Introduction to Metaphysics (Heidegger book)


Introduction to Metaphysics is a 1953 book by the philosopher Martin Heidegger. The work is a revised and edited lecture course Heidegger gave in the summer of 1935 at the University of Freiburg. Heidegger suggested the work relates to the unwritten "second half" of his 1927 magnum opus Being and Time. The work is also notable for illustrating Heidegger's supposed "Kehre," or turn in thought beginning in the 1930s, and for its mention of the "inner greatness" of Nazism.

Background and publication history

Introduction to Metaphysics was originally presented as a lecture course Heidegger gave at the University of Freiburg in the summer of 1935. It was first published in 1953 by Max Niemeyer Verlag, simultaneously with the Seventh German Edition of Being and Time.
In an eight-sentence preface accompanying the 1953 edition of Being and Time, Heidegger wrote that this newly available volume, Introduction to Metaphysics, would "elucidate" material contemplated for the once-promised but long-abandoned second half of Being and Time. The preface also noted that all references within the latest B&T text to the work as a "First Half" were eliminated.
Introduction to Metaphysics first appeared in English in 1959. A "new" English translation in 2000 was prepared by Gregory Fried and Richard Polt, who said in their acknowledgements that the 1959 translation was largely responsible for introducing Heidegger to the English-speaking world.. Yale University Press reissued the Fried-Polt translation along with an expanded introduction in 2014.
At the same time, Yale published a separate volume edited by Fried and Polt, consisting of essays by various authors concerning the text.
Volume 40 of the Gesamtausgabe, Heidegger's collected works, edited by Petra Jaeger and published in 1983, included Introduction to Metaphysics.

Being and the 'Kehre'

Introduction to Metaphysics is, according to Thomas Sheehan, typically seen as the first instance in Heidegger's work of his much-discussed Kehre, or turn in thinking, that became evident from the 1930s onward. But Sheehan believes this supposed change is "far less dramatic than usually suggested," and entailed a change in focus and method, rather than a change in fundamental questions or answers. Sheehan contends that throughout his career, Heidegger never sought to fundamentally define "being," but rather tried to define " brings about being as a givenness of entities."
According to Heidegger in this work, the fundamental question of metaphysics is "why are there beings at all instead of nothing?" From this, Heidegger extracts a prior question about the relation to Being; or "How does it stand with Being?" Heidegger wrote in the separate "Age of the World Picture" that this question is not purely academic, for metaphysics grounds an age, by giving "that age the basis upon which it is essentially formed." The question thus implicates the totality of Dasein, and is asked so as to "restore the historical Dasein of human beings... back to the power of Being that is to be opened up originally".

Attempt to revive pre-Socratic ideas

Introduction to Metaphysics "was not about early Greek thought, and yet the Presocratics are at the pivotal center of discussion," writes W. Julian Korab-Karpowicz. In this view, "the thinking of Heraclitus and Parmenides, which lies at the origin of philosophy, was falsified and misinterpreted in Platonic and Aristotelian thought and the subsequent tradition."
Heidegger believed that early Greek ideas of being became "constricted" beginning with Plato and Aristotle and continuing with the Romans, according to Charles Guignon. Introduction to Metaphysics seeks to revive pre-Socratic notions of "being" with an emphasis on "understanding the way beings show up in an unfolding happening or event," Guignon says, adding, "we might call this alternative outlook 'event ontology.' "
Heidegger used his discussion of Heraclitus' and Parmenides' respective notions of logos in his argument that to avoid nihilism, modern philosophy must "reinvert" the traditional, post-Socratic conception of the relationship between being and thinking, according to Daniel Dahlstrom.
The 2000 English translation of Introduction to Metaphysics was reviewed by the philosopher Miles Groth, who characterized "Heidegger's readings of Heraclitus and Parmenides" as "famously idiosyncratic". He considered Heidegger's suggestion that Heraclitus and Parmenides "fundamentally agree" to be "challenging".

Politics

Gregory Fried and Richard Polt praised the work for "the range and depth of its thought as well as for its intricate and nuanced style", arguing that it deserved its status as the successor to Being and Time. Regarding the work's mention of National Socialism, they write that, “Interpreters differ widely, and often acrimoniously, on whether Heidegger’s Nazism was due to a personal character defect” or whether the philosophy itself reflects a fascist outlook.
Heidegger refers in the work to the "inner truth and greatness" of Nazism, but adds a qualifying statement in parentheses: "namely, the confrontation of planetary technology and modern humanity." The qualification had not been made during the original lecture, although Heidegger falsely claimed otherwise. Moreover, the controversial page of the 1935 manuscript is missing from the Heidegger Archives in Marbach.
In a 1953 review of the work in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Heidegger's former student Jurgen Habermas was highly critical of the "inner greatness" statement and wrote that "it's time to think with Heidegger against Heidegger."
Julian Young writes that Introduction to Metaphysics "is widely considered fascist in character by those who believe Heidegger can be criticized for his political engagement." But this characterization is false according to Young, who believes the work implicitly condemns Nazism for its racism, militarism and attempted destruction of civil society.
The work has also been seen as being critical of Nazism for being insufficiently radical and suffering from the same spiritual impoverishment as the Soviet Union and the United States.