The New Heideggerian Humanism

Abstract

One of the defining inquiries of Heideggerian thought is whether traditional humanism has fulfilled its original purpose—namely, to humanize man as much as possible, to evolve his moral stance, as well as the mode of knowledge of human consciousness. Ontology, epistemology, and ethics—the three dimensions that could directly support the impact of the transformations dictated by the history of humanism—nevertheless reveal a regression, a deviation from the original goal. Thus, ontology reveals a distancing of man from Being and a stagnation within the realm of beings; epistemology indicates a focus of human knowledge on the mobility of beings, on the immanent, and on immediate everydayness; and ethics appears to be more of a framework of behavioral imperatives dictated by the public sphere. Instead of humanism, therefore, we will have, in Heidegger's view, humanisms—that is, ideologies and dogmatisms foreign to man's authentic mission, namely that of being the shepherd of Being, the protector dwelling nearby, situated in the proximal abode offered by the realm of meaningful discourse. Is it still possible for man to return to Being and inaugurate an authentic humanism? Before hastening to offer an answer to this inquiry, Heidegger urges us to linger further on the meaning of this question.