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Philosopher

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Martin Heidegger

1889–1976 · Phenomenology · Modern

Martin Heidegger asked about the meaning of being, first in Being and Time and later in a thinking that treats language as the house of being. Being and Time analyses human existence, Dasein, as being-in-the-world, thrown, and toward death. Das Man, the they, is an argument about everyday absorption, not a slogan about peer pressure.

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The Letter on Humanism answers French existentialism and says language is the house of being. The sentence is his. It is also easy to repeat without understanding it. His membership of the Nazi party, the rectorate at Freiburg, and the Black Notebooks are part of reading him, not a footnote to skip in order to enjoy the metaphors.

A philosophy of dwelling and language does not get a holiday from the question of what it housed. This library keeps one secured sentence from the letter. The set pieces of Being and Time are arguments. They do not become stable one-sentence quotations in a single English, and inventing that English would be a different kind of failure.

Three lines are secured. Two are from the 1947 letter: language is the house of being, and, in Frank A. Capuzzi's English, the human being is the shepherd of Being rather than the lord of beings. The third is Macquarrie and Robinson's sentence in Being and Time §9. Being-toward-death and das Man are arguments, not stable one-sentence quotations in a single English. Further familiar lines are omitted where the wording or locus is not secure.

Start here

The Letter on Humanism, with a short guide beside you, after you know he is answering Sartre.

It is the source of the sentence this library can stand behind. Being and Time is the book, and it is not a book to meet first through a single line.

Quotations

“The human being is not the lord of beings. The human being is the shepherd of Being.”

Martin Heidegger · Phenomenology

meaningselfknowledge
Paraphrase or translation
Meaning & application

Key ideas

  • Being

    The question the tradition forgot, in his telling, by treating being as the most obvious word.

  • Being-in-the-world

    Dasein is not a subject looking out at objects. It is already amid things that matter.

  • Language

    Not a tool for labels. The house of being, in the Letter on Humanism.

Major works

  • Being and Time (1927)

    The analytic of Dasein. Macquarrie and Robinson, or Stambaugh.

  • Letter on Humanism (1947)

    Language as the house of being. A reply to Sartre's humanism.

Influences

Influenced

Common misreadings

  • The house of being is not a claim that changing words is the whole of politics.
  • Being-toward-death is an analysis, not a motivational remark about living fully.
  • The politics are not external to the work. Skipping them is a way of not reading the language he trusted.

Famous lines Martin Heidegger never said

None of the lines this library files for Martin Heidegger is marked Questionable or Misattributed. That is only a fact about these cards. It is not a certificate that every popular sentence is theirs.

FAQ

What is the best book to start with?

The Letter on Humanism, with a short guide beside you, after you know he is answering Sartre. It is the source of the sentence this library can stand behind. Being and Time is the book, and it is not a book to meet first through a single line.

What is the most famous quote?

This library does not measure fame, and it does not rank lines by how often they are shared. The first line it files for Martin Heidegger that is not marked Questionable or Misattributed is “Language is the house of being.” (Letter on Humanism (1947), Paraphrase or translation).

What is the most misquoted line?

None of the lines this library files for Martin Heidegger is marked Misattributed or Questionable. That is a fact about these cards, not a certificate that every popular sentence is theirs.

What is one key idea, in a sentence?

Being: The question the tradition forgot, in his telling, by treating being as the most obvious word.