In the Proximity of Guilt and Danger
2000; DePaul University; Volume: 44; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês
10.5840/philtoday200044334
ISSN2329-8596
Autores Tópico(s)Hannah Arendt's Political Philosophy
ResumoKARL RAHNER AS HEIDEGGER'S OTHER What is clear, and beyond dispute, is that the German philosopher Martin Heidegger was a National Socialist at least in so far as one can date his party membership from 1933 to 1945.1 What is also clear, and beyond dispute, is that Heidegger did and said things, both during and after his tenure as rector of Freiburg University, that made obvious his support for the revolution that the National Socialists were carrying out in Germany. It is also clear, and beyond dispute, that Heidegger never truly relinquished his belief that there remained within National Socialism--authentic National Socialism-an inner truth and greatness.2 Finally, it is also clear, and beyond dispute, that up to the end of his life Heidegger actively attempted to conceal the extent of his commitment to and involvement with National Socialism, authentic or otherwise. What remains far from clear and open to doubt, however, is what are to make of these that are clear and beyond dispute. The range and plethora of critical responses that have appeared since the publication of Victor Farias's Heidegger and Nazism in 1987 and Hugo Ott's Martin Heidegger: Unterwegs zu seiner Biognctphie in 1988 make at least this clear and beyond dispute.3 What is at work here in this complex dialectic between what is clear and beyond dispute and that which is not is the issue of whom we happen to be at any given moment (e.g., philosophers, historians, literary critics, anthropologists, political scientists, etc.; and beyond these professional identities our more personal identities as wives, husbands, lovers, sons, daughters, Jews, Catholics, Protestants, Muslims, conservatives, liberals, radicals, etc.) and why we are supposed to do anything with these clear and undisputed facts. Who or what calls us to such a responsibility? Why should we care? And if we do, why are we called to do something-anything-about this concern? For it seems certain that these clear and undisputed in the case of Heidegger (or the Heidegger controversy) become facts only in relationship to who we are and why we are supposed to take notice of, and action on, these facts. Without exploring the full range of issues involved here, which would take us well beyond the topic at hand, one can at least point to the notion that what is at issue here with Heidegger and National Socialism is his status (deserved or not; and this depends on who is performing such an assessment) as one of the most, if not the most significant European philosopher of the twentieth century; and its status as one of the most, if not the most, radical manifestations of human evil in the twentieth century. That is, it is the disturbing linkage between this thinker and this movement, and the significance each has been endowed with, which calls forth all this confused and confusing attention. Wherein, one wonders, lies the key to explaining, let alone understanding, how a thinker of Heidegger's stature could descend into the proximity of a political movement so radically evil? But if one did not admire-if only grudgingly-Heidegger's achievement as a philosopher so highly (and admit to the enormous impact he has had on European thought), then the question of his commitment to National Socialism would not even be a question. Rather, Heidegger would be relegated to the ignored status of those philosophers such as Alfred Baeumler, Ernst Krieck, Nicolai Hartmann, Bruno Bauch, and Hans Heyse, who along with Heidegger also attempted a philosophical reconciliation with National Socialism and its revolution. It is in this light, then, that the nexus between Heidegger and National Socialism has been sought within Heidegger's philosophy. Therein, it has been presupposed, assumed, and argued exists the answer to Heidegger's fall into the proximity of National Socialism. For here, it can be argued, lies the real guilt of which Heidegger stands accused: that he dared to bring philosophy-particularly a thinking apparently as rigorous and profound as his own-into any sort of relationship with National Socialism, let alone as foundational a one as he appeared to. …
Referência(s)