section.

Certainly, Heidegger knew Scheler's book Formalism in Ethics and, thus, Scheler's discussion of the four types of social units, that is, Masse (mass, herd), Lebensgemeinschaft (life-community), Gesellschaft (society), and Liebesgemeinschaft (love-community). When it comes to the different large-scale communities, Scheier—as many of the other authors on this topic—takes great pains to explain what he regards as the proper hierarchy. It is at this point that Heidegger builds a very specific option into his excellent summary of the revolutionary rightist notion of history and politics. As to the hierarchy among the various large-scale communities, Scheler uses four criteria. One is the ranking of the value each large-scale community is concerned with (FEe 541; FE 529 and passim). Another is the number of human beings it is concerned with. Furthermore, it matters whether a community is a «collective person » (FEe 543; FE 531; see also FEe 520ff.; FE 510ff. and passim) and the degree to which it comes more or less close to this. Finally, it is crucial whether a community acknowledges the individual as a person in his own right independent of his functional contribution to the Gemeinschaft, and the degree to which it comes close to this (FEe 524f.; FE 513f.). With respect to all criteria, the love-community and its earthly organization, the church, is unambiguously at the top of the hierarchy. It is with regard to the love-community and the church that Scheler reestablishes the universalism he denied to reason as developed by Enlightenment and «English cant.» He

also ascribes to the love-community another capacity he denied reason, namely, to realize its universal ends in a variety of different empirical churches, that is, to abstract from and at the same time acknowledge the differences and to realize its value within the various churches without negating their differences. The church is concerned with the highest value (FEe 554f.; FE 541f.). It cares not only for all living human beings, but also for all dead and future ones and for all finite individual persons (FEe 547f.; FE 535). It regards the individual not as a member of a family, tribe, or Volk, but rather as a «purely spiritual individual person » (FEe 547; FE 535); or, as already mentioned, the individual person as in Gesellschaft is preserved in the love-community. Scheler develops his understanding of the Last Judgment: «Suppose that we find ourselves in a world court. No one alone would be tried by its highest judge; all would have to answer to him in the unity of one act, and all taken together would have to listen to this judge in one act. He would not sentence anyone until he had heard, understood, and valued all others with this one. In each he would cosentence the whole no less than the whole in each» (FEe 535; FE 523). Postmodernss and deconstructionists will probably not acknowledge this court as the institutionalized site of, as it is said, the recognition of «the Other as Other,» and they might be right. The author of Formalism in Ethics definitely belongs to the revolutionary Right, and only those who lack any sense of the «spirit» and the letter of different philosophies mistake Scheler and «Schelerians» for Habermas's theory of communicative action. However, the mentality giving rise to the notion of the court in Scheler definitely enabled him to distance himself from the advocates of the Volksgemeinschaft.

It would take readers too far beyond the scope of this book to go into the details of Scheler's reasoning. At any rate, for him the order below the love-community is that «the state is, in ranks of values, above the people {Volk} but below the nation» (FEe 547; FE 534f.; the «nation» being the Kulturgemeinschaft, community of culture, which embraces several peoples, as for instance, western Europe forms a Kulturgemeinschaft). That is, the ranking is the following: at the top is the love-community; next is the community of culture followed by the state; at the bottom of the hierarchy is the Volksgemeinschaft. The «people» concerns the smallest number of individuals (and, thus, excludes the largest number of other individuals), and it is not concerned about the individual as a value in himself (FEe 546; FE 534). Since all the lower communities and society as well are in the service of the highest community, it follows from this reasoning that the church has a right of intervention in regard to the lower Gemeinschaften. The church does not positively interfere by prescribing specific norms. However, again Scheler ascribes to the church a universalistic function in regard to the community of culture (and—since the community of culture is higher than the community of the

people—in regard to the state and the community of the people), something he had denied reason: «First, there is the essentially negative task of immediately controlling all cultural activity and its works in order to see that the ethos of this activity and the guiding structure of the preferring of the values of the domain in question (style in the arts, the methodological structure of science) do not conflict with the conditions of a possible collective salvation and, if necessary, of issuing an authoritative declaration on the matter» (FEe 551; FE 539).

In the twenties, Scheler became a social democrat and liberal. At that point, as a social democrat, city-dweller, and notorious frequenter of bars and brothels, Max Scheler would definitely not have joined the National Socialists. However, the author of Formalism in Ethics and of the essay on resentment would probably also not have done so. Though, as I have shown, his theories in Formalism and related writings present a paternalistic and hierarchical view of the different nations and states that ascribes to the Germans as the proxy of the Liebesgemeinschaft and the Kulturgemeinschaft the task of an imperialistic and militaristic politics of dominion over the world, the internationalism of the Church (which he was to stress in his writings from 191 6 onward), the insistence on the individual person as a value in himself, and other elements in his theory, such as the emphasis on the «intimate person» (FEe 561ff.; FE 518ff.) and, so to speak, dialectical thoughts such as the one on mechanization and person would have served as a strong means of critique of a movement that places the Volksgemeinschaft at the top, instrumentalizes all the other communities as a means to pursue the interests of the Volk, and explicitly denies that individual persons have value independent of their functionalistic contribution to the politics of the Volksgemeinschaft. From the viewpoint of Scheler's theory, Hitler's preference for the Volksgemeinschaft looks like an overthrow in the realm of the large-scale communities similar to the overthrow of all communities by Gesellschaft. In fact, in the twenties, due to his Catholicism, Scheler identified the real foe, namely, the National Socialists, recognized that rightist politics gravitated toward them, and saw that they would become the strongest force on the Right. As a consequence, Scheler gave up any rightist politics of history as the rerealization of some overthrown community, reviewed his basic notions, and turned toward the center.

In contrast to Scheler, Heidegger joined the National Socialists, and he did so with great enthusiasm. In light of this, in the light of Scheler's theory of the large-scale communities, and also in light of Scheler's later abandonment of any rightist politics, Heidegger's formula of «of the community, of {the} people» (BT 436; SZ 384) is telling. I have mentioned Guignon's assumption that each authentic Dasein can choose the past that fits his respective utopian ideal. Regarding politics, this means for Guignon that Heidegger's

notion of historicality and politics is neutral and does not exclude any political options, whether liberalism, conservatism, social democracy, or communism (see chapter 4, section A). I have criticized his notion of the relation of authentic Dasein to the past. In addition, I have shown that Heidegger's notion of historicality is pro-revolutionary rightist politics and antiliberal and antileftist. One might say, within Heidegger's option for revolutionary rightist politics Guignon's notion emerges. For Heidegger gives a summary of the notion of history and politics of all the revolutionary rightists, and thus, he does not yet exclude any specific option. He does not yet exclude the friends of the Kaiser, the German Renaissance, or the Christian love-community, or the Vikings, provided that they don't want to rerealize a «romantic copy,» but rather present an updated version of the respective past they want to rerealize. In fact, Heidegger would not have excluded anyone of the revolutionary rightists if he had just written «of a community.» For «community» was the catchword among those on the Right, and this would have left open the possibility that this individual opts for the Kaiserreich, another for the love-community, etc. However, he adds «of the people» («of the community, of {the} people,» BT 436; «der Gemeinschaft, des Volkes,» SZ 384). This is a very conscious choice by which he also performs the second step in the debates of the rightists. By developing the common motive of all the revolutionary rightists, he establishes community as the «real» principle in history. In the second step, he adds his option in the debates, or struggles, among the rightists as to which community has the priority. From the viewpoint of Scheler's theory, this is a clear decision against Scheler's option and for the politics of the extreme right, the National Socialists, in the name of the Volksgemeinschaft. (One might add that by proceeding philosophically in the correct way—step by step, first the general notion and then its specification—he at the same time avoids the word Volksgemeinschaft itself, since this might have sounded too blunt in the ears of many of his conservative colleagues or students.) Again, Heidegger must have been aware of the significance of his choice. Even if he had not read any of the many writings of Scheler' s on politics, the political applications of Scheler' s Formalism are all too obvious and intended by Scheler, and even prior to the emergence of the National Socialist Party, in the preface of the second edition of Formalism in 1921, Scheler distinguished his theory not only from the Left, but also from developments on the Right (FEe xxiiif.; FE 15). One might say, the addition of the qualification «of the people» is voluntaristic in the sense that the text doesn't provide any argument allowing for this step. In some sense, this doesn't make things better. Why should one add an unwarranted specification, unless one has a strong interest in it? This interest then might inspire one to bridge the gap, and to concreticize theoretically the general option for rightist revolutionary politics such that it becomes an option for National Socialism. In fact,

however, in some sense he had no need to bridge the gap. His way of criticizing subjectivity and universality of reason placed his thinking on the right side of the political spectrum. It is not only the absence in Being and Time of anything analogous to Scheler's theory of values and social units that removed the possible resistance of, so to speak, regular and extreme conservatives on the Right against National Socialism. Rather, Heidegger explicitly criticizes the theoretical framework that enabled someone like Scheler to keep his distance to National Socialism and finally turn against any rightist politics (e.g., BT 131ff.; SZ 98ff.). As to the other parts of Being and Time , one cannot see anything that might enable its author to resist and criticize National Socialism (which is, of course, not to say that all of Division One and the other parts of Division Two are downright national socialistic). In this sense, one has to regard the addition of the specification «of {the} people» as the author's explicit affirmation that Being and Time and the notion of historicality allow for, and even invite, the extreme party on the side of the revolutionary Right and do not enable one to criticize National Socialism. If he did not want to convey this, he would have left out the phrase «of {the} people,» or he would have developed specifications that would have drawn a line between the National Socialists and other rightists with sympathy for the Volksgemeinschaft as the primary community. However, Being and Time as it stands does not allow for such specifications, and Heidegger even explicitly criticizes possible rightist means to criticize National Socialism. In light of this, one can hardly imagine a philosophical work that leads into National Socialism more directly than Heidegger's Being and Time . Therefore, one should not be surprised that, six years later, on May 1, 1933, Heidegger joined the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei,61 and that twenty-six days later—on May 27, 1933—he gave his, as Jonas called it, «infamous» (MH 200) rectorate address.

At no point do Scheler and Heidegger feel any need to explain what they mean by «Schicksal.» Indeed, they do not need to explain the notion, for their use of it is completely in line with the everyday one. Schicksal is not something an individual or a group creates in this or that way. Rather, this Schicksal precedes the individual or the group whose fate it is. The question is not as to the need and the way of inventing one's fate, but rather as to whether one—to use one of the later Heidegger' s pet words—«fügt sich in,» complies with, one's fate, or whether one tries to ignore or even to fight against it. According to common understanding as well as in Scheler's and Heidegger's views of the matter, only unwise or inauthentic people try the second path. The only difference between Scheler and Heidegger is that Heidegger replaces «unser deutsches Schicksal» or «ein eigentümlich nationales Schicksal» (PPS I; «our German fate,» «a peculiar national fate») with «Geschick» (SZ 384; «destiny,» BT 436) in order to maintain a terminological distinction between

the all embracing Geschick and the different individual slots allotted by Geschick to each individual, «the lowliest as well as the greatest» (PPS 11).62 Still, fate does not realize itself automatically. The rerealization of Gemeinschaft depends on Dasein's proper listening and successful fighting. It can no longer be assumed that what is supposed to happen according to fate will happen anyway. Rather, without Dasein's compliance with fate and Dasein's active struggle for its realization, that fate would not be realized. The fate of fate requires that those whose fate it is properly realize it63 and thus properly rerealize Gemeinschaft. In 1934/35, in his lecture course on two hymns by Hölderlin, Heidegger said that the notion of fate in this sense is «an essentially German notion» (HH 173), and he denounced the «traditional» notion of fate as the «Asian notion of fate» (HH 173), according to which what fate ordains will happen anyway, no matter whether one actively subjugates oneself to it and fights for its realization or doesn't care to do so.

This redefinition, however, required as it is in the moment of crisis, does not do away with the basic meaning of fate as something we do not choose but have to comply with. Indeed, the redefinition even strengthens this basic meaning insofar as we ourselves would not even survive if we did not listen to the call and act accordingly. Also, it makes explicit the normative aspect in the everyday usage of the word fate. Thus, neither Scheler nor Heidegger need to elaborate on the notion, because both of them could rely on everyone understanding what they meant. The redefinition itself, however, might have been a further reason for Heidegger in the passage in Being and Time to use the word «Erwiderung,» as erwidern is often used for answering someone's call for help. Fate calls upon us and demands us to help it. Without our help, fate could not realize itself, but rather would, so to speak, be drowned and disappear. The implication that we ourselves would be drowned if we don't help fate, is evident in the abundant usage of metaphors of falling and downward plunge in the works of Hitler, Scheler, and also Heidegger. Accordingly, in my view the label «empty decionism» for Heidegger's notion of decision is only half of the story. Authentic Dasein is empty insofar as it has to empty itself from the forms of ordinary and inauthentic Dasein. Becoming empty in this sense, however, is already part of the process of facing a decision that is an either-or such that Dasein must obey the call and must not fail to listen to it.64

I have identified Heidegger's section 74 of Being and Time as politically rightist on the grounds that it shares with other works unambiguously on the Right the premises of their reasoning against leftists and liberals. In addition, as I will show in more detail in chapter 4, Heidegger's reasoning lacks any of the premises used by leftist authors. One might object that this procedure is unfair and unreliable. However, even those agreeing with this objection will probably

admit that Heidegger's case is a special one. For not only did he some years later join the most extreme of the rightist parties, the National Socialists, but he also said in 1936 that the section on historicality in Being and Time was the basis for his engagement with National Socialism.65 True, an author's words about his works do not necessarily have to be taken at face value. However, unless there is substantial evidence that the author's assessment of his works is wrong, his statements have to be respected. At the beginning of my book, I mentioned the «Helden von Langemarck» and the «Helden von Verdun.» Scheler's writings provide a good example of the hopes several rightist authors associated with World War I. As the following quote shows, quite obviously in 1914 the same hopes were present in Heidegger, and he saw in the Machtübernahme of the National Socialists in 1933 a «new beginning,» a new opportunity to realize the hopes of 1914 that had then been betrayed by the outcome of the war and by the Weimar Republic. As Jaspers tells in a pretty macabre story, in Heidelberg on June 30, 1933, Heidegger gave a talk entitled "The University in the new Reich":

As to its form, it was a masterly talk, as to its content it was a program for the National Socialist renewal of the universities. . . . Our conversations after the talk were, as far as I was concerned, not frank. I told him that one had expected him to stand up for our university and its great tradition. No answer. I talked about the Jewish question, about the vicious nonsense of the 'Wise Men of Zion,' to which he replied: "As you know, there is a dangerous international connection {Verbindung} among Jews." During dinner, he said in a somewhat furious tone that it was nonsense to have that many philosophy professors in Germany; only two or three should be retained. "Which ones?" I asked. No answer. "How can such an uneducated man like Hitler govern Germany?"—"Education {Bildung} doesn't matter at all," he replied. "Just look at his wonderful hands! {sehen Sie nur seine wunderbaren Häinde an! }"

Heidegger himself seemed to have changed. Already on his arrival a distancing mood had begun to develop. National Socialism had intoxicated the population. I went up to Heidegger's room to welcome him. "It is like 1914," I began, and I wanted to continue, "again the same delusive mass ecstasy." However, faced with a Heidegger who agreed with my first words and beamed, the words stuck in my throat. This radical break left me extremely troubled. With no one else had I experienced something like this. It was all the more provoking since Heidegger seemed not to notice it at all.66

F. Scheler "im Weltalter des Ausgleichs"

Quite certainly, Heidegger saw in Hitler «the man» (PPS 646) Scheler had been waiting for after the outcome of World War I and the establishment of the Weimar Republic had disappointed the latter's hope for a rerealization of his version of a Christian love-community through World War I. In the twenties,

however, Scheler changed his mind on the task of politics dramatically, and he did so precisely at the time when Heidegger was writing and publishing Being and Time . If, according to the old theory of opposites, in ethics and politics the state in the middle is the eigentliche extreme to each of the extremes, he became the eigentliche extremist. For Scheler became a post-classic liberal or some sort of social democrat. For an inspired philosopher like Scheler, this turn, or Kehre, perhaps did not exclude a belief in a hierarchy of values independent of human beings. But it certainly did exclude the theory of social units and their hierarchy as developed in Formalism in Ethics . I will not discuss this question nor the development of his change. Rather, I will only present a speech he gave in the Deutsche Hochschule für Politik in Berlin in November 1927, less than one year before his death. To be sure, in this speech also the author sometimes rhetorically underscores the obvious fact that he is by no means, so to speak, counting peanuts. Rather, as one says in German ironically, «er geht aufs Ganze.» All of his great topics are present in a speech of not more than twenty-five pages; God, religion, metaphysics, capitalism, socialism, Europe, England, Russia, Japan, China, India, the genius, fate, blood and its mixtures, and «man» being «a direction of the movement of the universe itself, indeed, of its ground» (WA 151). However, all are treated from a point of view that is the exact opposite of the one in the writings I have discussed so far and that is already announced in the title of the talk, namely, "Der Mensch im Weltalter des Ausgleichs" (Man in the age of conciliation). Ausgleich is «balance, adjustment, conciliation, equalization, settlement» and thus the opposite of the politics of de-cision he had proposed in his writings discussed in the preceding sections. To be sure, the meaning of fate remains the same, for the process of Ausgleich is «inescapable » (WA 152), that is, it is «fate —not choice» (WA 165), and one who wants to oppose fate will, with an allusion to Don Quixote, «in die Luft stob en» («thrust into the air») (WA 152). However, the task fate imposes on us is precisely the opposite of its gift67 in the years around World War I. For the cluster of notions I have presented as the hallmark of the rightist notion of history is dissolved. The notion of Gemeinschaft is not even mentioned once. It is not used, because what is at stake is the defense of Gesellschaft, of parliamentary democracy. In his phase of de-cision, Scheler considered class struggle and the various oppositions between Gesellschaft and Gemeinschaften a result of the value-falsifying process through which liberalism and Gesellschaft had taken over not only the entrepreneurs but also the workers, but now democracy just «unveils » these oppositions but «does not produce them» (WA 145). What matters is «the free democratic discussion and formation of will in parliament» (WA 146). He says that «in the dangerous crisis, in which today parliamentary democracy . . . finds itself almost all over the world, in its hard struggle, not as in former times against this or that kind of conservative monarchism (today, this opposition is almost dead), but rather

against the dictatorial tendencies from the Right and from the Left, parliamentary democracy will assert itself only if» (WA 145) his—or rather fate' s—recommendations for this struggle are followed. The text is paragraph by paragraph a revocation of his politics of de-cision. The theme of the genius, leader, or saint is taken up as the quest for an elite in democracy. However, the elite is not regarded as the vanguard in the upward movement of authentic valuerealiziation but rather as an effort «to beat the foes of parliamentary democracy at their own game» (WA 145). Scheler' s statement that «the development of human mind and of its forms of activities has become autonomous and independent of its bodily organisation » (WA 148) dismisses all the variants of thinking in terms of biology or in terms of an opposition between the mind and the «deeper» forces of soul, race, etc. (WA 146—150). Distancing himself from the rightist authors, Scheler at the same time comes closer to Marx. To be sure, pace Marx the religious ideas cannot be reduced to economic factors. However, pace the de-cisionistic Scheler they are not independent of them either, for: «still, an inner bond ties them together, an ultimate conception and attitude toward Being, shared by both, even though this bond is hard to perceive and to investigate» (WA 168). The materialism of Marxism is a reaction against the idealistic ideologies, including Christianity, of the ruling classes (WA 167f.). «Man» is different from what the rightists maintain who reduce him to a pre-given identity, from which the moderns have fallen away: «Man is a being whose essence itself is the decision, still open, of what this being wants to be and to become. . . . Thus, allow for man and his movement, infinite by his essence! No fixation on an "exemplary state," on a certain form, taken from either natural history or worm history » (WA 150f.).68 Clearly it is impossible «to try to renew again {wieder erneuern zu wollen} the "pagan" man, the "early Christian" man, the "Gothic" man,» etc. (WA 152). In contrast to his de-cisionistic assessment of the League of Nations as a means of Anglo-American economic world domination (PPS 382f., 665), here Scheler defends it (WA 166). Certain groups in the Catholic Church are reprimanded for their claim that basic features of the constitution of the Weimar Republic contradict the teaching of the Church (WA 169). Instead of the renovations by de-cision, the name of the new world age is «Ausgleich » (WA 152), Ausgleich in all relevant areas, races, cultures, sexes, etc. (WA 152f.). While in his de-cisionistic phase mixture was the cause of the downward plunge and the movement up again entailed the reemergence of the pure type, now it is mixture that moves forward and upward. In his de-cisionistic phase the supposed causes of mixture of blood were relegated to Israel. Now, the one who wants to expel them out of Germany and the world ought to leave the country: «Without fail, the Ausgleich of races, the mixture of blood, will progress. . . . All those who expect the Heil of the world from the preservation of a "pure" race, in his view the "noble-race" . . . should retreat with his fellow race-nobles to an island and despair» (WA 153). In Scheler's de-cisionistic phase, already by 1913 Germany has

«moved with full sails into the first phases of the socialist state . . . hostile to freedom» (UW 383f.). Also back then he regarded Spencer's assumption that the development of capitalism would cure the damage it initially inflicted as the «basic error» (RE 173; UW 146). Now, Scheler takes recourse to the dialectical formula of progress: «To be sure, {spirit} inflicts wounds. However, it also heals them» (WA 150). The same capitalism that has devastated the environment in the eighteenth century has already developed the means to protect organic natural life, and it will do so better and better (WA 150). The ideal of the nineteenth century, the sovereign national state, is doomed to disappear. The Ausgleich of the different nations, the development of international strata between them, will not do away with their specific identities. Rather, it will produce tolerance, and their spiritual and cultural autonomy will flourish (WA 164f.). In his de-cisionistic phase, he regarded the internationalization in society as a threat against the Gemeinschaften. Now, it is hailed as the vanguard of diversity through Ausgleich and mixture (WA 154). In the new economic politics from 1924 on, Russia has already adopted capitalist elements. The capitalist states, in turn, will maintain private property and, nonetheless, adopt more and more socialist elements to the effect «that, more and more, the realities on both sides will bridge the oppositions of the names and concepts» (WA 166). «Bridging of . . . oppositions» is now the key phrase, a bridging that takes place by processes of mixture, of adaptation of opposing elements. These processes are by no means benign, and the only end of politics is to facilitate them (WA 152f.). Now, politics is about precisely the opposite from what it was in his de-cisionistic phase.

Quite obviously, the causes for Scheler's turn were not the leftists and bolshevism. For the rationale for his de-cisionistic politics had been the liberals and the Social Democrats as the outcome and consummation of liberalism. Also, still in his de-cisionistic phase, in 1919, Scheler had maintained that bolshevism would not last long (PPS 651), and—in his search for precapitalist mentalities—he even recommended a cooperation between Germany and bolshevist Russia against England and the United States in order to prepare for the overthrow of capitalism (PPS 658). The cause of his turn was the emergence of National Socialism. He realized that the National Socialists represented, as it were, the «truth» of the politics of de-cision, one version of which he himself had pursued around World War I, and that they would take over the politics of the Right. This recognition made him completely turn away from any version of rightist politics and instead join his former foes, the liberals and the Social Democrats.

Especially in light of the thesis, again promoted recently in Germany by Ernst Nolte, that knowing that the Weimar Republic would not be able to do anything against bolshevism, National Socialism was an understandable, if not necessary, reaction against the threat of bolshevism,69 Scheler's philosophical and political career is remarkable. His way led in the opposite direction. Scheler

was, to use a sloppy expression, a Sozialistenfresser70 only as long as there was not yet any bolshevism and as long as he faced only liberals and social democrats, of whom many said that they had already lost sight of the notorious «expropriation of the expropriators.» When, in the twenties, bolshevism as well as National Socialism emerged, Scheler realized that neither social democracy nor bolshevism was the foe but rather National Socialism. This recognition disabused him of the viewpoint of the rightists and enabled him to reevaluate liberalism after the end of classic liberalism and social democracy and to join the fight of the parliamentary Center against National Socialism.

At the beginning of section B, I have mentioned Heidegger's high praise for Scheler in his obituary on Scheler. Heidegger doesn't talk directly about politics. However, he says of Scheler that, «standing in the midst of the whole of beings, he had an unusual sensitivity for all the new possibilities and forces opening up.»71 Two things are clear in his obituary. Heidegger highly appreciated the book Formalism in Ethics . His first point after his praise of Scheler is that Scheler «clearly perceived the new possibilities of phenomenology»; he took up phenomenology not «superficially,» but he «furthered it essentially and unified it directly with central problems of philosophy. In particular, his critique of ethical formalism bears witness to this.»72 However, the Scheler after Formalism in Ethics is not appreciated that much by Heidegger. Heidegger refers to Scheler's Catholicism and his thoughts on man as «God's co-worker,» in order thereupon to pose an incisive question one would not expect after the great praise in the beginning of the obituary. Heidegger asks: «Were his changing views a sign of a lack of substance, of inner emptiness?»73 His answer is devastating. Logically one is strongly invited to or even has no other choice but add between the question and Heidegger's own comment on it something like «Yes, indeed!» For Heidegger does not answer the question explicitly. However, he comments on Scheler in a way that sounds like an excuse for Scheler's supposed lack of substance: ·

But one recognizes here—something which of course only a few could directly experience in day-and-night-long conversations and arguments with him—an obsession with philosophy, which he himself was unable to master and after which he had to follow, something which in the brokenness of contemporary existence often drove him to powerlessness and despair. But this obsession was his substance. And with every change he remained loyal to his inner direction of his nature in always new approaches and endeavors. And this loyalty must have been the source from which sprang the childlike kindness he showed on occasion.74

Thereupon, Heidegger summarizes Scheler's «greatness» again with recourse to a formula of the early, the de-cisionistic, Scheler. It lies in «an encounter with mankind that allows for no appeasement {beschwichtigen } and leveling through a sterile humanism.» He then concludes: «Max Scheler is dead. We

bow before his fate {Wir beugen uns vor seinem Schicksal}.»75 Especially in the light of Heidegger's question, one might refer the last sentence not only to Scheler's physical death in 1928, but also, or even mainly, to his development. «Beschwichtigung» («appeasement») belongs to the same semantic field as «Ausgleich.» What Heidegger says here about Scheler's way is somewhat ironic, if not even a severe distortion by omission. In the preface to the third edition of Formalism , Scheler says that he does «not wish to see the bond with Kairos , i.e., the call of the hour of our human and historical being and life, severed as completely as it is in Hartmann's work» (FEe xxxi; FE 23). In the manuscript, this is followed by the sentence: «Ultimately ethics is a 'damned bloody affair' {eine "verdammt blutige Sache"}, and if it can give me no directives concerning how 'I' 'should' live now in this social and historical context, then what is it?» (FEe xxxi, n. 14; FE 591).

The later Scheler completely abandoned the political advice given in his book dating from his de-cisionistic phase, and he identified himself with precisely those politics his book had advised people to expel out of the blood. Heidegger either neglects this or even denounces it with his question and his answer. «Sich beugen vor jemandes Schicksal» means «to recognize and accept his fate.» At the same time, however, it often implies also that «it is not our fate; he could not but go his way, and we couldn't prevent him from doing so; however, our way is different.» Though Heidegger always regarded thinking in terms of values as what amounts in his framework, so to speak, to the original sin of philosophizing, namely, as a reduction of Dasein and being to a Vorhandenes, he highly appreciated Formalism in Ethics , certainly because of Scheler's criticism of the modern subject and probably also because of its logic and politics of de-cision which, in its most radical version, Heidegger was about to renew precisely at the time when Scheler abandoned it on account of its devastating political implications. Most certainly, Heidegger's allusion to the «lack of substance» refers to Scheler's Catholicism. Already in Formalism , the internationalism of Catholicism prevented Scheler from identifying his politics with a politics of Blut und Boden, and, some years later, enabled him to identify the foe, to break with his politics of decision and to realize that the promise entailed in Catholicism is preserved by those against whom his former politics of de-cisionism was directed, namely, by the liberals and social democrats.

In the speech "Der Mensch im Weltalter des Ausgleichs," Scheler describes rightist thinking and leftist thinking in a series of several «either-or»-combinations. In one of the pairs, he uses the notion of Angst so prominent in Heidegger:

The praise of the "good old time," combined with Angst of the future, or the directedness toward some utopian ideal, in eschatological hope and expectation,

combined with a fierce critique of the past; . . . both of them are not founded in the things themselves. Both are logical categories, ideologies , that one-sidedly are caused by class myths and that bear witness to the power of interests over reason {Vernunft}. Anyone who, politically, wants to see clearly, has to take off both . (WA 166f.)

In this passage, Scheler gives a clear account of the basic difference of the notion of history and politics on the Right and on the Left. Whether out of Angst or not, the rightists saw the progress of Gesellschaft as the chariot of doom, whose course had to be stopped in order to rerealize the past, this or that Gemeinschaft, which had been overthrown by Gesellschaft. The leftists, however, maintained that it was good that the progress of Gesellschaft liberated us from the different Gemeinschaften in the past. It is in this alternative that in Scheler Vernunft resurfaces, as a faculty of mediation between the two opposites. Politically, Scheler addressed post-classic liberals and the Social Democrats to defend the project of Vernunft against the Right. Five years after Scheler's speech in Berlin, the Social Democrats suffered huge losses, and the extreme Right was about to become the strongest party. In this situation Scheler's successor to his chair in Frankfurt, Paul Tillich, carried Scheler's suggestion of reason as Ausgleich further, and he developed the thesis that the Social Democrats and the Left are the legitimate heirs of the promises entailed in Christianity as well as in liberalism (see section B of chapter 4).

A. Lukács's History and Class Consciousness

As mentioned in section E of chapter 3, in the section on conscience Heidegger characterizes the call as «vorrufenden Rückruf» (SZ 280; «one which calls us back in calling us forth,» BT 326). After the discussions in chapters 1-3 it is now clear that this means: Ordinary and inauthentic Daseine are engaged in the project of Gesellschaft, and the authentic Daseine step out of Gesellschaft. In section 74 it turns out that what calls them back and out of Gesellschaft is Geschick, and Geschick is the Volksgemeinschaft. The Volksgemeinschaft calls each Dasein back into its Schicksal, and authentic Daseine listen to, and erwidern, the call whereas only inauthentic Daseine try not to listen to and not to erwidern the call. Dasein's Schicksal is to disavow Gesellschaft in order to rerealize Gemeinschaft. It is clear against whom Heidegger is arguing in these passages. He argues against liberals and leftists, that is, against all those who are engaged in the project of Gesellschaft; and who maintain that we have to go on in our project of developing Gesellschaft, that is, to develop a capitalist society and its accompanying political structures, parliamentarism and also labor unions.

In the preceding chapters, I have compared my interpretation with Guignon's and Birmingham's interpretations. I wanted to show that Heidegger's notion of repetition is not, as Birmingham has it, about the anarchistic break with each and every tradition. As to Guignon, I pointed out that according to his interpretation, under the gaze of authentic Dasein the monolithic bloc of the present and the past dissolves. Upon becoming authentic, Dasein realizes that there are many possibilities in the past that have been covered

up by ordinary Dasein, by the «they.» Those who have become authentic realize that in the past there are Socrates, Galileo, and many other heroes who have established a profession, or a certain way of practicing a profession and who might be taken up and repeated by the authentic Dasein. By virtue of its utopian ideal, authentic Dasein has a distance to each of them, and it can screen the heroes of the past to choose and «creatively reinterpret» (HC 138) the one who fits his or her utopian ideal best. In Being and Time , Heidegger merely presents this general structure, and he does not make any specific suggestions as to who should choose which hero. I wanted to show that this interpretation also turns the relation of the present to the past, or to what-has-been-there, upside down. According to Guignon, Heidegger's notion of historicality also encompasses the explicitly political choices of different Daseine. On that level, his thesis means that Being and Time is politically neutral.

At the beginning of his essay, Guignon refers to the meeting between Karl Löwith and Heidegger in Rome in 1936 and says his essay «should help to clarify why Heidegger said that "his concept of historicity was the basis for his political engagement" with the Nazis in the thirties. But I hope to show also that this connection between Being and Time and Heidegger's actions does not entail that this early work is inherently fascist or proto-Nazi» (HC 131). After the passages on authentic historicality which I quoted at length in section B of chapter 1, Guignon discusses Heidegger's concept of «situation» and then turns back to the question of the beginning in order to conclude his essay with the following sentences:

My own view is that Heidegger's accounts of historicity and authenticity do not point to any particular political orientation, and that his actions in the thirties resulted solely from his own deeply held conservative beliefs. The early concepts of history and authentic action seem consistent with diverse political views because of their highly formal nature. Heidegger's ontology of human existence identifies a tripartite temporal structure according to which Dasein's "happening" springs from a projection onto future possibilities, draws on what is embodied in the past, and thereby acts in the present. The authentic mode of this temporal existence involves encountering a future as a "destiny," the past as a "heritage," and the present context as a "world-historical Situation." The clear-sighted recognition that we are always implicated in the undertakings of the shared "co-happening of a community" gives one some guidance in making choices. But it should be evident that this formalistic image of "temporalizing" and historicity by itself gives us no guidance as to which political stance we should adopt.

In fact, it appears that this picture of historical unfolding—this "metanarrative" or "narrative framework"—an be made to accommodate almost any political position. With its mythos of pristine beginnings, a time of "falling," and a final recovery of origins, it recapitulates the traditional Christian model of creation, sinfulness, and redemption. It is this soteriological model which also underlies the Marxist story-line of human species-beings currently deformed by capitalism but promised fulfillment in world communism. And it can be made

to fit the liberal story of humans who are born to be free but now languish in the chains of ignorance and superstition, or the conservative story of a return to community after wandering in the wilderness of extreme individualism.

Heidegger's account of authentic historicity demanded that he take a stand on the situation in Germany in the thirties. This explains his comment to LÖwith that "the concept of historicity was the basis for his political engagement." What we do know is that, faced with what most Germans at the time saw as the need for a decision between Bolshevism and Nazism, Heidegger sided with the Nazis. Yet ultimately it seems to be only a mix of opportunism and personal preference that directed his decision, not anything built into his fundamental ontology. (HC 141-142)

There are several remarkable points in this passage. It is not quite clear how this passage with its emphasis on the «mythos of pristine beginnings, a time of "falling," and a final recovery of origins» relates to the passage on «authentic historiography» with the latter's claim «that it is only on the basis of utopian ideals together with a sense of alternative ways of living discovered by antiquarian preservation that we can have a standpoint for criticizing calcified forms of life of the present» (HC 138). In addition, Guignon wants to show that Being and Time is politically neutral, and that it was «not anything built into { Heidegger's } fundamental ontology» that directed Heidegger's commitment to Nazism. In light of this, it is amazing that he uses formulations such as «can be made to accommodate almost any political position» and «can be made to fit» without any further comment. Finally, it is truly amazing that he assumes that the short paragraph on Christians, Marxists, and liberals is all that needs to be said on the different political movements of that time.1

However, it is simply untrue that, as Guignon maintains, everyone at the time employed a notion of history as a «mythos of pristine beginnings, a time of "falling," and a final recovery of origins» (HC 141). Neither liberals nor the political party Guignon does not mention, namely, the Social Democrats, adhered to Guignon's model. In hindsight, in the eleventh of his Theses on the Philosophy of History , written in 1940, Benjamin said:

The conformism which has been part and parcel of Social Democracy from the beginning attaches not only to its political tactics but to its economic views as well. It is one reason for its later breakdown. Nothing has corrupted the German working class so much as the notion that it was moving with the current. It regarded technological developments as the fall of the stream with which it thought it was moving {das Gefälle des Stroms, mit dem sie zu schwimmen meinte}.2

The twelfth thesis reads:

Not man or men but the straggling, oppressed class itself is the depository of historical knowledge. In Marx it appears as the last enslaved class, as the avenger

that completes the task of liberation in the name of generations of the downtrodden. This conviction, which had a brief resurgence in the Spartacist group, has always been objectionable to Social Democrats. Within three decades they managed virtually to erase the name of Blanqui, though it had been the rallying sound that had reverberated through the preceding century. Social Democracy thought fit to assign to the working class the role of the redeemer of future generations, in this way cutting the sinews of its greatest strength. This training made the working class forget both its hatred and its spirit of sacrifice, for both are nourished by the image of enslaved ancestors rather than that of liberated grandchildren.3

To move «with the current,» to move with «the fall of the stream,» or in Heidegger's and Hitler's terms «to move with the downward plunge» without looking back is exactly the stance against which, in order to discontinue it, Heidegger and other rightist authors developed their notion of history, one that demands that «we» widerrufen, cancel, the current of society and that gives «having been its peculiarly privileged position in the historical» (BT 438; SZ 386). «Moving with the current» of Gesellschaft, of capitalist society and parliamentarism, toward the future is what liberals and Social Democrats had in common. The difference between them was that liberals did so for the sake of the liberal individuals, Social Democrats for the sake of future socialism. Both employed a notion of progress according to which, step by step, we leave behind the ignorance and imperfection of the past and the present. We move with the current precisely in order to liberate ourselves from the imperfections of the past and the present, not in order to rerealize this or that past. According to Heidegger and other rightist authors, however, this is precisely our downward plunge. Thus, we have to cancel this move, have to perform a «Widerruf » (SZ 386; BT 438); or, as Scheler put it, we have to «expel Anglo-American capitalism from {Europe's } blood like a foreign poison» (PPS 153) in order to rerealize community. If, however, some liberals or social democrats at the time did in fact, as Guignon maintains, use the «mythos of pristine beginnings, a time of "falling," and a final recovery of origins» (HC 141), they did so in a way contrary to how it was used by rightist authors. According to rightist authors, we rerealize the past by canceling Gesellschaft, since the development of Gesellschaft leads us only deeper into the abyss of the downward plunge, which Gesellschaft itself is, without ever leading us back to the lost origin. Those liberals, social democrats, and communists, however, who used the «mythos of pristine beginnings, a time of "falling," and a final recovery of origins» (HC 141) restored the lost origin—freedom or «primordial communism»—only at the end of the full development of Gesellschaft. We must not cancel our gradual progress toward that development, but rather must move forward, because only in this way can we restore the lost origin. Philosophically, this is the difference between Heidegger's notion of «Widerruf » (SZ 386; «disavowal, » BT 438) of Gesellschaft, or of Scheler's act of expulsion of Gesellschaft, and a dialectical

Aufhebung, sublation, of bourgeois Gesellschaft.4 Politically, the pronounced difference between a Widerruf and an Aufhebung was the reason that allowed liberals and Social Democrats to join forces against conservative bourgeois parties. In this sense, Heidegger's notion of historicality is tailored polemically against the notion of history in liberalism and social democracy. In what follows, I will not refer to texts by liberals or social democrats. Rather, I turn to two authors of the twenties—Lukács's book History and Class Consciousness , published in 1923, and Paul Tillich's The Socialist Decision , published in 1933—who saw the difference between the social democrats and liberals on the one hand and rightist authors on the other as clearly as Hitler and Scheler did, and who regarded themselves as leftists without relying on the social democratic, or liberal, concept of history. In the course of the discussion of their views, it will become clear that Heidegger's concept of historicality was opposed not only to liberals and social democrats but also to their views, and that they themselves regarded their ideas as also directed against concepts of history such as Heidegger's.5

In myth, a human being can turn into a pig and back again into a human being (Homer, Odyssey X, vv. 235ff.). In some way, the Geist, the spirit, of this remains present in some pre-Socratic philosophers, especially in those whom Plato, appropriately, calls the «more tightly strained of the Muses.»6 Metaphysics of substance does away with such a notion of change and motion and all its remnants in philosophy. An idea does not admit, and does not change into, its opposite. However, not only an idea, but also an idea «in us» does not change into its opposite. Rather, if it can no longer resist its approaching opposite, it will leave the scene instead of transforming itself into its opposite. In accidental change, an accident does riot' change itself into its opposite either. Rather, it has to leave its subject. Only in this way can the new accident arrive at, or be realized within, the substance. A substance changes only accidentally. In order for a substance to allow the emergence of a different substance from it, the substance and its substantial form have to disappear and its matter has to be emptied of forms, or de-formed, down to the level of the four elements and simple bodies. Only if the, so to speak, «higher» substantial form has disappeared, is matter in a position to receive a new «higher» substantial form.

Unorthodox teaching on the eucharistic host and alchemy fully acknowledge this model. The substance Òf bread is not transubstantiated into the substance of Jesus Christ. Rather, the substance of bread is annihilated by God, or its matter is emptied of forms down to the level of prime matter or the four elements before Jesus Christ becomes present. One cannot produce the body of all bodies, gold, by informing existing substances. Rather, one has to expel the forms, that is, to deform their matter, until one has arrived at pure prime matter. Only at that point can the form of gold be introduced. Each form

within matter prevents it from, closes it against, receiving the form of gold. Matter is open, entschlossen, for the new form, only if it has been cleansed of any other form. The arrival of the new presupposes the expulsion of the old, and does not allow for the possibility that the old forms work on themselves and transform themselves according to their tendencies and needs.

In his theory on authentic Dasein, Heidegger follows the metaphysical model of substances and their changes. We do not achieve authenticity by building upon all the states, the forms we have due to our living in the mode of the «they.» Rather, we achieve authenticity, are entschlossen for the new form that authenticity is, only after deforming ourselves, only after having been cleansed of the forms of ordinary Dasein. This happens in Angst, in anxiety (BT 225ff.; SZ 180). If we manage to endure it and do not shrink away from it, anxiety rewards us by cleansing us of all the forms of ordinary everyday-ness, and thus makes us entschlossen for the new state of authenticity. In Heidegger, there is no intrinsic relation between ordinary Dasein and Angst. At least, he does not develop any. Ordinary Dasein tends to shy away from Angst, and Angst is not the intrinsic result of a tendency built into the forms by which ordinary Dasein is shaped.7 One implication of this model is that there is nothing intrinsic to the forms of ordinary Dasein that makes them worth preserving in the new state of authenticity. Of course, it might happen that some, or even many, features of ordinary Dasein are preserved in authenticity, for instance, as Hitler and Scheler argued, private property of the means of production and modem technology. However, this is purely accidental, a matter, so to speak, of the «grace» of authenticity.

The substance of bread has been annihilated. Its accidents remain. However, they are neither the end nor a necessary means of the Eucharist. Rather, God does not want to trigger our disgust for cannibalism and thus allows the accidents of the bread to cover up the raw flesh of Jesus Christ's body. Heidegger has chosen the proper expression. For, as was mentioned in section D of chapter I, an act of «Widerruf » (SZ 386; «disavowal, » BT 438) is indeed a cancellation, a destruction, in which something is negated completely and must never recur. In contrast, in Hegelian dialectics the transition into a new sphere also proceeds by way of deformation. However, that deformation is brought about, not by the cancellation of the determinations, but rather by the process of the self-determination of the determinations and of the subject, which never exists independent of its process of determining itself and which thus never relapses into pure matter.

Accordingly, dialectic negation is not a Widerruf. Being negated or negating themselves, the determinations are not destroyed, annihilated, or canceled, but rather aufgehoben, sublated. They still are, and they are in their truth, for they are moments of a new and larger structure into which they have sublated themselves. Politically speaking, the difference between a dialectical Aufhebung and a Heideggerian Widerruf—a thoroughly metaphysical presencing of

the renewal via the destruction of the old—also accounts for the difference between the end of righist struggle and leftist class struggle. In dialectics, nothing is abandoned. Instead, everything and everyone will be redeemed. The end of the class struggle is the sublation of the sway of classes and thus the production of equal and free individuals no longer confined by class distinctions. The rightist struggle, however, is about the rerealization of ranks, orders, and distinctions that supposedly were leveled by liberalism and Social Democracy. The rerealization requires that Gesellschaft is expelled, and that its members are either expelled or integrated into one or the other of the lower ranks of Gemeinschaft.

According to Lukács, the establishment of a socialist society presupposes a fully developed capitalist society and, if it happens at all, is brought about by the proletarians who are, as he puts it by quoting Marx, «the dissolution { AuflÖ-sung} of the existing social order {Weltordnung}» (HI 3; GK 15).8 In a fully developed capitalist society, all those individuals who are not capitalists have to offer their skills as commodities on the job market; they have become commodities. However, it is only proletarians who can distance themselves from, that is, cleanse themselves of, all the bourgeois forms and can recognize the ultimate bourgeois form, namely, that of being a commodity, as the one they have to, and can, liberate themselves from by transforming the capitalist society into a socialist one. Though all individuals have become a commodity, that is not all they are. Those who are not part of the proletariat can use these other forms to cover up, so to speak, the blunt fact that they have to offer their skills as commodities. You might deplore the fact that Geist, spirit and mind, has become a commodity. Still, if you can satisfy your vocation to geistige Führung, spiritual leadership, or your interest in studying philosophical texts, only by selling your Geist to a newspaper or a university, you might do so, and you might always maintain, as it were, in a metaphysical fashion that Geist is different from, irreducible to, and higher than, flesh and money. A proletarian, however, cannot do so:

For his work as he experiences it directly possesses the naked and abstract form of the commodity, while in other forms of work this is hidden behind the facade of 'mental labour', of 'responsibility', etc. (and sometimes it even lies concealed behind 'patriarchal' forms). The more deeply reification penetrates into the soul of the man who sells his achievement as a commodity the more deceptive appearances are (as in the case of journalism). (HI 172, GK 188)

Informed by the notion of responsibility, etc., the non-proletarian individual feels no need to distance himself from being a commodity and, thus, becomes more and more reified in all his faculties. To be a commodity permeates all his other forms and capacities. However, the proletarian cannot cover up being a commodity. Thus, he recognizes it as the form from which

he has to distance himself. In the preface to the 1968 edition, Lukács said that, in History and Class Consciousness , he has analyzed the emergence of revolutionary praxis as though it were a «sheer miracle.»9 In a passage that is almost a miracle in German since one immediately gets his point though the relations of grammar, logic, and meaning are nonetheless enigmatic, Lukács continues:

Corresponding to the objective concealment of the commodity form, there is the subjective element. This is the fact that while the process by which the worker is reified and becomes a commodity dehumanises him and cripples and atrophies his 'soul'—as long as he does not consciously rebel against it—it remains true that precisely his humanity and his soul are not changed into commodities. He is able therefore to objectify himself completely against his existence while the man reified in the bureaucracy, for instance, is turned into a commodity, mechanised and reified in the only faculties that might enable him to rebel against reification. Even his thoughts and feelings become reified. As Hegel says: "It is much harder to bring movement into fixed ideas than into sensuous existence." (HI 172, GK 188f.)

In addition, in contrast to proletarians, who, as Marx and Engels said, «have nothing to lose but their chains,»10 bourgeois individuals have something to lose. And if they don't have anything to lose, they at least have a lot to gain:

The worker experiences his place in the production process as ultimate but at the same time it has all the characteristics of the commodity (the uncertainties of day-to-day-movements of the market, etc.). This stands in contrast to other groups which have both the appearance of stability (the routine of duty, pension, etc.) and also the—abstract—possibility of an individual's elevating himself into the ruling class. By such means a 'status-consciousness' is created that is calculated {geeignet ist} to inhibit effectively the growth of a class consciousness. (HI 172; GK 189; note that Lukács's formulation «geeignet ist» does not imply any intention of any individual or group; thus instead of «is calculated» read «is fit» or even «happens.»)

The form of being a commodity has not only permeated all other forms, but it has also emptied the proletarians of any substance. A proletarian cannot justify his job in terms of responsibility, etc., and his job itself has become an unstable affair. In addition, he is no longer able to interpret his activities on the job as a means to a reasonable end (HI 87ff; GK 98ff.). It is only in the state of deformation of all other forms that human beings can recognize that they have been made into a commodity and can distance themselves from this form and thus from all history. Lukács goes on:

Thus the purely abstract negativity in the life of the worker is objectively the most typical manifestation of reification, it is the constitutive type of capitalist

socialisation. But for this very reason it is also subjectively the point at which this structure is { werden kann } raised to consciousness and can be breached in practice. As Marx says: "Labour . . . is no longer grown together with the individual into one particular determination." (HI 172; instead of «is raised» it should read «can be raised»; GK 189)

In former societies this process of becoming conscious was not possible. The economy was not yet autonomous (HI 238ff.; GK 244ff.). Political forms of domination were part of the economy and provided a framework of forms people could identify with and from which it was not necessary to abstract. This is no longer true for the «free» worker in a capitalist society. In addition, individuals and goods were not yet commodities in earlier societies. To be a commodity, however, requires a constant dividing of oneself and distancing of oneself from oneself (HI 90ff., 165ff.; GK 102, 182ff.). In addition, one might add, former processes of distancing, in stoic, Christian, and bourgeois philosophy all intended to make conscious, to lead to, and to strengthen, the reality of the form of human beingness that informs each individual human being and in regard to which all humans are equal. However, one can no longer rely on the way this form was realized in bourgeois society, since its realization has resulted in the inhuman conditions of modem capitalist society. The proletarians have been distanced from, deformed of, all traditional forms under the pressure of the commodity form. They can become aware of the power of distancing at work in commodities since due to the inner dynamics of capitalism, they themselves have become sheer commodities. Only because they have become pure commodities can they turn the power of distancing against commodities and distance themselves from the commodity form in order to realize by way of sublation the universalism inherent in bourgeois universalism. Thus, Lukács calls the consciousness of the proletarians «the self-consciousness of the commodity » (HI 168; GK 185).

For a communist, the average everydayness and the world of ordinary Dasein is certainly the economy and one's place in it. In line with Hegel's dialectics and in contrast to Heidegger, the de-formation that is the precondition to authenticity—to be a communist and finally a socialist society—is a result of the inner tendency at work in ordinary Dasein itself. Still, one must not overlook the «can» in Lukács's statements on becoming conscious. To become a commodity, to become aware of it, and to finally realize a socialist society is made possible, and indeed in some way intended, by the inner tendency active in ordinary Dasein in its average everydayness. However, it is only in becoming a commodity that the necessary and unavoidable outcome of this inner tendency is realized. To become aware of having become a commodity and to follow this through to the realization of socialism, however, is by no means a necessary outcome of this inner tendency even though it remains its intention. This is the difference, in Lukács's view, between

social democrats and communists, and it compels Lukács, as he maintains, to defend Marx against the social democratic revisionists.

Having become a commodity, a proletarian might realize a number of things, first, that the antagonism between the forces of production and the relations of production is the driving power in history, at least in the modem era (HI 10; GK 23). Second, he also begins to understand what Marx and Lukács call reification. In capitalist society, the relations between human beings have become relations between things, and these relations between things produce their own system, the capitalist economy, which determines all the other realms. The system follows its own self-generated laws (HI 83ff.; GK 94ff.) and produces a specific type of rationality—specific forms of thinking and acting—for all individuals working in it. The structure of these forms of thinking and acting differs from that of the system itself and its laws, though the former is necessary for the working of the system. Bourgeois thinking interprets the system in terms of the structure of thinking produced by the system and thus misinterprets the latter. As a consequence, bourgeois thinking misses the historical character of capitalism and takes capitalism for eternal and «natural» (HI 181ff.; GK 198ff.). Third, proletarian thinking recognizes that the relations between things are relations between human beings and at the same time that the system can function only when individuals misinterpret the laws of the system. The proletarians comprehend that the system of capitalist economy is by no means eternal but rather historical, for the inner contradictions inherent in it push it beyond liberal capitalist economy, though by no means necessarily into socialism and communism. In particular, a proletarian who is philosophically educated realizes that in modem philosophy the general conditions of reification are tacitly presupposed, in particular in German idealism, and that for that reason modem philosophy cannot solve the problems it itself raises (HI 110ff.; GK 122ff.). Concerning all these points one might find in Being and Time or in the later Heidegger an analogous claim, and it might be useful to compare them, if only because some might find Lukács's analysis of what Heidegger called «Vorhandenheit,» or Lukács's version of a thinking in terms of process as opposed to a thinking in terms of things and facts, more interesting and useful than Heidegger's analysis. However, this is not relevant to my purpose here.

Recognizing the antagonism between the forces of production and the relations of production as the driving power in history, proletarians can look through former theories on history as ideology in the Marxist sense. Lukács makes this point several times, twice only in a short comment. In a passage recapitulating Rousseau and Schiller, he adds in parentheses the proper Marxist terms: «culture and civilisation (i.e., capitalism and reification)» (HI 136; GK 150). Or, in a passage on the theory of history in Rickert he adds in parentheses his Marxist comment to a quote from Rickert: «However, this does no more than enthrone as the measure and the index of objectivity, the "cultural

values" actually "prevailing in his community {Gemeinschaft}" (i.e., in his class)» (HI 151; GK 166). Lukács's replacement of «Gemeinschaft» with «class» in the quote from Rickert is typical of leftist authors; they insist that class and class struggle are the relevant parameters in history and that the traditional Gemeinschaften will be replaced with a rational Gesellschaft. Thus, history is precisely not a return of some past. On the contrary, to them, using this or that Gemeinschaft as the relevant parameter and primary entity in history is a sign that the author either wrote at a time of not yet fully developed capitalism or is trying, more or less consciously, to «save» capitalist society against the threat from the Left. As I have shown in regard to Hitler, Scheler, and Heidegger, after the emergence of liberalism and socialism rightist authors want to replace the conceptual framework of society, class, and class struggle with that of Gemeinschaft in the minds of the proletarians. In this sense, Heidegger's use of «Gemeinschaft» in Being and Time by itself already indicates strongly that the author proposes a rightist theory of history, even if Guignon's claim that everyone at that time employed a «mythos of pristine beginnings, a time of "falling," and a final recovery of origins» (HC 141) were correct.

However, liberals, social democrats, and communists did not use such a model. Having become «the self-consciousness of the commodity» (HI 168; GK 185) and managing to make the first steps toward a proper class consciousness (which will be achieved only in a difficult process, HI 173ff.; GK 189ff.), the proletarians realize that bourgeois individuals will not leave behind their reified consciousness. However, they also realize that many of their fellow proletarians either don't reach the point of self-consciousness or, if they have done so, are not capable of maintaining this achievement. Instead of distancing themselves from the forms of reified thinking and action and instead of replacing them with the proper dialectical ones, they stay in, or relapse into, bourgeois ways of thinking and acting. The bourgeois forms of consciousness are strong and, as Hegel observed, adhere to the law of inertia more than physical bodies. For Lukács, the Social Democratic party is where bourgeois consciousness has the strongest hold on proletarians.

Social Democrats, and also to some extent Rosa Luxemburg, adhere to a model of history Lukács describes as «the organic character of the course of history» (HI 277; «des organischen Charakters der gesellschaftlichen Entwicklung,» GK 281), or «economic fatalism» (HI 305; «Ö konomistischen Fatalismus,» GK 308). The three basic assumptions of this model are first, that the development of the forces of production will automatically bring about a socialist economy (HI 277; GK 281); second, proletarian consciousness is always in tune with the economic development (HI 305; GK 308); and third, the task of the working class is merely to adjust the political and social superstructure to the level of economic development realized at the respective time. Parliamentary democracy provides a forum for achieving this without

violence. It is this reliance on economic development Benjamin called the assumption of «moving with the current.» Lukács labels it «fatalism,» because, according to this model, it is fate, or necessity, that brings about socialism, and individuals simply can go along with fate. Fate is not determined by individuals. People only have to follow fate, that is, just remove any remaining obstacles. This is in line with the general meaning of Schicksal as some process or entity that determines our life in advance and thus is our fate. We have to comply with fate and must not try to resist it. Lukács can label it «organic» because, in this way of thinking, the socialist society will come about almost as naturally as biological growth; every stage of economic development always finds its proper expression in the proletarian consciousness and thus proceeds in as organic and holistic a fashion as growth in plants or animals where all the different parts always develop in tune with each other.

Lukács himself considers his and the communist concept of history a «non-fatalistic, non-'economistic' theory» (HI 305; GK 308), because, first, in his view it is by no means the case that the forces of production will bring about a socialist economy automatically. Though there is necessity within history, and though the agent of the necessity is economic development, this necessity or inevitability prevails only up to the moment of crisis:

For capitalism, then, expedients can certainly be thought of in and for themselves. Whether they can be put into practice depends, however, on the proletariat . The proletariat, the actions of the proletariat, block capitalism's way out of the crisis. Admittedly, the fact that the proletariat obtains power at that moment is due to the 'natural laws' governing the economic process. But these 'natural laws' only determine the crisis itself, giving it dimensions which frustrate the 'peaceful' advance of capitalism. However, if left to develop (along capitalist lines) they would not lead to the simple downfall of capitalism or to a smooth transition to socialism. They would lead over a long period of crises, civil wars and imperialist world wars on an ever-increasing scale to "the mutual destruction of the opposing classes" and to a new barbarism.

Moreover, these forces, swept along by their own 'natural' impetus have brought into being a proletariat whose physical and economic strength leaves capitalism very little scope to enforce a purely economic solution along the lines of those which put an end to previous crises in which the proletariat figured only as the object of an economic process. The new-found strength of the proletariat is the product of objective economic 'laws'. The problem, however, of converting this potential power into a real one and of enabling the proletariat (which today really is the mere object of the economic process and only potentially and latently its co-determining subject) to emerge as its subject in reality, is no longer determined by these 'laws' in any fatalistic and automatic way. (HI 306; GK 309f.)

Throughout his book, Lukács formulates this thesis in terms of the «tendency» or «objective possibilities» inherent in the economic development,

and I will give some examples of this. For Lukács, the different theories of history lead to a crucial difference between communists and social democrats in their concrete politics, namely, their attitudes toward violence. First, relying on the fatalism, or inevitability, of economic development, social democrats deny that violence is necessary to bring about socialism. Lukács and other communists, however, insist that violence has always been an economic power and is necessary for the realization of socialism (HI 239ff; GK 246ff). Second, there is no organic relationship between economic development and the consciousness of the proletariat. Rather, due to the inertia, the consciousness of many proletarians lags behind the economic development (HI 304; GK 307). This situation is extremely serious. As early as in The Communist Manifesto Marx and Engels formulated the issue of Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft, of the destructive forces unleashed by the modem age, in an unsurpassed way, and already at that point they reduced the issue to its economic basis:

The bourgeoisie cannot exist without constantly revolutionizing the instruments of production, and thereby the relations of production, and with them the whole relations of society. Conservation of the old modes of production in unaltered form, was, on the contrary, the first condition of existence for all earlier industrial classes. Constant revolutionizing of production, uninterrupted disturbance of all social conditions, everlasting uncertainty and agitation distinguish the bourgeois epoch from all earlier ones. All fixed, fast-frozen relations, with their train of ancient and venerable prejudices and opinions are swept away, all new-formed ones become antiquated before they can ossify. All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned.11

Looking back from the present into the past, one thus realizes how often and quickly, at least in modem times, forms of consciousness had already become anachronistic before they were finally swept away by history. However, the same applies to the present as well. Perhaps one's own consciousness too is already outdated, especially since capitalism is the institutionalized constant revolution of all relations due to the basic structure of private ownership of the means of production. In precapitalist societies this gap between consciousness and economic basis is absent, since the instruments of production didn't change that much. In addition, in precapitalist societies the available means for working on nature and society were much more limited. In the light of this, social democrats are naive and lack any sense for the peculiar character of the modem age. Relying on the organic relationship between economic development and consciousness, a social democrat infers from the absence of a clear and common will to revolution in the proletariat that, indeed, no revolutionary situation exists (HI 305; GK 308). A communist, however, might infer that the proletariat is just not up to its task. This gap between consciousness and economic development allows Lukács to describe the behavior of the social

democratic parties and of the unions in a way that is similar to how Heidegger characterizes the behavior of ordinary and inauthentic Dasein, which covers up the authentic possibilities of authentic action. The tactical theses of the Third Congress very rightly emphasize that every mass strike tends to transform itself into a civil war and a direct struggle for power. However, as Lukács emphasizes, «it only tends to do so.» Though the economic and social preconditions were often fulfilled, this tendency has not yet become reality. This «precisely is the ideological crisis of the proletariat » (HI 310; GK 312). The social democratic parties and the unions prevent the proletarians from developing the proper class consciousness, and they do so in a division of labor. The unions «take on the task of atomising and de-politicising the movement and concealing its relation to the totality,» while the social democratic parties «perform the task of establishing the reification in the consciousness of the proletariat both ideologically and on the level of organisation» (HI 310; GK 312f.). Thus, as the inauthentic Daseine in Heidegger, the social democrats and the unions prevent the proletarians from resolving the crisis «by the free action {freie Tat } of the proletariat » (HI 311; GK 313).12

In contrast to social democrats and liberals, Heidegger and Lukács share the assumption of the critical character of the moment, the kairos, the crisis brought about by history. History does not realize the new state after bourgeois society—socialism or Volksgemeinschaft—in the way that trees produce fruits but leads to a crisis, in which both the authentic Daseine in Heidegger's sense and the proletarians believe to realize that the current state of society is transitory and will disappear. Both also maintain that the «real» logic of history differs from what individuals have considered it to be before becoming authentic or self-conscious. Moreover, both maintain that history can now develop in two directions and that it is up to the individuals which way history will go. Finally, both regard themselves as called upon by history to guide it in one direction and to prevent it from going the other way. Because of these similarities, one finds the rhetoric of crisis, decision, and call also in Lukács. In fact, at one point Lukács uses the concept of Schicksal in the same way the rightist authors did. According to Lukács, Rosa Luxemburg overlooked the limitation of possible choices «which fate forced upon the proletarian revolution right from the start» (HI 276; «die vom Schicksal aufgezwungene Wahl zwischen,» GK 280; note, however, that fate here does not call for a repetition). One must listen to and obey fate, otherwise one will fail. Rosa Luxemburg did not listen to fate. Thus, her criticism «has been refuted . . . by history itself» (HI 276; GK 280). In his strictly theoretical passages, Lukács uses not Schicksal but rather Geschichte, history, and according to him the communist theory is «non-fatalistic.» For he wants to oppose the social democrats already on the level of terminology, and in the eyes of leftists the fact alone that rightists use the term «fate» already reveals the latter's «irrational» view of history. Thus, as in the case of the replacement of «Gemeinschaft» with «class,» leftist authors do not use «fate»

as a basic term. They use it only polemically to indicate that other parties pretending to be leftists have in fact fallen prey to bourgeois ideology, as Lukács does regarding the social democrats. Otherwise, however, the structure and the vocabulary are the same as Heidegger's. Consider, for instance, the following sentence: «The proletariat "has no ideals to realize." When its consciousness is put into practice it can only breathe life into the things which the dialectics of history have forced to a crisis {nur das von der geschichtlichen Dialektik zur Entscheidung Gedrängte ins Leben rufen}; it can never 'in practice' ignore the course of history, forcing on it what are no more than its own desires or knowledge» (HI 177f; GK 194).13 Or, on the next page Lukács comments on the issue of force: «For this is the point where the 'eternal laws' of capitalist economics fail and become dialectical and are thus compelled to yield up the decisions regarding the fate of history to the conscious actions of men {dem bewußten Handeln der Menschen die Entscheidung über das Schicksal der Entwicklung zu überlassen gezwungen ist}» (HI 178; GK 195). As the last quotation shows, Lukács also uses the concept of fate in the derivative sense in that the actions of someone can become the fate of someone else in the future. However, as in the authors on the Right, this is a derivative sense, insofar as the individuals or groups are morally not free to realize whatever they wish. Rather, they are bound, called upon, by history to realize this—on the Right Volksgemeinschaft and on the Left socialism—and to avoid that———on the Right socialism and on the Left Volksgemeinschaft. For this obligation history places on the proletariat Lukács uses the word Beruf, mission:

Only the consciousness of the proletariat can point to the way that leads out of the impasse of capitalism . As long as this consciousness is lacking, the crisis remains permanent. . . . But the proletariat is not given any choice. {Das Proletariat hat aber hier keine Wahl.}. . . . But the proletariat cannot abdicate its mission. {Denn das Proletariat kann sich seinem Beruf nicht entziehen.} The only question at issue is how much it has to suffer before it achieves ideological maturity, before it acquires a true understanding of its class situation and a true class consciousness. (HI 76; GK 88f.)

Or he speaks of «the universal mission {weltgeschichtliche Sendung} of the proletariat» (HI 325; GK 327). 14 However, strong as these similarities between Heidegger and Lukács might be—in the decisive point Lukács's theory on history is the total opposite of Heidegger's. For the proletarians are called to a decision whose structure with regard to temporality is just the opposite of decision in Heidegger. Lukács often talks of the «new,» or «the radically new character of a consciously ordered society {Gesellschaft}» (HI 252, GK 258). This is not a mere phrase. History is not about the repetition of some vanished past but about the production of something essentially new that has never existed before, as the following features of Lukács' s concept of history clearly show.

The moment of crisis is decisive for the future of the world, and it is decisive for Lukács's entire theory on dialectics and history. In nature there is no critical dialectics between subject and object. Thus, dialectics and historical materialism do not apply to nature but only to the history of humanity (HI ff.; GK 15ff.). Since in precapitalist societies there is no reification and no critical dialectics either, dialectics and historical materialism apply to them, if at all, only in a modified and restricted way, one that still has to be determined by future theoretical work (HI 238ff.; GK 244ff.). In socialism, there will no longer be reification and critical dialectics between subject and object. Marx has shown that, pace Hegel, the categories of reflection are not «eternal» but rather valid only for bourgeois society (HI 177; GK 194). At the time of History and Class Consciousness , dialectics and Marxism in Lukács is, as he put it self-critically in 1968, not a universal ontology, but rather a «theory of society,» a «social philosophy» (HI xvi), 15 indeed, a theory of Gesellschaft that pertains only to a very small portion of the history of all societies. Still, in History and Class Consciousness Lukács makes two claims for history in general. First, he speaks of «the world-historical mission of the process of civilisation that culminates in capitalism {weltgeschichtliche Sendung des im Kapitalismus gipfelnden Zivilisationsprozesses},» and this mission is «to achieve control over nature » (HI 233; GK 239). The laws of reified capitalist society «have the task {Funktion} of subordinating the categories of nature to the process of socialisation {Vergesellschaftung}. In the course of history they have performed this function» (HI 233; GK 239). Certainly, this mission of capitalism is sublated and preserved in socialism. Insofar as no society prior to the modem capitalist ones ever achieved full domination over nature, this criterion excludes any repetition of a vanished past as the end of history. Indeed, in the context of these reflections Lukács does not speak of any repetition of a vanished past within socialism. Even if certain features of this or that precapitalist society recurred in a socialist society, this would be accidental, or they would recur as something instrumental to the functioning of a socialist society and its complete domination of nature. As rightist authors see it, however, it is just the other way around, and if any achievements of Gesellschaft are preserved at all in the revitalization of Gemeinschaft, it will be those that are instrumental to the life of the revitalized Gemeinschaft.

The second claim is the 'identical subject-object' that history intends to bring about. Again, in the systematic parts of this discussion Lukács does not even mention the problem of a «re.» As in the case of the first criterion either the second criterion also allows no room for a reoccurrence of a vanished past, or if so, the reoccurrence is accidental to the realization of the 'identical subject-object.' Lukács maintains that the central problem of German idealism was overcoming the separations characteristic of the modem age and resulting from the split between subject and object due to reification. The greatness of

German idealism lies in the fact that it did not deny but instead faced the separations and contradictions of the modem age, that is, of capitalism; it searched for ways to overcome them, and finally Hegel pointed the way out of those contradictions. The tragedy of German idealism lies in the fact that in its day the agent that alone was capable of overcoming bourgeois Gesellschaft and reification did not yet exist. Thus, German idealism wound up in mythologies. History is the result of an agent, of the subject who acts and who acts on something, the object; and history is about the realization of the subject's freedom. The subject will be free only if the object it acts on is not alien to the subject and if the subject is not acted upon by an alien object. An alien object is one that is different and independent from the subject and was not produced by the latter, or having been produced by the subject, it has a life of its own that determines the subject. The science of history has to show that over time what seems to be alien to the subject turns out to be indeed the subject itself, which will overcome its own determination by what is alien to it; the subject dirempts itself into itself as subject and its own object. Thus, the science of history shows that the latent identity of subject and object becomes manifest in history. German idealism could develop the abstract logic of this motif. However, in its time, the real subject-object in history did not yet exist. Thus, in Lukács's view, Hegel's philosophy was driven into mythology by a methodological necessity. Being unable to identify the real subject-object in history, Hegel made history itself dependent on something transcendent, and he introduced as the real agent in history the notorious World Spirit and its concrete incarnations, the Volksgeister, the spirits of the individual peoples (HI 141 - 149; GK 156-164). With the emergence of the proletarians German idealism faces a crisis as well. If one adheres to the «idealism» in Hegel, one will lose the vitality of dialectics. One will be left only with the antinomies and their increasingly mythological solutions. This is what German idealism «bequeath {es} to succeeding (bourgeois) generations» (HI 148; the German text has «Erbschaft,» GK 164). If an adherent of German idealism wants to remain faithful to its intention, he has to abandon Hegel's material theories, has to isolate their method, dialectics, and has to transplant dialectics into a context completely unfamiliar to philosophers, namely, into history as the history of production:

The continuation of that course which at least in method started to point the way beyond these limits, namely the dialectical method as the true historical method was reserved for the class which was able to discover within itself on the basis of its life-experience the identical subject-object, the subject of action; the 'we' of the genesis: namely the proletariat. (HI 148f.; GK 164) 16

Only by a radical transformation of itself can German idealism remain faithful to its intention; if it remains the same and unchanged, it becomes unfaithful to its intentions and turns reactionary. In this sense Lukács approvingly

quotes Engels's sentence on «the 'German workers' movement' as the 'heir {Erbin} to classical German philosophy'» (HI xlv; GK 9). Quite soberly, Lukács acknowledges that later ages always use «the historical heritage {historische Erbschaft} » by «bending it to their own purposes» (HI 111; GK 123). Followers of the Volksgemeinschaft or other Gemeinschaften use Hegel selectively and abandon his dialectics and his liberalism in order to defend an illiberal bourgeois society against the threat of liberalism and leftist politics. Proletarians save Hegelian dialectics by radically transforming it, and they do so, according to Lukács, to save the intentions of German idealism. These three are the only occurrences of the word «Erbschaft» or «Erbe» in History and Class Consciousness . For Heidegger, nothing in modem Gesellschaft is intrinsically worth preserving in the state of authenticity (see chapter 2, section C). Reacting to the dynamics of the modem era, Heidegger transforms Erbschaft into a false god that demands obedience and subordination. Erbschaft or Erbe is intrinsically completely good, and it demands of the heirs that they rerealize it through their cancellation of modem Gesellschaft. Lukács acknowledges that, at least in the modem era, an Erbe is often contested and is always in danger. Whether it will be beneficial or not depends on how the heirs use it, on whether their use is attentive to the inner tensions and possibilities in the Erbe itself as well as to its context. Lukács uses this motif only in the context of philosophical knowledge, and not in the context of the different historical Gemeinschaften that have been pushed aside or are threatened by modem Gesellschaft. Tillich later claimed that to have missed the latter was the crucial political mistake of all liberals and leftists.

As to the identical subject-object, capitalism plays a crucial role. Prior to capitalism, the technologies of human beings were too limited not to be determined by nature and natural circumstances that humans could not control because they are different from them and not produced by them. Lukács does not tire of emphasizing that capitalism does away with this limitation. He speaks of a «'receding of natural limits'» (HI 237; «"Zurückweichen der Naturschranke",» GK 243) through capitalism. Or he puts it as follows: «The uniqueness of capitalism is to be seen precisely in its abolition of all 'natural barriers' {alle "Naturschranken" aufhebt} and its transformation of all relations between human beings into purely social relations {rein gesellschaftliche}» (HI 176; GK 193). One might object that, unless Lukács explains in more detail what he means, a receding of natural limits does not necessarily mean that the natural limits completely disappear, which seems to be what he implies in this as well as in several other passages (though one has to acknowledge that the German «aufhebt» sounds definitely more subtle than the English translation «abolition»). However, assuming purely social relations prepares the ground for the production of the identical subject-object. Lukács maintains that bourgeois thought necessarily «trails behind the objective development» (HI 176; GK 193), because it remains enmeshed in the abstract cate-

gories of reification and treats the categories of capitalist economy as eternal, and he continues:

The proletariat, however, stands at the focal point of this socialising process {Vergesellschaftung}. On the one hand, this transformation of labour into a commodity removes every 'human' element from the immediate existence of the proletariat, on the other hand the same development progressively eliminates everything 'organic', every direct link with nature from the forms of society so that socialised man can stand revealed in an objectivity remote from or even opposed to humanity. It is just in this objectification, in this rationalisation and reification of all social forms that we see clearly for the first time how society is constructed from the relations of men with each other. (HI 176; GK 193) 17

If the relationships in capitalism were not purely social, the proletarians would not be capable of reflecting on their situation and of recognizing that the alien objectivity is social, that is, produced by them and thus in itself identical to them. They would not be able to establish themselves as the identical subject-object, because human society would still be determined by something not made by human beings. According to Lukács, the capitalist objectivity is «remote from or even opposed to humanity,» not «remote from or even opposed to nature.» Alienation from and return to nature or a natural state of humankind by retreat from, Widerruf of, or Aufhebung of, Gesellschaft—a great theme in philosophy from the eighteenth century on—is not Lukács's concern. Rather, emancipation from all natural barriers as achieved in capitalism and thereafter sublation of the reified objectivity of capitalism are the necessary steps toward the production of the identical subject-object of history. It is obvious that this concept of history leaves no room for a return to or a revitalization of a past Gemeinschaft that was pushed aside by capitalism, for previous Gemeinschaften simply do not meet the two criteria, namely, full domination over nature and the realization of the identical subject-object. Features of former Gemeinschaften recur in the consciously ordered society only accidentally.

The proletarians are the object of history, insofar as they are the result of history. The proletariat has to become its subject by becoming self-aware and by sublating the reified objectivity of capitalism. Having established a consciously ordered society the proletariat will have established a society in which human beings are no longer determined by something alien. The proletarians act on behalf of all human beings because they remove reification, and they realize the purpose of history:

The self-understanding of the proletariat is therefore simultaneously the objective understanding of the nature of society. When the proletariat furthers its own class-aims it simultaneously achieves the conscious realisation of the—objective—aims of society, aims which would inevitably remain abstract

possibilities and objective frontiers but for this conscious intervention. (HI 149; GK 165)

It is only the relationships in capitalism that are dialectical. In connection with the proletariat, Lukács discusses two features of dialectics, mediation and the category of totality (HI 1ff., 149ff.; GK 13ff., 165ff). The proletarians must not remain in the immediacy of their everyday experiences. Rather, they have to learn to conceive their situation as a result of historical processes. By doing so, they can relate themselves to the processes of history as a totality. Since only the relations in capitalism are dialectical and since the purpose of history is the production of the identical subject-object, the issue of a past returning is not even mentioned in this book. Rather, by becoming conscious of themselves the proletarians discover the immanent tendencies in the present and their task to consciously push these tendencies further. For Lukács, this effort does not imply that these tendencies in the present are related to some past to be rerealized. Consider, for instance, the following passage:

The methodology of the natural sciences which forms the methodological ideal of every fetishistic science and every kind of Revisionism rejects the idea of contradiction and antagonism in its subject matter. . . . But we maintain that in ' the case of social reality these contradictions are not a sign of the imperfect understanding of society; on the contrary, they belong to the nature of reality itself and to the nature of capitalism . When the totality is known they will not be transcended and cease to be contradictions. Quite the reverse, they will be seen to be necessary contradictions arising out of the antagonisms of this system of production. When theory (as the knowledge of the whole) opens up the way to resolving these contradictions it does so by revealing the real tendencies of social evolution. For these are destined to effect a real resolution of the contradictions that have emerged in the course of history. (HI 10; GK 23)

Or consider a passage in which Lukács summarizes this motif in terms of the three modes of time:

Becoming is also the mediation between past and future. But it is the mediation between the concrete, i.e. historical past, and the equally concrete, i.e. historical future. When the concrete here and now dissolves into a process it is no longer a continuous, intangible moment, immediacy slipping away; it is the focus of the deepest and most widely ramified mediation, the focus of decision and of the birth of the new. As long as man concentrates his interest contemplatively upon the past or future, both ossify into an alien existence. . .. Man must be able to comprehend the present as a becoming. He can do this by seeing in it the tendencies out of whose dialectical opposition he can make the future. Only when he does this will the present be a process of becoming, that belongs to him . Only he who is willing and whose mission it is {berufen} to create the future can see the present in its concrete truth. . .. But when the truth

of becoming is the future that is to be created but has not yet been born, when it is the new that resides in the tendencies that (with our conscious aid) will be realised, then the question whether thought is a reflection {Abbildlichkeit des Denkens} appears quite senseless. (HI 203f.; GK 223)

Indeed, this is a further description of the kairos, the crisis. Heidegger develops the dramatics of a move forward and away from the past, back to the past, and again forward with the past, a maneuver in which the past, or having-been, raises its voice and claims «its peculiarly privileged position in the historical» (BT 438; SZ 386). One finds nothing of this in Lukács. The proletariat does not retrieve a past. Rather, understanding itself as the result of a process, it sees that there are tendencies at work in the present that enable, indeed force, the proletariat to transform capitalist Gesellschaft into something radically new, namely, a socialist Gesellschaft which as such is not a repetition of a past. According to Heidegger and Scheler, in the crisis authentic Dasein understands that it draws its identity from something other than Gesellschaft, namely, from a Gemeinschaft it has to rerealize. The authentic Dasein becomes, as it were, the self-consciousness or conscience of Geschick and Gemeinschaft when it comprehends that Gemeinschaft has been pushed aside by Gesellschaft and when Gemeinschaft raises its voice demanding to be rerealized. In liberalism, individuals are the self-consciousness of reason. In Lukács, the proletarians draw their identity and strength only from the inner tendencies of Gesellschaft itself. To indicate that there is nothing beyond Gesellschaft and that the proletarians only rely on the emancipating power of the commodity form, Lukács defines the revolutionary proletarians neither in terms of Gemeinschaft nor in terms of reason, but rather as «the self-consciousness of the commodity » (HI 168; GK 185). 18

Lukács takes up the issue of a «re»—a repetition of or a return to the past— three times. In the first part of the long essay "Reification and the Consciousness of the Proletariat," he explores the phenomenon of reification as it occurs in capitalist economy and other areas of modern society, in particular bureaucracy. The second part begins with the thesis, «Modern critical philosophy springs from the reified structure of consciousness» (HI 110f.; GK 122). In the first two sections, he discusses this with reference to Kant and Fichte. In the third, he turns back to the eighteenth century and presents briefly What he regards as the central antinomy with which its philosophers dealt and which goes back to reification. The antinomy renders the concept of nature, for instance, ambivalent. «Nature» means the «"aggregate of systems of the laws" governing what happens.» «Nature» also functions as a «value concept » (HI 136; GK 150). However, there is a third meaning «quite different» from, and «wholly incompatible with,» the other ones. This notion of nature is related to

«the feeling that social institutions (reification) strip man of his human essence and that the more culture and civilisation (i.e. capitalism and reification) take possession of him, the less able he is to be a human being» (HI 136; GK 150). Nature becomes «the repository» of all tendencies opposing «mechanisation, dehumanisation and reification.» In this context, Lukács refers to Rousseau and Schiller: «But, at the same time, it can be understood as that aspect of human inwardness which has remained natural, or at least tends or longs to become natural once more {die Tendenz, die Sehnsucht hat, wieder Natur zu werden}. "They are what we once were," says Schiller of the forms of nature, "they are what we should once more become" {"sie sind, was wir wieder werden sollen"}» (HI 136; GK 150f.). Schiller's aesthetic-pedagogical writings, however, are excellent examples of a thinking in terms of Aufhebung as opposed to a thinking in terms of Widerruf. 19 Thus, even if Lukács were to endorse Schiller's view, he would still be opposed to the rightist program. However, Lukács criticizes the proposal of an overcoming of capitalist reification through aesthetics (HI 137ff.; GK 151ff.). The second occurrence of the rhetorics of a «re» is at the beginning of the following section in which Lukács presents Hegel's philosophy, which definitely comes closer to the relevant point than an aesthetic overcoming because Hegel considers history to be the relevant realm: «The reconstitution {Wiederherstellung} of the unity of the subject, the intellectual restoration {Rettung} of man has consciously to take its path through the realm of disintegration and fragmentation» (HI 141; GK 156). Again, if Lukács followed Hegel, the resulting model would still be one of Aufhebung of Gesellschaft and not of its Widerruf. In addition, particularly regarding Hegel's theory of Gesellschaft, the motif of a return of a past is indeed accidental to Hegelian dialectics. 20 However, again one need not elaborate this point, for, as mentioned, Lukács criticizes Hegel's turn to mythology. What is relevant in Hegel is not the world spirit or the Volksgeister, but only the dialectical method (HI 141-140; GK 156-164). As indicated earlier, the dialectical method in Lukács operates independently of any assumption of the return of the past pushed aside by capitalist Gesellschaft. This is confirmed by the third occurrence of the «re.» In the essay "The Changing Function of Historical Materialism," Lukács argues that with capitalism the «umbilical cord between man and nature» has been cut and that the past becomes transparent only when the present can practice self-criticism in an appropriate manner, and consequently, precapitalist societies can be understood only after historical materialism has proved that capitalist society is not a natural and eternal, but rather a historical phenomenon (HI 237; GK 243f.). In fact, Lukács continues: «For only now, with the prospect opening up of reestablishing {Wiedererlangung} non-reified relations between man and man and between man and nature, could those factors in primitive, pre-capitalist formations be discovered in which these (non-reified) forms were present—albeit in the service of quite different functions» (HI 237f.; GK 244). Lukács then points out that though

historical materialism in its classic form can be applied to the nineteenth century it can be applied to old societies only with «much greater caution» than the revisionists assumed (HI 238f; GK 244). This passage shows that the dialectical theory of revolution does not, and—due to the imperfect state of Marxist research of precapitalist societies—must not, depend on specific theories about precapitalist societies and the possible discovery of societies with so-called primitive communism. Rather, it is the other way around. Only if the dialectical theory of capitalist society can show the inner tendencies at work in capitalist society to overcome reification, can Marxist research of precapitalist societies look for nonreified relationships in them. In addition, the absence of reification is only one criterion among others, and it is common knowledge among Marxists that the absence of reification in precapitalist societies served conditions that should not be rerealized. Lukács' s metaphor of the «umbilical cord between man and nature» (HI 237; GK 244) clearly indicates that his theory is not about the repetition of a past or—in Heidegger' s terms—a world that has-been-there. Probably no one wants to repeat a state in which one is as helpless and as dependent on something or someone else as a newborn child is. Umbilical cords are cut to bring the child on his way to independence and not to be reestablished at a later point. If the newborn child has features that also occur in the adult, these features and the world they were part of are by no means the end for the sake of which a communist society is established21

One might say that Guignon's notion of repetition applies to Lukács's relationship to Hegel. The revisionists have no proper understanding of Hegelian dialectics in Marx. Thus, Lukács takes the authentic Hegel as his hero whom he repeats. However, Lukács as well as Heidegger in section 74 talk about history and not about the theory of history, and Lukács's repetition of Hegel serves his concept of history that does not allow for a repetition of a past. In addition, though I will not go into detail here, Lukács's concept of repetition of Hegel is certainly much more interesting than Guignon's. Lukács has always been very sensitive to the phenomenon that in the course of history a theory, either as unchanged or in different phases of its development, can be placed «in the service of quite different functions.» While at the time of its formulation Hegelianism was progressive because of its articulation of problems and the means it offered for their solution, Hegelianism became reactionary as soon as it let the moment slip past unused when it had to thoroughly transform itself in order to realize its intentions. Besides missing the distinction between a Widerruf and an Aufhebung of the present, Guignon's concept of repetition also does not address this idea of saving a past from itself by virtue of its thorough transformation.

Though one might argue that under the impact of Lukács's theory of the Communist Party one has often underestimated the limitations of dialectics in Lukács, from a Heideggerian perspective Lukács's concept of history clearly presents inauthentic historicality. The later Heidegger would certainly have

regarded it as part of the last phase of metaphysics. Lukács adheres to the idea of a «collective plan» (HI 247; «Gesamtplan,» GK 254) for society, and he assumes that the purpose of history is for human beings to do away with any determination of human history by something other than human beings themselves. Whether Heidegger read History and Class Consciousness or not, from the perspective of Being and Time Lukács just offers another formulation of precisely the process Heidegger criticizes as a downward plunge, a falling-down-and-away-from the origin, from Gemeinschaft, the process targeted by Heidegger's criticism of the idea of a «business procedure that can be regulated» (BT 340; «Idee eines regelbaren Geschäftsganges,» SZ 294). There has always been a certain Platonism in Heidegger, namely, the assumption that human beings are authentic, or realize their essence, only if they no longer deny that they are essentially related to, and dependent on, something that is «higher» than and independent from their understanding or reason and their other faculties. In the essay "The Question Concerning Technology," Heidegger writes that, today, «the illusion comes to prevail that everything man encounters exists only insofar as it is his construct {Gemächte}. This illusion gives rise in turn to one final delusion: it seems as though man everywhere and always encounters only himself» (BW 308; VA 31). 22 He adds: «In truth, however, precisely nowhere does man today any longer encounter himself, i.e., his essence . Man . . . fails in every way to hear {überhört} in what respect he eksists, from out of his essence {aus seinem Wesen her}, in the realm of an exhortation or address {Zuspruch}, so that he can never encounter only himself» (BW 308f.; VA 31). Again, it is the same story as in Being and Time . In Being and Time , Gemeinschaft stands for the entity whose «Zuspruch» the inauthentic Daseine fail to hear, and maybe already in the unwritten «second half» (BT 17; SZ n.p.) of Being and Time Heidegger would have located Gemeinschaft in the larger picture of Being. Liberals, social democrats, and communists alike take pride in the certainty that the ideal Gesellschaft we have to realize is the result of our rational contracts and planning and that in it human beings have emancipated themselves from all human follies and all nonhuman entities that determined their lives in the Gemeinschaften. From the perspective of Being and Time as well as that of Hitler and Scheler (prior to his Kehre), Lukács is just a social democrat with more advanced methods, and thus he is nothing more than an advanced liberal. Lukács opposes what he regards to be the social democrats' naiveté concerning how a socialist society can be brought about, and for this purpose he presents his conceptual framework. However, the end is the same, namely, to establish a Gesellschaft and to do so by leaving behind any past. That my interpretation of Lukács is not, so to speak, a deconstructive one, but rather represents the way he was read by other leftists at the time is confirmed by Tillich's analysis in 1933. Tillich maintains that not to have looked back to the past was precisely the decisive political mistake of liberals, social democrats, and communists alike, and—in much the same way in which

Lukács regards it to be necessary for Hegelian dialectics to transform itself if it wants to remain faithful to its intentions—he presents the offer to the rightists to transform themselves and their traditions in order to save themselves from themselves and to realize their intentions.

B. Tillich's The Socialist Decision

The moment of decision arises out of a situation. The situation is the historical reality that has reached the crisis stage and calls for a decision. Historical reality develops into a crisis when the historical agents—individuals, groups, parties, and classes—no longer rely on the basic tenets of their social and political life, that is, when at least one agent no longer acknowledges the work of the other as its own. One party renounces the social contract—whether it had been an explicit or an implicit one—and reality begins to deteriorate into a struggle between different parties, none of which acknowledges the claim of the other to realize the common good. Each party, or at least one of them, acts in the name of the common good by separating itself from the others and by claiming that the others are the foe and must be destroyed if need be. To strengthen and promote the conflicting tendencies that are inherent in reality and thus to destroy the common good may be the path to glory for those who believe in this or that sort of necessity in history, whether they call it fate, destiny, or by some other name. In the terms of Being and Time , a person following this path is a Held, since he responds to and fulfills destiny rather than evading it; that is, he submits to the sort of necessity he assumes to be at work in history. Carl Schmitt is often believed to have done so on the political right. According to him, there are no common norms, values, or third parties to intervene when one of two or several other parties have defined the other as the foe one must be willing to kill in order to preserve «one's own form {die eigene, seinsmäßige Art} of existence.» 23 Schmitt became famous for these theories, for in taking the radical step he fulfilled fate and destiny and thus became what «Germans» mean by Held, which is different from the American understanding of authenticity (see chapter 5, section C). Submitting to destiny required rightists to step out of the bounds of the Weimar constitution, the sphere of mediation, and to consider it and politics in general from the viewpoint of the warrior who has distanced himself from the other whom he has defined as the foe to be killed if need be.

However, is there really only one way of understanding decision, Entscheidung? Is Entscheidung necessarily always a de-cision, a separation, a Scheidung, divorce, and the subsequent struggle? Adorno, Heidegger's great antipode in the 1960s in Germany, who, like Benjamin, took the temporality of beings much more seriously than Heidegger did and who therefore did not look for an origin of history in or beyond history, permitted himself once to

indulge in an etymological speculation. Notwendigkeit, Necessity, means, as he said, «die Not wenden,» to turn around, against, necessity, to set one's face against and break fate, destiny, and necessity—in other words, not subjugation to necessity, but breaking necessity. Along the lines of this remarkable piece of etymology, one might also listen more closely to the word Entscheidung, and what one might hear is that Ent-Scheidung is the End' of Scheidung, the end of separation or divorce. Combined with Notwendigkeit in Adorno's sense of the turn against destiny, Entscheidung as the end of divorce is the call for alliance, for the covenant, in the moment of danger, of crisis. For all those who think in terms of fate and necessity and who thus favor the clarity of the «one» voice, this may have seemed futile and idealistic and indicative of a lack of the Härte des Willens, hardness of the will that Heidegger and his ilk held in such high esteem. 24 But who knows whether the destiny and necessity they claim «we» have to subjugate ourselves to is not just their own self-fulfilling demagogy. To look for the covenant, alliance, in the moment of crisis is the opposite of what Heidegger and the other rightists understand by decision. It is not to divorce oneself from the other, expelling him out of oneself, so as to be prepared to kill the other, and it is also not simply recognizing the other as other, as some people have interpreted Heidegger's concept of authenticity. Looking for the covenant involves the recognition of the other in his own right as well as of the other in oneself and of oneself as the other. At the same time it also implies accepting that the other, in fact, all human beings, have a claim on one. It is the recognition of the reciprocal

, grace, potlatch between me and the other and respect for our human rights. Looking for the covenant aims at ending the gesture of divorcing the other and one's own «part maudit» from oneself. Maybe, Carl Schmitt also meant something like this when after World War II he gave a short and enigmatic interpretation of his concept of the foe: «The foe is our own question as Gestalt. » 25 In terms of philosophy and politics in the twenties, to recognize one's «part maudit» was to make an alliance with the Jews and the Jew in oneself—or, rather, with the Jewish prophet in oneself—and not, as in right-wingers, to deny and expel the Jews and the Jewish prophet in oneself.

In a section entitled "The Break with the Myth of Origin {Ursprungsmythos} in the Enlightenment and the Romantic Reaction," 26 Tillich maintains: «The powers of the myth of origin, to be sure, have been broken by the Enlightenment; their symbols and forms of expression have been destroyed; but they have not been eradicated as powers, neither as psychological nor as social powers» (SD 24f.; SE 33). In a section entitled "The Struggle Concerning Tradition," he states:

A weariness with autonomy {Daß man der Autonomie müde geworden ist} can be discerned in all groups and levels of society. This is one of the most sig-

nificant mood-determining elements in the background {einer der wichtigsten stimmungsmäßgen Hintergründe} of contemporary political events. It is also a root {Wurzel} of the antiparliamentary tendency of the younger generation. (SD 169, n. 21; SE 41, n. 1)

In his analysis of "The leading Groups and the Limits of the Bourgeois Principle {bürgerlichen Prinzips}," he points to certain developments among the bourgeois parties and argues that they testify to «a true consciousness of the limits of the bourgeois principle and the impossibility of its standing alone without a supportive pre-bourgeois substance» (SD 56; SE 55). These three passages outline the common ground of a rightist analysis and Tillich's analysis of the political situation of that time. Tillich and the rightists, however, interpret these assumptions differently, and they also draw completely different conclusions.

In the table of contents of Tillich's book, there are the following entries: "Introduction: The Two Roots {Wurzeln} of Political Thought," "I. Mythical Powers of Origin {Ursprungsmythische Mächte}," "Part Two: The Principle of Bourgeois Society {Das Prinzip der bürgerlichen Gesellschaft} and the inner Conflict of Socialism," and "5. Eros and Purpose in the Life of the Community {im Leben der Gemeinschaft}" (SD vff.; SE 5f.). Looking at these titles and the few passages quoted above, one would not necessarily expect the author to be on the left part of the political spectrum. Rather, his vocabulary («roots,» «principles,» «origin,» «Gemeinschaft») sounds more conservative. In part, the vocabulary results from his Christian beliefs and his conceptualization of those beliefs. More important, however, is Tillich's use of these terms, which distinguishes his position from both the Right and the Left. Concerning the Right, Tillich attempts to meet «the others» on their own ground and to convince them that, for their own sake, they should consider using the rightist way of thinking and vocabulary not in the name of a philosophy of origins but in order to oppose a philosophy of origins, for only in opposition to such a philosophy can the rightists realize their intentions as well as that of the origin. Concerning the Left, Tillich is convinced that the Left was wrong in neglecting the claims of all the Gemeinschaften.

For Tillich political behavior and thought have two roots. He introduces one of them with reference to Heidegger:

Human beings find themselves in existence {Der Mensch findet sich vor}; they find themselves as they find their environment, and as this latter finds them and itself. But to find oneself means that one does not originate from oneself; it means to have an origin that is not oneself, or—in the pregnant phrase of Martin Heidegger—to be "thrown" into the world. The human question concerning the "Whence" of existence {die menschliche Frage nach dem "Woher"} arises out of this situation. Only later does it appear as a philosophical question. But it has always been a question; and its first and permanently normative answer is enshrined in myth.

The origin is creative {Der Ursprung läßt entspringen}. Something new springs into being, something that did not previously exist and now is something with its own character over against the origin. We experience ourselves as posited, yet also as independent. Our life proceeds in a tension between dependence on the origin and independence. For the origin does not let us go; it is not something that was and is no longer, once we become independent selves. Rather, we are continually dependent on the origin; it bears us, it creates us anew at every moment, and thereby holds us fast. The origin brings us forth as something new and singular; but it takes us, as such, back to the origin again. Just in being born we become involved in having to die. "It is necessary that things should pass away into that from which they are born," declares the first saying handed down to us in Western philosophy {the fragment of Anaximander}. Our life runs its course in terms of birth, development and death. No living thing can transcend the limits set by its birth; development is the growing and passing away of what comes from the origin and returns to it. This has been expressed in myth in infinitely diverse ways, according to the things and events in which a particular group envisages its origin. In all mythology, however, there resounds the cyclical law of birth and death. Every myth is a myth of origin, that is, an answer to the question about the "Whence" of existence and an expression of dependence on the origin and on its power. The consciousness oriented to the myth of origin is the root of all conservative and romantic thought in politics . (SD 3f.; SE 18)

The other root raises the opposite question:

But human beings not only find themselves in existence; they not only know themselves to be posited and withdrawn in the cycle of birth and death, like all living things. They experience a demand {eine Forderung} that frees them from being simply bound to what is given, and which compels them to add to the question "Whence?" [Woher ] the question "Whither?" [Wozu ]. With this question the cycle is broken in principle and humankind is elevated beyond the sphere of merely living things. For the demand calls for {Die Forderung fordert} something that does not yet exist but should exist, should come to fulfillment. A being that experiences a demand is no longer simply bound to the origin. Human life involves more than a mere development of what already is. Through the demand, humanity is directed to what ought to be. And what ought to be does not emerge with the unfolding of what is; if it did, it would be something that is, rather than something that ought to be. This means, however, that the demand that confronts humanity is an unconditional demand {unbedingte Forderung}. The question "Whither?" is not contained within the limits of the question "Whence?" It is something unconditionally new {ein unbedingt Neues} that transcends what is new and what is old within the sphere of mere development. Through human beings, something unconditionally new is to be realized; this is the meaning of the demand that they experience, and which they are able to experience because in them being is twofold. For the human person is not only an individual, a self, but also has knowledge about himself or herself, and thereby the possibility of transcending what is found within the self and around the self. This is human freedom, not that one has a so-called "free will," but that as a human being one

is not bound to what one finds in existence, that one is subject to a demand that something unconditionally new should be realized through oneself. Thus the cycle of birth and death is broken; the existence and the actions of human beings are not confined within a mere development of their origin. Wherever this consciousness prevails, the tie to the origin has been dissolved in principle and the myth of origin has been broken in principle. The breaking of the myth of origin by the unconditional demand is the root of liberal, democratic, and socialist thought in politics . (SD 4f.; SE 18f.)

However, as Tillich explains «we cannot stop with a simple opposition between these two aspects of human existence» (SD 5; SE 19). For, as he argues throughout the entire book, the «unconditional demand» must not ignore and simply push aside the powers of origin, nor must the powers of the origin exclude the demand. Thus, from the beginning Tillich's key motif is just the opposite of Heidegger's. If one reads Heidegger's concept of historicality along the lines of Birmingham or Guignon, one will probably expect Heidegger to be mentioned in connection with Tillich's second «root.» However, I hope to have shown that, indeed, Tillich is right in connecting Heidegger with the first root. For all the emphasis on futurality in Heidegger, in the moment of becoming authentic Dasein realizes the «peculiarly privileged position in the historical» of «having-been » (BT 438; SZ 386), and the resulting futurality of authentic Dasein consists in its work of canceling Gesellschaft and of rerealizing «having-been, » the Gemeinschaft.

To be sure, as happens so often in situations of crisis, Tillich, too, develops a «grand narrative.» However, Heideggerians are the last to deny that a more or less «grand» narrative is needed to illuminate our concrete situation. In addition, Tillich's version differs from the others I have presented so far in two respects. First, he develops it in order to meet the rightists on their own ground. Second, it enables him to present an interpretation of Germany' s political history from the nineteenth century on that, like no other book written by a professional philosopher in the 1910s and 1920s, illuminates the concrete tensions of the different political movements and parties. Explaining this second aspect in concrete detail would go beyond the scope of this book, and the same is true for a detailed presentation of Tillich's interpretation of Jewish and Christian religions and their relationship to politics. Thus, the following presentation of the motifs found in Tillich that are relevant to my purpose here is somewhat abstract and sketchy and does not capture the richness and concreteness of his original text.

In his foreword, Tillich explains that the

political events of recent years have been decisive in providing the impulse to begin and complete this book: the decline of the political influence of the Social

Democrats, the apparently final split in the proletarian working class {between the Social Democrats and the communists}, the triumphal advance of National Socialism, the consolidation of the late-capitalistic powers on a military basis, the increasingly perilous situation in foreign affairs. (SD xxxiii; SE 12)

In his framework, this means that the first root of political thinking is about to exclude the second one and its representatives, liberalism, Social Democrats and communists. At the same time, this sentence indicates the Left's political failure in not having been able to offer forms in which the adherents of rightist movements and parties or all the vacillating Daseine can recognize themselves and their needs.

The first root thinks in terms of origin. An origin is always a particular origin, a particular «soil ,» a particular «blood ,» or a particular «social group » that provides its members with identity and claims their allegiance while punishing their departure from it. It is the holiness of Being that, in religious terms, is sanctified by the priests who consecrate a particular site, blood, or group as origin. Though each origin is particular, there is a tendency to enlarge its dominion. Thinking in terms of origin is a spatial thinking, since it excludes the new, and justice is not relevant to it (SD 13ff., 18ff.; SE 24ff., 27ff.). Tillich uses the notion of «principle» («Prinzip») in order to denote a dynamis, a power of a historical reality, that accounts for the emergence of new and unexpected realizations of an origin or root (SD 9f.; SE 22f.). The first root is meant to account for mythology, for strands in Greek philosophy, and also attitudes and mentalities in modem societies as they are manifest in psychological and social phenomena and in movements such as the Youth Movement. Indeed, it is part of the anthropology Marxism must not lack (SD 164, n. 3; SE 16, n. 3). The first root is the opposite of the second whose first realization Tillich sees in Jewish prophecy:

It is the significance of Jewish prophetism to have fought explicitly against the myth of origin and the attachment to space and to have conquered them. On the basis of a powerful social myth of origin, Jewish prophetism radicalized the social imperative to the point of freeing itself from the bond of origin. God is free from the soil, the sacred land, not because he has conquered foreign lands, but precisely because he has led foreign conquerors into his own land in order to punish the "people of his inheritance" and to subject them to an unconditional demand. The bond of origin between God and his people is broken if the bond of the law is broken by the people. Thus the myth of origin is shattered— and this is the world-historical mission of Jewish prophetism. With the breaking of the tie to the soil, the other forms of the myth of origin also lose their power. The sacred aristocracy, including the monarchy, is rejected for the sake of righteousness. The claim of belonging to the people avails nothing in face of the unconditional demand, on account of which the alien can be held in equal, indeed, in higher esteem. The priestly tradition is not abolished but is judged

by the demand of righteousness, and its cultic aspects are devalued. The breaking of the myth of origin becomes evident, finally, in the prophet's opposition to the priests. (SD 20; SE 29)

Christianity has adopted «the spirit of Judaism.» However, the myth of the origin has made its way into Christianity (SD 21; SE 30):

Over against {the fact that the myth of origin has made its way into Christianity} it remains the function of the Jewish spirit to raise the prophetic protest, both in Judaism and in Christianity, against every new attempt to revive such bondage to the myth of origin, and to help time, the unconditional demand, and the "Wither" to be victorious over space, mere being, and the "Whence." The spirit of Judaism is therefore the necessary and 'eternal enemy of political romanticism. Anti-Semitism is an essential element in political romanticism. Christianity, however, by virtue of its principle, belongs radically and unambiguously on the side of Judaism in this conflict. Any wavering on this issue is apostasy from itself, involving compromise and denial of the shattering—manifest in the cross—of all holiness of being, even the highest religious being. A Christianity that abandons its prophetic foundation by allying itself with political romanticism has lost its own identity.

Of course, prophetism and Judaism cannot simply be equated. Old Testament prophetism is the persistent struggle of the "spirit of Judaism" with the realities of Jewish national life . For the actual life of the Jewish nation, like the actual life of every nation, is by nature pagan. Hence, we see the foolishness of certain nationalistic demands that the Old Testament be dismissed as an expression of an alien nationality. In fact, the Old Testament writings are a continuous testimony to the struggle of prophetic Judaism against pagan, national Judaism. For this reason, and solely for this reason, the Old Testament is a book for humanity—because in it the particular, the bondage to space and blood and nationalism, are seen as things to be fought against.

Now it is the tragedy of Judaism that its historical fate not only broke the hegemony of the powers of origin, but also frequently dissolved them altogether, insofar as no new ties to the soil were created in their place (though this did come to pass in east-European Judaism). This negative element, the critical dissolution of the myth of origin instead of its prophetic transformation, gives to anti-Semitism and political romanticism an apparent justification for resisting this tendency. But this justification is invalid, because such resistance, instead of strengthening the prophetic element in Judaism against the dissolving tendency, fights against the prophetic element itself and thereby weakens its power, even within Judaism. (SD 21f.; SE 30f.)

The basic attitude is «Erwartung,» Erwartung of the unconditioned new. Erwartung, expectation, is the opposite of Ursprungsbindung, tie to the origin, and the political Right. Erwartung is not passive but rather entails action (SD 100ff.; SE 85ff.). The second root is also present in the modem era. In fact, the modem age is the presence of the second root in world history. Autonomy as

well as «objectification» («Verdinglichung») and «analysis» («In every origin there is an element of the unconditioned. The wholly conditioned, that which has become merely a thing, no longer bears any marks of the origin» [SD 48; SE 49].) carry out the principle of bourgeois society, namely, to radically break and do away with any bondage to the origin and its powers (SD 23ff., 47ff.; SE 31ff., 49ff.).

The political Right is a reaction against the developed bourgeois society and against the latter's principles and procedures. Tillich labels the political right «political romanticism» (SD 27ff.; SE 34ff.), distinguishes between two forms—a conservative and a revolutionary form—and argues that the

two forms of political romanticism, despite the differences in their concept of the goal, are united in their desire to return to the origin—not in a general way, but to the particular powers of origin from which prophetism and bourgeois society have broken away. All their political demands are basically to be understood in terms of this return to origin.
The return to the soil {Boden }. . . .
Blood and race {Blut und Rasse}. . . .

The return to the social group is expressed in the appeal for "community" {Gemeinschaft} which is so common to all forms of political romanticism. . . . It presents the demand, so to speak, for the son to create the mother and to call the father into being out of nothing. (SD 29-32; SE 36-38)

Tillich then develops this motif in regard to several aspects, among them tradition:

Between the origin and the present stands tradition. It is therefore of decisive importance in every respect for political romanticism to be able to relate itself to prebourgeois traditions.

The fact that there has been an almost two-hundred-year-old break with traditions in most sectors of life cannot, however, be wished away. Political romanticism, in the face of this, has only two possibilities: either to defend such islands of tradition as remain, even though they have become meaningless in the total structure of existence, or to attempt to revive the old, lost traditions. But a tradition that has been broken is really no longer a tradition, but a literary remembrance. The attempt to make tradition out of literary remembrances is the true mark of romanticism, on account of which it is called romanticism; and this is also the clearest expression of its inner contradiction. . .. In every case, tradition has two connotations: descent from an origin and subordination to the authority of the origin, i.e., of a special realm and its structure. Small as the practical value of these ideas may seem at the present time, their ideological power is strong, and thus their value as weapons against existing forms {Kampfwert gegen bestehende Gestaltungen}. Their attack is directed against {gegen} universal humanistic education, against the leveling of moral standards {Sitten, that is, customs and the ethical standards embodied in them} and philosophies of life as a result of the uniform framework of social interchange; against the intellectual auton-

omy of the individual and the lack of inwardly authoritative criteria; against the openness of the professions to everyone and the lack of established social rankings; against the equalizing tendencies of the metropolis, in which many realms of life interpenetrate one another, and whose influences, through technical means such as radio and cinema, draw even the rural areas into this single unit. Finally, and chiefly, it is directed against the political autonomy of the individual, detached from all special traditions. Positively, the myth of tradition concentrates on the national tradition. It finds its climax in the demand to maintain this tradition, to strengthen it through the creation of a national historical legend, and to free it from international traditions. Political romanticism demands such a myth of tradition and sets about creating it. (SD 33f.; SE 39)

This passage can be regarded as an excellent summary and critique of the intentions of the political Right. Concerning Heidegger, what I wanted to show in this book is that section 74 of Being and Time in its logical structure as well as its contents is a brilliant summary of the revolutionary Right. What in Tillich is «subordination to the authority of the origin,» is in Heidegger «erwidert vielmehr» (SZ 386; BT 438). What in Tillich is «their attack is directed against {gegen},» is in Heidegger the «disavowal {Widerruf } of that which in the "today", is working itself out as the 'past'» (BT 438; SZ 386), this disavowal already being anticipated in the sentence that authentic Dasein acts «against {gegen}» «the way of interpreting Dasein which has come down to us» (BT 435; SZ 383; see above, chapter 2, section C). Since the subordination to the origin occurs in a situation in which the origin is seen as endangered or even as already pushed aside by «that which in the "today", is working itself out as the 'past'» (BT 438; SZ 386), Heidegger labels the subordination an Erwiderung («erwidert vielmehr,» SZ 386; BT 438) in the sense of «I erwidere, respond, to a call for help.» I respond to the call for help by destroying («Widerruf ») what threatens or has pushed aside the origin. Since the past calls upon me to rerealize it against «that which in the "today", is working itself out as the 'past'» (BT 438; SZ 386), my repeating of the past does not just simply «bring again [Wiederbringen] something that is 'past'» (BT 437; SZ 385; the last sentence belongs to the passage through which Heidegger makes clear that he is summarizing not just rightist politics, but the politics of the revolutionary rightists; by adding «of {the} people» [BT 436; SZ 384], he turns his summary into an option for National Socialism; see chapter 3, section E). In fact, in Tillich's analysis of political romanticism one finds several sentences with the same structure found in Heidegger's passage on Erwiderung and Widerruf (SZ 386; BT 438). Consider, for instance: «The leading groups, especially of revolutionary romanticism, seek to counter the threat of their complete loss of power {Entmächtigung} by depriving the rising proletariat of its power {Wider-entmächtigung}» (SD 43, hyphen mine, J. F.; SE 46); or: «The way from being to consciousness, from origin to structure, cannot be reversed {rückwärts gehen} without the

destruction of the society that has undergone this development {Vernichtung der Gesellschaft, die ihn gegangen ist}» (SD 56; SE 55f.). Or, consider his definition of political romanticism:

Out of the convergence of all these forces {that is, eros, fate, and death}, political romanticism arises. It is an attempt to restore {wieder herzustellen} the broken myth of origin, both spiritually and socially.

Political romanticism is, thus, the countermovement to {Gegenbewegung gegen } prophetism and the Enlightenment on the basis of a spiritual and social situation that is determined by prophetism and the Enlightenment . (SD 25f.; SE 33f.)

The first part in each quote corresponds to the sentence on Erwiderung, and the second corresponds to the sentence on Widerruf in Heidegger.27

Tillich's criticism of the social democrats and the communists does not soften the basic distinction between the Right and the Left as to temporality. On the contrary, his definition of political romanticism captures the intention of the political Right to turn back to the past so as to replace the basic features of the present, Gesellschaft, with those of the revitalized past, Gemeinschaft. Socialism, however, is not oriented toward the past, but rather toward the unconditioned new in the future, as is all prophecy: «The socialist principle, so far as its substance is concerned, is prophetic . Socialism is a prophetic movement, but it exists in a context in which the myth of origin has been broken and the bourgeois principle has become dominant. Socialism is prophetism on the soil of an autonomous, self-sufficient world » (SD 101; SE 86). As the first sentence already indicates, however, Tillich differs from the leftist theories I have discussed in his attitude to the Gemeinschaften of the past. For to most Leftists the Gemeinschaften were of no positive significance. In Heidegger's terms, social democrats were engaged in inauthentic futurality, that is, a temporality that does not impart «to having-been its peculiarly privileged position in the historical» (BT 438; SZ 386). For social democrats, as Benjamin put it (see section A), «thought fit to assign to the working class the role of the redeemer of future generations.» According to Benjamin (see section A), Blanqui and the members of the Spartacist groups acted out of «hatred» toward the past. According to them, the various Gemeinschaften in the past «enslaved» their «ancestors.» Heidegger would probably regard this as an even more intense form of inauthentic futurality than the one practiced by the social democrats. For Lukács, the process of the proletariat becoming conscious was the first manifestation of the identical subject-object as the purpose of history. All these leftists regarded relics of former Gemeinschaften as obstacles to joining the Left. Tillich, however, maintains that it was the decisive mistake of the socialist theoreticians to insist on the complete reification of the proletarians (SD 99; SE 84). According to him,

the proletarians oppose the bourgeois society for the same reasons the political romantics do:

That which reacts in the proletarian is the same as that which political romanticism makes the sole principle of human nature and of society —the origin . Here is the point where they stand together in opposition to the bourgeois principle. They differ only in that, presupposing this relation to the origin, political romanticism seeks to reject {zurücknehmen} the bourgeois principle, while socialism seeks to incorporate it {aufnehmen}. In this light we can understand that in spite of their common point of departure, namely, the elevation of humanity as opposed to the dehumanizing bourgeois principle, political romanticism attacks socialism so forcefully. The bourgeoisie from its inception has guarded itself, both psychologically and socially, against a complete severance of its connection with the origin. It has never consistently carried through its own principle. The proletariat, by contrast, was forced into such consistency by its situation. . .. There remains an element of proletarian being which has not been reduced to the status of a thing, and from this element there emerges the struggle against the bourgeois principle . (SD 98f.; SE 83f.)

Again, a comparison to section 74 of Being and Time reveals the same differences. The political Right erwidert the call of the origin for help and widerruft (zurücknehmen as in the last quote: something has moved forward on the road; I nehme, catch it and pull it zurück, back to cancel or destroy) the bourgeois principle. Liberals as well as the leftists do not listen to the call and proceed on the road of Gesellschaft (aufnehmen as in the last quote: I pick it up and carry it forward in order to save it from those who want to zurücknehmen it) toward a future society no longer marked by the political suppression characteristic of former Gemeinschaften. According to Tillich, the proletarians erwidern the call of the different Gemeinschaften. In this, they behave like rightists and not like liberals and not in the way socialist theoreticians have so far believed them to behave. However, they don't cancel Gesellschaft, but like liberals and leftists, they rely on it. Socialism adheres to the bourgeois principle of breaking the power of origin and of subjecting everyone to the unconditional demand (SD 100ff., 109ff.; SE 85ff., 92ff.). However, socialism can no longer adhere to the bourgeois belief in harmony. For reification and economic crises have proven the liberal realization of the bourgeois principle wrong, or at least one-sided. The laws of capitalist economy do not lead to equality, freedom, and harmony but to their opposites. Thus, socialism has to assume that the bourgeois principle can be realized only in a socialist society (SD 57ff.; SE 56ff.). The bourgeois society must be overcome and be replaced with a different economy if its ideals are to be realized. Tillich describes this relationship between proletarians and bourgeois Gesellschaft and the bourgeois principle in formulations such as that socialism is «the fulfillment {Vollendung } of the bourgeois principle » and at the same time «the expression of its destruction » (SD 61; SE

59). Clearly, he is talking about a dialectical Aufhebung and not a Widerruf of Gesellschaft. Socialism is the expression of the destruction of the bourgeois principle also for the reason that, according to Tillich, socialism has to draw on the powers and needs of the origin and take them seriously. His thesis is that the powers of the origin are not a hindrance to socialism, but rather the very drives without which there would be no realization of socialism. The need for Boden, Blut, and Gemeinschaft cannot be satisfied immediately, that is, in precapitalist communities, for this leads to the struggle of different origins. It has to be translated into the terms of the second root. However, this need cannot be realized within bourgeois society either, for this leads to imperialism, poverty, and abstract autonomy. Socialism does realize the needs of the Gemeinschaften and of autonomy by transferring them to a different sphere. Tillich uses for this the expression that socialism has to be able «at once to break {brechen} and to confirm {bestätigen}» (SE 123; the English translation has «to judge and to support,» SD 151) the needs of the first root. The National Socialists are «false prophets,» and false prophets are not those «whose predictions don't come true,» but rather those who preach «" 'peace, peace,' {Heil}, when there is no peace {Heil}," for example in an origin-related group that expects to achieve stability and power by avoiding the demand for justice» (SD 173f., n. 4; SE 89 n.). The end of the last longer quotation above already contains Tillich' s theory on why, so far, socialism has failed to take into account the needs of the powers of origin. Stripped of the details of Tillich' s conceptual framework and his rich references to German history, his theory reads as follows. In the nineteenth century the bourgeoisie entered into alliances with the prebourgeois origins of Blut, Boden, and Gemeinschaft to strengthen its dominion. In the process, the prebourgeois groups were integrated, and the needs of the origins were more or less satisfied. In this situation, emerging socialism had no other choice but to side with the radical bourgeoisie, the liberals and thus realize the bourgeois principle better than the bourgeoisie itself, because otherwise society could not reach the point at which socialist changes would become possible. Thus, socialism ended up in pronounced opposition to all groups and needs that belong to the first root (SD 66ff.; SE 62ff.). However, this situation has changed because of the World War:

The new and pivotal factor in the present situation is that the origin-related groups have assumed, to a large extent, a stance of opposition to bourgeois society. It is a function of National Socialism to have accomplished this revolution by means that corresponded to the origin-related character of these groups. Prerequisite to this success was, to be sure, the shattering of the mutually supportive relationship of the bourgeois and the prebourgeois forces through which they maintained the system of class domination at the expense of the proletariat. The World War, the inflation, and the international economic crisis forced the bourgeoisie to impose the cost of dominion upon the middle classes, too. They were sucked into

the crisis of capitalism, not only as individuals but also as groups. For a time, capitalism had held out advantages for them: the possibility of appointment and promotion as clerks and middle-level officials in the bureaucracy; strong safeguards against unemployment; the management of, and payment of interest on, savings; the heavy demand especially for products created by advanced agricultural methods. But all this perished in the war, the inflation, and the economic crisis. Thereby a new situation was created for socialism. It is not mere demagoguery for the revolutionary movement of the middle classes to call itself socialist {the NSDAP}. It has a real "expectation." The symbolic term the Third Reich , for example, refers not only to the concept of a third German empire; it also, by virtue of the magic number three, conjures up the ancient expectations of a third age. The content of this expectation is simply the unbroken origin, reflecting the inner contradiction of political romanticism in general. Thus the movement is in constant danger of being absorbed by the conservative form of political romanticism and of being led back into the service of class rule. This danger is all the greater since the movement's Führer appears to be working for this end. If this should happen, the realization of socialism in Germany would be impossible, unless new movements should arise out of economic or political catastrophes. (SD 129f.; SE 106)

When the book was published in 1933, the National Socialists had already come to power, Tillich had to leave Germany, and Heidegger was about to give his rectorate address in which he would continue to use motifs that were also used by Christians in a pagan sense. At least from 1929 on, it was pretty obvious that the National Socialists and «big business» had become allies. In contrast to the National Socialist Heidegger, Scheler and Tillich had sufficient judgment to anticipate that the alliance of German capitalists, conservative bourgeoisie, and National Socialism would be disastrous. One might call Tillich's suggestion a dialectical approach. In doing so, however, one should not forget two things. First, there is no dialectical development in Tillich. His notion of socialism is an act of balance at the last minute, an effort to save Europe from a «return to barbarism {Rückkehr in die Barbarei}» (SD 161; SE 130), and it is an offer to the rightists:

But a socialist decision is demanded also of the enemies of socialism. Above all, those groups that today carry the word socialism in their names must be brought to a real socialist decision. . .. These groups are not to become a part of the proletariat but rather are to be drawn to its side, so that by a common socialist decision the fate of death now facing the people of Europe can be averted {damit in gemeinsamer sozialistischer Entscheidung das Todesschicksal der europäischen Völker gewendet werde}. Only the socialist decision can avert this fate. It is for this reason that we are summoned to it. (SD xxxif.; SE 11)28

Second, Tillich's book is a very concrete piece of party politics with regard to the major topics.29 One can surely say that Tillich' s suggestion is in line with

and is in fact a further development of the late Scheler' s suggestion of a politics of «Ausgleich.» However, my purpose here is not a discussion of the concept of socialism at the time, but only the difference between Heidegger' s idea of historicality and the liberal and leftist concepts of history. Clearly, Tillich's suggestion is based on the difference between the Right and the Left that I have elucidated from the writings of Hitler, Heidegger, Scheler, and Lukács. Tillich's own suggestion does not blur the distinction but rather emphasizes it even more, insofar as he insists that, indeed, the needs of the origin, of the past, have a right to be fulfilled; however, they cannot be fulfilled by canceling Gesellschaft and by rerealizing or returning to a Gemeinschaft, but only by sublating bourgeois Gesellschaft into a socialist Gesellschaft, which is not the repetition of some past but rather something unconditionally new even though it can be brought about only with the powers of the origin. As Tillich puts it:

The actual origin {the one conjured up by the rightists} is not the origin in truth . It is not the fulfillment of what is intended for humanity from the origin. The fulfillment of the origin lies rather in what confronts us as a demand, as an ought. The "Whence" of humanity finds its fulfillment in the "Whither." The actual origin is contradicted by the true origin, not absolutely and in every respect, for the actual origin—in order to be actual at all—must participate in the true origin; it expresses it, but at the same time both obscures it and distorts it. The mentality oriented solely to the myth of origin knows nothing of this ambiguity of the origin. Therefore it clings to the origin and feels that it is a sacrilege to go beyond it. The ambiguity of the origin is first revealed to it when the experience of the unconditional demand frees this consciousness from bondage to the origin. (SD 5f.; SE 19)

Tillich continues:

The demand is directed towards the fulfillment of the true origin. Now a person experiences an unconditional demand only from another person. The demand becomes concrete in the "I-Thou" encounter. The content of the demand is therefore that the "thou" be accorded the same dignity as the "I"; this is the dignity of being free, of being the bearer of the fulfillment implied in the origin. This recognition of the equal dignity of the "Thou" and the "I" is justice. The demand that separates from the ambiguous origin is the demand of justice . From the unbroken origin proceed powers that are in tension with one another; they seek dominion and destroy each other. From the unbroken origin there comes the power of being, the rising and perishing of forces that "pay one another the penalty and compensation for their injustice according to the ordinance of time," as is asserted in the already quoted first statement of Greek philosophy {Anaximander's fragment}. The unconditional demand transcends this tragic cycle of existence. It confronts the power and impotence of being with justice, arising from the demand. And yet, the contrast is not absolute, for the ought is the fulfillment of the is. Justice is the true power of being . In it the intention of the origin is fulfilled.

The result is that the two elements of human being and the two roots of political thought are related in such a way that the demand is superior to mere origin and justice is superior to the mere power of being. The question "Whither?" is of higher rank than the question "Whence?" Only when the myth of origin is broken and its ambiguity disclosed may it enter into political thinking . (SD 6; SE 19f.)

Neither Heidegger in Being and Time nor Tillich talk about the choices of an individual with regard to his or her private life but about decisions in the realm of the political. Sentences such as Tillich's on the I and the Thou and on justice do not exist anywhere in Heidegger. Already before Heidegger announced the return to his version of the pre-Socratics in public, Tillich had realized that in the political romanticism of the time—and that included Heidegger—the Greek myth of the origin was at work. He saw that it would be disastrous to renew this type of thinking in the context of a fully developed capitalist society and at the risk of excluding the Jewish-Christian tradition. Today, many American Heideggerians or post-Heideggerians talk about the «JewGreek,» after Derrida did so.30 Often, it seems as though one can become a «JewGreek» only via carefully studying Heidegger in all his maneuvers, achievements, and for some interpreters also his failures. Tillich identified the «pure Greek» much earlier, and he put the «JewGreek» to work with regard to the political situation of his days in an admirably concrete manner.31 Perhaps, some will say the demand of justice with which he confronted the «Greeks» interferes with the other in a metaphysical fashion. However, in hindsight one will agree that his diagnosis of the other was right. Besides, to let the other be the other is much more risky than—and therefore can never simply mean—just letting the other be the other.

A. Geschlecht, Gemächte, and Technology in Heidegger

Heidegger's concept of politics as it is presented in Being and Time is not politically neutral. Rather, it is a brilliant summary of the politics of the revolutionary Right and as such is directed against the conservative Right, liberals, social democrats, communists, and socialists like Paul Tillich. Leaving aside the issue of repetition and construed according to the formula of the political used a lot nowadays, that is, in terms of «the other,» the different concepts of decision can be summarized as: decision or Ent-scheidung as Ausscheidung, the excretion of the other and the other within oneself, accompanied by the destructive turn against the other as in Heidegger; decision as the intensification of the antagonistic relationship to the other so that finally, in a classless society, the polemical relationship to the other can be overcome, as in Lukács's model; finally, as in Tillich, decision as the end of separation that allows one to make a covenant, an alliance, with the other, a covenant that acknowledges the other and the other within oneself and thus prevents oneself and the other from drifting apart, which would result in an Ausscheidung of the other. The act of Ausscheidung of the other presupposes the Ausscheidung of one's own ordinary or inauthentic Dasein, the Ausscheidung of oneself as «they» and of Gesellschaft, in order to reconstitute oneself as a healthy and pure Gemeinschaft. For some this act was painful. However, the political Right managed to make many people think that they would eventually be rewarded for the act of Ausscheidung with the blessings of the revitalized Gemeinschaft.

The concept of fate or destiny, used by philosophers and politicians on the Right, drew its impact and power from its polemical character in regard to the Center and the Left. As long as there was the common enemy, that is, the liberals and the leftists, many people on the political Right felt no need to consider their actual and possible alliances with other groups on the political Right. Many rightists did not join the National Socialist Party. However, Heidegger had built into his brilliant summary of revolutionary rightist politics in Being and Time an option for the National Socialists, and there was nothing in Being and Time on which he could have based a critique of National Socialism. Heidegger joined the National Socialist Party in 1933—notably, on May I, prior to 1933 the national holiday honoring the working class, an achievement of the Left.

Conservatives as well as National Socialists used the term «Opfer,» sacrifice, for the Ausscheidung. In the sections on Hitler and Scheler, I have already mentioned some occurrences of Opfer. In a speech, "The University in the National Socialist State," delivered on November 30, 1933, in Tübingen, Heidegger said:

We of today are in the process of fighting to bring about the new reality. We are merely a transition, a willing sacrifice. As the warriors in this struggle we must be a hard race {ein hartes Geschlecht}, that cares for nothing of its own, that rests firmly on the foundation of the people and the nation {auf den Grund des Volkes}. The struggle is not about individuals and colleagues, nor about empty tokens and general measures. All genuine struggle bears some permanent mark of the image of the combatants and their work. Struggle alone reveals the true laws whereby things are brought into being. The struggle we seek is one in which we stand shoulder to shoulder, man to man.1

«(Geschlecht» can be used in several ways. As Derrida remarks, depending on its contexts it can be translated by «sex, race, family, generation, lineage, species, genre/genus»2 or «sex, race, species, genus, gender, stock, family, generation or genealogy, community.»3 Nowadays the word «Geschlecht» is used in bureaucratic and administrative forms and documents, in science, and in words like «Geschlechtskrankheit,» (venereal disease) or «Geschlechts-verkehr» (sexual intercourse). In these contexts, it is used as a descriptive term without any emotional connotations. Nevertheless, in other' contexts it can be given dramatic flavor, as in the passage Derrida quotes from Fichte,4 in the quote from Heidegger above, or in the statement a somewhat old-fashioned Heideggerian today might make, namely, that our Geschlecht is living in the closure of metaphysics. In this last sense all human beings alive in the present are the current Geschlecht. The term can also have emphatic connotations when used in the sense of lineage, family, dynasty as the Geschlechter in aristocratic societies («Agamemnon belongs to/is of the Geschlecht of the Atrides»). The emphasis is on the nobility of the Geschlecht whose members

are noble because of the nobility of their blood. Of course, it can also mean race or Volk as, for instance, in the quote from Heidegger. Again, the emphasis is on the nobility and purity of the race or the Volk. «Hart» is «hard,» «hart wie Krupp-Stahl,» «as hard as steel made by Krupp,» as the Führer wanted German soldiers to be.

«Geschlecht» in the sense of race or Volk implies that there are several Geschlechter here on earth, and for right-wingers only some are noble and pure. Drawing upon this sense of Geschlecht, Heidegger could easily indicate in one word the imperialistic mission of the German Volk to act as the proxy of mankind. Empirically, the German Volk is one among several Geschlechter; because of its nobility, however, it can and must act «for» (BT 435; SZ 383) all the Geschlechter, that is, for the entire generation, for the human Geschlecht, that is, for all human beings. The passage wiederholt, repeats, section 74 of Being and Time and in particular the sentences on Erwiderung and Widerruf. The call in Being and Time demands that authentic Dasein erwidert the call of the Volk, that is, that Dasein hands itself down to the Volk in order to regain a stable identity in the face of the vacillations of ordinary and inauthentic Dasein. In the same way, in Heidegger's speech, Dasein is called upon to rest firmly on the Grund, foundation, of the people, for only the people provides Dasein with a stable identity. Already in Being and Time this requires that Dasein widerruft, scheidet aus, cancels, eliminates itself as the ordinary Dasein it has been so far. Thus in the speech Dasein no longer cares for anything «of its own,» that is, it sacrifices all what is its own. («Eigenem» [«its own»] is not «eigentlich,» «authentic,» as in «authentic» and «inauthentic,» but rather is that which belongs exclusively to oneself, one's individuality or, as in Eigentum,5 one's private property one has to give up; that is, it is what belongs to inauthentic Dasein; authentic Dasein has to give up its individuality.) In Being and Time , having sacrificed its ordinary Dasein and having found its Grund in the Volk, Dasein is called upon to properly realize the Grund, the Volksgemeinschaft; that is, it is called upon to carry out the Widerruf of the Gesellschaft. Thus, in his speech, Heidegger says: «We of today are in the process of fighting to bring about the new reality.» In Being and Time , the realization of the Volksgemeinschaft is a rerealization of Gemeinschaft or of destiny. Destiny is not produced by the authentic Daseine. Rather, «only . . . in struggling {im Kampf} does the power of destiny become free» (BT 436; SZ 384). Similarly, in the speech struggle does not create the law of the new reality. Rather, «struggle alone reveals the true laws whereby things are brought into being» (italics mine, J. F.).6 The struggle for the new reality requires the sacrifice of «us» as Gesellschaft as well as of those whom we ausscheiden, expel, from the Gemeinschaft. In the first step we expel our Jewish, liberal, or social democratic colleagues out of the university,7 then out of Germany, «und morgen die ganze Welt» («and tomorrow we conquer the entire world,» as the song of the

National Socialists had it). We as well as those whom we ausscheiden might die in this battle. Thus, «we are but a transition, a sacrifice.» However, this sacrifice of our colleagues and maybe also of ourselves is a rightful claim the Volk has on all of us. For, «the battle is not about persons or colleagues.» Therefore persons and colleagues must be sacrificed if need be. Furthermore, we gain something, we gain on a large scale what bourgeois subjects enjoyed only in a fallen version in the privacy of their chambres séparees, that is, the public intimacy of «heart to heart, man to man» as the fulfillment of the promise of Gemeinschaft.

The speech, "The University in the National Socialist State," was Heidegger's last public speech outside of Freiburg under the National Socialist regime.8 At the time, he was already somewhat at odds with the empirical realities of National Socialism, though he remained a National Socialist and faithful to Hitler (MH 158). After the war, Heidegger came to regard politics and action as practiced in the kairos of the twenties and the thirties as metaphysical. He considered the cause he fought for as well as its consequences— namely, Auschwitz—as sent by Geschick and Gestell, destiny and enframing, for which individuals are not responsible,9 and promoted a post-metaphysical notion of praxis, namely, Gelassenheit. In several of his texts of that time, he used another word with the notorious prefix «ge-» whose meanings overlap with those of the word «Geschlecht.» Concerning sex and gender, the word «Geschlecht» often means specifically the male or female sex organ, the vagina or the penis.10 Another word for the male Geschlecht, the male sex organ, is das Gemächte, nowadays an old-fashioned term. Nonetheless, even in 1970 Marg renders «

» in lines 180 and 188 of Hesiod's Theogony —that is, the genitals of Ouranos, which his son, Chronos, cuts off and throws into the sea, out of the foam of which Aphrodite emerges—as «Gemächte.»11 In 1939, in his essay on Aristotle's notion of nature, Heidegger uses «das Gemächte» as a technical term and as his translation of the Greek word

He comments on Aristotle's Physics , 192 b 16-20:

In opposition to beings like "plants," animals, earth, and air, Aristotle now sets beings like bedsteads, robes, shields, wagons, ships, and houses. The former are "growing things" ["Gewächse "] in the same broad sense that we use in speaking of a "field under growth." The latter are "artifacts" (

), in German, Gemächte , although this last term must be stripped of any derogatory connotations. 12

Probably Heidegger arrived at this term in three steps. He begins, so to speak, here on earth, within «a 'here' and a 'yonder'» to which each «'there' {Da}» points (BT 171; SZ 132f.). Thereupon, several individual cases of these «'here'» and «'yonder'» allow for some, so to speak, floating generality. In the

third step, Heidegger claims that, as death in Being and Time , something else «enters into » (BT 292; «in dieses hereinsteht, » SZ 248; literally «stands into») this floating generality. The verb «machen» (to make, to do, to produce, to fix, to manage, to arrange, to perform, to finish) is a word of everyday language used especially when the action performed does not need to be specified. I have ordered a chair at a carpenter's shop, or I have taken a jacket to a tailor for mending. When I go to pick it up, however, the person says: «I have es not yet fertig gemacht, finished it.» Or, the person might say, «It is still in der Mache, in the making.»13 In an art gallery someone admires a canvas. Proudly, I point to myself and say: «I have gemacht it.» Accused of having produced this or that mess, I point to someone else and to the mess and exclaim: «Der da hat das (da) gemacht!» (That da [-sein over there] has done this [mess over there]!). Or, babies or children «machen Pipi,» or «machen sich in die Hose,» that is, urinate or defecate into their pants. As one can already see from these examples, the word—or at least the noun, das Gemachte, or das Machwerk—has a flavor of craftsmanship. It belongs, as it were, to the ordinary world «in the mode of its genuineness» (BT 189; «im Modus seiner Echtheit,» SZ 148), the world of «preparing, putting to rights, repairing, improving, rounding-out» (BT 189; SZ 148) where we see things «as a table, a door, a carriage, or a bridge» (BT 189; SZ 149); it belongs to our human-all-too-human everyday affairs in which we proudly present or tenderly cover up «das nackte Vorhandene» (SZ 150; «some naked thing,» BT 190), or try to blame someone else for it. Still, as the most general term it can be used in almost any situation to point to the cause of something. In this sense Heidegger says in "The Question Concerning Technology": «The fact that the real has been showing itself in the light of Ideas ever since the time of Plato, Plato did not bring about {hat nicht Platon gemacht}. The thinker only responded to what addressed itself to him {Der Denker hat nur dem entsprochen , was sich ihm zusprach }» (BW 299; VA 21, italics mine, J. F.).14

Machen is a verb («I mache something»), gemacht is the perfect participle, used both in the active and passive voice: «I have gemacht it,» and «The table is gemacht.» The participle can be made into a noun: «The table is a Gemachtes.» Or, as Hegel says, the constitution of a state should not be regarded as «ein Gemachtes.»15 Thus, we have a general noun that can be used for everything produced by human beings, for the corresponding comportment of human beings, and maybe also for what brings about this comportment. However, Heidegger could not leave it at das Gemachte, for as a general term in the theory of epochs of Being the word is just too naked and sober. If it has a flavor, it is by no means the entsprechende for the philosopher of destining history of Being. Also, it might have affirmed the illusion that we are the author of what brings about the comportment in which we treat everything as a Gemachtes or as raw material for a Zu-Machendes. Thus, Heidegger crowned das Gemachte with diacritical marks (Umlaut) and asks

us to abstract from its derogatory usage. «Das Gemächte» is indeed a very old and by now outdated expression for what a person or nature has produced or for what God has created. Crowned by the Umlaut, in Heidegger Gemächte is supposed to acquire some sort of Güte.16 Heidegger uses the term «Gemächte» for all products of human beings from Plato and Aristotle onward up to the present day and, at the same time, points out a decisive difference between modem products and Gemächte in Aristotle.

There is a remarkable shift in his basic vocabulary from the essay on Aristotle to "The Question Concerning Technology." In the essay on Aristotle, Heidegger uses as the common term for natural products and technical products—that is, as the common term for «Gemächte» and «Gewächse» (see the quote above)—«Herstellung» or «Herstellen.» Physis is «das Sich—aus sich her, auf sich zu—Herstellen» (WM 367; «production of itself from out of itself unto itself»).17 This allows for the term «Gestellung.» In quite an unusual maneuver, Heidegger translates Aristotle's

with «Gestellung in das Aussehen» and comments:

By translating

as placing into the appearance {Gestellung in das Aussehen}, we mean to express chiefly two things which are equal in the Greek word but thoroughly lacking in our word "form." First, placing into the appearance is a mode of becoming present,

.

is not an ontic property present in matter, but a mode of Being . Secondly, "placing into the appearance" is being-moved,

which "moment" is radically lacking in the concept of form. 18

Thus, a «Gewächs» is the result of a «Herstellung» as a «Gestellung.» However, a «Gemächte» is the result of a «Herstellung» as a «Machen.» Still, according to Heidegger, there is a difference between human products at Aristotle's time and in modernity. Heidegger maintains that Aristotle wrote lines 192 b 23-27 «in order to avoid misunderstanding

as a kind of selfproducing and the

merely as a special kind of artifact {eine besondere Art von Gemächten}.»19 In a rather unusual interpretation of these lines Heidegger maintains that, according to Aristotle, «

can only cooperate with

, can more or less expedite the cure; but as

it can never replace

and in its stead become itself the

of health as such.»20 The latter, however, is the notion of technic in modernity: «That could only happen if life as such were to become a "technically" producible artifact {"technisch" her-stellbaren Gemächte} . . . Sometimes it seems as if modem man rushes headlong towards this goal of producing himself technologically . »21

From this perspective of modem man, the «Gewächse» in ancient Greece are misinterpreted. For, as Heidegger argues, «the idea of "organism" and of the "organic" is a purely modem, mechanistic-technological concept according to which "growing things" are interpreted as artifacts that make themselves {sich selbst machendes Gemächte}.»22 In "The Question Concerning Technology," however, q calls production in nature and technology no

longer «Herstellung,» but rather «Hervorbringen.» Physis is the «Her-vor-bringen» («bringing-forth») that has the «Aufbruch des Her-vor-bringens» («bursting open belonging to bringing-forth») in itself, whereas technology is the «Hervorbringen» which does not have the «Aufbruch seines Hervorbringens» in itself (VA 15; BW 293). Surprisingly enough, however, both terms for physis in the essay on Aristotle, «Herstellung» as well as «Gestellung,» are used in "The Question Concerning Technology" for technology. «Her-stellen» or «Darstellen» («producing and presenting») is used for the Greek poiesis (VA 24; BW 303). «Gestellung,» however, is stripped of its suffix «-ung» and becomes the technical term for modem technology, «Ge-stelb» («enframing») (VA 23; 301). Thus, «Gemächte» is no longer a term for artifacts in Aristotle nor for the products of modem technology. Consequently, «das Gemächte» is used only three times, and always in the negative.23

One reason for these changes is probably that «Her-stellen» and «be-stellen» («Bestand,» «Gestelb») allowed Heidegger to distinguish between Greek poiesis and modem technology also in his terminology. Furthermore, Hiroshima, Dresden, and Auschwitz happened after he wrote the essay on nature in Aristotle. Since in "The Question Concerning Technology" he talks in an oblique way about the «skeleton {s}» (BW 301; «Knochengerippe,» VA 23) in Auschwitz, and how to forget about them,24 it would be somewhat indecent to use a word for the male sex organ too frequently. In the section on historicality in Being and Time , Heidegger characterized authentic Dasein as the Dasein that—in contrast to inauthentic Dasein—is able to relate itself properly to its death as well to its birth and thus to the Volksgemeinschaft of the Germans. "The Question Concerning Technology" was delivered as a speech in Munich in 1953 and published in Vorträge und Aufsätze in 1954. It might have embarrassed some listeners and readers if the two cornerstones of Being and Time , death and birth, had recurred in that speech as the skeletons in Auschwitz together with the frequent usage of a word for the male sex organ.

As far as I know, studies of Heidegger's use of terms for sex organs have not yet addressed the passages I have discussed here. Those who maintain that Western metaphysics is phallocentric might find further support in Heidegger's use of the noun «Gemächte.» Furthermore, the passage on the «harte Geschlecht» seems to indicate that crucial motifs of the Heidegger of Being and Time have remained the same in his thinking after the Machtergreifung, as I will explain in the next section.

B. Heidegger's An Introduction to Metaphysics

Besides Rilke and Nietzsche, Hölderlin was the author whose poems and writings educated German soldiers in World War I, and also later in World War II, carried with them in their «Tomister» (knapsack) when they went to war. In his Mein Kampf , Hitler had left no doubt that, as to foreign affairs,

his top priority or Lebensaufgabe was to conquer Russia by war (MKe 641ff.; MK 726ff.), and he had maintained that only six years of National Socialist rule would suffice to make the German Volk ready for war (MKe 633; MK 716). In the year after the Machtergreifung, in the winter semester of 1934-35, Heidegger gave a lecture course on Hölderlin's hymns "Germanien" (the German word for the Latin word for Germany, Germania) and "Der Rhein" (The [river] Rhine), in which he also interpreted two lines of an unfinished poem by Hölderlin,

Seit ein Gespräch wir sind
Und hören können voneinander. (HH 71)

It is a subclause and runs, literally translated: «Since we have become a conversation and are able to hear from (of) each other.»25 In Heideggerian terms, one might say that, in 1933, Being took over. Verfallen, taken in by the beings, the ordinary and inauthentic Daseine ignored or covered up Being and stuck to their Gesellschaft. However, Being, Gemeinschaft, raised its voice and demanded that Gesellschaft be canceled so that Being, Gemeinschaft, could be properly manifested. In 1933 Being was successful. Heidegger adds to Hölderlin's subclause what he thinks was the main clause Höldefiin intended and then comments on the two lines as follows:

Since we are a conversation, we are placed into and at the mercy of the being as it reveals itself {ausgesetzt in das sich eröffnende Seiende}; it is only since then that the Being {Sein} of the being as such can encounter and determine us {uns begegnen und bestimmen}. (HH 72)26

The inauthentic Daseine wanted to deny and cover up Being in order to avoid being taken over and determined by Being. Now Being reveals itself as it is in reality, no longer covered up and distorted by the inauthentic Daseine. In this moment, we realize that it is not we who determine ourselves. Rather, we give up the pretense of autonomy and expose ourselves to, open ourselves for, or submit ourselves to, the Being of the beings as such, which catches hold of us and determines us. We realize that only now can we relate to the other authentically. Heidegger goes on:

The fact, however, that the being as to its Being {das Seiende . . . in seinem Sein } is unconcealed in advance for each of us, is the presupposition for being able to hear from the other something, that is, something about some being, whether this being is what we are not—that is, nature—or whether it is what we ourselves are—that is, history. (HH 72)

Being in Heidegger has priority over the beings that Being gives. The proponents of Gemeinschaft maintained that, prior to being in Gesellschaft, human beings had been in Gemeinschaft and that the individuals in Gesellschaft

regarded the latter as a mere means to pursue their selfish interests and, for that very reason, were not really happy, even if they accumulated a fortune. For, in reality Gemeinschaft founded the individuals, and it was only Gemeinschaft that gave them identity and rewarding feelings about themselves, the others, and the Gemeinschaft. Heidegger continues:

The ability to hear by no means produces the relation of the one to the other, that is, the Gemeinschaft. Rather, the ability to hear presupposes the Gemeinschaft. This primordial {ursprüngliche} Gemeinschaft by no means originates through entering into a relationship; that is how Gesellschaft originates. Rather, Gemeinschaft is because of the preceding bond, a bond that binds each individual to that which keeps bound and determines each individual in a superelevating manner {das, was jeden Einzelnen überhöhend bindet und bestimmt}. (HH 7227

Authentic belonging-to-one-another results neither from the Aristotelian natural inclination toward society nor from contracts, as, for instance, in liberalism. Heidegger considered it convenient to give an example. For German right-wingers after World War I, the paradigmatic Gemeinschaft were the heroes of Langemarck. As I've pointed out in the sections on Hitler and Scheler, right-wingers thought the war would surely be lost if it was approached with the attitudes of Gesellschaft. When faced with war, Gesellschaft evaporates, and Gemeinschaft raises its voice. War is the ultimate rationale, the Grund or ground, of Gemeinschaft. Fully in line with that sort of reasoning, Heidegger continues:

That which neither the individual by itself nor the Gemeinschaft as such is, that must become manifest. The comradeship of the frontline soldiers was grounded neither in the fact that they had to gather together with other humans because they needed them and could find them only at other places {daß man sich zusammenfinden mußte, weil andere Menschen, denen man fern war, fehlten}, nor in agreeing upon a shared enthusiasm {daß man sich auf eine gemeinsame Begeisterung erst verabredete}. Rather, at bottom it is grounded only in the fact that the nearness of death as a sacrifice placed each one in advance into the same nullity, so that this latter became the source of the unconditional belonging-to-each-other. (HH 72f.)

It is not the bargaining of social democrats and liberals in labor unions and in parliament that leads to authentic belonging-to-each-other. This is, according to Heidegger, what the Philistines have to learn:

It is precisely death—the death each human being has to die for himself and which singularizes each individual to the utmost extent—it is precisely death and the willingness of its sacrifice {= the willingness to offer one's own death as a sacrifice} that first and foremost and beforehand creates the site of Gemeinschaft, from which comradeship emerges {entspringt}. Thus, does comradeship grow {entspringt} out of Angst? No and yes. No, if one, like the Philistine, understands

by Angst only the helpless quivering of a panicky cowardice. Yes, if Angst is understood as a metaphysical nearness to the unconditional, a nearness that is given as a gift only to the highest self-sufficiency and readiness. If we do not compel powers into our Dasein that, like death as a free sacrifice, bind and singularize unconditionally—that is, powers that catch hold of {angreifen} each individual at the root of its Dasein and that, like death as a free sacrifice, stand deeply and wholly in an authentic knowing—then no 'comradeship' will emerge. In that case, the result will at best be a modified form of Gesellschaft. (HH 73)28

One sees that it is, so to speak, «the same old story» as in Being and Time . In 1926, Heidegger shied away from calling the actors by their proper names. He left out the name of the foe, and he wrote «der Gemeinschaft, des Volkes» (SZ 384; «of the community, of {the} people,» BT 436). The latter phrase allowed him to use as well as to avoid the blunt word «Volksgemeinschaft» and at the same time be understood by philosophers, that is, by people who are not Denker, but just Verstandesdenker, and who proceed from the genus to the species. After 1933, Heidegger could use the proper names, for everyone knew what he was talking about anyway, and he could leave out the Volk of the Volksgemeinschaft. Indeed, the German Volksgemeinschaft was not just one species among several others; it was the proper manifestation and agent of Being, which would clean up the remaining Gesellschaften in Europe and, as the song had it, «tomorrow {in} the entire world.» Heidegger's last two sentences in the above-quoted passage are a warning. No one must have recourse to «the endless multiplicity of possibilities . . . of comfortableness, shirking, and taking things lightly» (BT 435; «Behagens, Leichtnehmens, Sich-drückens,» SZ 384), for «each individual» is in charge. However, at the same time Heidegger's sentences might express some doubts as to whether «we» were fast enough or even whether «we» were still «mit beiden Beinen,» with both legs, on the authentic track.

The lecture course on Hölderlin took place in winter 1934-35. In the next semester, in the summer of 1935, Heidegger gave the lecture course An Introduction to Metaphysics . Having read the passage on erwidert in Being and Time , the readers might recall the following passage:

It is absolutely correct and proper to say that "You can't do anything with philosophy." It is only wrong to suppose that this is the last word in philosophy. For the rejoinder imposes itself: granted that we cannot do anything with philosophy, might not philosophy, if we concern ourselves with it, do something with us? So much for what philosophy is not. (IM 12; EM 9)

This is an unambiguous instance of what in chapter I, sections B and D, I referred to as an Erwiderung in the dative, namely, someone proposes something, and I contradict, or object to him. Thus, the English reader might expect

that the translator has rendered the German word «Erwiderung» through the English term «rejoinder.» However, the reader might also become suspicious, since this rejoinder is very impressive, or at least says something, whereas the rejoinder in Being and Time didn't say anything at all. The reader would be right, for the German text has, not «Erwiderung,» but rather «Gegenfrage» («Es kommt nämlich noch ein kleiner Nachtrag in der Gestalt einer Gegenfrage,» EM 9). The corresponding verb to «Gegenfrage,» or «Entgegnung,» is «entgegnen.» «Gegenfrage,» «Entgegnung,,» and «entgegnen» are unambiguous formulations of what I referred to as «erwidern» in the dative, and they can also serve as «erwidern» in the accusative in the sense of fighting back. Thus, instead of the ambiguous «erwidert» Heidegger could have used «entgegnen» if he had wanted to indicate a reciprocative rejoinder in Guignon's, the translators', or Birmingham's sense. Furthermore, as mentioned, «erwidert» in the dative and also, to some degree, «erwidert» in the sense of «fighting back» would have required Heidegger to tell the readers what the authentic Dasein erwidert.29 As was indicated above, he could have also used «Auseinandersetzung» or «auseinandersetzen» or «Widerspruch» or «widersprechen» if he had wanted to say what Guignon and Birmingham take him to say.30 Since he did not use any of these expressions, he must have meant his «erwidert» as subjugation.31 In the same context as the first passage quoted above, Heidegger writes:

Philosophy is essentially untimely because it is one of those few things that can never find an immediate echo {Widerklang} in the present and that must never find such an echo {und auch nie finden zu dürfen}. When such an echo {solches} seems to occur, when a philosophy becomes fashionable, either it is no real philosophy or it has been misinterpreted and misused for ephemeral and extraneous purposes. . .. But what is useless can still, and even more than ever {und erst recht}, be a force, perhaps the only real force. What has no immediate echo {Widerklang} in everyday life can be intimately bound up {im innigsten Einklang stehen} with a nation's {eines Volkes} profound {eigentlichen} historical development, and can even anticipate it {dessen Vorklang}. What is untimely will have its own times. This is true of philosophy. (IM 8; EM 6f.; the words in italics have been left out in the English translation, J. F.)

The phrase «is one of those few things that» is a somewhat colorless translation of Heidegger's phrase «sie zu jenen wenigen Dingen gehört, deren Schicksal es bleibt» («belongs to those very few things whose fate it remains»). «Echo,» «intimately bound up,» and «anticipate» are translations of Heidegger's sequence of «Widerklang,» «Anklang,» and «Vorklang»:

Die Philosophie ist wesenhaft unzeitgemäß, weil sie zu jenen wenigen Dingen gehört, deren Schicksal es bleibt, nie einen unmittelbaren Wider-klang {echo } in ihrem jeweiligen Heute finden zu können und auch nie finden zu dürfen. Wo solches scheinbar eintritt, wo eine Philosophie Mode wird, da ist entweder keine

wirkliche Philosophie oder diese wird mißdeutet und nach irgendwelchen ihr fremden Absichten für Tagesbedüfnisse vernutzt. . .. Aber, was nutzlos ist, kann doch und erst recht eine Macht sein. Was den unmittelbaren Wider-klang {echo } in der Alltäglichkeit nicht kennt, kann mit dem eigentlichen Geschehen in der Geschichte eines Volkes im innigsten Ein-klang stehen {intimately bound up }. Es kann sogar dessen Vor-klang {anticipate } sein. (EM 6f.; italics and hyphens mine, J. F.)

This sequence of «Widerklang,» «Einklang,» and «Vorklang» is brilliant. All three nouns have as their root the noun «Klang,» sound. «Wider» in «Wider-klang» is, pace Birmingham, not «in opposition to,» but rather, as in «I erwidere/return a favor,» «back,» or «re-»; that is, «Widerklang» is «resonance» or, as the translator rightly puts it, «echo.» «Ein» in «Einklang» is «in accord with»; thus, «Einklang» is «unison,» «accord,» or «harmony.» «Vor» in «Vorklang» has a temporal sense; thus, «Vorklang» is an anticipation in the sense that there is some so far unknown event in the future that makes itself felt somehow in the present for those who are open to perceive this, that is, philosophy, or exclusively Heidegger himself who thus becomes the «Vorklang» of this futural event. In German, one expects words like these in two kinds of situations. One uses them in descriptions of very subtle, often erotic, situations in which one communicates indirectly.32 Or, imagine someone sitting pensively, melancholic, or in pangs of love on some hill not too far away from a village, and the bells of the church begin to ring. He listens to them and, duplicating or echoing, erwidernd in the accusative, their Klang, he opens himself to them, and his thoughts and feelings follow the sounds. (He might refer to his state after the bells have actually stopped ringing by using another compound noun with «Klang»: «Even several hours later, I felt the Nachklang, echo, of the bells in me.») In Heidegger, however, these words receive a slightly tragic as well as defiant tone. As one knows, the lecture course An Introduction to Metaphysics was delivered in 1935, that is, shortly after Heidegger had resigned from the rectorate, and after he had declared in a speech broadcast on radio why he would not go to Berlin but rather stay in the provinces.33

In 1935 Heidegger still believed in Hitler and National Socialism as the notorious sentence claiming «the inner truth and greatness of this movement» (IM 199; EM 152) in An Introduction shows.34 However, the truth of National Socialism has become an «inner» one; that is, it seems the empirical reality of National Socialism no longer counts as a proper realization of the Volk and National Socialism. In 1926 and subsequent years, the philosopher had thought that the «fate» allotted by «destiny» to philosophy was to bring about, or to help to bring about, the practical comeback of the Volk. However, something must have gone wrong. Thus, through the mouth of its only incarnation philosophy declares that all those who thought that philosophy had become practical had simply misunderstood philosophy, and philosophy also declares

that it, is its fate never to find an immediate echo. Nevertheless, the philosopher remains the one with privileged access to the authentic historizing of the Volk, and he is the only one, except perhaps for the Führer. Thus, the expressionistic and actionistic vocabulary of «Kampf,» «hörig,»35 «erwidern,» and «Widerruf» of Being and Time is replaced with the bucolic Innerlichkeit, inwardness, of «Anklang,» «Einklang,» and «Vorklang» (in which the «Vor-klang» no longer insists on the possibility of immediate realization and thus, as in contrast to «Vorlaufen zum Tode,» can be properly translated as «anticipate»).

Something else, however, has not changed. Imagine if Heidegger had published section 74 of Being and Time in a journal and had written an abstract. It might have looked like the following:

Heritage in section 74 stands in the closest connection with krinein , to separate, in the sense of de-cide in collecting toward the authentic historizing of the German Volk. Erwiderung and Widerruf are the foundation and proof of the pursuit of the Volk as authentic community and the battle against liberal and democratic Gesellschaft . The meaning of krinein includes to pick out, to favor, to set a measure that will determine rank.

Replace the phrases in bold type with «logos, » «the collectedness of being { Sein },» «Selection,» «being,» and «appearance,» respectively, and you have Heidegger's summary of his interpretation of Parmenides in An Introduction to Metaphysics :

Logos here stands in the closest connection with krinein , to separate [Scheiden] in the sense of de-cide [Ent-scheiden] in collecting toward the collectedness of being. Selection [das auslesende "Lesen"] is the foundation and proof of the pursuit of being and the battle against appearance. The meaning of krinein includes to pick out {auslesen}, to favor, to set a measure that will determine rank. (IM 174; EM 133; as in the next quotation italics with «auslesende» mine, J. F.)

This sentence reads in German: «

steht hier im engsten Verband mit

, dem Scheiden als Ent-scheiden im Vollzug der Sammlung auf die Gesammeltheit des Seins. Das auslesende "Lesen" begründet und trägt den Verfolg des Seins und die Abwehr des Scheins. In der Bedeutung des

schwingt mit: auslesen, abheben, die rangbestimmende Maßgabe» (EM 133).36

In this summarizing passage key terms of Being and Time, « Ent-scheiden» («de-cision»), «Entschlossenheit,» («resoluteness») occur alongside items from the National Socialist vocabulary, such as «Auslese» («selection» or «pick out» as in «rassische Auslese,» «racial selection»). At the same time, in the text Heidegger forcefully promotes Sammlung, sammeln (gathering, to gather) to a key term of his later philosophy. The passage precisely «repeats»

the passage on erwidert and Widerruf in Being and Time , section 74. We live in a fallen state of mixture. The call of the Volksgemeinschaft calls us back («erwidern») and calls upon us to purify the mixture, that is, to throw out the impure and alien elements and to restore the pure Gemeinschaft («erwidern» and «Widerruf»). In the passage from An Introduction to Metaphysics , it is especially the phrase «das auslesende "Lesen"» («selection») that carries the required restoration of the pure Gemeinschaft by throwing out the alien elements. The phrase «das auslesende "Lesen"» («selection») specifies the phrases «de-cide» («Ent-scheiden») and «collecting» («Sammlung»). By this, «gathering» in Heidegger follows the same logic as «gathering» in National Socialism. Within National Socialism, the inconspicuous everyday word «sammeln» all of a sudden gained a prominent place in the political vocabulary in precisely the sense in which Heidegger uses it in the above-quoted passage from An Introduction to Metaphysics . To be sure, the notions Versammlungen, Sammlungen, and Sammlungsbewegungen, meetings and merger movements (of political parties or religious groups), were used already before the emergence of National Socialism. However, from 1933 on the word «sammeln» acquired a new sense.

The history of the Sammlungsbewegung National Socialism prior to its final defeat consisted of three stages. First, the members of the party sammelten sich selbst, assembled by leaving the city, the Weimar Republic, to congregate outside of it or by forming their own city within the city. This is «to separate in the sense of de-cide in collecting toward the collectedness of being» (IM 174; EM 133). In doing so, they cleanse themselves of the unhealthy mixtures and corruption they believed to be prevalent in the city. They cleanse themselves of any trace of Gesellschaft, liberalism, social democracy, and Jewishness in themselves. From their vantage point, the city was afflicted with alien elements from which it had to be purged so that its purity might be restored. In other words, the city was in a state of unhealthy mixtures of Being and Non-Being, and the philosophical term for this usually is «Schein» (EM 133; «appearance,» IM 174). That first act was an Auslese, a separation, a selection, a de-cision, and the party members were the subjects as well as the objects of this act. They de-cided themselves from the city by leaving it and forming their party. The authentic Daseine are «followers {Hörige}» (IM 129; EM 99)37 of Being. They only collect themselves because they listen to Being's commands. Thus the first act is the moment in which Being collects itself («in collecting toward the collectedness of being»). The phrase «in collecting toward the collectedness of being» corresponds to the phrase «the handing down of a heritage constitutes itself in resoluteness» (BT 435; SZ 383f.), which I discussed in section C of chapter 2. In the first act, the authentic Daseine erwidern the call of Being; Being is no longer covered up; rather it begins to be active and to be the main actor in the second

and third act in which the authentic Daseine widerrufen, cancel, Gesellschaft. In the second act the party members took over the city, the so-called Machtübernahme. In the third act, they realized the program they had developed in the first act, namely, the removal of those whom they have declared to be the alien, unhealthy elements from which the city had to be cleansed. They remove the alien elements and their world, Gesellschaft, to restore a pure Gemeinschaft. Especially this third act is a selection, a de-cision. The party members remain the subjects of this decision; however, the object has changed. The objects of this decision are now those whom the party members have designated as the foe of the Volk and who must be ausgelesen, selected, and eliminated.

One might say not only the first sentence in the passage on logos in An Introduction , but also the second and the third sentences—the ones with «selection» and «to pick out»—are analogous at most to what I described as the first step of the history of National Socialism. To be sure, it might not be completely impossible for an ingenious exegete of Heidegger to refer the second and the third sentences to the first step. In this way, he might reduce all three sentences to the first step and leave out the Machtübernahme and the disavowal of Gesellschaft and of the alien elements. However, there is nothing that can prevent one from referring the second and third sentences to the second and the third step. In fact, if one looks at the German expressions Heidegger uses, one is strongly moved and encouraged—if not in fact forced— to refer them to the third step. Heidegger employed a widely used and well-known expression that was also part of the official vocabulary of the National Socialists. What is translated by «selection,» reads in German: «auslesende "Lesen".» While in relation to texts and writing lesen means «to read,» in the context of agriculture and cooking, for instance, «Lese» and «lesen» refer to the gathering of crops and beans. In this process, «lesend,» one stands «in» the «"Lese[n]"» (EM 133; «Selection,» IM 174), or «in der Sammlung,» as Heidegger put it on the preceding page («Der Mensch ist als der im Logos, in der Sammlung, Stehende und Tätige: der Sammler,» EM 131f.; «Standing and active in logos, which is ingathering, man is the gatherer,» IM 172). Harvesting, however, entails that one will «die Spreu vom Weizen trennen» («separate the chaff from the wheat»), as a well-known saying puts it. Applied to the sorting of beans, the Bohnen-Lese, this saying became «die schlechten ins Kröpfchen, die guten ins Töpfchen,» i.e., the good beans are gathered in the cooking pot («Töpfchen») and the bad ones are «ausgelesen,» «aussortiert,» sorted out and thrown into the trash («Kröpfchen»).38 Thus, by adding «auslesende» to «"Lese",» Heidegger just makes what is implied in «Lese» explicit. This amounts to no less than the supposed Einklang (unison) between everyday discourse, especially the one of the peasants, and that of the National Socialist Party. Since sammeln, to gather, is «auslesende "Lese",»

«auslesende» simply expresses what is clearly implied in the very act of gathering, namely, a sorting out and elimination. Once the party members leave the city and regain their purity, they come back, take over the city, and purify the mixtures; that is, they redeem and restore the originally pure ones by pushing the aliens out of the city. From 1933 on, all human beings, first in Germany and later in all of Europe, became the object of this auslesende Lese, of this gathering and sorting.

From the very beginning of their reign, the National Socialists set up sites where aliens were gathered. One did not use the German «sammeln» to designate these sites but rather a related word of Latin derivation, namely, «konzentrieren,» «Konzentrationslager» (concentrate, focus, «concentration camps»), konzentrieren being the most intense form of sammeln. The German word «sammeln» was used from the beginning of the mass deportations. «Sammelstelle,» «Sammelplatz,» or «Sammellager» («collecting point, collecting camp») designated the sites in the villages and cities where the Jews had «sich einzufinden» (the bureaucratic word for «to appear, to assemble at a certain time and a certain place») in order then to be pushed into the trains to Auschwitz and the other concentration camps. As objects of the Lese, they were forced to move from the village to the Sammelplatz at the brink of the village, that is, they were forced to move to and gather at the railway station, made to enter the trains, and to move along the tracks until the final gathering on the Verlade-Brücke in Auschwitz.39

Heidegger' s interpretation of logos in An Introduction to Metaphysics is identical with the activities called for in the sentences with «erwidert» and «Wider-ruf» in Being and Time . Thus it might be that eigentlich, in truth, Heidegger's pre-Socratics and his history of Being are the characters of Being and Time , sections 72-77, transposed under new names onto the broader stage of the history of Being. They are, so to speak, the Führer's «new clothes.» Though it is not possible to pursue this in more detail in this book and though there are many, more or less different, Heideggers after the Kehre, I want to address at least briefly one later Heidegger, the one Caputo developed in his Heidegger and Aquinas , published in 1982, before he began his project of Demythologizing Heidegger in the second half of the eighties.

The carpenter in his workshop in Division One of Being and Time (BT 95ff.; SZ 66ff.) is not yet in the «downward plunge,» for he is in the ordinary world «in the mode of its genuineness» (BT 189; SZ 148). However, he is already on the road «Falling,» which will lead into the downward plunge. Similarly, we peregrinatores, as Augustine has called us—Heidegger might say that the language of the «they» translates this with «tourists»—are, to use one of Heidegger's pet expressions, immer schon, always already, on the road that leads into

the excess of idle talk, curiosity, and ambiguity of the ordinary and inauthentic Daseine (BT 210ff.; SZ 167ff.). As is known, Thomas Aquinas struggled so hard to reconcile all the different paths on the broad road «Falling.» Ordinary Dasein is not aware that it is no longer at the beginning. It takes its falling or downward plunge as given traditions, and doesn't reflect on the fact that they are a fallen-away version of the real beginning that nonetheless is somehow responsible for the falling and the downward plunge and, thus, holds the Daseine even as they are moving away from it. Similarly, Thomas Aquinas «does not put the tradition itself into question; . . . He thinks within the tradition without thinking the tradition as precisely what is to be thought, that is, as a Being-process in which Being is withdrawn precisely insofar as it gives itself.»40 Thus, as ordinary Dasein does not recognize that it is caught up on the road «Falling,» Thomas Aquinas «is caught up in the historical sweep of the "it gives" without experiencing the giving itself which is at work in Scholasticism, without experiencing Scholasticism as a constellation of meaning which itself has been made possible on deeper—alethiological—grounds. Thomas stands within the clearing without thinking the clearing as such.»41

Impatient Daseine on the road and a

follower of St. Thomas might object at this point that not every age of Being is equally an oblivion, not every period of thought is equally an "epoch" of withdrawal. For even though the "It" which gives remained behind, Being as presence was bestowed upon the early Greek thinkers with a primal and undistorted originality. And if such a gift has been granted to the early Greeks, who were no more historically minded than St. Thomas, why not for Thomas too? Why cannot Thomas have a status somewhat like Parmenides who thought Being in its truth as presencing, even though the "It" which "gives" was concealed from him?42

However, first of all, Dasein on the road is quite obviously not at the beginning. In other words, there are «important differences between the primal bestowal of Being as presence in the early Greeks and the metaphysics of esse .»43 Second, the time is not yet ripe, the Bocksgesang has not yet arisen to break out of Gesellschaft, or «to break the spell of metaphysics.»44 Thus, Thomas Aquinas «stands at neither end (terminus,

) of the tradition, but precisely, as a "medieval," in the middle.»45

The authentic Dasein realizes that Volk is not to be reified. In the beginning, Volk is a fluid something, and later on Volk is somehow responsible for the move away from itself that nonetheless remains within itself. Authentic Dasein begins from within ordinary Dasein and sees through the activities by means of which ordinary Dasein forgets that it is in the downward plunge as a forgetfulness of the origin. Thus, authentic Dasein looks through the forgetting of a forgetting. Similarly, there is a double Vergessenheit, «oblivion simpliciter or the oblivion of that oblivion, concealment simpliciter

or the concealment of that concealment.»46 The latter is Gesellschaft, or «metaphysics, and metaphysics can be overcome»47 only at the end of the downward plunge where either everything falls apart and into chaos, socialism or anarchy, or the origin as such reenters the stage. It is only here that the Bocksgesang arises and the crisis begins. In this crisis, the Daseine become responsible for their becoming authentic or inauthentic and for the future of the world. Those capable of listening will become authentic. Thus, one can

determine where the element of human "responsibility" enters into Heidegger' s thought. It has not always been possible to overcome metaphysics, to spot the withdrawal as a withdrawal. For as long as thought was caught up within the sweep of the tradition and what it passed along, in medias res , the thinker was inevitably drawn along with it. But now, in these days, we live in extremis , in the extreme radicalization of this withdrawal, at the "end" of philosophy, when the tradition of withdrawal and concealment has reached its deepest and most ominous stage. Now, in this very moment of extreme danger, the saving is most palpable for those who would submit themselves to the discipline of "thought" and who would lay aside the pretension of rationality. Awakening from oblivion in this sense can be carried out. If men would be thoughtful enough, attentive enough to the movement of withdrawal whose vibrations we all can feel, whose soft reverberations we all can hear if we lend an ear, then the awakening from oblivion to oblivion would take place. The primal withdrawal of Being itself is something over which no man has any influence, for which he has no responsibility. But the oblivion of this concealment can be escaped. It lies within the pale of man's responsibility, that is, of his responsive-ness, to awaken to the movement of this withdrawal and to think this withdrawal as a withdrawal. If we make the turn into the Ereignis (Einkehren in das Ereignis ), the withdrawal of the Ereignis is not removed; we come rather to stand in it, to attend to it. And this is a possibility for thought itself.48

Authentic Dasein cancels Gesellschaft to rerealize the origin. Similarly, in the later Heidegger «a new beginning will become possible. . . . and we shall be granted an experience of Being comparable to that of the early Greek thinkers. Then we too shall be the recipients of the gift and grace of presencing in its primal splendor.»49 For these Greek thinkers «whom philosophy considers to be semi-philosophical and still encumbered by the old myths, are in fact non-metaphysical thinkers who were not yet victimized by Western ratio . Their thinking is still close to the source, primal, freshly bestowed upon Western man, like the new-fallen snow outside the cabin in Todtnauberg.»50

Having been called upon and facing heritage to repeat it, authentic Dasein realizes that the repetition is not a simple repetition. Similarly, «we today live in the eschatology, in the ending of the first great beginning, in the ever-growing night which is the evening-land called the "West" (Abendland ). We seek not literally to repeat the first beginning, which would be "vain and absurd" (Weg. ² 369/2 10), but»—and this might be a dose of Guignon's interpretation

of Being and Time in the later Heidegger—«to find in what the early Greeks thought a renewal of our own history in a way which is uniquely proper to us.»51 However, it is, if at all, only a dose. For, as Heidegger in section 75 (BT 444; SZ 39 If.), Caputo returns to a return simpliciter : «Hence, this early Greek experience must come again, at the end of the present history of Being, and thereby set free a new dispensation, a new beginning, precisely at the point at which the old dispensation takes its leave.»52

He doesn't elaborate this delicate point. But who would blame him for this? After all, Heidegger himself hasn't done so. At least, he did not offer much beyond the formula of logos I discussed above. In Anaximander, justice still managed to «subdue the stubbornness of that which wants to persist inordinately.»53 After Parmenides, however, something has happened. In Being and Time Heidegger doesn't talk about a single Dasein that becomes authentic individually by distancing itself from any tradition or by freely exploiting any tradition, but about Daseine that, called upon by heritage, break out of Gesellschaft in order to rerealize, against Gesellschaft, the denied origin Volk, Volksgemeinschaft, they are called upon to identify with. Similarly, what is at stake in the later Heidegger is the entire Westen and thus by implication the entire world.

At least Caputo's later Heidegger shows that the basic framework in his late writings remains the same as in Being and Time . Thus, it might be possible that, in contrast to many interpreters, the later Heidegger was right when, especially in Brief über den "Humanismus " (Letter on Humanism ), he stressed the continuity between Being and Time and his later writings. In addition, in an ambiguous sentence in the Letter on Humanism , Heidegger invites us to regard the analysis of the «they» in Being and Time as I took it, namely, as an analysis of Gesellschaft. For, the analysis of the «they» is a «sociology.» And what, after Weber, was sociology about if not about—as the German title of Weber' s famous book from 1922 reads—Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft , economy and society? However, at the same time Heidegger' s analysis of the «they» is much more than a contribution to sociology. After talking about «the dictatorship of the public realm {Diktatur der Öffentlichkeit}» (BW 197; WM 149), he continues: «Was in "Sein und Zeit" (1927), ## 27 und 35 über das "man" gesagt ist, soll keineswegs nur einen beiläufigen Beitrag zur Soziologie liefern» (WM 149). This means that «what is said in Being and Time (1927), sections 27 and 35, about the "they" is by no means supposed to furnish a merely incidental contribution to sociology.» That is, what is said in those sections about the «they» is indeed a contribution to sociology, but it is also much more than that. (The English translator has misunderstood the German phrase «keineswegs nur» and has mistranslated the sentence: «What is said in Being and Time [1927], sections 27 and 35, about the "they" in no way means to furnish an incidental contribution to sociology,» BW 197.) It is a contribution to sociology, and it is much more than an incidental contribution, because it is undertaken

from the viewpoint of fundamental ontology, and it is offered on the way to the true origin of Gesellschaft, on the way to Gemeinschaft. (Given Heidegger's remarks on the relation of his fundamental ontology to «subordinated» sciences [BT 28ff.; SZ 8ff.]—remarks that are certainly authoritarian as no other First Philosophy has ever been—one is entitled to say that the phrase «incidental contribution» is of ironic modesty; from his point of view, a sociology that is not undertaken under the auspices of his fundamental ontology is simply not a science.) Heidegger goes on:

Just as little does the "they" mean merely the opposite, understood in an ethicalexistentiell way, of the selfhood of persons. Rather, what is said there contains a reference, thought in terms of the question of the truth of Being, to the word's primordial belongingness to Being. This relation remains concealed beneath the dominance of subjectivity that presents itself as the public realm. (BW 197f.; WM 149)

One might read these sentences as Heidegger's veto against interpretations of section 74 such as Guignon' s and Birmingham' s. For in one way or another, both miss the peculiar pull of the Gemeinschaft, or of Being, to which Gesellschaft, subjectivity, and the ordinary Daseine are subject. One must not resist the pull or ignore the call. In other words, both Guignon and Birmingham miss the peculiar figure of handing oneself over, or sacrificing oneself to, that origin Volk, hidden up to now, whose agents the authentic Daseine become. In this sense, section 74 may have been in fact already «this turning [Kehre ]» (BW 208; WM 159), or the threshold to it, in which «everything is reversed» (BW 208; WM 159).54

C. Heidegger in the USA

Moving from the 1930s in Germany more than half a century ahead and halfway around the world, it has to be noted that—at least, as far as I know— in the German literature concerning politics in Being and Time no interpretation with a claim as strong as mine can be found. However, one also does not find there an interpretation such as Birmingham' s. Perhaps that is because, prior to any detailed analysis, German readers generally sense intuitively that Heidegger's language is so thoroughly impregnated with conservative figures of speech as to make the idea that he could have proposed Birmingham's anarchistic notion of politics unlikely. American readers perhaps do not share this background understanding to the same extent and so enjoy greater freedom in their interpretations. However, interpretations such as Birmingham's are also based on the fundamental self-understanding of the individual in the USA; a self-understanding that was either completely absent among many Germans of Heidegger' s time or was precisely the kind that conservatives argued and fought against. It is, Scheler would say, «English cant» (PPS 218) and its sociological

and cultural ramifications that make possible interpretations such as Birmingham' s. The «German» Held and the «German» notion of fate are indeed foreign to the average person, to the «they,» so to speak, in the United States.

At the beginning of chapter 4, I presented Guignon's reasoning that Being and Time is by no means «inherently fascist or proto-Nazi» (HC 131). His interpretation is directed in particular against Wolin's claim that

Heidegger's involvement with National Socialism—which was of the order of deep-seated, existential commitment—was far from being an adventitious, merely biographical episode. Instead, it was rooted in the innermost tendencies of his thought . This claim in no way entails the assumption that Nazism is somehow a necessary and inevitable outgrowth of the philosophy of Being and Time . It does suggest, however, that the politics of the Nazi movement emphatically satisfied the desiderata of authentic historical commitment adumbrated in that work. (PB 66)

As mentioned at the beginning of chapter I, section B, Guignon begins his essay by quoting Wolin's statement that «Existenzphilosophie in its Heideggerian variant tends to be inherently destructive of tradition» (PB 32) (HC 130), a statement that might lead us to expect that Wolin interprets the sentences on erwidert and Widerruf as acts of simple negations—like Birmingham. But Wolin does not comment on these sentences;55 however, amazingly, Guignon would probably accept all of Wolin's statements about destiny and fate, but give them a slight twist, and add his own interpretation of Heidegger's sentence on erwidert so as to present Being and Time as politically neutral. This is an interesting hermeneutical situation. Wolin's statements on Heideggerian philosophy's inherent tendency to destroy all tradition occur in the general introduction to his interpretation of Being and Time ("The 'Historicity' of Being and Time, " PB 22-35); he also adds there, however, a note that a «full exposition and justification of this claim will have to wait until our analysis of Heidegger's concept of "resolve" (Entschlossenheit ) below» (PB 32, n. 45). Accordingly, his interpretative statements refer not so much to Heidegger's concept of historicality as to that of resoluteness; in fact, they function as interpretation of historicality only with a stipulation that Guignon does not mention. After his interpretation of "Authenticity and Decision" (PB 35-40) and of "The Call of Conscience" (PB 40-46), Wolin interprets Entschlossenheit under the heading "A Self-Canceling Social Ontology; The Aporias of 'Decisiveness'" (PB 46-53). He focuses on the problem of «cri-terionlessness» (PB 52), and summarizes his analysis as follows:

For when {Heidegger's concept of decisiveness, or decisionism in general} is devoid of any and every normative orientation, "decision" can only be blind and uninformed —ultimately , it becomes a leap into the void. Without any material criteria for decision, it becomes impossible to distinguish an authentic from an inauthentic decision, responsible from irresponsible action—let alone on

what grounds an individual would even prefer one course of action to another. Indeed, at times, Heidegger seems to openly glorify the irrationalist basis of decision. (PB 52)

However, Guignon's reference to Wolin does not lead us to expect that in "'Destiny' or The Incorporation of Dasein Within A Historical Community" (PB 53-66), Wolin, in a sense, interprets «historicality» from pretty much the same point of view as Guignon himself, namely, arguing that, according to Heidegger, the past is meant to provide decision with those meanings that decision in itself lacks: «Historicity is a mode of authentic, past-directed temporalization : Dasein situates itself in relation to a meaningful historical continuum, and this act endows its projection toward the future with content and direction» (PB 60). However, in contrast to Guignon, Wolin discusses the past, as I did in chapters 1 and 2, using the singular, and he characterizes Dasein's relation to it, as I did, in terms of subjugation:

The discussion of "authentic temporality," in which the concept of "destiny" figures so prominently, is specifically intended to solve the problem of the self-referentiality of resolve in its preliminary version. In effect, the indeterminacy of resolve is answered by the demand that the individual subordinate him or herself to a common destiny. (PB 57)

Wolin finds this sense of subjugation, subordination, or, as he puts it, «fatalism» (PB 62), in section 74 in the passages preceding the sentence on «repetition» (BT 434-437; SZ 382-385), and this leads Wolin to posit an opposition between voluntarism and fatalism:

The opposition between voluntarism and fatalism in Being and Time is never reconciled. Heidegger tries to have it both ways and fails: "destiny" is meant to provide the existentiell basis for the empty self-referentiality of authentic decision, thereby furnishing a measure of content for an otherwise ungrounded, free-floating will. However, the "fatalistic" implications of this category subsequently undermine the autonomy of authentic resolve, an autonomy that was so painstakingly wrested (via the Angst of Being-towards-death) from the inauthentic Existenzialien of everydayness. Since this manner of reconciling the opposition is unpalatable, Heidegger at times lurches to the opposite extreme, suggesting that destiny itself can be "chosen" or "willed." But with this move, we have essentially relapsed into the same decisionistic arbitrariness that the concept of destiny was intended to counteract in the first place. (PB 62f.)

According to Wolin, the concept of destiny is grounded in that of repetition. He quotes the sentence on repetition («But when one has, . . .» BT 437; SZ 385) (PB 63) to address the problem of mere reproduction of the past, but he focuses not on the passage about Erwiderung and Widerruf (BT 438; SZ 386) but rather

on the sentence about the choice of the hero (BT 437; SZ 385). Based on this, he launches the same criticism as above and reiterates the same aporia:

To repeat an authentic possibility derived from the past means that "Dasein may choose its hero ," . . . But the question remains: on what basis is the hero to be chosen? How is one to recognize an authentic hero from an icon with feet of clay? Unless some criteria of selection are provided, we run the risk once more of relapsing into the vertiginous arbitrariness of pure decisionism. The only answer Heidegger provides to this question is characteristically unsatisfying. When we inquire as to the basis on which authentic repetition is to proceed and in terms of which true heroes might be distinguished from charlatans . . . we are told that repetition itself is "grounded existentially in anticipatory resolve." { BT 437; SZ 385} Thus, resolve is grounded in repetition (e.g., the choice of a proper hero), and repetition itself is grounded in resolve. Once again, circular reasoning replaces cogent insight and sheer assertion substitutes for compelling argumentation. (PB 63f.)

Note that in this passage Wolin switches from the singular «destiny» to the plural of several possibilities, the «true heroes» and «charlatans.» Already here Guignon can step in and reevaluate Wolin's entire argument. However, Wolin goes a step further. Since Heidegger's concept of decision lacks any content, Dasein is not only not capable of any reasonable decision but also has no way to resist any preexisting decision. Thus,

not only is decisionism thoroughly "unprincipled"; it is also on this account nakedly opportunistic . And all voluntaristic bluster about "will," "choice," etc., notwithstanding, opportunism in the end reveals itself often enough as a base and simple conformism. Thus, because it lacks any and every inherent basis for choice, decisionism is forced to grasp at random existing opportunities for self-actualization. And as we saw earlier, an authentic resolve that shunned self-actualization would be a contradiction in terms. As innately destitute of inner substance, resolve has no choice but to conform to whatever options are historically available. (PB 64f.)

Thus, if one combines the inherent opportunism with the «sufficiently formal and abstract» (PB 76) character of the existential analysis of Being and Time , «one could virtually imagine the philosopher opting for a Bolshevist instead of a Nationalist revolutionary course» (PB 76). Since from the beginning Wolin has made it clear beyond any doubt that, for him, Heidegger belonged to the conservatives who opposed the Weimar Republic as well as bolshevism, this second step of his interpretation introduces some ambiguity into his summary, either intentionally or by accident. Wolin continues:

The consequences of this decisionistic "ethical vacuum," coupled with the prejudicial nature of Heidegger's conservative revolutionary degradation of the modem life-world, suggest an undeniable theoretical cogency behind Heideg-

ger's ignominious life-choice of 1933. In its rejection of "moral convention" which qua convention, proves inimical to acts of heroic bravado— decisionism shows itself to be distinctly nihilistic vis-à-vis the totality of inherited ethical paradigms. For this reason, the implicit political theory of Being and Time — and in this respect, it proves a classical instance of the German conservative-authoritarian mentality of the period—remains devoid of fundamental "liberal convictions" that might have served as an ethicopolitical bulwark against the enticement of fascism. Freed of such bourgeois qualms, the National Socialist movement presented itself as a plausible material "filling" for the empty vessel of authentic decision and its categorical demand for existentiell-historical content. The summons toward an "authentic historical destiny" enunciated in Being and Time was thus provided with an ominously appropriate response by Germany's National Revolution. The latter, in effect, was viewed by Heidegger as the ontic fulfillment of the categorical demands of "historicity": it was Heidegger's own choice of a "hero," a "destiny," and a "community." (PB 65)

Thus, one might ask, Was the Heidegger of Being and Time a Nazi? Or was he just a conservative who unfortunately wrote a book that took any weapons against National Socialism out of his hands? Did he write a book against the alleged conformism of the «they» without realizing that he himself did nothing but reestablish this conformism on the noble level of authentic Dasein? Would Heidegger have become a communist if the communists, in some way or another, had seized power? These are embarrassing conclusions. To be sure, Georges Sorel changed from a Leninist into an admirer of Mussolini; in the latter years of the Weimar Republic, some Social Democrats or communists changed over to National Socialism; in 1933, many people who had formerly been neutral—or lukewarm—became National Socialists. And perhaps even in politics, the French proverb that the extremes touch each other contains some truth. However, German professors at that time insisted on the difference between the Right and the Left, and according to Wolin, so did Heidegger. Should we assume that all this notwithstanding, Heidegger wrote a book in which he blurred these differences? Not in his prephilosophical opinions but rather in his masterpiece, the great philosopher maneuvers himself into the position of the double-headed mortals who vacillate between the Right and the Left and consequently conform to whatever decisions are forced upon them. At this point, Guignon can see not only the possibility but, so to speak, the necessity to intervene. And he can do so very smoothly.

Wolin already anticipated the result of his interpretation early on in his argument concerning historicality, namely, in the note accompanying his quotation of the sentences «The resoluteness in which Dasein comes back to itself, . . . but not necessarily as having thus come down» (BT 435; SZ 383):

The concluding phrase to this citation is of great interest insofar as it indicates a profound decisionistic residue in the entire discussion of historicity. It implies

that the taking up of historically extant possibilities is never something unalterable and merely given, but in the last analysis something codetermined by the autonomous decision of Dasein itself. (PB 60, n. 107)

For Wolin, this autonomy of the Dasein vis-à-vis the past is the unwanted outcome of Heidegger's analysis. Heidegger wanted a past, or destiny, that subjugated the Daseine. Because of his concept of resoluteness, however, these Daseine rum out to be those «Helden» who care only about their glorious self-affirmation and thus negate the past and its offers. However, Heidegger did not explicitly state that he wanted to develop a concept of a subjugating past that left no room for Dasein's objection against the past's exaction. Therefore, one can regard Dasein's autonomy, if properly understood—that is, in terms of, as Guignon says with reference to Taylor, «situated freedom» (HC 131)—to be not the unwanted outcome but rather exactly the aim Heidegger was reaching for. On this basis, one can see Being and Time in its political import as a book of fundamental, and in themselves neutral, politics rather than as a proto-fascist or at least very confused book. Guignon might even concede that in the passage preceding the sentences on repetition and the choice of one's hero, Heidegger allows some demanding aspect in heritage, destiny, and past. However, beginning with the sentence «But when one has, by repetition, handed down to oneself a possibility that has been. . . . » (BT 437; SZ 385), Heidegger might introduce Dasein's relative independence vis-à-vis the past and the present; this independence is not the same as Wolin's glorious acts of self-affirmation or nihilism in regard to the past; rather, it is made possible by Dasein's utopian ideal, and it enables Dasein to consider the various possibilities offered by the past, to choose what fits its utopian ideal, and to distance itself from the others as well as from the present, as, according to Guignon, Heidegger states in the sentences on erwidert and Widerruf (BT 438; SZ 386).56

Wolin sees an unresolved tension in Heidegger's theory. On the one hand, there is fate as a tradition demanding obedience. On the other, Dasein is only concerned with its self-affirmation and is intrinsically nihilistic vis-à-vis the past57 Regarding the nihilistic Dasein, it seems to me that—when reading Heidegger, at least—Wolin has not sufficiently distanced himself from a specifically North American notion of authenticity. As an advertisement for the aftershave lotion «eXcesS» puts it, «an overstepping of bounds»—this is what Americans have to do to be noticed socially. The attitude of overstepping bounds, of being creative, of making a difference, of breaking with the tradition and initiating something new, and of distancing oneself from all others as the norm of life is probably related to the admirable figures of cowboys, dishwashers, and self-made men. Each of them had left behind the suffocating traditions of the «Old World»; each of them was concerned with making his own life and fate.58 The self-made man, however, is actually the

opposite of a German «Held» and of the «Helden» (SZ 385; «hero,» BT 437) in Being and Time . A German Held is not someone who distances himself from tradition so as to realize himself in his individuality; rather, he is someone capable of forgetting himself, of putting his entire being into the service of the common good, and of «sacrificing» himself for it. Or—more precisely and in terms of the logic of transfiguration59 —a Held even finds his self-fulfillment in self-sacrifice for the common good.60 Still, especially under the sway of deconstructive theory, which fits nicely into, as Heidegger would say, the American «they,» a large majority of American commentators project the self-made man onto Heidegger's Held and authentic Dasein, and even project the aspect of distancing onto the notion of fate. Fate becomes something created by the authentic Dasein itself, or it becomes the site of resistance to and breaking with any tradition.

Guignon probably intends his emphasis on utopian ideals as a means to avoid Wolin's criticism of circularity.61 In his book Heidegger: Thought and Historicity , Fynsk finds nothing wrong in circularities like these, once we come to think of the circular movement not «in a linear fashion,» but «on the contrary, as a simultaneous, open-ended movement in two opposing directions—not in terms of a circle but in terms of a paradoxical structure of simultaneous approach and withdrawal, of a casting forth that casts back.»62 In some sense, this anticipates his interpretation of section 74. Fynsk warns against an interpretation in which we lose sight of «the possibility of thinking the political import of Heidegger's thought.»63 Thus, by his «largely immanent readings of Heidegger's texts,»64 Fynsk wants to illuminate «those points where the text marks its relation to something that exceeds it and that provokes its movement.»65 Yet, in his interpretation of Being and Time , in the chapter "The Self and its Witness,"66 he doesn't talk about politics, at least not in the sense of Wolin and Guignon. It is «the other» and «the more primordial experience that is an originary encounter with alterity»67 that ignites the paradoxical structure of simultaneous approach and withdrawal. Choosing one's hero is this act of approaching and following. However, as the sentences on erwidert and Widerruf show, «choosing as affirming and following is not a form of passive reception; insofar as it involves interpretation, it is also a struggle»;68 a struggle whose purpose is to distance Dasein from its hero. The way from Being and Time does not lead to the Nazis but to Heidegger's lectures on Nietzsche:

Therefore, if the "following" that is made possible by such an existentiell choice is a fateful necessity, then it might be said that, by writing Being and Time , Heidegger had to write Nietzsche —at least, insofar as a fate must be written. Nietzsche , we might say, represents Heidegger's effort to lose Nietzsche. The engagement with that possibility of existence (or of thought) that is Nietzsche's—a repetition of the engagement marked in Being and Time —is

undertaken for the purposes of disengagement and the demarcation of a new historical position.69

I leave open whether Fynsk's interpretation is closer to Birmingham or to Guignon, or whether it marks a genuine stand within the field demarcated by «erwidert» as conversation with, and negation of, the past. In my view it is a further example of the devastating effects of Heidegger's «playful» punning with «wieder» and «wider,» and with the dative and accusative.

Guignon developed an interpretation according to which authentic Dasein distances itself from the present and the past and yet identifies itself with some past. However, as I pointed out in section B of chapter 1, this would have required the dative with «erwidert.» Yet, there is even a sense of «erwidern» in the accusative according to which it might mean an act of distancing even stronger than in Guignon. As Guignon and also Fynsk, Birmingham too might have admitted a strong demand in the passages on heritage, destiny, and repetition in order then to make the act of negation that, according to her, authentic Dasein performs in the sentences on erwidern and Widerruf even more dramatic. In section B of chapter 1 I presented Birmingham' s interpretation of the passage on erwidert and Widerruf, and in section C of chapter 2 I summarized her interpretation of the passage on «destiny.» Birmingham wants to show that «Heidegger does not articulate a philosophy of history at all, but instead opens the way for rethinking political judgment» (TP 25), and that Lacoue-Labarthe is wrong in his claim that Heidegger's engagement in National Socialism was «permitted» by «an unexamined theory of mimetic identification» (TP 44).70 Following her interpretation of «erwidert» and «Widermf» she states in a bluntly metaphysical way that there are entities with a clear definition, that Heidegger knew of this, and that, in the passage in question, he wrote about these entities:

Events, by definition, are occurrences that interrupt routine processes, and Heidegger clearly understands this when he writes of the event of destiny as that which allows for the disavowal of the past and possibility of something unexpected and unpredictable. . . . In still other words, Dasein's critical response dissolves any authorization of repeatable historical possibilities based on a myth of beginnings. (TP 31)

By this, she smuggles into the text a term of the later Heidegger, «Ereignis,» which Heidegger does not use at all as a technical term in Being and Time . (Note that she translates «Geschehen» with «historizing,» or «historicity»; thus, «event» must be the translation of the term «Ereignis» in Heidegger's later writings.) She regards her projection of her specific interpretation of the later Heidegger's concept of event onto the two passages in Being and Time in section 74 as sufficient to refute Lacoue-Labarthe's analysis of the Rectorate Address and of Being and Time . After these two points, she tries to

show that this project of Being and Time , namely, to develop a philosophy of Rig, of antitotalitarian politics, is central in Heidegger's lectures on Nietzsche between 1936 and 194o (TP 33ff.).71 Thus, if Lacoue-Labarthe is wrong, what else was it that «permitted» Heidegger's engagement in National Socialism? Her answer is brief: «in certain crucial texts in the 1930s, namely, the Rectorial Address and in some passages of Introduction to Metaphysics , Heidegger forgot the sublime moment which calls for Dasein's resolute judgment» (TP 44). He forgot. Thus, according to Birmingham, having been engaged since at least the early 1920s until, at least, the end of the 1930s in a philosophy of antitotalitarian politics, the greatest philosopher simply forgot his entire philosophy though it was tailored precisely as a theoretical and practical critique of situations like his and Hitler's Machtübernahme in 1933.72

A. Keep Silent! Or, Heidegger's Machtergreifung

Birmingham's and Guignon's interpretations to the contrary notwithstanding, Being and Time is neither anarchist nor politically neutral. Rather, it is a brilliant summary of the politics of the revolutionary Right. But is it «inherently fascist or proto-Nazi» (HC 131)? There is no need for long speculations, for Heidegger himself has given a clear answer to the question. As was mentioned above,1 Guignon refers to the meeting between Heidegger and the Jew Karl Löwith in Rome 1936. Heidegger wore the swastika during his entire stay in Rome, even during an excursion to Frascati and Tusculum with his wife, his sons, and Löwith. They talked about this and that until Löwith brought up the controversy in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung of January 1936 between Hans Barth and Emil Staiger (see MH 241-248) and said that he agreed neither with Barth nor with Staiger, «insofar as I was of the opinion that his partisanship for National Socialism lay in the essence of his philosophy {daß seine Parteinahme für den Nationalsozialismus im Wesen seiner Philosophie läge }.»2

If Birmingham were right, Heidegger's answer probably would have been very short: «Being and Time? Historicality? Never heard of it!» According to Wolin, he would have shaken his head slowly and pensively, and would have finally said: «Well, Mr. Löwith! You know, I was just a regular conservative, and with Volk and all that kind of stuff; I wanted to ground these ideas in a theory of autonomy and decision. Unfortunately, it turned out that I lost any criteria. So, I couldn't help but become a conformist. Thus, in 1933 I couldn't resist. If the communists had achieved power, I would have become

a hard-working communist instead.» According to Guignon's interpretation, one would have expected a statement like the following: «Mr. Löwith, you are wrong. My partisanship for National Socialism is by no means inherent in the essence of Being and Time . I would not even call Being and Time the basis of my political engagement. However, if you like to think of it that way, you must keep in mind that it is the basis only in a very, very weak sense. For, first, as I say at the beginning of section 74, "In the existential analysis we cannot, in principle, discuss what Dasein factically resolves in any particular case. Our investigation excludes even the existential projection of the factical possibilities of existence" (BT 434; SZ 383). Thus, whatever one might read out of section 74, it doesn't affect Being and Time itself. Second, in my concept of historicality in sections 74-77, I merely explain the general structure of the situation in which, at that time, each person had to make his decision. From this analysis of the general structure one cannot infer anything about my own decision. Thus, third, even if one reads into section 74 a decision for National Socialism, one has to keep in mind that it is just one example of the possible decisions and could easily have been replaced with an example of the decision of a communist.»

However, as is known, «Heidegger agreed with me without reservation and added that his concept of "historicity" was the basis {die Grundlage} of his political "engagement" ("Einsatz"). He also left no doubt about his belief in Hitler.»3 Guignon misreads the notion of «basis {die Grundlage}»4 and he doesn't realize that «erwidert» in section 74 does not mean some deliberating conversation with the past, or some other act of distancing oneself from the past, but rather indicates compliance with the call of the past. According to my interpretation, in section 74 Heidegger presented a brilliant summary of the motif common to all revolutionary rightist authors. In his peculiar way, however, he inserted the notion of Volksgemeinschaft into his summary. In preceding parts of Being and Time , he explicitly criticized basic assumptions of Scheler's theory. In addition, there is no discussion in Being and Time that is analogous to Scheler's discussion of the different Gemeinschaften and that thus might have enabled Heidegger to criticize National Socialism. In light of these facts, his addition of the Volksgemeinschaft has to be read as an option for National Socialism. At the same time, the theory of history and politics is formulated in such an abstract way that philosophical readers could easily mistake it for a neutral fundamental ontology or at least could easily leave aside the impression that it was much more specific. The general motif of downward plunge and recovery in Being and Time as a whole and in its section 74 in particular could certainly not be missed, and it might be the case that in the eyes of many readers this motif could pass as fundamental ontology. Heidegger's option for National Socialism, however, was not so obvious. In order to recognize it one had to revert the sequence of «der Gemeinschaft» (SZ 394; «of the community,» BT 436) and «des Volkes» (SZ 384;

«of {the} people,» BT 436) and had to connect the resulting Volksgemeinschaft not only with Heidegger's criticism of the subject but also with his criticism of Scheler's notion of value and of the basis of Scheler's entire ontology, namely, the latter's distinction between a temporal realm and a realm of eternal entities. Still, even more was necessary, namely, to relate these findings to the presence of an absence, the absence of any discussion comparable to Scheler's theory of the different Gemeinschaften. In this way, Heidegger's option could easily be overlooked or ignored. No one reading a book on fundamental ontology by the «most famous» philosopher would normally be prepared for the possiblity that its author was making a case for the most radical party on the revolutionary Right.

The presentation in section 74 has been carefully prepared, not only from the beginning of section 74 and of section 72, but already from the end of Division One on, if not almost from the beginning of the entire book. It is certainly true that nothing in Being and Time allows for the step from Gemeinschaft in general to the Volksgemeinschaft in particular. However, it is equally true that there is nothing in Being and Time that might have prevented its author from making this specification. Like Scheler prior to his Kehre, Heidegger «deconstructs» liberalism and leftism and thus paves the way for an alignment with the Right. In contrast to Scheler, however, Heidegger also explicitly and implicitly «deconstructs» positions on the right, such as Scheler's, that allow their authors to distance themselves from and criticize Nazism. It is in this sense that, indeed, Being and Time leads directly into Nazism. Thus, one should not be surprised that Heidegger adds the specific difference «Volk» to the genus «Gemeinschaft» (BT 436; SZ 384) and thus sides with Hitler's «Volksgemeinschaft.» One also should not be surprised that, five years later, he joined the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei on May 1, 1933, and that twenty six days after that, on May 27, he gave his, as Jonas said, «infamous» (MH 200) rectorate address. All this underpins the assessment of Hans-Georg Gadamer, who himself has never been a detractor of Heidegger and his philosophy: «Sometimes, in admiration for the great thinker, Heidegger's defenders declared that his political error had nothing to do with his philosophy. That they could pacify themselves with such an argument! They did not notice how insulting such a defense of such an important thinker was» (MH 142).5

Being and Time is a miraculous work, and its section 74 is perhaps some sort of picture-puzzle, one of those Gestalt-switch figures used in psychology, for Heidegger's students at the time at least.6 You see something, and then, all of the sudden, after the Gestalt-switch, or after the leap, you see something else, and even if you try hard, you can no longer go back and see what you had first seen. You see in Being and Time the terrifying face of the old witch of the loneliness of the isolated bourgeois subjects, or the un-erotic groupings in their Gesellschaft, and you see the desire for a leap out of

Gesellschaft. Explicitly from 1929 on, the philosopher produces in you the mood to make the leap, and he gives you the clear direction for the leap. Maybe a critic steeped in deconstructive theory might say that you rearrange the words in «der Gemeinschaft, des Volkes» (SZ 384; «of the community, of {the} people,» BT 436), and thus, you open up the female receptivity of «die Gemeinschaft» to become impregnated by the sober, male, or neuter force of «das Volk.» In this process, you incorporate and make «frei» (SZ 38; «free,» BT 436) the real origin, and you eroticize it. Thus, you see the beautiful woman of the «Volksgemeinschaft,» as Heidegger says in the Rectorate Address (SB 15; MH 10), in all the radiance of her spiritual and technical armament. Another picture-puzzle is placed by Heidegger at the end of his Rectorate Address . Heidegger develops the same motif of identification I discussed with reference to Being and Time . As in Being and Time , the origin is present in an extremely endangered situation, and you have to listen to its call to grasp it in order to regain stable identity, authenticity, or your own true essence, and in order to fulfill the demand of the origin to be faithfully rerealized: «But neither will anyone ask us whether we will it or do not will it when the spriritual strength of the West fails and the West starts to come apart at the seams {in seinen Fugen kracht}, when this moribund pseudo civilization {abgelebte Scheinkultur} collapses into itself, pulling all forces into confusion and allowing them to suffocate in madness.»7

Everyone understands the very colloquial metaphor, «in den Fugen krachen» (to creak in the joints, to split, come apart, at the seams). For instance, a shaky chair «kracht in den Fugen» if one sits down on it, for its joints no longer keep the different parts firmly together. This expression is sometimes accompanied by some sort of enjoyment of or satisfaction with the shakiness, similar to the peculiar sadism children display from time to time. At this point in Heidegger' s speech, it is the triumphant gesture indicating that meanwhile, the anschwellender Bocksgesang has become such a Krach (very loud noise) that no one can any longer miss it or cover it up with the work of ambiguity, and that those whose victory has been forecast in the sentences on erwidert and Widerruf have in fact taken over the city. The countermovement to this downward plunge of collapse and suffocation is performed in the next paragraph, although he has already presented it several times before, and at one place in terms of Fuge. For about three pages prior to the sentence with «moribund pseudo civilization» he says that to realize the «primordial and full essence of science» requires that «we submit ourselves to the command decreed from long ago by the beginning of our spiritual-historical existence {wir uns in die ferne Verfügung des Anfangs unseres geistig-geschichtlichen Daseins fügen}» (SB 16; italics mine, J. F.).8 The Fuge (joint) keeps something in the proper order. «In den Fugen krachen» is one state within the process of falling apart that can be counteracted only if one turns back and listens to the call of the Fuge to which the corresponding, or echoing, verb is «sich fügen.» «Sich fügen» is «to fit oneself (back) into the

proper order,» and is often used with the implication that one has tried hard to avoid fitting in but can no longer resist and thus gives in. «Sich in sein Schicksal fügen» means to accept one's fate and no longer try to resist it. To accept one' s fate is what authentic Dasein does since it realizes that by this it gains fullness and authenticity of life. Only inauthentic Dasein does not sich fügen into its fate. Pace Birmingham, Guignon, and Caputo, fate is neither made by the individual nor can it be evaded by the individual. Often, «sich fügen» means simply to surrender, «sich überliefern dem»;9 correspondingly, that into which Dasein sich fügt, is the Fuge, Fügung, or Gefügtheit. Heidegger doesn't use Schicksal or Fügung. Rather, he prefers the noun «Verfügung.» For the latter is a bureaucratic, legal and military term and often means a command given in a very serious situation. Furthermore, the Verfügung is fate, namely, fate as it raises its voice and delivers a command. A command has to be heard. In Being and Time , (in contrast to inauthentic Dasein, which doesn't listen to the call) authentic Dasein erwidert the call of the Volk. In the Rectorate Address , «we» «fügen» ourselves into the call, that is, the «Verfügung.» The «Verfügung,» however, verfügt, commands, that the city—the universities and Germany— has to be cleaned up from all the «moribund pseudo civilization» in order to make room for the proper realization of Volk and Führer, just as the call in Being and Time verfügte that Gesellschaft had to be destroyed in order to make room for the proper rerealization of Gemeinschaft.

To return to the end of the Rectorate Address , after the paragraph with «in seinen Fugen kracht» Heidegger goes on:

Whether such a thing occurs or does not occur, this depends solely on whether we as a historical-spiritual Volk will ourselves, still and again {noch und wieder}, or whether we will ourselves no longer. Each individual has a part in deciding this {entscheidet darüber mir }, even if, and precisely if, he seeks to evade this decision10

As opposed to the situation in 1927, in 1933 the origin is already «free» in several empirical Daseine and has already taken over. Thus, one has to identify oneself with these authentic Daseine since they are the truth of oneself. In an ugly parody of Kant's fact of freedom, and as an example of the phenomenon that, as it was called in Being and Time , some Dasein can be the «'conscience' of Others» (BT 344; SZ 298),11 Heidegger goes on:

But it is our will that our Volk fulfill its historical mission. We will ourselves. For the young and youngest elements of the Volk, which are already reaching beyond us, have already decided this. { Aber wir wollen, daß unser Volk seinen geschichtlichen Auftrag erfüllt. Wir wollen uns selbst. Denn die junge und jüngste Kraft des Volkes, die über uns schon hinweggreift, hat darüber bereits entschieden . }12

He then moves on with one of his characteristic «aber» («however»): «We can only fully understand the glory and greatness of this new beginning, however,

{ Die Herrlichkeit aber und die Größe dieses Aufbruchs } if we carry within ourselves that deep and broad thoughtfulness upon which the ancient wisdom of the Greeks drew in uttering the words»13 in order to conclude with a quote from Plato: «ta . . . megala panta episphale . . . ("All that is great stands in the storm . . . ") {"Alles Große steht im Sturm"} (Platon, Republic , 497d, 9).»14

The sentence with «however» is well placed. The proverbial German «zer-streute Professor» (absentminded professor) might have been somewhat embarrassed by the format and tone of Heidegger's address. Now he can lean back relieved: Heidegger remains one of ours, concerned with Plato and serious study. Non-absentminded professors and all the «verblendeten jungen Leute» (deluded young people),15 however, could see in the last sentences the appropriate expression of the sublime event, and for them the particle «however» amounted to a «now, finally.» However, just as at the forked road where we negate the obligations contained in the institutions of

,16 there is more than one way. Those who already had a more specific agenda than the one of the non-absentminded professors and of the deluded young people will have heard, and read, the end differently. For them, the particle «however» introduced a warning to all the absentminded and non-absentminded professors: «Ihr werdet euch noch wundern!» (or: «Ihr werdet noch euer blaues Wunder erleben!» You will get the shock of your life!). The name of the most disgusting journal of the extreme Right in the Weimar Republic was Der Stürmer, a magazine full of the most horrifying anti-Semitic propaganda. The noun «Stürmer» is grammatically, in Aristotelean terms, paronymous, and a «Stürmer» is, psychologically and christologically, a figure of, with Heideggerian hyphens, In-Spiration and redemption. As «the grammarian gets his name from grammar,»17 a Stürmer, stormer, gets his name from Sturm, storm. As the grammarian is able to practice grammar in virtue of the grammar in him, the Stürmer stürmt, storms, in virtue of the storm in him, which is the primary agent in the storming of the Stürmer: «The Stürmer stürmt. This individual storms in virtue of the storm that has ergriffen, captured, him, or that has sich in ihm niedergelassen, settled itself in this individual; therefore, this individual stands in the storm and is a stormer.» Stürmer was another name for those soldiers who—as in Langemarck and Verdun—ran out of their trenches in order to erstürmen, to take by storm, the lines of the enemy. Of course, the editors and readers of Der Stürmer used this name to indicate where they came from, and where they wanted to go to, namely, from the battlefield against the external enemy of World War I back into the city, in order to erstürmen, take by storm, the city and throw out whomever they regarded as the city's internal enemies, notably, the Jews, social democrats, liberals, communists, Asphalt-Literaten, and homosexuals, and to establish their sway. To be sure, no one can reasonably maintain that Heidegger found his anti-Semitism represented, or erwidert, echoed, in Der Stürmer , or that Heidegger wiederholte or erwiderte the anti-Semitism of Der Stürmer . Yet, Der Stürmer and its readers formed a

remarkable and vociferous group of those in whose leader Heidegger still believed in 1936. However, even without the existence of Der Stürmer , the people listening to Heidegger' s speech could not but be reminded of the heroes of Langemarck and Verdun. Most of the educated readers at that time had read Ernst Jünger's diary of his World War I, published for the first time in 1920 under the title In Stahlgewittern (In the thunderstorms of steel). In this book one could read about the dangers, excitements, and pleasures of warriors that were unattainable within bourgeois Gesellschaft, and about true comradeship brought about by the war; or, rather, made «free» (BT 436; SZ 384) by the war; the war that makes manifest whether in one' s own true self one is really a comrade or not. In Jünger, this was literature and for the most part free of what bourgeois readers might have regarded to be the vulgarities of many of the other novels on World War I. Even without Jünger's text, however, everyone was familiar with the vocabulary of Sturm, in which Sturm, or the command «Auf zum Sturm!,» «Sturmangriff!,» («Attack! Assault!») governs—as a substance or health in an Aristotelean

18 —all the activities, persons, and materials necessary for an assault, as, for instance, with Heideggerian hyphens, «Sturm-Gepäck,» «Sturm-Gewehr,» «Sturm-Führer» «Sturm-Abteilung,» and so on. Jünger' s title is ambivalent. On the one hand, it refers, of course, to all the munition exploding on the battlefields. On the other hand, it refers to the alleged process whereby the war makes «free» one' s true self, and that the war forms, informs, that is, «steels» the individual, as the Führer used to say that the German soldier had to be «hart wie Krupp-Stahb» («as hard as steel manufactured by Krupp»). Jünger can indicate these multiple meanings already in the title of his novel because he can quite naturally rely on the use of the German preposition and prefix «in-» (in) in metaphors of In-Spiration. «Seid einig im Geiste!» («Be united in spirit!») is a formula used in church at several occasions in order to indicate that we open the hardened houses of our selfish egos to surrender the interior of our houses to God and to let the Geist enter, to let the Geist be the primary agent in all our deeds, and to be «authentically» united with the others im Geiste, in our spirits, because we are united in God's spirit in which we are because it is in us. 19 In 1934 the artist Ernst Barlach, who had hoped for a short time that the National Socialists would officially acknowledge his art as «German art,» made a sculpture entitled with a variation on the last words of the Rectorate Address , namely, "Wanderer im Wind" (Wanderer in the wind), today on display in the Ernst Barlach Museum in Hamburg. As the face of the upright person shows, it is a piece of inner emigration. This is probably the reason why Barlach preferred «wind» over «storm.» For «im Sturm» can of course be used, say, as the title of a painting showing a shipwreck or sailors trying to avoid one. However, its use as a metaphor of «heroic» enthusiasm and inspiration is common. A Wind can carry and inspire me as well, and it can also «blow into my face.» However, a Wind is by definition less strong than a Sturm, and it can even be very light. Furthermore, in contrast

to «Sturm» the word «Wind» can invite a certain pensiveness and even melancholy. 20 Thus Barlach's figure is not a «Stürmer» but a «Wanderer,» who does not have a specific agenda to realize or a target to «take by storm.» Still, he walks «in» the wind. The hair of the wanderer is moved by the wind. Either the wind is erwidert, in all its different meanings (including resistance to it), by an inner movement of the wanderer, or there is no exterior wind, and the face as well as the hair is the exterior expression of an inner wind. Or it is both ways at the same time.

Again, all these possibilities of this sculpture are covered in a completely appropriate way by the «im» of the title since, especially when faced with the accusation of resistance against the Sturm, Barlach can always refer to, and rely on, the uses of «in» in different inspirations depending on what it is that is in me and inspires me, as grammatically, according to Aristotle, the grammar is «

,» «in,»21 me and enables me to practice it, to be realized grammar, and, thus, to be called a grammarian.

Educated in ancient literature as he was, Heidegger could have used another Greek quote, especially if he had wanted to calm the enthusiasm about the National Socialist «new beginning» down in some way, or to indicate, in whatever manner, inner reservations toward National Socialism. However, he chose the one which, by virtue of its context in Plato22 as well as in Heidegger's speech, was, like no other, pertinent to support die Sache des, the cause of the, New National Socialist State as well as die Sache des Denkens, the issue of thinking. Or he could have given the entire sentence as it appears in the widely used translation by Schleiermacher: «Denn alles Große ist auch bedenklich und, wie man sagt, das SchÖne in der Tat schwer» («For, all that is great is also grave, and, as they say, the beautiful is difficult, indeed»). Since «bedenklich» often means «dubious,» this might have been read even as some sort of mental reservation toward National Socialism by those interested in that. If he had wanted to avoid any possibility of being understood as having reservations toward National Socialism, he could have replaced «bedenklich» with several other words, the best of which, in this situation, would probably have been «erhaben» (sublime). However, he left aside the second part of Plato' s sentence, and he translated its first part extremely willfully. If one assumes that Heidegger maintained, as do all the translators I know of, that Plato's «

» was supposed to mean something like «precarious,» «risky,» or «grave,» he deliberately turned Plato's intention into the opposite. By this, he produced a stirring metaphor of inspiration for all, so to speak, normal National .Socialists, and for all not yet decided. At the same time, however, he turned the «Military Service [Wehrdienst ]» (MH 10; SB 15ff.), about which he had talked before, into explicit aggression. In addition, he did not distance himself from the readers and producers of Der Stürmer . Rather, he invited them to add their «Angriff» (attack) to his «im Sturm»; all those Stürmer who already at that time wanted the war, or at least, as a

relative of mine (not a reader of Der Stürmer ) put it, a «small war» to conquer the Soviet Union and to make good for the «shame of Versailles.»

However, things are much simpler. As to Being and Time , one might wonder whether for its students at the time it was a picture-puzzle or straightforward national socialistic. The last line of the Rectorate Address , however, is definitely too blunt to be a picture-puzzle. For—to assume the impossible— even if none of the listeners to the Rectorate Address had ever heard of Der Stürmer , Jünger, or World War I, the presence of the SA with their swastika flags at the Rectorate Address was all too obvious, and—«um das Maß voll zu machen» (to fill the cup to the brim)—Heidegger had ordained that, at the end of the entire procedure, all attendants had to sing the so-called "Horst-Wessel-Lied." 23 During the Weimar Republic the SA, the Sturm Abteilung, had been the illegal army of Hitler's party, and the "Horst-Wessel-Lied" was their Kampflied (and, under the National Socialists, «the other» German national anthem). The members of the SA had erstürmt the meetings of their political foes and had beaten up and killed a lot of people. Thus, also the last sentence of Heidegger's speech is an open command to übefliefern oneself to the new state. The military term «Sturm Abteilung» meant the leading group, the vanguard, in a Sturm-Angriff. Of course, being the vanguard of the National Socialists, the SA and the editors of Der Stürmer used these names to call upon a political and military Wiederholung—Wiederholung in Heidegger's sense, namely, under new circumstances, that is, this time victorious—of the Sturm-Angriffe of the brave German soldiers in World War I. Thus, let' s zoom in one last time on the heroes of Langemarck and Verdun in order, then, to disappear into the German or non-German forests and to leave for other shores. 24

B. Events under Trees and Stars

Hans Castorp was no dandy, nor an environmentalist. He wasn't a Held either, neither a «Held von Verdun» nor some other Held. And he was no Heros. Without knowing how, he stumbled into World War I as it burst into the last four pages of Thomas Mann's novel The Magic Mountain . Nonetheless, like the «Helden von Verdun,» Hans Castorp too ran forward, he too listened to some call of the Volk, and he too gave voice to the call he was hearing. But he was not singing the German national anthem. Rather, he sang some love song, a song of Heimat, homeland, and love, "Der Lindenbaum" ("The Lime Tree"):

Up he gets, and staggers on, limping on his earth-bound feet, all unconsciously singing:

"Its waving branches whi—ispered
A mess—age in my ear—"

and thus, in the tumult, in the rain, in the dusk, vanishes out of our sight. 25

He wasn't in the first line, and he didn't seem to be very enthusiastic, or skillful. For, he didn't have the German Volk, or some of its blonde women in mind. Rather, he had fallen in love with the foe, with Madame Chauchat, Clavdia Chauchat, the Russian with a French husband; with her peculiarly gliding step, her broad cheek-bones, and her Kirghiz eyes that went through him «like a knife»26 when he passed her by in the dining room. We don't know what happened to Hans Castorp. The author, son of the haute bourgeoisie in the open-minded Lübeck, for one moment feels tempted «to press a finger delicately to our eyes at the thought that we shall see you no more, hear you no more for ever.»27 However, he immediately er-mann-t sich (pulls himself together), and even confesses that it is without great concern that he leaves Castorp's fortunes open.

"The Lime Tree" is part of the collection of poems "Winter Journey" ("Winter Reise"), written by the disappointed and persecuted democrat Wilhelm Müller, and set to music by Franz Schubert. Without its fifth angry and political stanza, it became very popular, a Volkslied. Heinrich Heine, a Jew, also wrote a poem that became a Volkslied, "Die Loreley." During National Socialism, in anthologies of folk songs, Heinrich Heine's name as the author was replaced with «author unknown,» or simply «Volkslied.» I don't know whether Heidegger liked "The Lime Tree." Maybe it doesn't particularly fit areas like the Black Forest, or the Harz about which Heine wrote his Die Harzreise . Nor does it seem to fit, or to respond, to erwidern, Heidegger's specific melancholia. Probably, there are folk songs about fir trees that he would have liked more. 28 o be sure, trees show up not only in Germany. After all, there is the Porphyrean tree in logic and ontology, and it was under a tree, notably, a fig tree, the Geschlecht of the mother, that Saint Augustine was converted:

So I stood up and left him where we had been sitting, utterly bewildered. Somehow I flung myself down beneath a fig tree and gave way to the tears which now streamed from my eyes, the sacrifice that is acceptable to you. . . . I was asking myself these questions, weeping all the while with the most bitter sorrow in my heart, when all at once I heard the sing-song voice of a child in a nearby house. Whether it was the voice of a boy or a gift I cannot say, but again and again it repeated the refrain 'Take it and read, take it and read' {tolle lege, tolle lege}.29

Nonetheless, there might be something special to the Deutsche Wald, even for those who have no sense for the German Soldier. Even in Benjamin, at a crucial point, namely, in his explication of aura, a tree shows up. 30 One might read as an implicit criticism of the theological abuse of the tree in Augustine the aphorism,

Commentary and translation stand in the same relation to the text as style and mimesis to nature: the same phenomenon considered from different aspects. On

the tree of the sacred text both are only the eternally rustling leaves; on that of the profane, the seasonally falling fruits. 31

The same might hold true of a short piece in the context of aura not translated into English:

I climbed up a slope and lay down under a tree. The tree was a poplar or an alder. You ask why I have forgotten its species? I did so because, as I looked into the foliage and followed its movements with my eyes, language in me was absorbed by it so that, in my presence, language at that moment consummated again the very old marriage with the tree. The branches and the top swayed in consideration or bent in refusal. The branches presented themselves as inclined or as high-handed. The foliage fought against a rough draft of wind, shuddering before it or complying with it. The trunk had its good ground to stand on. And the leaves cast their shadows upon each other. A soft wind played for the wedding and soon took away the children, quickly sprouted from this bed, carded them into the world as an image-language. 32

Maybe, these sentences show that, sometimes, even Benjamin could write somewhat kitschig. Nonetheless, they also show a little bit of Benjamin's tender nominalism as in contrast to the call in Augustine and Heidegger. Notably, they bear witness to Benjamin's concern with nature. After all, already in 1928, in One-Way Street , Benjamin wrote, «If society has so degenerated through necessity and greed that it can now receive the gifts of nature only rapaciously, that it snatches the fruit unripe from the trees in order to sell it most profitably, and is compelled to empty each dish in its determination to have enough, the earth will be impoverished and the land yield bad harvests.»33 Thus, Benjamin was the first environmentalist, not Heidegger! «I'm just kidding,» as one often hears in this country after some joke, even after not very good ones of which, as I frankly admit, my book might contain some. Anyway, I started with the «Helden von Langemarck,» and I referred to Max Scheler's hymn on the war. Most probably, Heidegger had also read Ernst Jünger's In Stahlgewittern , and, immediately after its publication, he studied carefully Jünger's Der Arbeiter (SB 24f MH 17f.). Let me finish by just quoting the last, and pretty strange, piece, "To the Planetarium," of Benjamin's One-Way Street :

If one had to expound the doctrine of antiquity with utmost brevity while standing on one leg, as did Hillel that of the Jews, it could only be in this sentence: "They alone shall possess the earth who live from the powers of the cosmos." Nothing distinguishes the ancient from the modern man so much as the former's absorption in a cosmic experience scarcely known to later periods. Its waning is marked by the flowering of astronomy at the beginning of the modem age. Kepler, Copernicus, and Tycho Brahe were certainly not driven by sci-

entific impulses alone. All the same, the exclusive emphasis on an optical connection to the universe, to which astronomy very quickly led, contained a portent of what was to come. The ancients' intercourse with the cosmos had been different: the ecstatic trance. For it is in this experience alone that we gain certain knowledge of what is nearest to us and what is remotest to us, and never of one without the other. This means, however, that man can be in ecstatic contact with the cosmos only communally. It is the dangerous error of modem men to regard this experience as unimportant and avoidable, and to consign it to the individual as the poetic rapture of starry nights. It is not; its hour strikes again and again, and then neither nations nor generations can escape it, as was made terribly clear by the last war, which was an attempt at a new and unprecedented commingling with the cosmic powers. Human multitudes, gases, electrical forces were hurled into the open country, high-frequency currents coursed through the landscape, new constellations rose in the sky, aerial space and ocean depths thundered with propellers, and everywhere sacrificial shafts were dug in Mother Earth. This immense wooing of the cosmos was enacted for the first time on a planetary scale, that is, in the spirit of technology. But because the lust for profit of the ruling classes sought satisfaction through it, technology betrayed man and turned the bridal bed into a bloodbath. The mastery of nature, so the imperialists teach, is the purpose of all technology. But who would trust a cane wielder who proclaimed the mastery of children by adults to be the purpose of education? Is not education above all the indispensable ordering of the relationship between generations and therefore mastery, if we are to use this term, of that relationship and not of children? And likewise technology is not the mastery of nature but of the relation between nature and man. Men as a species completed their development thousands of years ago; but mankind as a species is just beginning his. In technology a physis is being organized through which mankind's contact with the cosmos takes a new and different form from that which it had in nations and families. One need recall only the experience of velocities by virtue of which mankind is now preparing to embark on incalculable journeys into the interior of time, to encounter there rhythms from which the sick shall draw strength as they did earlier on high mountains or at Southern seas. The "Lunaparks" are a prefiguration of sanatoria. The paroxysm of genuine cosmic experience is not tied to that tiny fragment of nature that we are accustomed to call "Nature." In the nights of annihilation of the last war the frame of mankind was shaken by a feeling that resembled the bliss of the epileptic. And the revolts that followed it were the first attempt of mankind to bring the new body under its control. The power of the proletariat is the measure of its convalescence. If it is not gripped to the very marrow by the discipline of this power, no pacifist polemics will save it. Living substance conquers the frenzy of destruction only in the ecstasy of procreation. 34

After this, one might turn back a few pages and compare to Heidegger the notions of decision and resoluteness in "Madame Ariane—Second Courtyard on the Left." 35 Isn't that more interesting and much better written as well?

After all, it is you, dear readers, who are called upon to make up your minds, to make a decision , and «to have the last word»! Anyway, don't forget the end of "Madame Ariane—Second Courtyard on the Left":

Each morning the day lies like a fresh shirt on our bed; this incomparably fine, incomparably tightly woven tissue of pure prediction fits us perfectly. The happiness of the next twenty-four hours depends on our ability, on waking, to pick it up.