Heidegger, fenomenologia, hermenêutica, existênciaThe overall philosophical theme or issue of Contributions is the same as in Being and Time , namely the question of being which remains the horizon of Heidegger’s philosophical pursuits throughout his life. But as Being and Time pointed out in its introductory sections, the question of being is the most general and therefore in a sense the most empty of all possible questions. There is a reason why it has been “forgotten” or overlooked, namely that it has appeared throughout history as no question at all. In order to awaken even the relevance of this apparent non-question, its question-worthiness must be called forth. In Being and Time, the hermeneutical procedure goes by way of an existential-ontological examination of the questioner himself, i.e. Dasein . The book has a clear and systematic structure, modeled on the great predecessors in the genre, in particular Husserl and Kant . As the book reaches its provisionary end (which was to become its real end, since the promised continuation was never published), it has excavated a series of ontological strata, all related to Dasein’s being-in-the-world, culminating in ecstatic temporality, which shines forth as a quasi-transcendental foundation for the meaning of being.
Perhaps the most obvious deviation from the program of Being and Time in Contributions is precisely the abandonment of the ideal of the system . In the very important section 39, where Heidegger comments on the structure and form of the new “inceptual thinking” attempted in Contributions, he says that systems belong to the past, that they only have their place in the history of responses to the guiding question of being (GA65 :81). In the place of the system and of a systematic approach in general he here presents the ideal of “the jointure,” die Fuge, the fugue. The outline or contribution presented in the book is an attempt to provide a jointure of such an inceptual thinking. Consequently the 281 sections are organized into six parts or chapters, each one of which he speaks of as separate joinings (Fügungen) within the overall jointure (Fuge). They are called “Echo ” (Der Anklang ), “Playing-forth” (Das Zuspiel ), “Leaping” (Der Sprung ), “Grounding” (Die Gründung ), “Those Who Are to Come” (Die Zukünftigen ), and “The Last God” (Die letzte Gott ). These six are followed by a last long section entitled simply “Be-ing” (Das Seyn ), which was apparently intended for Contributions, but its position within the whole was never finally settled by Heidegger himself. There has been a good amount of discussion surrounding the meaning and significance of this metaphorical and enigmatic structure. What is the rationale behind this particular ordering of the material? Is there a progressing or developing argument that motivates it, or is this not rather a random ordering of notes that really does not permit a distinct structure? When discussing the structure himself, Heidegger is evasive, stating that each of the joinings “stand for itself ” yet in order to “make the essential onefold more pressing” (GA65:82). In another remark he defines the jointure as a possession (Verfügung) which complies with the call (sich den Zuruf fügende), and thus grounds Dasein (GA65:82). The English translation reads “the jointure is the conjoining that enjoins the call and thus grounds Dasein,” which is an admirable attempt to preserve the play on Fuge but which nevertheless confuses the philosophical sense of the passage. What Heidegger is suggesting is essentially that the structure of the work somehow responds to the matter at stake, which becomes visible, or perhaps audible, for the one who is prepared to listen to its call.
