Abstract
Starting from current discussions on atheism, the article focusses on Stein’s and Conrad-Martius’s religious situation, connection, and struggles from the early 1920s to the mid-1930s. It highlights their relationships with Husserl and Reinach, taking advantage of recent studies on Alfred von Sybel, who shares with them the experience of Christianity lived in a deeply convincing way within the Bergzabern circle. Like Conrad-Martius and Stein, he strives for a clear stand on Heidegger’s existential philosophy, yet with an initially rather welcoming attitude. Comparing the three philosophers’ views on the way Heidegger considers the connection between life, existence, and death, clarifies the degree to which Stein is carefully attentive to him, but at the same time cunningly critical of him. Eventually, she teaches a most appropriate way of treating factual or so-called atheism, inspiring Christians to talk and act most confidently in order to debunk ideology and ignorance for the sake of sound solidarity and healthy life.
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Notes
- 1.
cf. Casey (2016, 257–8).
- 2.
Conrad-Martius’s remarks lead us immediately to the crucial role the term “Sachverhalt” played in her and Stein’s thinking, coming of course from Reinach. Taking up Schuhmann’s investigations on Stein and Reinach, for example, Ales Bello (1993, 256–267) and Müller (1993, 130–132, 141–157) provide further helpful insights on the connections between the three thinkers (and also with Hering as phenomenologist and theologian).
- 3.
This also rejects any attempts of conservative Roman-Catholic circles who desperately try to patronize the developments described above for a so-called “ver sacrum catholicum.” For example, Herbstrith highlights that especially Stein was totally foreign to a “Gettodenken,” as it had developed in the churches at that time, and that this attitude was influenced by Husserl’s phenomenology: “Husserl and his audience were her helpers on this path. Real science, said Husserl, must be free of prejudice, scrutinize every experience and insight without being alienated by an ideology, be it liberal or denominational” (Herbstrith, 1977, 261).
- 4.
Postcard to Conrad-Martius of May 24th, 1919, BSB Ana 378 B II von Sybel 90.
- 5.
Postcard to Conrad-Martius from June 30, 1919, BSB Ana 378 B II von Sybel 94. “Jesus Among the Dead” is published, provided with an introduction by Eberhard Avé-Lallement and Joachim Feldes, in Edith-Stein-Jahrbuch 15 (2009): 9–51.
- 6.
His decision documents his letters to Conrad-Martius and Jean Hering from May 1923 (BSB Ana 378 B II von Sybel 110), as well as the Brotherhood of the Community of Marburg-Süd from September 7, 1923 (estate of Alfred von Sybel). For the sanctification movement see, for example Holthaus (2005).
- 7.
Letter from Conrad-Martius to John M. Oesterreicher on August 5th, 488, in Herbstrith 1990, 307.
- 8.
Pfeiffer, on the other hand (2005, 92), only sees additions to an argument that has already been closed “with the aim of also illuminating what has been discussed from a Christian theological point of view,” “[t]o be confronted with theses” (107). For a better classification, she uses Elmar Holenstein, who interprets these additions as meaning that Conrad-Martius is primarily concerned with philosophically justifying the possibility of the facts that have come to light through revelation. (Holenstein, 1963, 2–16, 4, cited from Pfeiffer 2005, 107, note 62).
- 9.
In his mail to Salomonsen on February 15, 2013, Rummel wrote that he knew about “practically no written documents.” Material may be in the parish archives, stored in the state archives of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bavaria in Nuremberg (https://www.academia.edu/7087330/Rescension_Feldes_Phanomenologenheim, accessed on April 26, 20).
- 10.
Von Sybel’s estate. On Schwarz Schumann 1989/90, 21, note 95.
- 11.
Von Sybel’s estate.
- 12.
It appears as: “L’existence, la substantialité et l’âme,” in Recherches philosophiques 2. Paris 1932/33, 148–181. The German version can be found in Conrad-Martius (1963a), 194–227.
- 13.
Published in Conrad-Martius (1963c), 15–31.
- 14.
- 15.
See Pfeiffer (2005, 46.213).
- 16.
In a personal conversation, Ronny Miron notes that for HCM Dasein is simply existence and the I is part of existence or Being (therefore her idea of the I is declaredly a chapter in her idea of Being, despite its peculiarities; Miron argues elsewhere that HCM has more in common with Heidegger than is known, especially in terms of his later thinking.
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Feldes, J. (2022). Side by Side as if on a Narrow Ridge: Edith Stein and Hedwig Conrad-Martius Living Out Christianity and Facing Atheistic Philosophy. In: Calcagno, A., Miron, R. (eds) Hedwig Conrad-Martius and Edith Stein: Philosophical Encounters and Divides. Women in the History of Philosophy and Sciences, vol 16. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-14759-3_9
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