Subject: Re: Heidegger and the Hebrew Tradition
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 1999 08:57:59 -0500



On Mon, 11 Jan 1999 00:16:42 -0500 bob scheetz <rscheetz-AT-cboss.com> 
wrote:

> 
> where science/hermeneutics discovers nihility/uncertainty,
> pragmatical/existential apprehension encounters absolutes.
> by custom peasant/prole/poet
> derogate the former as cloud-cuckoo-land;
> and philosophers reciprocate with:
> "naive, illusory...ersatz.
> but the cogency of the respective apprehensions,
> for all they are in contradiction,
> is ultimately indistinguishable, no?
> and, it's only bourgeois class prejudice
> that privileges the professor's with "knowledge";
> and renders the worker's a subordinate form,
> as "common sense" or "empiricism".
> kant's way (pure & practical) was to treat
> them separate but equal; marx, dialectically.
> but the denial of absolutes is as monist a
> thinking as the denial of nihility.

Bob, the "absolutes" that my work-for-a-living mentors 
have taught me overthe years-- "things are never what 
they appear"; "things never work out the way you plan, etc."
This has as much to do with politics & religion as it does
fitting a cabinet on a kitchen wall or figuring out wht the damn 
tractor ain't got spark.

There are many of us, most of the time inauthentic, falling in with
dasMan, but most are sometimes pondering variations on "why is there 
anything instead of nothing" tho we may fiond most of us doign this 
with regard to our "ownmost potentiality-for-Being" ie, daisy-pushing.

I think that most are aware of the nihilism-trouble.  That our 
science/hermeneutics conversation contributes the vanity of 
meaninglessness along with the more substantial pieces is a good 
indication that it should always be placed aongside the other 
conversations, be they pragmatic/existential apprehensions or
even ideological traditions, and reified testimonies.



> secondly, by "redeeming" is intended
> that marx re-grounded (the labor theory of value)
> the judaeo/xtian ethos for the post death-of-god west,
> ...anticipating neitzsche in all
> except the byronic silliness:
> the annihilation of the bourgeois ethos,
> and the advancing homo faber as
> the unacknowledged everyman-superman
> of western existence and history, being & time;
> worshiping at no altars, but recognizing
> chartres, san marco, versailles, ...
> not ad maiorem dei gloria nor any Big-ism, but
> for marvels (sophocles' "many the wonders" choral paean
> to humanism, or yeats', "monuments of its own magnificence," ...)
> of his own hand/head labor.


i'm of the impression that marx, maybe mostly inadvertently,
reminded that part of the job of the clearing is to resist
theory-- often at the expense of the empowered and to the amusement
of the pragmatic.  That and a sense of justice give the obvious:
a realistically level playing field.  Add a dose of "progress"
and one gets a plan, a theory, an ideology-- (so mostly the 
working class has had to grade that field level by hand.)

nietz the peach said it all, cutely, 
for the bourgeoise of his day.  

 
> "messianism" is not the right word for marx, eh?
> really no looking for king david...that's neitzsche.
> soteriological, certainly.
> yet even here, communist paradise
> is no conventional land-of-the-lotus-eaters;
> but, proletarian anarchy,
> with the thetical moment, the moral dynamic of humanism,
> and the anti-thetical, his marvel of technic.
> the only myth is the faith
> in the existence of a "proletarian community."
> but, again this is a bringing the tradition
> back down to earth; i.e. re-grounding a structure
> (judaeo/xtian salvation history)
> whose meaning had long since been lost
> in shamanic mystification.

well, i'm for that down-to-earth myth, though
i don't see it ever grounded. myth never is.

 
> yet even tho human existence be justified in spe by its works
> (i.e., the eventuation of the humanist community);
> that doesn't obviate the mysterium tremendum;
> so that unless one holds (as you say husserl & co do)
> to the old enlightenment religion of god-reason
> ...believing that science will one day overcome
> the naked and inflexible facticity of death
> (and as you say, it does seem to be getting alarmingly near);
> a second-order innocence (precisely),
> that is to say mh, the cooper's lad from naz...
> i mean, messkirch, is exigent.

ah, the tech/nihilism thing, my fav.
some see that as the main thrust and just around the corner,
but it is something we go thru and out the other side of all
together if at different times, just like the death a'gawd:
some left early, some are now left and don't know it/some do;
some are still being extradited from jerusalem even as i type.
and some, maybe me, just see it as the big dream composed of
all those others. . . somehow. . .

> so you see, (always allowing for layman's  limitations)
> i really don't understand why you guys insist
> one can't have it both ways,...eh?
> sure, some of heid would have to be cut loose,
> some paths abandoned,
> but, he even left warrant for that, no?
> 
> yours,
> bob


yeah, agreed. but not just both, aren't there more?

kindest regards,
henry



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