A VOLUME IN THE SUNY SERIES IN CONTEMPORARY CONTINENTAL PHILOSOPHY Walter A. Brogan Walter A. Brogan Heidegger and Aristotle The Twofoldness of Being Heidegger and Aristotle The Twofoldness of Being SUNY series in Contemporary Continental Philosophy Dennis J. Schmidt, editor Heidegger and Aristotle The Twofoldness of Being Walter A. Brogan STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK PRESS Published by State University of New York Press, Albany © 2005 State University of New York All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission. No part of this book may be stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means including electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopy- ing, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission in writing of the publisher. For information, address State University of New York Press, 194 Washington Avenue, Suite 305, Albany, NY 12210–23 Production by Kelli Williams Marketing by Michael Campochiaro Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data 10987654321 Brogan, Walter, 1945– Heidegger and Aristotle: the twofoldness of being / Walter A. Brogan. p. cm. — (SUNY series in contemporary continental philosophy) Includes bibliographical references and index. isbn 0-7914-6491-1 (hardcover: alk. paper) 1. Heidegger, Martin, 1899–1976. 2. Aristotle. 3. Ontology—History. I. Title. II. Series. b3279.h49b743 2005 193—dc22 2004024570 8 4 For my mother, Lillian Berry Brogan Heidegger and Aristotle This page intentionally left blank. contents Acknowledgments ix Preface xi Chapter 1 Martin Heidegger’s Relationship to Aristotle 1 Heidegger’s Phenomenological Reading of Aristotle What It Means to Read Aristotle as a Phenomenologist The Lost Manuscript: An Introduction to Heidegger’s Interpretation of Aristotle Chapter 2 The Doubling of Phusis: Aristotle’s View of Nature 21 The Meaning of Phusis Heidegger’s Ontological Interpretation of Movement in Aristotle’s Philosophy The Phenomenology of Seeing and the Recognition of Movement as the Being of Beings The Meaning of Cause in Natural Beings: Heidegger’s Rejection of Agent Causality Ontological Movement and the Constancy of Beings Phusis as the Granting of Place: Change and the Place of Beings The Complex Relationship of Phusis and Techn¯e The Horizon for Understanding Phusis: The Meaning of Ousia Chapter 3 The Destructuring of the Tradition 57 Aristotle’s Confrontation with Antiphon Elemental Being (Stoicheia): Aristotle’s Conception of Ontological Difference The Meaning of Eternal (Aidion) and Its Relation to Limit (Peras) The Necessity Belonging to Beings (Anangk¯e) and the Possibility of Violence The Law of Non-Contradiction viii contents • The Difference Between Being and Beings The Method of Aristotle’s Thought The Path of Aristotle’s Thought: The Twofoldness of Phusis Aristotle’s Hylomorphic Theory The Way of Logos in the Discovery of Phusis Genesis and Ster¯esis: The Negation at the Heart of Being Chapter 4 The Force of Being 110 Aristotle’s Resolution of the Aporia of Early Greek Philosophy The Rejection of the Categorial Sense of Being as the Framework for Understanding of Being as Force The Non-Categorial Meaning of Logos in Connection with Being as Dunamis: Force in Relationship to Production Aristotle’s Confrontation with the Megarians: The Way of Being-Present of Force The Connection Between Force and Perception: The Capability of Disclosing Beings as Such Chapter 5 Heidegger and Aristotle: An Ontology of Human Dasein 138 Dasein and the Question of Practical Life Sein und Zeit and the Ethics of Aristotle Plato’s Dialectical Philosophy and Aristotle’s Recovery of Nous: The Problem of Rhetoric and the Limits of Logos The Ontological Status of Dialectic Plato’s Negative Account of Rhetoric in the Gorgias Plato’s Positive Account of Rhetoric in the Phaedrus The Sophist Course: Aristotle’s Recovery of Truth after Plato The 1925–1926 Logik Course: Aristotle’s Twofold Sense of Truth Conclusion 188 Notes 191 Bibliography 203 Index 209 acknowledgments Heidegger says that the cause of something is that which is responsible for its coming into being. In this regard, I am indebted to many besides those I will name here, whose gift to me cannot be repaid. I am especially grate- ful for their patience and encouragement. Sandy Brown has allowed me to see that there are no limitations to the possibilities of being and being to- gether. My son Daniel first taught me to appreciate birth and nature in the hills around Rielingshausen. He and my son Steven are a constant remin- der of the wonder of life. My philosophical life began with the provoca- tion of my brother Harold, and I owe to him not only a lifelong feast of philosophical conversation, but an awareness of what it means to live life fully and be a great human being. All of my brothers and sisters have been incredibly supportive. I am grateful to John Sallis for his formative intellectual inspiration and guidance, but especially for what he has taught me about the connection between philosophy and friendship. The graduate students I have taught over the years at Villanova have been an indispensable resource for me. In very specific ways, I am grateful to Elaine Brogan, James Risser, Jerry Sallis, Dennis Schmidt, Peter Warnek, and my colleagues at Villanova for all they have contributed to my work. [...]... faithful to the Parmenidean dictum regarding the oneness and unity of being, nevertheless thinks being as twofold It is this philosophical discovery that permits him, within the framework of the Greek understanding of being, to account for the centricity of motion in the meaning of being, what I call Aristotle s kinetic ontology On the basis of a detailed reading of sections of the Physics and Metaphysics,... account of this sense of being Aristotle s philosophy attempts to think the twofoldness of phusis without denying the oneness that characterizes being Human beings can grasp the twofoldness to the extent that their logos (itself a double logos) stands in the between that is opened up in the space of this duplicity of being and beings Heidegger s explanation of the double stance of Aristotle s logos is made... and address, is this: the origin must be one and yet, as Aristotle shows, the origin is manifold The philosopher is called upon to think the unitary multiplicity of being, in particular, the twofoldness of being, the double arch¯e This task of thinking is approached in different ways by Aristotle, but the twofoldness of being is Aristotle s fundamental insight Chapter Two THE DOUBLING OF PHUSIS: ARISTOTLE S... historical The genuine pursuit of the question of being, the task of philosophy, is the same as the pursuit of the historical meaning of being To recover the meaning of being requires a gathering back of that which is the ongoing source of tradition The meaning that this historical approach to the question of being uncovers, as we know also from Sein und Zeit, turns out to be time Already in 1922, Heidegger. .. of human being? 42 Heidegger s claim is that the primordial sense of being for Aristotle the field of beings and sense of being that govern his general understanding and interpretation of beings—is production.43 For the most part, beings are interpreted in their being as available for use in our dealings (Vorhandensein) Thus, according to Heidegger s analysis, the idea that Aristotle employed a theoretical,... hand as produced as the primary meaning of being In other words, beings are understood primarily in terms of their having already been produced and their standing there in their availability for use That is to say, being- present is the primary ecstasis of time for Aristotle, and perhaps also for the early phenomenology of Husserl and Heidegger Thus, Heidegger says “ the not-yet’ and the already’ are... at the heart of Aristotle s thought Recently, with the publication of Heidegger s Collected Works, these early, formative courses are beginning to be published Several of them have been translated into English The result of the increased availability of these materials has been a significant surge of interest in the question of the role of Aristotle in the genesis of Heidegger s unique understanding of. .. their being Aristotle s Physics is primarily an investigation of moved-beings and of being- moved as the way of being of these natural beings Finally, the Nichomachean Ethics is about the “movement” or way in which one becomes human A significant portion of Heidegger s treatment of Nichomachean Ethics VI in this Introduction to his projected book on Aristotle has to do with the meaning of al¯etheia and. .. in Being and Time In some regards, in reading this essay, one gets a better sense of the interdependence of each of the parts of Being and Time 14 • Heidegger and Aristotle One of my purposes in using Heidegger s 1922 outline for his Aristotle book as the framework for my own initial remarks is to show that the plan for his interpretation of the Physics and Metaphysics, though the actual courses and. .. treatment of epag¯og¯e, which is traditionally translated as induction, and in his analysis of the relationship between logos and eidos These interpretations are studied in chapters two and three But the cognizance of the twofoldness of being that is, according to Aristotle, essential for philosophical understanding also gets interpreted by Heidegger as the horizon for the bringing together of theory and . editor Heidegger and Aristotle The Twofoldness of Being Walter A. Brogan STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK PRESS Published by State University of New York Press, Albany © 2005 State University of New York All. of Violence The Law of Non-Contradiction viii contents • The Difference Between Being and Beings The Method of Aristotle s Thought The Path of Aristotle s Thought: The Twofoldness of Phusis Aristotle s. VOLUME IN THE SUNY SERIES IN CONTEMPORARY CONTINENTAL PHILOSOPHY Walter A. Brogan Walter A. Brogan Heidegger and Aristotle The Twofoldness of Being Heidegger and Aristotle The Twofoldness of Being SUNY