Abstract
This paper addresses the issue of human spatiality as existential givenness, taking as its fundamental orientation relationality, namely the natural tendency towards the other as my co-man (Mitmensch) for the purposes of instituting, together with him, the first place for such a spatiality : the being-with-one-another (Miteinandersein). If the being-with-one-another embodies the first place of this spatiality, then the encounter between an I and a you—that is to say, otherness declined in the second person, as Duheit—represents the culmination of such a place . On this basis the τόπος of the Miteinandersein emerges as an οἶκος and the achievement of such an ‘oikological’ rank makes the space of the relation a real Lebensraum, a living space. Given these assumptions, a comparison will be offered between two paradigmatic modes of interpreting Duheit, the outcomes of a short season in which continental philosophy questioned itself on this issue with unusual urgency and depth . On the one hand, the Zwischenontologie (“Between-ontology”) of Martin Buber, on the other, the Mitanthropologie (“With-anthropology”) of Karl Löwith . The comparison here proposed will reveal that the philosophical question of otherness is essentially a matter of measure, namely that the promotion of the space of the relation established by I and you to the rank of οἶκος and Lebensraum depends on its ability to stay within the limit of an anthropic perimeter.
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Notes
- 1.
The current English translation of the German ‘Mitmensch’ is ‘fellow man’. In this case I prefer a more literal rendering, albeit one that is less grammatically correct: ‘co-man’ (Mit-Mensch), since in the economy of my discourse (as will be seen particularly in the lines dedicated to the illustration of Mitanthropologie) this term will designate the human being exclusively as a ‘relational being’, a ‘man-with-men’.
- 2.
Zwischenontologie, literally translated, means ‘Between-ontology’, while Mitanthropologie is, literally, ‘With-anthropology’ [Translator’s note].
- 3.
Therefore, I refer the reader to the main stages of this path of research in order to deepen the many themes that, for obvious reasons, will only be spoken of in passing here. In the first place: Cera (2010). Also: Cera (2007) and Löwith (2007). The comparison between Löwith and Buber was made in a first and larger version in Cera (2013).
- 4.
See Löwith (1928). The version now included in Sämtliche Schriften (Löwith 1981), refers to the Second Edition, slightly revised, from 1962 (Löwith 1962). The textual references from the present paper will refer to this edition. In 2013 the text was reprinted in a single edition, preceded by a useful introduction of Giovanni Tidona (2013).
- 5.
On this topic see Cera (2010: 283–311).
- 6.
The first chapter of IRM is dedicated to a “re-enactment” of Principles (see Löwith 1981: 20–28).
- 7.
As is known, Plessner characterizes the human being as “exzentrische Positionalität”. See Plessner (1981).
- 8.
This is a partial translation of the original German edition (Theunissen 1977), to which, where necessary, I will make direct reference.
- 9.
Buber presents a brief but dense survey of dialogicalism in Buber (1954). John Cullberg offers an in-depth real-time reconstruction (we are in 1933) of the “I-thou problem in the ontology of the present” (Cullberg 1933: 18–169). However, the historical reconstruction of reference is found in the now classic Casper (1967), next to which should be mentioned: Böckenhoff (1970). A more theoretical approach is proposed by the dialogical section of Theunissen’s book (Theunissen 1977: 242–373; partial translation in Theunissen 1984: 257–344). Among the publications of recent years: Wojcieszuk (2010) and Heinze (2011).
- 10.
These pages are discussed in Löwith (1981: 145–147).
- 11.
- 12.
The bond between Löwith and Buber (between IRM and dialogicalism) has been addressed by the South Korean researcher Choi Sung-Sik (Choi 1993). However, since the author aims at an enrichment of the philosophical debate in his country—traditionally monopolized by the communitarian dimension of the ‘we’—through the engagement of the ‘Western category’ of Duheit, his interest focuses more on an exposition of Löwith’s and Buber’s positions than on their comparative analysis.
- 13.
For purposes of clarification, it should be said that Löwith probably did not know Ich und Du at the time of preparing IRM, since although he discusses the positions of Ebner, Gogarten and Scheler, he does not make a single mention of it. It appears only fleetingly in the preface to the second edition (1962), in a list of references relating to the themes of Mitwelt and Mitmenschlichkeit, prepared by the author precisely to make up for a lack in the first edition (see Löwith 1981: 14).
- 14.
That the renewed philosophical interest in the relational dimension should be ascribed to Feuerbach’s Principles is an assumption shared by all the thinkers linked to Dialogismus.
- 15.
- 16.
- 17.
Both refer to the Humboldtian essay of 1827 Über den Dualis (Humboldt 1997) focused precisely on the distinction between “you” and “he”.
- 18.
The cosmocentric turn of his anthropology also coincides with the re-evaluation of the Unmittelbarkeit in a Feuerbachian key. On this topic see Löwith (1988).
- 19.
Theunissen recognizes the philosophically spurious character of the Buberian analysis, since “the thought about the ‘dialogical principle’ springs not from a metaphysical experience but from an ‘experience of faith’ and must, for this reason, first be translated into philosophical concepts. Such a translation is necessarily inadequate” (Theunissen 1984: 269–270). See also Theunissen (1964).
- 20.
- 21.
See the famous work of 1949, which originally appeared in English during Lowith’s ‘exile’ in USA (Löwith 1957).
- 22.
Although the explicit elaboration of the category of the Zwischen would take place only in a course held in Jerusalem in 1938 and published in 1943: What is Man? (Buber 1943), it is beyond dispute that the system of dialogicalism has always rested on these theoretical assumptions, beyond their explicit formalization.
- 23.
A critique to which, however, Ferdinand Ebner exposes himself (see Casper 1967: 259–269).
- 24.
On the Löwithian skeptical ethos see Cera (2011).
- 25.
Theunissen speaks of a Theologie des Zwischen: “the purpose, exceeding the philosophy, of Buber's dialogicalism” (Theunissen 1977: 330 and 330–346).
- 26.
The analysis of Heidegger’s Mitsein is proposed in § 21 of IRM (Löwith 1981: 96–98). On Löwith’s critiques of the layout of existential analytics see Theunissen (1977: 413–420), Koltan (2011), Cera (2010: 99–159). For a comparison between Buber and Heidegger on the subject of Duheit see Gordon (2001).
- 27.
Quote from the Afterword to the 1957 edition of I and Thou (Buber 1970: 164–165).
- 28.
Even Lévinas expressed himself in a critical manner regarding the extension of the ‘you’ to things (see Lévinas 1967).
- 29.
The two definitions, quoted by Theunissen (1977: 2), are respectively by Husserl and Rosenstock-Huessy.
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Cera, A. (2017). The Other’s Place in the Space of the Relation: Karl Löwith and Martin Buber as Theorists of Duheit. In: Catena, M., Masi, F. (eds) The Changing Faces of Space. Studies in Applied Philosophy, Epistemology and Rational Ethics, vol 39. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-66911-3_4
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