Cologne, 3 August 1996
There was an interchange yesterday between Tom Blancato and Michael Pennamacoor
on polemos in the context of the discussion of the now notorious question of
violence. More and more I have the impression that this question is morally
charged in multiple senses: the question charges to the fore with an urgency, as
if it were cavalry. It is charged with explosive power which, when detonated,
clouds the air and obscures the view of the phenomena involved. And it is
charged in the sense of an accusation which accuses us that the question must be
given weight and urgency.
But getting back to polemos: Michael P. brings Heidegger's thinking of
Heraclitian polemos into play once again. This has to be seen on the background
of the strife of being in which a world comes to unconcealedness. In the first
place it is not strife among humans, but secondarily so insofar as humans are
used by being.
Tom B. replies by citing the U.S. adversarial legal system. He writes:
"As a mode of disclosure, as, for instance, in the setting of law, the
litigation process, which seems to me to be adequately described as a
polemical process, produces a restrictive mode of truth."
Here we have an opening that, if followed up patiently, could bring the
phenomenon of violence to speak. For, the mere reference to an empirical state
of affairs is not the phenomenon itself. _Sein und Zeit_ teaches us that, e.g.:
"Phenomena are accordingly *never* appearances, but every appearance relies on
phenomena." (S.30) "And precisely because phenomena are initially and mostly
*not* given, phenomenology is necessary. Hiddenness is the counterconcept to
*phenomenon*." (S.36) "It is one thing to report narratively about *beings*, and
another to grasp beings in their *being*." (S.39)
Violence has thus to be brought to speak _in its being_. Tom B. points the way
with his reference to a "mode of disclosure". He claims the U.S. legal system is
a "polemical process" producing "a restrictive mode of truth". This needs
further locating. First of all it must be pointed out that this sense of polemos
is NOT the sense of Heracleitos' polemos, nor the sense in which it occurs in
Heidegger's thinking through of Fragment 58. Rather, here it is a matter of an
essencing of truth. The U.S. legal system has essentially nothing to do with the
U.S. but with the Roman, and ultimately, Greek judicial system from which it
derives. These systems of justice are rooted in the truth of being and, more
specifically, in the essencing of truth. What is the restrictiveness of the
"restrictive mode of truth" to which Tom refers? It could perhaps be called the
'Roman-Imperial' essencing of truth, the Roman _veritas_. Heidegger writes on
this:
"Doch was bedeutet das lateinische verum? [...] Der Stamm 'ver' zeigt sich
eindeutig in unserem deutschen Wort 'wehren', 'die Wehr', 'das Wehr'; darin
liegt das Moment des 'Gegen', des 'Widerstandes' [...] 'Ver' bedeutet dann: die
Stellung halten, in Stand bleiben, wozu freilich immer in gewisser Weise
Widerstand gehört, der seinerseits aber doch nur stets aus einer Standfestigkeit
kommen kann. 'Ver', das sagt: in Stand-stehen, in Stand-bleiben, d.h.
nicht-fallen (kein falsum), oben bleiben, sich behaupten, das Haupt-sein,
befehlen. Das Sichbehauptende und das Aufrechtstehende -
Aufrechte."(_Parmenides_ GA Band. 54 S.69f.)
My crude translation:
"But what does Latin verum mean? ... The root 'ver' is clearly apparent in our
German word 'wehren' [defend], 'die Wehr' [defence] 'das Wehr' [weir]; this
contains the moment of 'against', of 'resistance' ... 'Ver' thus means: hold
one's position, keep one's stand, which of course always requires resistance
(standing against) in a certain sense, which in turn however can only come from
a firm stand. 'Ver', this says: stand in a stand, keep in a stance, i.e. do not
fall (no false-ness), stay on top, assert oneself as head, be the head, command.
The one who asserts oneself and the one standing upright - the upright one."
As I say, the translation is intentionally rough. This is not polemos but the
essencing of truth as correctness, veritas. Truth essences here defensively in
order resist and prevent a fall: falsity. Falseness and fall are related
etymologically and phenomenologically. From the start and in its essence, truth
as veritas is exposed to the danger of being brought to fall. Weirs and
barricades against this eventuality must be erected. Veritas is thus not
primarily a mode of disclosure (of beings in their being) but a mode of
defensive self-assertion. What the case is has to be asserted and maintained in
order to stay on top. Can this contestational essencing of truth be called
violent? This word seems to me to over-state and over-charge the case with a
moral super-charge that is inclined to obscure the view. As Tom points out: the
essence of violence is nothing violent. It could even seem innocuous and
valuable.
For it is the essencing of truth that has to be made questionable, allowing a
step back and a twisting out (Verwindung!) of it rather than an accusation of it
being what it is. What would a twisting step back enable? A view of aletheia
itself: the truth of essencing rather than the essencing of truth (remember the
turning).
So maybe by turning to the essencing of truth, the phenomenon of violence could
shown for what it is, that is: in its being.
Where does that leave polemos (which is not veritas)?
Cheers,
Michael
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