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‘Time’ has long functioned as an ontological – or rather an ontical – criterion for naïvely discriminating various realms of entities. A distinction has been made between ‘temporal’ entities (natural processes and historical happenings) and ‘non-temporal’ entities (spatial and numerical relationships). We are accustomed to contrasting the ‘timeless’ meaning of propositions with the ‘temporal’ course of propositional assertions. It is also held that there is a ‘cleavage’ between ‘temporal’ entities and the ‘supra-temporal’ eternal, and efforts are made to bridge this over. Here ‘temporal’ always means simply being [seiend] ‘in time’ – a designation which, admittedly, is still pretty obscure. The Fact remains that time, in the sense of ‘being [sein] in time’, functions as a criterion for distinguishing realms of Being. Hitherto no one has asked or troubled to investigate how time has come to have this distinctive ontological function, or with what right anything like time functions as such a criterion; nor has anyone asked whether the authentic ontological relevance which is possible for it, gets expressed when “time” is used in so naïvely ontological a manner. ‘Time’ has acquired this ‘self-evident’ ontological function ‘of its own accord’, so to speak; indeed it has done so within the horizon of the way it is ordinarily understood. And it has maintained itself in this function to this DAY. BTMR   §5

The Greek expression phainomenon, to which the term ‘phenomenon’ goes back, is derived from the verb phainesthai, which signifies “to show itself “. Thus phainomenon means that which shows itself, the manifest [das, was sich zeigt, das Sichzeigende, das Offenbare]. phainesthai itself is a middle-voiced form which comes from phaino – to bring to the light of DAY, to put in the light. phaino comes from the stem pha – , like phos, the light, that which is bright – in other words, that wherein something can become manifest, visible in itself. Thus we must keep in mind that the expression ‘phenomenon’ signifies that which shows itself in itself, the manifest. Accordingly the phainomena or ‘phenomena’ are the totality of what lies in the light of DAY or can be brought to the light – what the Greeks sometimes identified simply with ta onta (entities). Now an entity can show itself from itself [von ihm selbst her] in many ways, depending in each case on the kind of access we have to it. Indeed it is even possible for an entity to show itself as something which in itself it is not. When it shows itself in this way, it ‘looks like something or other’ [“sieht” … “so aus wie …”]. This kind of showing-itself is what we call “seeming” [Scheinen]. Thus in Greek too the expression phainomenon (“phenomenon”) signifies that which looks like something, that which is ‘semblant’, ‘semblance’ [das “Scheinbare”, der “Schein”]. phainomenon agathon means something good which looks like, but ‘in actuality’ is not, what it gives itself out to be. If we are to have any further understanding of the concept of phenomenon, everything depends on our seeing how what is designated in the first signification of phainomenon (‘phenomenon’ as that which shows itself) and what is designated in the second (‘phenomenon’ as semblance) are structurally interconnected. Only when the meaning of something is such that it makes a pretension of showing itself – that is, of being a phenomenon – can it show itself as something which it is not; only then can it ‘merely look like so-and-so’. When phainomenon signifies ‘semblance’, the primordial signification (the phenomenon as the manifest) is already included as that upon which the second signification is founded. We shall allot the term ‘phenomenon’ to this positive and primordial signification of phainomenon, and distinguish “phenomenon” from “semblance”, which is the privative modification of “phenomenon” as thus defined. But what both these terms express has proximally nothing at all to do with what iscalled an ‘appearance’, or still less a ‘mere appearance’. BTMR   §7

De-severing does not necessarily imply any explicit estimation of the fatness of something ready-to-hand in relation to Dasein. Above all, remoteness never gets taken as a distance. If farness is to be estimated, this is done relatively to deseverances in which everyDAY Dasein maintains itself. Though these estimates may be imprecise and variable if we try to compute them, in the everyDAYness of Dasein they have their own definiteness which is thoroughly intelligible. We say that to go over yonder is “a good walk”, “a stone’s throw”, or ‘as long as it takes to smoke a pipe’. These measures express not only that they are not intended to ‘measure’ anything but also that the remoteness here estimated belongs to some entity to which one goes with concernful circumspection. But even when we avail ourselves of a fixed measure and say ‘it is half an hour to the house’, this measure must be taken as an estimate. ‘Half an hour’ is not-thirty minutes, but a duration [Dauer] which has no ‘length’ at all in the sense of a quantitative stretch. Such a duration is always interpreted in terms of well-accustomed everyDAY ways in which we ‘make provision’ [“Besorgungen”]. Remotenesses are estimated proximally by circumspection, even when one is quite familiar with ‘officially’ calculated measures. Since what is de-severed in such estimates is ready-to-hand, it retains its character as specifically within-the-world. This even implies that the pathways we take towards desevered entities in the course of our dealings will vary in their length from DAY to DAY. What is ready-to-hand in the environment is certainly not present-at-hand for an eternal observer exempt from Dasein: but it is encountered in Dasein’s circumspectively concernful everyDAYness. As Dasein goes along its ways, it does not measure off a stretch of space as a corporeal Thing which is present-at-hand; it does not ‘devour the kilometres’; bringing-close or de-severance is always a kind of concernful Being towards what is brought close and de-severed. A pathway which is long ‘Objectively’ can be much shorter than one which is ‘Objectively’ shorter still but which is perhaps ‘hard going’ and comes [SZ  :106] before us as interminably long. Yet only in thus ‘coming before us is the current world authentically ready-to-hand. The Objective distances of Things present-at-hand do not coincide with the remoteness and closeness of what is ready-to-hand within-the-world. Though we may know these distances exactly, this knowledge still remains blind; it does not have the function of discovering the environment circumspectively and bringing it close; this knowledge is used only in and for a concernful Being which does not measure stretches – a Being towards the world that ‘matters’ to one [… Sein zu der einen “angehenden” Welt]. BTMR   §23

The fact that, even though states-of-mind are primarily disclosive, everyDAY circumspection goes wrong and to a large extent succumbs to delusion because of them, is a me ón [non-being] when measured against the idea of knowing the ‘world’ absolutely. But if we make evaluations which are so unjustified ontologically, we shall completely fail to recognize the existentially positive character of the capacity for delusion. It is precisely when we see the ‘world’ unsteadily and fitfully in accordance with our moods, that the ready-to-hand shows itself in its specific worldhood, which is never the same from DAY to DAY. By looking at the world theoretically, we have already dimmed it down to the uniformity of what is purely present-at-hand, though admittedly this uniformity comprises a new abundance of things which can be discovered by simply characterizing them. Yet even the purest theoria [theory] has not left all moods behind it; even when we look theoretically at what is just present-at-hand, it does not show itself purely as it looks unless this theoria lets it come towards us in a tranquil tarrying alongside …, in rastone and diagoge. Any cognitive determining has its existential-ontological Constitution in the state-of-mind of Being-in-the-world; but pointing this out is not to be confused with attempting to surrender science ontically to ‘feeling’. BTMR   §29

Even supposing that what “they” have surmised and scented out should some DAY be actually translated into deeds, ambiguity has already taken care that interest in what has been Realised will promptly die away. Indeed this interest persists, in a kind of curiosity and idle talk, only so long as there is a possibility of a non-committal just-surmising-with-someone-else. Being “in on it” with someone [das Mit-dabei-sein] when one is on the scent, and so long as one is on it, precludes one’s allegiance when what has been surmised gets carried out. For in such a case Dasein is in every case forced back on itself. Idle talk and curiosity lose their power, and are already exacting their penalty. When confronted with the carrying-through of what “they” have surmised together, idle talk readily establishes that “they” “could have done that too” – for “they” have indeed surmised it together. In the end, idle talk is even indignant that what it has surmised and constantly demanded now actually happens. In that case, indeed, the opportunity to keep on surmising has been snatched away. [SZ  :174] BTMR   §37

Furthermore, the pallid lack of mood – indifference – which is addicted to nothing and has no urge for anything, and which abandons itself to whatever the DAY may bring, yet in so doing takes everything along with it in a certain manner, demonstrates most penetratingly the power of forgetting in the everyDAY mode of that concern which is closest to us. Just living along [Das Dahinleben] in a way which ‘lets’ everything ‘be’ as it is, is based on forgetting and abandoning oneself to one’s thrownness. It has the ecstatical meaning of an inauthentic way of having been. Indifference, which can go along with busying oneself head over heels, must be sharply distinguished from equanimity. This latter mood springs from resoluteness, which, in a moment of vision, looks at those Situations which are possible in one’s potentiality-for-Being-a-whole as disclosed in our anticipation of [zum] death. BTMR   §68

”EveryDAYness” manifestly stands for that way of existing in which Dasein maintains itself ‘every DAY’ [“alle Tage”]. And yet this ‘every DAY’ does not signify the sum of those ‘DAYS’ which have been allotted to Dasein in its ‘lifetime’. Though this ‘every DAY’ is not to be understood calendrically, there is still an overtone of some such temporal character in the signification of the ‘everyDAY’ [“Alltag”]. But what we have primarily in mind in the expression “everyDAYness” is a definite “how” of existence by which Dasein is dominated through and through for life’ [“zeitlebens”]. In our analyses we have often used the expression ‘proximally and for the most part’. ‘Proximally’ signifies the way in which Dasein is ‘manifest’ in the “with-one-another” of publicness, even if ‘at bottom’ everyDAYness is precisely something which, in an existentiell manner, it has ‘surmounted’. ‘For the most part’ signifies the way in which Dasein shows itself for Everyman, not always, but ‘as a rule’. BTMR   §71

”EveryDAYness” means the “how” in accordance with which Dasein ‘lives unto the DAY’ [“in den Tag hineinlebt”], whether in all its ways of behaving or only in certain ones which have been prescribed by Being-with-one-another. To this “how” there belongs further the comfortableness of the accustomed, even if it forces one to do something burdensome and ‘repugnant’. That which will come tomorrow (and this is what everyDAY concern keeps awaiting) is ‘eternally yesterDAY’s’. In everyDAYness everything is all one and the same, but whatever the DAY may bring is taken as diversification. EveryDAYness is determinative for Dasein even when it has not chosen the “they” for its ‘hero’. [SZ  :371] BTMR   §71

And is it not also a Fact of existing Dasein that in spending its time it takes ‘time’ into its reckoning from DAY to DAY and regulates this ‘reckoning’ astronomically and calendrically? Only if both Dasein’s everyDAY ‘historizing’ and the reckoning with ‘time’ with which it concerns itself in this historizing, are included in our Interpretation of Dasein’s temporality, will our orientation be embracing enough to enable us to make a problem of the ontological meaning of everyDAYness as such. But because at bottom we mean by the term “everyDAYness” nothing else than temporality, while temporality is made possible by Dasein’s Being, an adequate conceptual delimitation of everyDAYness can succeed only in a framework in which the meaning of Being in general and its possible variations are discussed in principle. [SZ  :372] BTMR   §71

The concern which awaits, retains, and makes present, is one which ‘allows itself’ so much time; and it assigns itself this time concernfully, even without determining the time by any specific reckoning, and before any such reckoning has been done. Here time dates itself in one’s current mode of allowing oneself time concernfully; and it does so in terms of those very matters with which one concerns oneself environmentally, and which have been disclosed in the understanding with its accompanying state-of-mind – in terms of what one does ‘all DAY long’. The more Dasein is awaitingly absorbed in the object of its concern and forgets itself in not awaiting itself, the more does even the time which it ‘allows’ itself remain covered up by this way of ‘allowing’. When Dasein is ‘living along’ in an everyDAY concernful manner, it just never understands itself as running along in a Continuously enduring sequence of pure ‘nows’. By reason of this covering up, the time which Dasein allows itself has gaps in it, as it were. Often we do not bring a ‘DAY’ together again when we come back to the time which we have ‘used’. But the time which has gaps in it does not go to pieces in this lack-of-togetherness, which is rather a mode of that temporality which has already been disclosed and stretched along ecstatically. The manner in which the time we have ‘allowed’ ‘runs its course’, and the way in which concern more or less explicitly assigns itself that time, can be properly explained as phenomena only if, on the one hand, we avoid [SZ  :410] the theoretical ‘representation’ of a Continuous stream of “nows”, and if, on the other hand, the possible ways in which Dasein assigns itself time and allows itself time are to be conceived of as determined primarily in terms of how Dasein, in a manner corresponding to its current existence, ‘has’ its time. BTMR   §79

The Being of Dasein is care. This entity exists fallingly as something that has been thrown. Abandoned to the ‘world’ which is discovered with its factical “there”, and concernfully submitted to it, Dasein awaits its potentiality-for-Being-in-the-world; it awaits it in such a manner that it ‘reckons’ on and ‘reckons’ with whatever has an involvement for the sake of this potentiality-for-Being – an involvement which, in the end, is a distinctive one. EveryDAY circumspective Being-in-the-world needs the possibility of sight (and this means that it needs brightness) if it is to deal concerrifully with what is ready-to-hand within the present-at-hand. With the factical disclosedness of Dasein’s world, Nature has been uncovered for Dasein. In its thrownness Dasein has been surrendered to the changes of DAY and night. DAY with its brightness gives it the possibility of sight; night takes this away. BTMR   §80

Dasein awaits with circumspective concern the possibility of sight, and it understands itself in terms of its daily work; in thus awaiting and understanding, it gives its time with the ‘then, when it dawns …’ The ‘then’ with which Dasein concerns itself gets dated in terms of something which is connected with getting bright, and which is connected with it in the closest kind of environmental involvement – namely, the rising of the sun. “Then, when the sun rises, it is time for so and so.” Thus Dasein dates the time which it must take, and dates it in terms of something it encounters within the world and within the horizon of its abandonment to the world – in terms of something encountered as having a distinctive involvement for its circumspective potentiality-for-Being-in-the-world. Concern makes use of the ‘Being-ready-to-hand’ of the sun, which sheds forth light and warmth. The sun dates the time which is interpreted in concern. In terms of this dating arises the ‘most natural’ measure of time – the DAY. [SZ  :413] BTMR   §80

And because the temporality of that Dasein which must take its time is finite, its DAYS are already numbered. Concernful awaiting takes precaution to define the ‘thens’ with which it is to concern itself – that is, to divide up the DAY. And the ‘during-the-DAYtime’ makes this possible. This dividing-up, in turn, is done with regard to that by which time is dated – the journeying sun. Sunset and midDAY, like the sunrise itself, are distinctive ‘places’ which this heavenly body occupies. Its regularly recurring passage is something which Dasein, as thrown into the world and giving itself time temporalizingly, takes into its reckoning. Dasein historizes from DAY to DAY by reason of its way of interpreting time by dating it – a way which is adumbrated in its thrownness into the “there”. BTMR   §80

Comparison shows that for the ‘advanced’ Dasein the DAY and the presence of sunlight no longer have such a special function as they have for the ‘primitive’ Dasein on which our analysis of ‘natural’ time-reckoning has been based; for the ‘advanced’ Dasein has the ‘advantage’ of even being able to turn night into DAY. Similarly we no longer need to glance explicitly and immediately at the sun and its position to ascertain the time. The manufacture and use of measuring-equipment of one’s own permits one to read off the time directly by a clock produced especially for this purpose. The “what o’clock is it?” is the ‘what time is it?’ Because the clock – in the sense of that which makes possible a public way of time-reckoning – must be regulated by the ‘natural’ clock, even the use of clocks as equipment is based upon Dasein’s temporality, which, with the disclosedness of the “there”, first makes possible a’dating of the time with which we concern ourselves; this is a fact, even if it is covered up when the time is read off. Our understanding of the natural clock develops with the advancing discovery of Nature, and instructs us as to new possibilities for a kind of time-measurement which is relatively independent of the DAY and of any explicit observation of the sky. BTMR   §80

The phenomenon of falling does not give us something like a ‘night view’ of Dasein, a property which occurs ontically and may serve to round out the innocuous aspects of this entity. Falling reveals an essential ontological structure of Dasein itself. Far from determining its nocturnal side, it constitutes all Dasein’s DAYS in their everyDAYness. BTMR   §38

In the publicness with which we are with one another in our everyDAY manner, death is ‘known’ as a mishap which is constantly occurring – as a ‘case of death?’. Someone or other ‘dies’, be he neighbour or stranger [SZ  :253] [Nächste oder Fernerstehende]. People who are no acquaintances of ours are ‘dying’ daily and hourly. ‘Death’ is encountered as a well-known event occurring within-the-world. As such it remains in the inconspicuousness characteristic of what is encountered in an everyDAY fashion. The “they” has already stowed away [gesichert] an interpretation for this event. It talks of it in a ‘fugitive’ manner, either expressly or else in a way which is mostly inhibited, as if to say, “One of these DAYS one will die too, in the end; but right now it has nothing to do with us.” BTMR   §51

But after the Interpretation of temporality which we have given thus far, do we find ourselves in any more promising a situation with regard to delimiting the structure of everyDAYness existentially? Or does this bewildering phenomenon make the inadequacy of our explication of temporality all too patent? Have we not hitherto been constantly immobilizing Dasein in certain situations, while we have, ‘consistently’ with this, been disregarding the fact that in living unto its DAYS Dasein stretches itself along ‘temporally’ in the sequence of those DAYS? The “it’s all one and the same”, the accustomed, the ‘like yesterDAY, so toDAY and tomorrow’, and the ‘for the most part’ – these are not to be grasped without recourse to this ‘temporal’ stretching-along of Dasein. BTMR   §71