Sheehan (2015:135-136) – ex-sistência

[…] O termo de Heidegger para qualquer instância concreta e pessoal de abertura hermenêutica é Dasein  , ao passo que a sua palavra exata para a "essência" ou estrutura ontológica de qualquer ex-sistência concreta e pessoal é Existenz   ou Da-sein   (normalmente com hífen, mas Heidegger nem sempre é coerente). Traduzo ambos os termos igualmente como ex-sistência [ex-sistence] (o contexto diz se se trata de Dasein ou Da-sein/Existenz), intencionalmente mal escrito e hifenizado de modo a chamar a atenção para a etimologia da palavra: ex + sistere: "ser feito para estar à frente [de si próprio] e para além [do que quer que se encontre]" – isto é, estar "aberto". Aquilo em que se está à frente e para além é o sentido como tal e, como base para isso, a clareira. Notamos que o verbo sistere não significa "estar de pé" (pelo seu próprio poder, por assim dizer), mas "ser feito estar de pé", o que, no caso presente, chama a atenção para a inexorável abertura-lançada tanto de uma ex-sistência como estrutura ontológica quanto de uma ex-sistência como própria vida pessoal.

Let us review some earlier remarks about terminology. Heidegger’s term for any concrete, personal instance of hermeneutical openedness is Dasein, whereas his precise word for the “essence” or ontological structure of any concrete, personal ex-sistence is Existenz or Da-sein (usually hyphenated, but Heidegger is not   always consistent). I translate both terms equally as ex-sistence (the context tells whether Dasein or Da-sein/Existenz is meant), intentionally misspelled and hyphenated so as to call attention to the etymology of the word: ex + sistere: “to be made to stand   ahead [of oneself] and beyond [whatever one encounters]”—that is, to stand “open.” [1] What one is ahead and beyond into is meaningfulness as such and, as the basis for that, the clearing. We note that the verb sistere does not mean “to stand” (by one’s own power, as it were) but “to be made to stand,” which in the present case draws attention to the inexorable thrown-openedness of both ex-sistence as one’s ontological structure and ex-sistence as one’s own personal life. [2]

The distinction between ex-sistence as personal and ex-sistence as structural is supremely important. The first refers to any one of us as living ahead in a range of concrete possibilities, whereas the second refers to our very essence as possibility. To be a Dasein means that, as possibility, one has always already (i.e., structurally, by one’s very essence) exceeded oneself-as-actuality. Human being is structurally ἐπέκεινα, an excessus. “Higher than actuality is possibility,” Heidegger wrote, not just as a jab at Husserl   [3] but more importantly as an inversion of the classical metaphysical tradition   (Aristotle  , Augustine  , Aquinas) according to which human beings are in movement toward full actualization (whether or not they ever reach that goal) in imitation of God as pure act. [4] Such movement is the dynamism of filling out the limits/πέρας   of one’s essence; and in that project, actuality (to actually be) stands higher than possibility (the ability to be), just as a hundred real thalers make one richer than a hundred possible thalers. [5] But Heidegger reverses that. Now the maxim that governs human being is no longer μηδὲν ἄγαν (“Nothing in excess”) but rather πὰν ἄγαν: human being is fundamentally a matter of excess. [6] With that, we reach the end of the worldview that stretches from Platonic ἔρως   and Aristotle’s κινεῖ ὡς ἐρώμενον, through Gregory of Nyssa’s ἐπέκτασις and Augustine’s donec requiescat in te, all the way down to Hegel  ’s “development and realization of Spirit.” [7]