Calcagno 2000 Fullness or the Nothing. Stein and Heidegger on Being

8/3/2019 Calcagno 2000 Fullness or the Nothing. Stein and Heidegger on Being

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Die Fiille oder das Nichts? Edith Stein and Martin Heideggeron the Question of Being

by Antonio Calcagno

Just after the Second World War, when the task of collating, editingand printing Edith Stein's Werke came under the auspices of the HusserIArchives at Louvain, a problem arose with regard to the publication ofEndliches undEwiges Sein (Finite and Eternal Being). The then editors ofthe collected works found attached to Stein's Habilitationsschrift twoappendices. The first was entitled, Die Seelenburg (The Castle 0/ he Soul)and the second, Martin Heideggers Existentialphilosophie (MartinHeidegger's Existential Philosophy). These appendices appeared to formthe last chapter of Endliches und Ewiges Sein. Yet when the work waspublished in 1950, these two appendices were not included. Theyeventually appeared in another volume, Welt und Person (World andPerson), published twelve years later. J

The second appendix, Martin Heideggers Existentialphilosophie,consists ofEdith Stein's reflections on four works ofHeidegger, namely,Being and Time, Kant and the Problem o/Metaphysics, On the Essence 0/the Ground, and What is Metaphysics? The reflections on the last threeworks are not very substantial, and basically consist of summaries ofHeidegger's position in these works. However, a "strong impression" was

I See Edith Stein, Endliches und Ewiges Sein, Edith Steins Werke 2 (Louvain: EditionsNauwelaerts, 1950), hereafter referred to as EES; and Edith Stein, Welt und Person, EdithSteins Werke 6 (Louvain: Editions Nauwelaerts, 1962). All translations are mine unlessotherwise specified. Here, one could investigate in further detail why the editors decided topublish the appendices as separate works. 2000, American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly, Vol. LXXIV, No.2


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270 AMERICAN CATHOLIC PHILOSOPHICAL QUARTERLYmade on Edith Stein by reading Heidegger's Being and Time. 2 Stein claimsthat she wrote the appendix in order to debate with Heidegger about hisnotion ofbeing. The question that needs to be asked is, what in Heidegger'sphilosophy made an indelible impression? Moreover, how exactly didHeidegger influence Edith Stein's ontology? This article seeks to addressthese questions.

First, I shall present Edith Stein's critique ofHeidegger's philosophyby examining her comments on Being and Time. In doing so, I hope tosketch the fundamental lineaments of Stein's philosophical dialogue withHeidegger. Second, drawing on her critique of Heidegger, I willdemonstrate how Stein overcomes Heidegger's insights, and develops herown sense of being as abundance (Fill/e). By doing so, I shall show thenature of Heidegger's influence on Stein's thought. More importantly, Ishall present a brief sketchofEdith Stein's own understanding ofbeing. Inconclusion, I shall offer some philosophical reflections on the relationshipbetween Heidegger and Stein as well as on the Steinian sense of being.

I.

The first part of the substantial appendix Martin HeideggersExistentialphilosophie is devoted to a summary of Being and Time'sprincipal tenets. In her weighty critique of Being and Time, which formsthe second part of the text, Edith Stein proposes to answer three questions:What is Dasein? Is Heidegger's analysis ofDasein adequate? And is theanalysis sufficient to serve as a ground for approaching the question of thesense of being?

In response to the first question, Stein believes that Heidegger'sDasein is poly-semantic.3 Stein maintains that Heidegger's different usesof the term Dasein are generally coherent. Sometimes he will use the termto refer to "human being." At other points, Heidegger is stricter with theterm, employing it to refer specifically to the particular way of being(Seinsweise) of he human being. Essentially, Dasein is characterized by itsbeing-in-the world. "By Dasein Heideggcr means humankind (it oftenrefers to a who or a self). Sometimes it refers to human being (in these

2EES, xii.3See Edith Stein, Martin Heideggers Existentialphilosophie, in Welt und Person (seenote 1), 92. Hereafter referred to as MHE.


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STEIN AND HEIDEGGER ON THE QUESTION OF BEING 271cases he mostly employs the expression the Being of the Dasein). Thisbeing in contradistinction to other modes of being is called existence(Existenz)."4What is troubling for Stein about Heidegger' s use of the term Daseinis that even though the being ofDasein is to be understood as a particularway of being, Heidegger claims that the essence of the human being isexistence. Traditionally, metaphysics reserved such a definition for God.The essence of God was existence. The implication for the being ofhumankind was clear: We are not the source of our own being, for we arenot God. It is not inherent in our essence to be self-generating. We arebrought into existence through our parents, and ultimately through God.What is at stake here is the question of origins or sources. For Stein,Heidegger cuts the human person off from the original source of being,namely, God. The human being is established as the central source ofbeing, for he/she alone can question his/her own being. By adopting themedieval formula and applying it to the being of Dasein, Heideggerachieves two things. First, the human being becomes the source from whichhis/her being takes on meaning, a kleiner Gatt (small god). Second, God isgiven no place, for God is excluded as the human being becomes theessence of his/her own existence. Heidegger does not leave open thepossibility for God to give sense or meaning to the being ofDasein. 5

The choice of the word Dasein to denote the being of the human beingis justified in a positive sense, according to Stein, by the fact thatHeidegger sees our being as being localized -a being there, ada sein. Thechoice of the word Dasein is also motivated by a negative factor.Heidegger wants to avoid the traditional and dogmatic dualism ofbody andsoul. He does not want to refer to the human being as composed of twosubstances, spiritual and corporeal. At the same time, Stein recognizes thatHeidegger does not want to exclude the body or the spirit from his view ofDasein. She points the reader to Heidegger's interpretation of spatiality,where the spirit is given a real pre-eminence. What is lacking for Stein isa real Seelenlehre (doctrine of the soul). The human person is bereft ofhis/her most intimate personal space or proprium wherein he/she cangenuinely encounter self, other and God, namely, the soul. Body and soulare neither states nor substances of he human being. They are components,

%id.5See ibid., 90-9 J .


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272 AMERICAN CATHOLIC PHILOSOPHICAL QUARTERLYand as components, both body and soul play passive and active roles in theconditioning and living out ofour existence in the world. Body and soul donot represent an inseparable dualism for Stein. Rather, they representdifferent aspects of the individual subject which coexist and condition oneanother reciprocally, sometimes for the better and sometimes for the worse.Ultimately, the absence ofa theory of the soul in Heidegger's account ofDasein is troubling for the Catholic Stein, for it excludes any possibility ofeternity and encounter with the divine. Dasein provides no real account ofbody and soul, for they are obscured by the vocabulary of being. 6

The second question that Stein addresses to Heidegger concerns thefaithfulnessofhis phenomenological description ofDasein. In other words,does Heidegger's analysis of Dasein conform really to our livedexperience? Despite the fact that Heidegger never develops a fuller senseof the body with regard to Dasein's fundamental determinations in theworld, that is, Befindlichkeit, Geworfenheit, and Verstehen, Stein nevertheless recognizes the greatness ofHeidegger' s analysis. What troubles heris the absoluteness of his claims. For Stein, Heidegger never takes hisquestioning far enough.

For example, let us take into account Heidegger's analysis of"thrownness." While it is true that Dasein may find him- or herself inexistence without knowing how s/he got there, Dasein may also know thats/he neither exists ex se norper se. Moreover, ifDasein questions his or herown being, the latter will not reveal its origin. Stein sees Heidegger goingto great lengths to stifle the fundamental questions that every being asks ofhim-or herself: Whence did I come? What is my origin? To say that suchquestions make little sense is to deny one of the more fundamental desiresof the human being, namely, the desire to know one's ultimate origin. Weare thrown into existence, and if the medievals and ancients were correctto assume that an effect implied a cause, the questions long to be asked:Whence have I been thrown? Who threw me into this existence? I wouldadd to Stein's list the ultimate question ofmeaning, Why?

This questioning is a profound means of philosophical investigationand is heuristic in the purest sense of the word. Stein maintains that it ishuman nature to ask such questions. In fact, as Heidegger rightly notes, it

6See ibid., 92. Stein recognizes that Heidegger tries to address the distinctions betweenetwas, was ist (with reference to body and soul) and the WerofDasein in his Kantbuch. Seeibid., footnote n. 54.


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STEIN AND HEIDEGGER ON THE QUESTION OF BEING 273is part of our ontological constitution in the world. For Stein, thesequestions and the desire for concrete answers to these questions point to asource or an origin which/who transcends the being of Dasein. Thesequestions arise from the very foundation ofour being and address a beingwhich/who is without foundation-an eternal being. I shall develop furtherStein's argument with regard to origins and sources as experienced in lifeand being in the second part of this paper. In essence, the experience ofthrownness, ifquestioned more deeply, points to the fact that we have beenthrown from somewhere by something. If we did not experience "beingthrown," we would not have to ask questions concerning the origin of ourthrownness. Ultimately, our thrownness reveals our creatureliness, that is,our created being-as it does our creator.7

Following the line of argumentation concerning his faithfulness towhat is given in experience, Stein believes that Heidegger understands dasMan (the They) too narrowly. She finds that the ambiguity implicit in theuse of das Man is misleading. 8 She believes that one can indeed refer to aparticular person when using the term das Man. One need not necessarilyconceive of das Man as impersonal. Stein gives the example of thesentence, "One may take the notion of idle chatter too seriously." What thissentence expresses here is not only a hypothetical situation but also the factthat some one, a person, may take Heidegger's notion of idle chatter tooseriously. Moreover. the statement is always made in a larger context,namely, the context of a larger community. The statement is addressed toa general audience familiar with Heidegger's work, a community which issubject to the same life conditions, namely, the knowledge of whatHeidegger intends by idle chatter. Stein holds that das Man could signify:(I) a definite group or an indefinite circle of individuals, or even all humanbeings who are subject to the same communal conditions or general rulesof behavior; (2) the individual, in so far as s/he is subject to or has madehim- or herself subject to a general rule.

To argue that Dasein, in its inauthenticity, flees into the ambiguity ofdas Man is much too obscure. Stein reads Heidegger as absolutizing theSelbst (self) ofDasein, thereby diminishing the role ofcommunity implicitin his use of das Man. In fleeing into the inauthenticity of das Man, oneforsakes self-responsibility. Das Man becomes a "place" to be comfortably

7See ibid., 93.8See ibid., 94.


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274 AMERICAN CATHOLIC PHILOSOPHICAL QUARTERLYmediocre, a hiding place. Stein maintains that the individual person cannotbe thought of apart from his/her community. One implies the other, andboth are constitutive ofone another. Stein remarks: "There is no such thingas a person in the authentic sense of the word, except for a multiplicity ofpersons who exist in a community."9 Heidegger polarizes the communityand the individual. The community (Gemeinschaft) is not given its properdue. According to Stein, a community of persons can also be authenticwhen it fulfills its responsibilities both to itself and to those persons whocompose the community, and when there is a genuine living in theexperience of the other and vice versa. Stein refers her readers to herworks, On the State lO and Individual andCommunity, I I in which she furtherdevelops the relationship between the person and the community. Forexample, the nation or state cannot be complete unless it organizes itselfaround the wellbeing of its individual members and smaller communities;however, it must also be conscious of the collective good. Both thecommunity and its individual members are inseparable. They reciprocallyform one another.

The Heideggerian will combat such an analysis by pointing to the factthat concomitant with Dasein is Mitsein-being with. 12 For Stein,Heidegger never really draws out the implications of his concept ofMitsein. It is a given, but a complete description of how it conditionsDasein and vice versa is never adequately given. Heidegger's use of dasMan points to a dualism between individual and community. The formeris charged with the task of an eigentliches Sein (authentic being), whereasthe latter only becomes a receptacle for a fallen or fleeing Dasein. Steinasks, does not the community playa more significant and responsible role

9See ibid., 97.IOSee Eine Untersuchung iiber den Staat, in Jahrbuch fiir Philosophie undphiinomenologische Forschung, cd. Edmund Husser! (Halle: Max Niemeyer, 1925), vol. 7.11See individuum und Gemeinschaji, in }ahrbuch fiir Philosophie und phiino-

menologische Forschung, ed. Edmund Husser1 (Halle: Max ~ i e m e y e r , 1922), vol. 5.12See MHE, 97 n. 57.


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STEIN AND HEIDEGGER ON THE QUESTION OF BEING 275in the formation ofDasein?13 In other words, what does it mean to have anauthentic community ofDasein as opposed to one authentic Dasein?

Heidegger is also criticized for being unfaithful to his very ownquestioning ofbeing (Seinsfrage) in so far as he does not push his questionsas far as human experience would dictate. We saw this type of shortcomingearlier when Stein commented on Heidegger's analysis of our thrownnessinto the world. Now Stein examines the notion of fallelmess. Heideggermaintains that we must not think of fallenness as a falling from an originalstate ofnature much like the Christian story ofAdam and Eve. Rather, ourfallenness consists in the fact that it stands in opposition to the task of aneigentliches Sein-Konnen (authentic attempt at being). The fallenness ofDasein 's particular mode ofbeing consists in its not being authentic. Steinsees Heidegger trying to account for the experience ofhuman fallibility bydismissing the traditional Genesis story of evil and disobedience. Even ifour fallenness consists in our inability to be more authentic, aconsciousness or experience of a more authentic being must have comefrom somewhere. Was there a more original, authentic sense ofbeing priorto our fall into mediocrity? Does eigentliches Sein carry with it some pre-consciousness of a fuller being which we somehow know we have notachieved? Has this been naturally instilled in us? By whom or by what?And for what purpose? Are these not typical questions of he human personcoming to terms with her or his own existence in the world? Fallennessimplies a falling from somewhere into something else. For Stein, thesequestions are answered, in part, by Revelation (OfJenbarung) and tradition.Humankind fell away from God, and it is the distance between God andhumankind that accounts for human fallibility.To Stein's challenge Heidegger would reply that our knowledge ofauthentic being is given to us in conscience. We are each averted to the callof authentic being by the voice of conscience. Conscience calls fallenDasein back to authentic being. According to Heidegger, the call ofconscience is Dasein itself. The call of he conscience ofDasein by Daseinis surprising in so far as it appears not to come from oneself. This is

13Sec ibid., 96: "Was kann danach die Flucht in das Man bedeuten'7 Wer tlieht? Wovorund wohin') Der Einzelnc tlicht-so h6rten wir-vor seinem eigcnsten und eigentlichenSein, das ein einsames und vcrantwortliches ist, in die Gemeinschaft, und er ladet seineV crantwortung aufdie Gemeinschaft ab, aufdie engere oder aufdie weitere. Dabei kann vonciner Flucht, genau genommen, erst gesprochen werden, wenn der Einzelne einmal zuseinem eigentlichen Sein und zum BewuBtsein seiner Verantwortung erwacht ist."


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276 AMERICAN CATHOLIC PHILOSOPHICAL QUARTERLYexplained by Heidegger as resulting from the estrangement which hasoccurred between the Selbst proper and the Selbst that has lost itself in theeverydayness ofdas Man. In essence, the caller has become the called. ForStein, this explanation is too solipsistic, or in HusserI's language, idiopsychic. There is no reference point other than the self. The communitydoes not come into play. Moreover, the possibilities of the voice ofconscience being formed by the divine, history and tradition are limited.Heidegger's solipsism is not true to human experience, for conscience notonly derives from the individual but is also an extension of a communalconscience. We are formed by our interactions with others in differentkinds of communities, be they political, social, economic, religious,cultural, etc. Often,we experience pangs ofconscience when others remindus ofcertain obligations and acts ofomission whereinwe should have donesomething but failed to do so. Ultimately, Heidegger' s vision ofconscienceas auto-directional forces Edith Stein to call into question the faithfulnessof his description to the breadth of human experience. 14

The preceding discussion ofconscience was intimately connected withauthentic being. Stein recognizes the important link that Heidegger makesbetween authentic being and death-Sein zum Tode (Being-unto-death).She goes on to reflect on Heidegger's analysis of death by asking threequestions: First, is there an experience ofdeath itself? (Heidegger respondsby saying yes in so far as it is my death-Jemeinigkeit). Second, is there anexperience of the death of an other? (Heidegger responds negatively).Third, how are the two aforementioned questions related?

Stein begins to answer her questions by first clarifying whatHeidegger means by death. ForHeidegger, death is the end ofDasein. Thisdefmition, however, does not preclude any discussion of the possibility oflife after death. Heidegger wishes to focus his discussion of death withinthe realm of the existence ofDasein. Death is something that belongs toDasein as an Existential. IS When one faces the possibility ofdeath, that is,the possibility of not existing, one is gripped by angst and fear. Therealization that Dasein will no longer be one day, or that Dasein has cometo its end, will shake one out of the mediocrity of das Man into a moreauthentic way ofbeing. Stein believes that Heidegger's approach is sterile(ergebnislos), for on the one hand, death is defined as an end, and yet on

I4See ibid., 100.I5See ibid., 102.


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STEIN AND HElDEGGER ON THE QUESTION OF BEING 277the other hand, this very end is believed to somehow give authenticmeaning to the very life it ends.

It appears that we have come to a contradiction. Heidegger' s analysisof the Sein zum Tode must be understood within the realm of realpossibilities or potentialities. Thus, death must be understood as a realpossibility that will eventually happen, an event that we are certain not toescape. Hence, though death remains only a definite possibility, itsimminence (possibility) has a real effect on the way we choose to live ourlives in so far as we can ignore the fact that we will die, we can live in fearof it, or we can even be changed by it, perhaps to a more authentic beingin the world. It must be noted, however, that in a later passage Steinrealizes that this is not a completely unfeasible way of inquiry, for shemakes the distinction between death and our living as a march towardsdeath, a dying. She admits the experiences of angst and fear in front of theNichtigkeit (nothingness) of death may have an effect on our existence inthe world. If Stein admits the possibility of an end (death) as beingpotentially helpful, then how can Heidegger's approach be called sterile?

I believe that Stein would argue that the approach is sterile becauseHeidegger's end is viewed as an absolute, for there is nothing moreabsolute than the nothing of Nichtigkeit. Even though Heidegger does notabsolutely exclude the possibility of an afterlife, Stein believes that he hasreduced existence merely to Dasein's temporal life on earth. Death, forStein, is a moment ofexistence, an existence that she believes is both finiteand infinite. We are caught in the aevum, the in-between, for our souls areeternal yet our earthly existence is temporal or finite. Death is not an endfor Dasein, for that would imply that Dasein becomes nothing, aNichtigkeit that by definition can only be understood in an absolute sense.Hence, Stein's problem with Heidegger's use of the term "end" is that hehas eternalized Dasein as nothing at the end of temporal existence.Moreover, Heidegger has excluded the possibility of Dasein 's existenceplaying itself out within the drama of both finite and eternal being. He hasabsolutized the moment of death in so far as it colors the whole meaningof life.

Returning to her first question concerning the experience of death asmy own, Stein would agree with Heidegger that we do indeed have anexperience of our own death. Turning back to human experience anddrawing on her experiences as a nurse for the Red Cross during World WarI (where she saw many people die), Stein argues that most ofus derive ourown experience of death and dying not so much from thinking about the


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278 AMERICAN CATHOLIC PHILOSOPHICAL QUARTERLYpossibility of not being, but from watching and experiencing the death ofothers, be they loved ones, acquaintances or strangers. These lifeexperiences fonn and condition our views of death. These experiencesim pact on us, and they carry with them grave existential import for our ownexistence in the world.

Stein gives a brilliant phenomenological description of death anddying in that she describes the experience ofnursing and caring for a dyingperson. Two salient points can be drawn from her description. First, thatone may not speak of death, but ofmany deaths, each unique and deeplypersonal. For example, not all people are angst-ridden or afraid as theycome face to face with death in cases of tenninal illness. Some are verypeaceful and have come to accept death as part ofa transfonnation processtoward a higher form ofexistence. Furthermore, one can speak ofdifferenttypes of death other than physical death. For example, in herKreuzeswissenschafl (Science of he Cross), Stein speaks of various typesof spiritual death where one experiences the desert or dryness of nothearing God. Second, Stein maintains that at the moment of death andshortly after when one is confronted with the presence of a corpse, one isstruck not by the nothingness ofdeath, but rather, by the struggle which theperson has gone through. Something has been lost and something remains.This causes those left behind, especially when a loved one passes away, toquestion the very evidence which they see before them, that is, a corpseformerly engaged in a deep struggle between life and death. What does thiscorpse mean or point to? Certainly, for Stein, it is not nothing. It is areminder of our finitude. But it also points to something eternal, for thiscorpse strikes the mourner as a non-natural state of existence. We have anatural desire to keep existing. 16 As a matter of fact, our daily lives arelived in such a manner that we expect to awake the next morning. Deathalways comes as a surprise, for we never know the exact minute or second.For Stein, this desire to keep existing despite death, and the fact that thedeath of the other strikes us as a non-natural state of affairs or struggle,point to another dimension ofbeing, namely, a more eternal state that doesnot admit nothingness, but only plenitude.

Do we have an experience of the death of the other? Heidegger sayswe do not, for death is our own experience. Stein says that we certainlycannot experience the same death as the other. This, however, does not

16See ibid., 105.


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STEIN AND HEIDEGGER ON THE QUESTION OF BEING 279imply that we cannot have an experience of the death of the other. A loverwho loses his/her lover may not die the same physical death of he beloved,but the death transforms the lover. Something is lost, namely, earthlypresence, but something may also be gained, possibly the hope of seeingone another again in a transformed world of being.

The last question which Stein asks regarding Heidegger's interpretation of death concerns the relationship between the experience ofone's own death and the impossibility ofexperiencing the death ofanother.For Heidegger, it would seem that there is no relationship, for the formermay be experienced by Dasein whereas the latter cannot be experienced.I would say that for Stein, the relationship between the death(s) of the selfand the other are intimately related. The death of another is still anexperience of death and may transforn1 us; it may even cause us to pullourselves out of the mediocrity of das Man into a more authentic being.Death happens in a community. All communities of peoples havedeveloped various burial rites in order to help community members mourntogether the loss of a loved one. In the extreme case where one dies aloneor is abandoned, Stein would say that person is not alone, but close to Godin whose image and likeness the person is fashioned. Moreover, in theusual realm of things, the death of someone affects the lives and existenceofthose around him/her. One should not be so naIve as to think that deathis an individual event, for its repercussions are felt by the community of heliving. Anyone who has lost a loved one will testify to this fact of humanexistence.

To conclude this section on Stein 's critique ofHeidegger, I would liketo return to Stein's last question: Is the analysis of being provided byHeidegger sufficient to serve as a ground for approaching the question ofthe sense of being? Essentially, Edith Stein's answer is negative. Echoingthe sentiments of the philosopher Hedwig Conrad-Martius,17 Edith Steinbelieves that Heidegger's project attempts to open the doors to and reinvestigate the question of being. She concedes that Heidegger may havewell been on his way to re-opening the question of being and giving it acosmological significance, however, he fails in his Entwurf (project)because he ultimately confines the question of being to Dasein. Being,understood in a multiplicity of forms ranging from the simple onta tohigher more complex beings, is never fully interrogated. Heidegger

17See ibid., 112.


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280 AMERICAN CATHOLIC PHILOSOPHICAL QUARTERLYexcludes them from speaking forth. Furthennore, no room is given to thepossible questioning oftheFirst Being, God. Heidegger questions, but doeshe always listen to the response? Moreover, because Heidegger may nothear a response when he questions certain types of beings, this does notnecessarily imply that these beings are incapable of responding. PerhapsHeidegger is incapable of understanding their response because theyrespond in ways different from Dasein, for they do not speak like Dasein.Their being may have meaning in the fact that their appearances(Erscheinungen) speak forth-an articulation without articulation. 18

Stein concludes her work by asking whether it would not have beenwiser on the part of Heidegger to be more closely in dialogue with thetradition of metaphysics. She wonders if a treatment of the analogia entiswould have proven more fruitful. She also believes that a more thoroughexamination of thinkers like Thomas, Aristotle and other Greek thinkersmay have proven challenging. 19 Heidegger's dismissal of the tradition ofWestern metaphysics as analyzing being only in tenns of Vorhandenseinhas not done justice to the subtleties and depth of the tradition. Ultimately,Heidegger has given a sense to the question of being which is much tooauto-referential. Dasein becomes the ultimate and absolute frameworkwherein being comes to play itself out. It is interesting to note that Steinwishes to compare future works of Heidegger to his earlier works. Sheundoubtedly recognized that Sein und Zeit was not completed as it wassupposed to have been. Unfortunately, Stein perished before she ever hadthe chance to become familiar with the later Heidegger's work.

II.Though critical of Heidegger, Stein employs what she sees to be of

value in Heidegger along with the insights of other schools of thought inorder to describe her own experience of being. What is this experiencelike? Presently, Stein's Werke consist of seventeen volumes, each volumedirectly or indirectly addressing the foregoing question. I would like tomention some key principles characterizing the Steinian sense of being:

18See ibid., 113: "Freilich wird es nicht so anlworten, wie ein Mensch antwortet. EinDing hat kein Seinverstandnis und kann nicht tiber sein Sein reden. Aber es ist und hat einenSinn, der sich in seiner auJ3eren Erscheinung und durch sie ausspricht. Und dieseSelbstoffenbarung gehi:irt zum Sinn des dinglichen Seins."

19See ibid., 116.


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STEIN AND HEIDEGGER ON THE QUESTION OF BEING 281Being-kept-in-being as a determining phenomenon for the meaning ofourexistence as opposed to anxiety in the face of death as a determiningmoment; being as plenitude or abundance; the person in a community ofpersons; and the notion ofgift as distinguished from the mere Gegebenheit(es gibt) of things in the world.

Both Heidegger and Stein recognize that the fear and anxiety whichone faces before the possibility of death or nothingness are not constant,everyday feelings. In fact, this is what makes them unique and possiblylife-altering. Though anxiety and fear may change our existence or the waywe dwell in the world, Stein does not attribute to them the weightHeidegger does. For Heidegger, both fear and anxiety are determiningmoments for Dasein. Stein prefers to give another reading of whatdetermines the meaning or sense ofour existence.

Ifwe reflect on our being, we realize that we are not responsible forour being in the world. We did not choose to be, it simply happened. In thissense, we fmd ourselves in the world not knowing exactly whence we cameor why. Yet, if one examines one's being, one exists despite oneself. Thatis, our being is not causa sui. Heidegger realized in his analysis that ourbeing is fleeting in so far as our lives may be seen as a coming closer todeath moment by moment. For Stein, what is vital is that even though mybeing is fleeting, nonetheless I continue to exist despite my jlilchtiges Sein(fleeting being). She affirms, "Ich bin"(I am). Furthermore, what she findseven more interesting is the fact that "I" continue to exist in my being. "I"p e r s i s t . ~ o

Remarkable in Stein's analysis is the qualityof hat persisting in beingor that being-kept-in-being. It is experienced not as a rational certainty, buta deeper, ontological security. She describes it as a child being held in astrong arm. The child feels secure and comfortable, as it will not beallowed to fall. Our being is marked by the secure sense that it will

20See EES, 56-7: "Denn derunleugbaren Tatsache, daB mein Sein ein fliichtiges, vonAugenblick zu Augenblick geflistetes und der Moglichkeit des Nichtseins ausgesetztes ist,entspricht die andere eben so unleugbare Tatsache, daB ich trotz dieser Fliichtigkeit bin undvon Augenblick zu Augenblick im Sein erhalten werde und in meinem fliichtigen Sein eindauerndes umfasse. Ich weiB mich gehalten und habe darin Ruhe und Sicherheit-nicht dieselbstgewisse Sicherheit des Mannes, der in eigener Kraft auffestem Boden steht, aber diesiiBe und selige Sicherheit des Kindes, das von einem starken Arm getragen wird-eine,sachlich betrachtet, nicht weniger verniinftige Sicherheit. Oder ware das Kind 'verniinftig',das bestiindig in der Angst lebte, die Mutter k6nnte es fallen lassen?"


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282 AMERICAN CATHOLIC PHILOSOPHICAL QUARTERLYcontinue to persist-death is unnatural, for it does not belong to theexperienced sense of security prevalent in our being. Death is a rupture ofthe natural security with which our persisting being is marked. Steinbelieves that the feeling of secure persistence in being, combined with therealization that "I am" despite the fleeting character of being, gives ourbeing a determining sense, namely, a sense of being as fullness and asoriginating from somewhere or from something in that our being iscontinually received.

It is not enough for Stein to stop questioning being as Heidegger doeswhen it comes to the question ofour thrownness into the world. For Stein,the questioning about the origin of our being does not fall onto deaf ears,for there is a response, but the response is given through the givenness ofall that exists. What exists is given, as is the case with our being in theworld. We are given to ourselves not by ourselves, but by something other.We are given to ourselves by our parents, and more fundamentally, we aregiven to ourselves by God. We are gifts of God. The fact that there issomething as opposed to nothing speaks profoundly to Edith Stein. Theexistence of the ego is received and is constantly being received, for theego itself cannot generate or control its existence. It cannot even control thefact that despite its very existence, its being is fleeting away moment bymoment. We do not create being, we find ourselves endowed with it. WhatStein experiences is not merely the Gegebenheiten (givens) of thephenomenologist, but the plenitudo omnitudinis (Fulle or fullness) ofcreation. Our being is marked by a profound sense of creatureliness. Steinmaintains that we are gepragt (stamped) with God's image and likeness.Stein calls the es gibt of Heidegger a "naive realism" because Heideggerdoes not develop to any great length the fact that the es gibt is conditionedand informed by ourselves, the world, and God. Moreover, Heideggerforgets that he himself conditions and forms the very world he findshimself in. It is not a matter of finding ourselves in the world, but a matterof creating and re-interpreting the world.21

What is unique about our creatureliness is the freedom with which wehave been endowed to auto-determine ourselves both in relation toourselves and each other. Though we may not have had the initial choiceto exist or not exist, we do have the free choice to accept or reject the very

2lSee Edith Stein, Die weltanschauliche Bedeutung der Phanomenologie, in Welt undPerson (see note 1), 15. Herafter referred to as DWB.


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STEIN AND HEIDEGGER ON THE QUESTION OF BEING 283being with which we have been endowed. We can do with our being as weplease. We are free to give it a certain shape or fonn in the world. In thissense, fmite or detenninate beings have been endowed with a quasi -eternalfreedom in that we can even choose to reject the ultimate source of eternalfreedom and being, namely, God. Also unique about the existence of thehuman person is precisely his/her personhood. Each person is unique, anIch. Moreover, this unique individual is not conceived as a salus ipse likeHeidegger's Dasein (despite his claim of the importance ofMitsein). Eachperson, besides having his/her own proprium, is also a Mehrheit vonPersonen. This literally means that each person is not a closed, idio-psychicindividual, but a multiplicity or community ofpersons. This community ofpersons consists not only of the person proper but also includes otherpeople such as parents, family relations, friends, anonymous people, andof course, the three divine Persons. The person is a Trager (bearer) ofhimself but also of all those people who have helped fonn the individualand continue to do so. The person does not evolve in and out of a vacuum,but rather within and through a complex network of relations and events,each brought to fulfillment in and by other people. In other words, the otheris constitutive of the self, and vice versa. One cannot have a selfwithoutothers, for we literally need others in order to come into being and developas persons. Likewise, other people need us in order to grow and develop.This multiplicity of persons contained within the ontic structure of theperson is not to be understood in the Aristotelian sense wherein the humanbeing is defined as a political animal. Rather, Stein wishes her readers tounderstand that on a fundamental, ontological level we are constituted asa continual coincidence of uniqueness and community. Our being isconstituted in such a way that we are fundamentally related in so far as thevery fullness of our person implies the fullness of the other-one cannotfully be without the other. Hence, the state must organize itself in order toallow this fundamental coincidence ofuniqueness and plurality to unfold.Its structures, all extensions of the human person, must be designed toaccommodate this fundamental, ontological reality.22 For Stein, there is nosuch thing as das Man. One can flee one's responsibility or one can live upto what one is responsible for in one's proper existence. One always

22See Edith Stein's Individuum und Gemeinscha{t and Ober den Staat (see notes 10and 11).


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284 AMERICAN CATHOLIC PHILOSOPHICAL QUARTERLYremains a person, yet one's ethical or moral comportment in terms ofVerantwortlichkeit (responsibility) may be less than desirable.

The source offmite or determined being (determinedqua personhood)is eternal Being, namely, God. Finite being simply means that each createdbeing has limits in that it is created in a particular form. In other words, itcannot but be human, for its being is defined or delimited in time and spaceas human. God's being is eternal, for God is without determination. God'sbeing and essence are identical. God is the fullness or FiJ}[e of being. Ourbeings share in this fullness in so far as they were created by God toparticipate in this very fullness. The very fullness that we experience is aconcrete sign ofGod giving us this being as a gift. The gift of the person'sbeing is particularly unique in that God made it in God's own image andlikeness. We are free to accept or reject this gift. There are no limits as towhat we can do with this gift ofbeing. We can even destroy it ifwe choose.Fallibility marks the being of the human person.

Stein believes that there is a fallenness that impedes the person's fullliving out of hislher existence in the world. Fallenness also has adeleterious effect on our relations with other human persons, thecommunity of persons with whom we live. For Stein, however, thefallenness is not a falling away from self in terms of inauthentic being.Rather, the fallenness consists in falling away from the very source ofourcreatureliness. We are fallible because we have turned and continue to tumaway from the source of love, namely, God. Each person is a God-seeker,and to tum away from God is to fall into a less than perfect existence. Aspersons, we are fundamentally related to the divine Persons. Our being onlybecomes full when we remain in relation with the triune God. Fallennessor sin cuts us from the source of our own perfection. For Stein, ourfallenness is to be understood in theological and historical terms. Shebelieves our fallenness is due to original sin, which is to be understood asa concrete historical event. Our fall from grace is not a myth. Heidegger,according to Stein, argues that we are fallen, but he never analyzes thisfallenness to the fullest degree. For, ifhe did, he would have to ask himselfmore fundamental questions: Whence did we fall? What is the nature ofevil? Why did we fall? For Stein, these questions are intimately linked withand inevitably point to the source ofour created personhood, namely, God.

We come now to a fundamental question: How did Heideggerultimately influence Stein? I would qualify the influence of Heidegger asnegative. Stein saw in Heidegger a great thinker who indeed opened thedoor to the question of being. His approach, however, was much too


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STEIN AND HEIDEGGER ON THE QUESTION OF BEING 285solipsistic, nihilistic and pessimistic. Heidegger viewed being in much toodark a fashion. We know that the later Heidegger gives a more ecstaticinterpretation of being; Stein however, never knew the texts of the laterHeidegger. She employs Heidegger's thought as a tool of inquiry. Shedialogues with Heidegger's phenomenology of being. Meditating onsimilar experiences such as death, fallenness, thrownness and das Man,Edith Stein draws quite different conclusions about the Sinn des Seins (themeaning of being), for the meaning ofbeing is viewed as an experience offullness concretized in radically personal and communitarian terms.

The sense ofbeing which Stein develops throughout her writings, andparticularly in Endliches und Ewiges Sein, is one rooted in love and hope.Love in so far as our created beings were brought into existence by afiatof love issued by God. Hope, in that we are not alone in our existence. Weare profoundly marked by the sense of the community ofcreatures and thecommunity who is the triune God. One may criticize Edith Stein'smetaphysics as being more of a work in theology than philosophy, for shedevelops much of her thinking on the basis of Christian Revelation. Ibelieve Stein would counter this charge on two fronts. As aphenomenologist, faith and the revelations contained therein fall under thephenomenological microscope. They are not to be excluded, for they arephenomena constitutive of experience. Stein is not a fideist who blindlybelieves that experiences of faith somehow transcend the capacities ofhuman reason. On the contrary, experiences of faith are real and have hada profound impact on the way she lived her life both in relation to herselfand to the community in general. Second, as one who appreciates theoriginality ofthe medievals, Stein argues that faith falls under the umbrellaofknowing. It is a certain kind ofknowing undertaken with different skillsand senses. This type of knowledge yields valid insights and is not to beglibly dismissed. Ultimately, what Stein leaves to her readers is theassurance that our personal beings are conditioned and marked by bothfinitude and eternity. As personal beings we share in both the individualand communal lives of the three divine Persons-a maximum Fi1lle orabundance of being. Ultimately, Stein will employ the works of Husserl,Thomas and other Christian philosophers to ground the validity of herinsights, thereby rendering Endliches undEwiges Sein true to its project ofsynthesis.University ofGuelphGuelph, Ontario

Documents

Calcagno 2000 Fullness or the Nothing. Stein and Heidegger on Being