The Early Heidegger and Medieval Philosophy


Book Description

This is an interpretive study of Heidegger's complex relationship to the medieval tradition. The text examines how the enthusiastic defender of the Aristotelian-Scholastic tradition became the great destroyer of metaphysical theology.




The Early Heidegger & Medieval Philosophy


Book Description

The Early Heidegger and Medieval Philosophy is a major interpretive study of Heidegger's complex relationship to medieval philosophy. S. J. McGrath's contribution is historical and biographical as well as philosophical, examining how the enthusiastic defender of the Aristotelian-Scholastic tradition became the great destroyer of metaphysical theology. This book provides an informative and comprehensive examination of Heidegger's changing approach to medieval sources--from the seminary studies of Bonaventure to the famous phenomenological destructions of medieval ontology. McGrath argues that the mid-point of this development, and the high point of Heidegger's reading of medieval philosophy, is the widely neglected habilitation thesis on Scotus and speculative grammar. He shows that this neo-Kantian retrieval of phenomenological moments in the metaphysics of Scotus and Thomas of Erfurt marks the beginning of a turn from metaphysics to existential phenomenology. McGrath's careful hermeneutical reconstruction of this complex trajectory uncovers the roots of Heidegger's critique of ontotheology in a Luther-inspired defection from his largely Scholastic formation. In the end McGrath argues that Heidegger fails to do justice to the spirit of medieval philosophy. The book sheds new light on a long-debated question of the early Heidegger's theological significance. Far from a neutral phenomenology, Heidegger's masterwork, Being and Time, is shown to be a philosophically questionable overturning of the medieval theological paradigm. ABOUT THE AUTHOR: S. J. McGrath is associate professor of philosophy at Memorial University of Newfoundland in Canada. PRAISE FOR THE BOOK: "McGrath's book is an impressive study of Heidegger's philosophy, which sheds light on almost all aspects of the early Heidegger and undoubtedly the book is an important contribution to the understanding of the relationship between Heidegger's philosophy and theology."--Christian Lotz, The Medieval Review " An] insightful new study. . . . It is no simple task to explicate Heidegger's philosophy -- early, middle, or late -- in terms that will render it somewhat accessible to readers while also supplying the backdrop to an argument about how that philosophy ought to be evaluated. McGrath succeeds admirably in this regard; his book is one of the most clearly written, lucid treatments of Heidegger to have been published in recent years."--Gavin T. Colvert, The Thomist "Over the last fifteen years or so, inquiry into Heidegger has been greatly enriched by studies of Heidegger's early development. . . . McGrath's study provides a useful addition to this body of scholarship, extending our understanding of Heidegger's relation to medieval theology, while offering a novel critical perspective on the course of this relation."--Glenn Branch, Philosophy in Review "McGrath offers a detailed analysis of Heidegger's early work as a way of defining his lifelong preoccupations with specific philosophical questions, especially the question concerning the meaning of God and Godforsakenness for understanding the shifts in/of his thinking. . . . McGrath's book proves itself to be one of the most insightful studies done on the early Heidegger before 1923. It offers a consistently reliable and often insightful account of Heidegger's engagement with Carl Braig, Franz Brentano, Duns Scotus, Thomas Aquinas, the medieval mystics, and the Catholic world of Freiburg in the years before WWI. Moreover, McGrath's helpful reading of Luther and of Luther's influence on Heidegger. . . Offers a model of hermeneutic care and rigor."--Charles Bambach, American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly "A systematic and detailed dismantling of Heidegger' deconstruction of medieval scholasticism. . . . Substantial and novel, this work offers a significant and timely




Heidegger


Book Description

"Martin Heidegger (1889-1976) is one of the greatest conundrums in the modern philosophical world, by turns inspiring and mind-bogglingly frustrating. In this critical introduction S. J. McGrath offers not a comprehensive summary of Heidegger but a series of incisive takes on Heidegger's thought, leading readers to a point from which they can begin or continue their own relationship with him."--BOOK JACKET.




Heidegger and Philosophical Atheology


Book Description

Heidegger and Philosophical Atheology offers an important new reading of Heidegger's middle and later thought. Beginning with Heidegger's early dissertation on the doctrine of categories in Duns Scotus, Peter S. Dillard shows how Heidegger's middle and later works develop a philosophical anti-theology or 'atheology' that poses a serious threat to traditional metaphysics, natural theology and philosophy of religion. Drawing on the insights of Scholastic thinkers such as St Thomas Aquinas and Duns Scotus, the book reveals the problematic assumptions of Heideggerian 'atheology' and shows why they should be rejected. Dillard's critique paves the way for a rejuvenation of Scholastic metaphysics and reveals its relevance to some contemporary philosophical disputes. In addition to clarifying the question of being and explaining the role of phenomenology in metaphysics, Dillard sheds light on the nature of nothingness, necessity and contingency. Ultimately the book offers a revolutionary reorientation of our understanding, both of the later Heidegger and of the legacy of Scholasticism.




Heidegger, Metaphysics and the Univocity of Being


Book Description

In Heidegger, Metaphysics and the Univocity of Being, Philip Tonner presents an interpretation of the philosophy of Martin Heidegger in terms of the doctrine of the 'univocity of being'. According to the doctrine of univocity there is a fundamental concept of being that is truly predicable of everything that exists. This book explores Heidegger's engagement with the work of John Duns Scotus, who raised philosophical univocity to its historical apotheosis. Early in his career, Heidegger wrote a book-length study of what he took to be a philosophical text of Duns Scotus'. Yet, the word 'univocity' rarely features in translations of Heidegger's works. Tonner shows, by way of a comprehensive discussion of Heidegger's philosophy, that a univocal notion of being in fact plays a distinctive and crucial role in his thought. This book thus presents a novel interpretation of Heidegger's work as a whole that builds on a suggested interpretation by Gilles Deleuze in Difference and Repetition and casts a new light on Heidegger's philosophy, clearly illuminating his debt to Duns Scotus.




Forms of Transcendence


Book Description

This book sets up a dialogue between Heidegger and four medieval authors: St. Bonaventure, Meister Eckhart, Johannes Tauler, and Jan van Ruusbroec. Through a close reading of medieval and Heideggerian texts, the book brings to light elements that present possibilities for a revised appropriation of some traditional metaphysical and theological ideas, arguing that, in spite of Heidegger's critique of "ontotheology," many aspects of his thought make a positive, and not exclusively critical, contribution. Unlike some past studies of the relation between Heidegger and medieval mysticism, this book seeks to establish a real identity between the content, the subject-matter (Sache), of the medieval and Heideggerian texts that it examines. In so doing, it challenges Heidegger's own assertion that what he calls "being" cannot be called God. Against this assertion, Sikka argues that what is to be called God remains an open question, and points out metaphysical and theological elements in Heidegger's reflections on being that help to answer this question. Offering new insights into the relation between metaphysics, theology, and mysticism, the book contributes not only to Heidegger studies but to philosophical theology as well.




Heidegger's Moral Ontology


Book Description

Heidegger's Moral Ontology offers the first comprehensive account of the ethical issues that underwrite Heidegger's efforts to develop a novel account of human existence. Drawing from a wide array of source materials from the period leading up to the publication of Being and Time (1919–1927), and in conversation with ancient, modern, and contemporary contributions to moral philosophy, James D. Reid brings Heidegger's early philosophy into fruitful dialogue with the history of ethics, and sheds fresh light on such familiar topics as Heidegger's critique of Husserl, his engagement with Aristotle, his account of mortality, the role played by Kant in the genesis of Being and Time, and Heidegger's early reflections on philosophical language and concepts. This lively book will appeal to all who are interested in Heidegger's early phenomenology and in his thought more generally, as well as to those interested in the nature, scope, and foundations of ethical life.




Supplements


Book Description

This indispensable volume adds for the first time a comprehensive anthology of the most important of Martin Heidegger's recently discovered early essays. Translated by preeminent Heidegger scholars, these supplements to Heidegger's published corpus are drawn from his long series of early experimental, constantly supplemental attempts at rethinking philosophy. Written during 1910–1925, they precede Being and Time and point beyond to Heidegger's later writings, when his famous "turn" took, in part, the form of a "return" to his earliest writings. Included are discussions of Nietzschean modernism, the mind's intentional relation to being and the problem of the external world, the concept of time in the human and natural sciences, the medieval theory of the categories of being, Jaspers's Kierkegaardian philosophy of existence and its relation to Husserl's phenomenology, being and factical life in Aristotle, the being of man and God in Luther's primal Christianity, and the relevance of Dilthey's philosophy of history for a new conception of ontology. A detailed chronological overview of Heidegger's early education, teaching, research, and publications is also included.




Being and Time


Book Description

"What is the meaning of being?" This is the central question of Martin Heidegger's profoundly important work, in which the great philosopher seeks to explain the basic problems of existence. A central influence on later philosophy, literature, art, and criticism—as well as existentialism and much of postmodern thought—Being and Time forever changed the intellectual map of the modern world. As Richard Rorty wrote in the New York Times Book Review, "You cannot read most of the important thinkers of recent times without taking Heidegger's thought into account." This first paperback edition of John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson's definitive translation also features a new foreword by Heidegger scholar Taylor Carman.




The Phenomenology of Religious Life


Book Description

“Scrupulously prepared and eminently readable,” this volume presents Heidegger’s most important lectures on religion from 1920–21 (Choice). In the early 1920s, Martin Heidegger delivered his famous lecture course, Introduction to the Phenomenology of Religion, at the University of Freiburg. He also prepared notes for a course on The Philosophical Foundations of Medieval Mysticism that was never delivered. Though he never prepared this material for publication, it represents a significant evolution in his philosophical perspective. Heidegger’s engagements with Aristotle, Neoplatonism, St. Paul, Augustine, and Martin Luther give readers a sense of what phenomenology would come to mean in the mature expression of his thought. Heidegger reveals an impressive display of theological knowledge, protecting Christian life experience from Greek philosophy and defending Paul against Nietzsche.