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13 On “Be-ing”: The Last Part of Contributions to Philosophy (From Enowning)
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13. On “Be-ing”: The Last Part of Contributions to Philosophy (From Enowning) Parvis Emad And any effort at wanting to force what is said in this beginning into a familiar intelligibility is futile and above all against the nature of such thinking. —Contributions to Philosophy, part VIII, “Be-ing,” §259 In order to enter the last part of Contributions to Philosophy (From Enowning ),1 entitled “Be-ing,” we must be clear about the following questions. Considering the structure of this work, which precisely re¶ects its hermeneutic-phenomenological thrust, in what sense can “Be-ing” be said to be the last part of Contributions? Do words such as “last” and “part” apply to “Be-ing” without reservation? And more importantly, how does Heidegger’s characterization of “Be-ing” as “an attempt to grasp the whole once again” (GA 65, 514; CP, 365) contribute to our understanding of the relation between “Be-ing” and the “parts” preceding it? If what being-historical thinking achieves in the six “joinings” (Fügungen or Fugen) of Contributions (in “Echo,” “Playing-Forth,” “Leap,” “Grounding,” “The Ones to Come,” and “The Last God”) is indispensable for entering into “Be-ing,” but “Be-ing” is not a “summary” and “conclusion ” of the six preceding “joinings,” then how are we to understand the relation between these “joinings” and “Being” and how are we to enter into this concluding part? If—considering their “contents”—neither the “Preview” nor the six “joinings” progressively develop an argument the way introductions and chapters usually do, then the relation between “Be-ing” and the six “joinings” cannot be grasped according to the assumption that in Contributions Heidegger steadily and gradually develops a central “thesis.” If this is the case, then we should seek the guiding clue for grasping the relation between the six “joinings” and “Be-ing” not in such an assumption but in the so-called “turning” (die Kehre) as the “happening ” that reverberates throughout Contributions and enables us to enter the last part of this work. Thus enabled, we shall understand what Heidegger means when he intends with “Be-ing” to grasp “the whole once again.” Beginning with a general characterization of the “turning” as the “happening” that reverberates in “Be-ing” as well as in the six “joinings” of Contributions, we shall see that Heidegger’s attempt to grasp—with “Be-ing”—“the whole once again” should not be misconstrued as the attempt of a willful thinking that, at the end of the road, deems itself to be in control of be-ing and wants to do the impossible, namely to grasp be-ing as a whole. Rather, by trying to achieve a basic understanding of 230 Parvis Emad the “turning” we shall see that the last part of Contributions, “Be-ing,” represents the attempt of a thinking that is claimed by be-ing in such a way as to respond in this part to that claim by returning, once again, to the full range of the “turning.” Why once again? Because “turning” is not only the “happening” that reverberates in the six “joinings” of Contributions and its last part “Be-ing” but also a “happening” that reverberates throughout the transcendental-horizonal pathway of fundamental ontology. Given this proviso, we must set out from a basic understanding of the so-called “turning.”2 I When several decades after Contributions Heidegger had the opportunity to express himself on the matter of “turning,” he precisely and concisely characterized the “turning” in three interconnected respects. First, he pointed out that “turning” marks “a turning point” (eine Wendung) in his own enactment in thinking of the “turning”; second, he indicated that “turning” is what occurs within the dynamic (Sachverhalt) named “being and time,” “time and being”; and ¤nally, he characterized the “turning” by stressing that this “happening” points directly to be-ing insofar as “the ‘happening’ of ‘turning’ . . . ’is’ be-ing as such” (Das “Geschehen” der Kehre . . . “ist” das Seyn als solches).3 Thus, if we want to enter “Be-ing” in a manner that behooves the matter called be-ing, we must ¤rst achieve a basic understanding of these characterizations of “turning.” We shall take our bearing from the last characterization of the “turning ,” because this characterization brings invaluable light to the entire matter of “turning.” By characterizing the “turning” as the “happening which is be-ing as such,” Heidegger tells us that this “happening” is nothing other than be-ing’s way of holding sway, and that this “happening ” should not...