In 1935, from lecture notes, Heidegger:
“The spiritual decline of the earth is so far advanced that the nations are in danger of losing the last bit of spiritual energy that makes it possible to see the decline. This simple observation has nothing to do with Kulturpessimismus, and of course it has nothing to do with any sort of optimism either; The darkening of the world, the flight of the gods, the destruction of the earth, the transformation of man into a mass, the hatred and suspicion of everything free and created have assumed such proportions throughout the earth, that such childish categories of pessimism and optimism have long become absurd.”
— Martin Heidegger, 1935
From his book eighteen years later, this:
Being [emerging appearance]21 intrinsically inclines toward self-concealment.22 Being means: to appear in emerging, to step forth out of concealment — and for this very reason, concealment and the provenance from concealment essentially belong to Being. Such provenance lies in the essence of Being, of what appears as such. Being remains inclined toward concealment, whether in great veiling and silence, or in the most superficial distorting and obscuring. The immediate proximity of phusis and kruptesthai reveals the intimacy of Being and seemingly as the strife between them.
(p.121, Introduction to Metaphysics, by Martin Heidegger, New translation by Gregory Fried and Richard Polt, 2000 (Originally published in German “Einführung in die Metaphysik, 1953))
21. In parentheses in the 1953 edition
22. Conventional translation: “Nature loves to hide.”
Elsewhere, in Wikipedia:
Introduction to Metaphysics, originally a summer lecture course at the University of Freiburg in 1935, was first published eighteen years later by the Max Niemeyer Verlag (Halle, Germany), simultaneously with the Seventh German Edition of Being and Time.[1]
In a one-page preface accompanying this post-war edition of Being and Time, Heidegger wrote that the newly available Introduction to Metaphysics, would "elucidate" material contemplated for the once-promised but long-abandoned "second half" of Being and Time. The preface also noted that the text of this latest (1953) B&T edition had eliminated several references to itself as a "first half."[2][3]
Among English translations, the second edition (2014) of a version by Gregory Fried and Richard Polt from Yale Press (New Haven) was in print as of 2020.[citation needed] Ralph Manheim produced a 1959 translation praised by Fried and Polt in their introduction to the second edition as largely responsible for introducing Heidegger to the English-speaking world.[4] But Manheim worked prior to the 1962 Macquarrie version of Being and Time—which established several conventions for Heidegger's English translators.[citation needed] The work is included in Volume 40 (1983) of Heidegger's Gesamtausgabe (collected works) edited by Petra Jaeger.[5]. wikipedia
Ever since I was a poor and inadequate student of philosophy in the 1960s I have been trying, poorly and inadequately since, to recapture the fascination and love sparked at that time for phenomenology, existentialism, classic Greek thought, and (singularly) Martin Heidegger. It might have been a better option than playing blackjack or holding up grocery stores on 20th avenue, or working on Wall Street, or going into politics -- none of which I did -- but had I, I’m sure it would have been done poorly and inadequately. Do you see a pattern here?
Heidegger wouldn’t agree, but I regularly see Being (Sein) as a transliteration of Deus (God) and the Heraclitus saying "Nature loves to hide" (Φύσις κρύπτεσθαι φιλεῖ) as a good-enough indication of the indecipherability of “what-is-called-God” in human experience.
Many say that they want to see God.
In our everyday encounter with what is right there before us -- what are we looking at? What am I looking at?
Last evening a red squirrel lay in the grass under bird feeders, unmoving. As I got closer I saw its mouth slowly moving open and closed. I turned it onto its stomach and wished it (prayed it?) well. This afternoon, I moved it into the brush weeds. It unmoves. It will disappear. Nature will draw it in. As it will me in due time.
Carl Jung held a pessimistic view of the future of western civilization. He believed it was in a state of decline destined to collapse. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqKQeAYRGJw
I can’t say much about that, either way.
But I do wonder about the coming into being and going out of being that is experienced in reading birth notices and death notices, bombings in war-torn regions, genocides and assassinations, plane crashes and mass shootings, cars crashing into crowds, tornadoes, floods, and various viruses and fungal infections afflicting us.
And what I wonder . . . is . . .
And . . . is . . . God . . .
What . . . is . . .
Emerging?
(I don’t know.)
I love the optimism many have toward our future. I also love Italiano bagels -- but my breaking teeth caution me to soft Jewish Rye with peanut butter and marmalade.
In a letter to Cary Baynes, April 12, 1959, Jung wrote: “Psychology like mine prepare us for an end or even for the end. The question is only, what are we going to kill: ourselves or our still infantile psychology and its appalling unconsciousness.”
This first half of 2025 watches the aggregation of a political power movement that is rife with corruption, cruelty, and a tolerated warfare in several regions of the world. So-called leaders focus on their personal aggrandizement, accumulating both power and wealth in an oblivious non-awareness of the devastating effects rumbling across the globe.
Sir Kenneth Clark ended his 1969 “Civilization: A Personal View” series by saying: “History is ourselves.” (Then, at end) “One may be optimistic but one can’t exactly be joyful at the prospect before us.”
Transcript
0:00 At this point I reveal myself in my true colours
0:03 as a stick-in-the-mud! I hold a number of beliefs that have been repudiated by
0:10 the liveliest intellects of our time:
0:12 I believe that order is better than chaos
0:17 Creation better than destruction. I prefer gentleness
0:24 to violence; forgiveness to vendetta.
0:27 On the whole
0:30 I think that knowledge is preferable to ignorance, and I am sure
0:35 that human sympathy is more valuable than
0:38 ideology. I believe
0:41 that in spite of recent triumphs of science
0:45 men haven't changed much in the last two thousand years
0:49 and in consequence, we must still try to learn from history:
0:54 History is ourselves.
1:00 I also hold one or two beliefs that are more difficult to put shortly:
1:03 For example, I believe in courtesy - the ritual by which we avoid
1:08 hurting other people's feelings by satisfying our own egos
1:13 And I think we should remember that we are part of a great whole -
1:18 which for convenience
1:20 we call Nature -
1:23 All living things are our brothers and sisters.
1:42 Above all
1:42 I believe in the God-given
1:46 genius of certain individuals and I value a society that makes their existence possible.
1:55 [Victoria Responses]
3:00 These programmes have been
3:01 filled with great work of genius: in architecture, sculpture and painting,
3:07 in philosophy, poetry and music; in science and engineering
3:10 There they are -
3:13 you can't dismiss them and they're
3:17 only a fraction of what Western man has achieved in the last 1000 years -
3:21 often after setbacks and deviations
3:25 at least as destructive as those of our own time.
3:29 Western Civilisation has been a series
3:32 of rebirths. Surely, this should give us confidence in ourselves.
3:41 I said at the beginning of the series that it's lack of confidence more than anything else
3:44
3:45 that kills a civilisation: we can destroy ourselves by
3:49 cynicism and disillusion, just as effectively as by bombs.
3:56 Fifty years ago, W.B. Yeats
3:57 who was more like a man of genius than anyone I've ever known...
4:00 wrote a prophetic poem - and in it he said: [Adopts Yeatsian accent]
4:05 "Things fall apart;
4:07 the centre cannot hold; Mere
4:11 anarchy is loosed upon the world. The blood-dimmed tide is loosed,
4:16 and everywhere the ceremony of innocence is drowned;
4:23 The best lack all conviction
4:26 while the worst are full of passionate
4:29 intensity."
4:32 Well, that was certainly true between the wars -- and it damn nearly destroyed us.
4:40 Is it true today?
4:42 -- Not quite because
4:44 good people have convictions - rather too many of them.
4:47 The trouble is that there is still
4:50 no centre. The moral and intellectual failure of Marxism
4:56 has left us with no alternative to heroic materialism
5:00 and that isn't enough. One may be optimistic
5:06 but one can't exactly be
5:08 joyful at the prospect before us.
5:19
[Stravinsky: Apollon musagete - Apotheosis]
5:42
Kenneth Clark:1903-1983
. . .
Cf. Bishop Robert Barron’s “Kenneth Clark and the Danger of Heroic Materialism”
https://www.wordonfire.org/articles/barron/kenneth-clark-and-the-danger-of-heroic-materialism/
