Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Engaging Heidegger

Here is a lovely moment from Richard Capobianco's impressive book Engaging Heidegger:

"In the final session of his lecture course The Principle of Reason in 1955-6, Heidegger, reflecting on Heraclitus' Fragment 52, likened Being to a child's play (Spiel). Being, understood originarily and fundamentally, is simply the 'play' of presencing, of emerging, a play without 'why'. 'It remains simply play,' he observes, 'but this "simply" is everything, the one, the only.' Similarly, we may say that Being is the 'clearing' that simply clears. We are cleared in the clearing. And in releasing ourselves to the clearing, we see through to the utter simplicity of our existence." (Engaging Heidegger p. 122)