Phenomenology and the Divine: Understanding the French Theological Turn

the first question we have to ask is what is the French theological turn and then work backwards to asking what is phenomenology and how does it relate to that so the first thing we should say what is the French theological turn well it is the major source of new phenomenological research many ways the major source of new philosophical research in France right and it is the contemporary inheritor of much of the European philosophical tradition so in a very general way this is what's happening now that's what the theological turn is okay but that doesn't really enlighten the concept too much so let's talk about what specifically is novel about it well it's a new way of addressing theological questions not from the basis of any pre given or pre understood concepts of the divine but beginning with concrete existence in other words it tries to answer some of the age-old philosophical and theological questions by not beginning with some ideal content or something like the idea of God but with the real or actual existence as we encounter it day to day in this way it tries to employ the full up philosophical systems of Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger the founders of phenomenology as a new platform for leaping into theological discussion right it is a way of avoiding sort of the traditional jumping-off point which would be Scripture and tradition right now this may strike some of you is not terribly novel especially those of you in the theology department because this is something after all which I think someone like Agustin attempted in his work right so for example in his essay on free will and grace when a Gustin goes about asking well how do we know that there is a God and what do we mean when we say that there is such a god he doesn't begin with Scripture nor does he begin with some sort of abstract assertion to what the nature of God's existence would be he says let's begin with our own existence right let's start by examining what what we are and who we are and of course you know the beginning of the confessions that begins with the statement our hearts are restless until they find their rest in thee the the idea being that we understand God on the basis of our own restlessness rather than on the basis of some abstract theological concept and this regard it's not new within philosophy but it is new within contemporary thought and it is novel in a sense after a Gustin but we could say that a Gustin was eivol not let's go as we say in French sort of before before his time a proto phenomenologist of some sort but I want to say this particularly novel within phenomenology the field that I work in and the field that we addressed we move backwards from the back end of the title of my talk to the beginning so the question is why is that well to understand that we have to understand a bit of the history of the phenomenological movement am I going too fast for anyone No good again this is meant to be a very general introductory very relaxed so also at any point if it gets a bit confusing just raise your hand I mean this is a colloquium right - a chance for us to meet his minds so alright so let's talk a bit about phenomenology and why this would be a novel approach within phenomenology well since the beginning of the phenomenological movement right which would be around the end of the 19th century the beginning of the 20th century phenomenology is really seen as a 20th century movement even though its roots and origins are really at the end of the 19th century the question of the existence of God and the nature of the valley the nature and the value of faith have been famously set aside now set aside is actually the technical language employed by the founder of phenomenology at MIT who Cyril what does he mean by that well philosophy at the time that Edmund Husserl came about had gotten in his words needlessly idealistic meaning that we had started tarrying with ideal content rather than actual real existence uh you know this is probably famously illustrated by the sort of arcane debates which were taking place not to point fingers in medieval philosophy at the time right and and which had been been taken off by some modern philosophers no questions like how many angels can dance on the head of a pan these sorts of silly questions right will allow the medieval is to defend themselves later if at all now Edmund Husserl championed his philosophical movement with a battlecry back to the things in themselves back to reality back to concrete existence well in the progress of of this movement he then felt that well anything which doesn't fit into reality as we experience it reality as it appears to us must be temporarily set aside or bracketed that doesn't mean we're not going to talk about these questions or that they're completely invalid it just means until we've gotten back to these the reality and understood this thing we have to kind of set them aside right so he says in a sense the essence of doing real philosophy is setting aside traditionally metaphysical questions metaphysics of course was seen traditionally as first philosophy the very most important thing the basic thing whose role wanted to throw metaphysics out the window right so let's give an example what's a classic metaphysical question when we talk about for example this table the classic metaphysical question is how do I know that the table is beyond my perception of the table there's an assumption that there's a distinction between the table as it appears to me what would you which we could call the phenomenal table and the table as it actually is which we can call the numeral table to use the classic content distinctions well who thought that this distinction was a bit arcane abstract and silly why presume who sure would ask that there is such a thing as the real numeral table beyond my phenomenal experience at the table isn't what I mean by the word is isn't what I mean by existence simply that something appears to me so let's toss this sort of metaphysical baggage out the window and let's replace our understanding of being with phenomena being is that which appears being in any way right either visually auditorily for example a song right and taste some is in as much as it appears to me right and this way who sir will redefined existence being itself with the phenomenal and not with the Newman elicited the traditionally held and philosophy but of course this presents a problem for people of faith how so well God doesn't ever appear as such there is no discrete phenomena that we can point to and say that is God as a result God along with all the metaphysical baggage of the numeral realm gets in a sense thrown out the window God can't be talked about within phenomenology it has to be purely a subject of faith who Cyril says which is beyond the realm of philosophical talk and he means it in a kind of a revelatory sense right when he says it's merely the subject of faith this is his way of saying of nonsense really right so does this make sense how by redefining being in this way God all of a sudden becomes something which is not is not a being right so the rule goes so far as in doing this right as to even in his 1929 Sorbonne lectures which were famously entitled des cartes meditations and he organized him six lectures in a row each lecture to deal with one of the famous six meditations of Descartes when he got to the third meditation which is famously you know the meditation which Descartes treats the existence of God he didn't mention that maybe the word God once in this lecture so it's quite interesting in the sense that he felt like he was really taking up de cartes mantle of doing proper philosophy and not doing sort of this weird theology starting with things themselves how they exist our own appearance of existence but he drops God entirely from the picture so this is how much the concept of God was set aside or bracketed in whose rules philosophy okay you'll remember that just to kind of return briefly Rajiv's paper that he presented last year was saying well wait a second let's not go so quickly maybe there is room for God and who strolls philosophy after all so he was trying in the sense to find a wiggle room for the theological within his role so that was what was novel about his paper for those of you who attended okay now this critique of theology and this way of doing philosophy which we're now calling phenomenology right dealing with the phenomena the things in themselves was taken up by whose rules premier student Martin Heidegger all right well so Heidegger now of course there is some debate on how much whose role room I mean Heidegger remains true to who strolls distinctions but let's let's for the moment assume that Heidegger is a phenomenologist in the sense that whose role is talking about but Heidegger goes even further than whose role in his critique of theology and his critique that the divine in his critique of what we would call a philosophy of religion because not only does he think that the content of God should be set aside right he thinks that the very idea of God is ridiculous in the way in which we typically conceive of it this comes across most clearly in his 1943 essay on Nietzsche and his 1957 essay entitled identity and difference but probably the best way to explain it is to start with a very fundamental concept within Heidegger philosophy Heidegger says okay in the course of talking about what it means for something to be what it means for something to exist like the table we have to make a distinction between what we mean by the word being right he says typically the word being can be thought of in two ways this he calls ontological difference right the first way is as something actually is right thing which appears a table of but-- a person you know etc a hammer whatever what have you a painting the second way we tend to use the word being is not as one particular entity which may appear but as the horizon or backdrop of all entities which appear this word he distinguishes by calling being and capitalizes a big B being so in a sense everything which is is in as much as it appears on the background of being as a whole right Big B B now this is a fairly traditional distinction within the history of philosophy to some regard right this isn't a lot of ways Heidegger's way of taking up plato's distinction right between things and therefore right things and their ideas the Heidegger goes one step further because he said we'll look when we're talking about being of course the only thing which properly is and as much as with what we mean by the word is is the entity itself this big B being which we assume is the backdrop upon which all particular beings appear isn't it doesn't exist in fact the very condition by which things appear is the fact that this backdrop or this horizon differentiates itself from that which appears so things appear is that which is precisely because their horizon is not right so says well of course this presents a very big problem for people of faith why well twofold you can now conceive of God in one of two ways if you want to assert that God is either you assert that God is in a very real way in the same way that a bhoot a tree or a person is in which case he says you reduce God to being an entity like any other entity according to Heidegger this is the tradition of Western metaphysics and he calls it Anto theology right it's a way of doing theology about beings but he says but this is a to make to kind of degrade the being of God right God is just like a chair except a bigger or God is just like a hammer except with infinite properties so this is this is a this is obviously a kind of idolatrous conception of God so clearly this is not what they mean so he says what what Christians must then mean by God is not a being as an entity but being as the backdrop of all particular entities but he says but of course if that's the case then your God is nothing your God doesn't exist right so when it's since haider goes a lot further than who stroll in his critique of philosophy of religion in theology because aside from simply setting God aside or bracketing a concept of God he really wants to sort of twist the knife in God's heart right and say look this concept of God is just it's nothing right okay this sets a background within the phenomenological tradition for a very hardcore atheism right and it makes sense that sattva who saw himself as the inheritor of the thought of who stro and Heidegger would you know carry this into a kind of existentialism which says you know the world is meaningless and empty and there is no God and all you can do is launch yourself into the abyss on your own ground cow Moos you know statements that when one realizes the true nature of phenomenon they're faced with only one choice to kill themselves or not you know these very sort of lovey sentiments that should be on Hallmark greeting cards and are in France okay it's a great country they have baguettes and chocolate and very depressing greeting cards I have a collection of them I'll show you all right but this sets the stage for what we're examining today which is this so-called theological turn right and now the true meaning of this word makes sense right which is what it's a turn towards theology within the tradition of hope phenomenology in a sense it's the resurrection of God as a topic of possible discourse but on a new ground on the ground of all the philosophic of philosophical assumptions of phenomenology okay now this resurrection or this turn towards theology has a very interesting and illustrious history which I'll just mention briefly for those of you who are who are know a little bit about this it was motivated primarily by two French thinkers Jean Val and Jean he would eat both expositors of the philosophy of Hegel in France they saw themselves as really the two thinkers who introduced Hegel too along with another guy koji F introducing Hegel to French thought they had such illustrious students as jean-paul Sartre Emmanuel Levinas Gabrielle Marcel Jacques Lacan so a lot of people studied with these two men your own Wylde himself I had an interesting pedigree he study with Beck Psalm who of course was seen as resurrecting theology in the French Academy in his time but it's not so much Joan Val and John people deep who started the French theological turn but more so the students of viola and primarily Emmanuel Levinas who I'll talk to you about briefly Lebanon of course is a subject of the bulk of my interests have just written a book on Emmanuel Levinas which I can take the good news to share with you here that it seems tentatively is going to be published with Duquesne University Press so we just got that news recently so Emmanuel having us was give you a brief biographical sketch and then I'll talk about how he went about sort of resurrecting God within the phenomenological tradition his dates in case you're interested or 1906 to 1995 so he's very very contemporary he was a little alien Jew who was raised mostly in Paris he went to Germany in 1928 through 29 to study with who stroll and who strolls name was sort of spreading whose role had just on the Sorbonne lectures in Paris and you know leve NOS thought it would be advantageous of him to go to Germany while there he discovered a word of this up-and-coming philosopher who had yet to be translated or heard outside of Germany Martin Heidegger so whose rule quickly became a devotee to Heidegger and really was the first person to bring Heidegger back into France right he was also the first person to translate who Searle into French so in a lot of ways he really is the door of phenomenology into France of course the irony in this in case you're interested is that even though he's the one who introduces who Cyril and Heidegger into the French philosophical scene he's also the very person who's going to call into question the very foundations of their relationship to the divine so in a sense from the very beginning in France phenomenology since the Simpson Amma knowledge is very beading in France it's always been already overturned in a sense this is a big sort of strange that that we're interested in okay but what's what's interesting and distinct about his philosophy is the way that he felt that who Cyril had overlooked certain phenomena you want to take a look I think Chris roles method is right I think we do need to treat being is that which appears but he says but there are strange things which appear they're curious phenomenon which seem to betray the very limits of their phenomenality now that sounds like a math full but really what he's trying to say is they're beings which seemed to explode infinitely all right so and though they appear they can't be sort of shoved into their box they're constantly overflowing in their appearance not all phenomena are the same not all phenomenon are like chairs or hammers they're other kinds of phenomenon for example and this is Lebanon s famous phenomenon the face of another human being he says the face appears to us otherwise now this is Latinos as menacing then other phenomenon and that the face always overflows and I'm quoting letting us hear its phenomenality always overflows the boundary of its phenomena now what he means by that is that the human face can't be reduced to its form right it's more in a sense than it appears now again this sounds all very technical and he has ways of exploring this and I'll talk about those briefly but really it's quick basic and it's something which you all experience every day right this is the kind of experience that you hear being expressed by young ladies on Rye Beach in the summertime when they say don't objectify me right my appearance is more than my body right I am more than you're seeing me as okay but of course we always already into it that when we look somebody in the face this is why the human face has a certain power over us it can make us nervous it can draw us up short right it has a certain ethical power in fact Emmanuel Levinas has says and one of the phenomenon that he's constantly fond of unpacking for us is the phenomenon of apology in the to be redundant in the face of a face so he says for example when the beggar asks us for money why is it that we always say I'm sorry why is this always our immediate response moreover why is it our response to look away to refuse to engage with the face of the beggar right to not want to see them right to put our heads down he says it seems that the face of the beggar though a concrete phenomenon has a power over us which can't be attributed to its sheer phenomenality to the simple fact that it appears this indicates says letting us but the face of the other carries a power or a presence which overflows its finite presentation in a sense it buries it carries what he says rien voguing the language of descartes an idea of the infinite it carries a kind of infinitude in it phenomena such as the face phenomena such as ethical apologia concerned he says seems to reveal that even within the phenomenal realm there is what he calls the trace of God the trace of the Divine Right that the phenomenological the phenomenal realm even though finite and fixed is in a sense always a neat this is again the quote I mean I was bleeding towards the infinite in a sense what letting us did by examining these strange and curious phenomenon was find wiggle room in the real world for that ideal thing not God has idea but God as actual real phenomena right ok now this a strange resurrection of God but within a phenomenological framework was taken up and I think I find this very interesting by one of lemme nasus of most brilliant students a man by the name of Jacques Derrida who I imagine you're all very familiar with now why is this ironic well dairy dot for those of you who aren't familiar with him is known as the father of deconstruction a lot of people also call him the father of post modernism and post-modernism has been excoriated from the heights as you know the godless twentieth century philosophy that's gonna sort of finally you know make us all heathens and having crazy orgies in the street or whatever it is will do there's no moral fixed code it's all relative right and Dario was seen as the sort of father of this thought no Soto this extent this is true Derrida is the father of deconstruction and he does work in his philosophy to to help unpack this word deconstruction break down traditional distinctions right right and wrong these things the reason Derrida does this is he felt that it these distinctions when we when we talk about phenomenon in terms of these right or wrong black and white inside outside what he called these binary opposites he says seems to miss these curious phenomena such as the face which seemed to reside on a border between these two things right so face is neither like the idea of God nor is it like a table it's sort of between so only by breaking up these concrete binary distinctions can we really begin to understand these phenomena and this way Derrida sought to resurrect what he thought of as a vital understanding of the divine the divine as a fluid movement which can't be fixed in any one particular concept Derrida likened himself to Nietzsche smashing the idols which would try to fix God in one particular concept or form so Derrida thought of himself indeed as a deeply religious thinker in fact his deconstruction and his post-modernism were ways of what he thought really vital izing the concept of God this is a wonderfully illustrated by a book in a book by a guy named Jack Caputo or John Caputo who's considered one of the amazing proponents of this French theological turn the book is entitled the prayers and tears of Jacques Derrida interesting Lee enough Derrida himself was a Jew from northern Africa who also was sort of an outsider in Paris indeed many people have seen this so-called French theological turn as merely a way of translating Jewish mystical thought into the language of Western philosophy okay so here we have Derrida and Latinos breaking down the traditional distinctions regarding the divine place or in the restrictions placed upon the divine but within the founders of phenomenology crucial and Heidegger right and then since creating room for a reinvestigation into the nature of the divine but on a phenomenological basis and this leads me to the fourth and last part of my talk how this inheritance has been taken up by contemporary thinkers and I wanted to introduce you to the thought of four contemporary French thinkers all of whom studied with Latinos and Da Vida and see themselves as reinvestigating theology but now on a phenomenological ground and they are in a sense the the hard core of this so-called French theological turn so just briefly I'll introduce you to a few of them and how they've taken up these thoughts the first I'll introduce you to is Michel LV his day turn 1922 to 2002 unfortunately died very recently Oh Michel he decided to try to reinvestigate the concept of the divine within a phenomenological framework by investigating what he called a material or phenomenological of assuming a material or phenomenology of the flesh right and what he means by this is he says look one of the principal proponents of the Christian faith is that God has made man so God is no mere ideal content but is in fact a phenomenological content which can be studied in a very real way huh so he wrote three books sort of exploring the idea and what is the way in which God appears as man and the way in which flesh sort of bears a theological reality a few of these books are one called Incarnation phenomena sofy of the flesh another one a very beautiful book entitled I am the truth towards a phenomenology of Christianity and a third one which i think is yet to be translated into English so this is my translation of the title philosophy and phenomenology of the body so this is Michelle Rhee's way of sort of again taking up the project initiated by levy nos and Dalida but doing it in his own doorway another guy who was very interesting in this talk is jean-luc Katia jean-luc Katia sought to explore religious experience in a phenomenological way especially the idea of call solicitation or address as a theologically rich phenomena so he wanted to explore for example the idea of what we would call in the Catholic tradition vocation right or prayer for example what is phenomenologically happening in prayer what's going on prayer is a phenomena and how does this phenomena sort of reopen a way in which to talk about God three of his books again I just throw these out in case you're interested in them is a book called The Unforgettable in the unhoped-for and which he explores the idea of the Messiah another one it's called call-and-response and which he talks about vocation in prayer and finally a third one which I love is called the nude voice a phenomenology of promise and which he talks about the way in which is speaking is already a sort of theologically fecund phenomena another guy one of my personal favorites is guys named Johnny black ghost in the fatherly affection he initiated what he called a phenomenology of liturgy an attempt to examine the integral role of ritual and human life as a way of experiencing the divine so he saw ritual ritualizing things like funeral Rite or even habits tics any kind of ritual as as a kind of liturgy as a way of interacting with the divine on a daily level and this way he took Heidegger's concept of being in the world and Ari understood it as a kind of being towards God every ritual which you engage in in the world he says is a way of orienting yourself towards this sort of theological power which we experience concretely in the world in the phenomenological world right and indeed he even thought as a way of protecting us from that that cost only wrote one book but I cannot give you a title of it in case you're interested it's called experience and the absolute disputed questions on the humanity of man again he saw man as a theological animal this is how he defines man so he wants to get rid of this concept of the human and start hauling us a feel at urge achill animal it says hmm finally I wonder - the idea of perfect Oh someone who is probably the most important member of this theological turn jean-luc Mavi ol jolly Mario is still with us fortunately he was born in 1946 and more than any of his contemporaries he is seen as the guy who has really made progress in finding room for the divine and for theologically fecund ideas within phenomenology he does this primarily through three different ways which I'll just address to you briefly the first is by exploring what we called again these fecund or these rich phenomena which he calls saturated phenomenon his two most saturated phenomenon the idea again being that there's more contained in the phenomena then seemingly can possibly be contained it's sort of supersaturated right he uses indeed the scientific idea of super saturation to talk about this three examples of saturated phenomenon he likes to explore are the concept of the Eucharist right the concept of icons icons as opposed to idols right so an icon is just it's a picture right but it's more than a picture does other things in a picture it says instead of absorbing the gaze of the viewer like a photo does where you sort of you're looking at it you're caught up in it he says it transports the gaze of the viewer into another realm and that's why it's again it's saturated it contains more than it possibly could another one of the saturated phenomenon is of course the face and he really develops Letty gnosis concept of the face here the second thing that John Luke Malone does to really reinitiate this theological term phenomenologically is to its poor what we mean by being what we mean by that which appears and it does this by resurrecting the ancient German word for being and I brother Andrew will feel free to correct me if I'm wrong here but of course Heidegger has already made overtures towards this but s deep design right so which in German means being given right well Heidegger talked about this briefly when actually it took to some length and there's later philosophies but he didn't see it isn't necessarily a theologically fecund idea Mario really takes this up and he says look everything which is is given is given to us so every appearance every being which appears can in a sense have some trace of the given of the giver therefore and finally and perhaps most extraordinarily maori-owned took up the concept of being as the nothing that Heidegger developed and explored it in terms of understanding God as he who is not and this is most famously developed in one of his books entitled God without being and it's a very rich and wonderful book and in a sense what Mahone is trying to do is draw upon the ancient mystical traditions of negative theology right to reinitiate a phenomenological concept of God as we so we can't even attribute being to God because even to do such a thing is to create those to the blaspheme so we have to talk about as he who is without being right Marky who is beyond being so again taking up this negative theological tradition where you can't make any a positive a statements about the nature of God but can only negate things I'll give you two other titles of books in case you're in it one is called INXS studies and saturated phenomenon each chapter is a study in the different saturated Mona and another one being given torta phenomenology of givenness so these are the major figures of the French Theological turn this is it's sort of history this is why it's important to phenomenology but why is important to theology or philosophy as a whole so whether you're in the phenomenology tradition phenomenological trician or not I think it's important in phenomenology because it provides an interesting way of responding to what is really the modern critique of theology and philosophy of religion which is oh look you're talking about nonsense this stuff is sort of beyond your ability to talk about it said it finds a way to talk about these things within a real actual world not just as ideal contents but as real potency step things which really occur things which really appear in the world so in a sense it reinvigorates the philosophy of religion so I think that's why it's important why is it important for theology well I think it provides a new pathways to talking about theological content without sort of drifting in to obscure ISM being too abstract or without simply having to ground every statement and say well that's just tradition that's the that's the way we've done it you can actually start reinvigorating a rethinking how to prove God's existence for example right I think indeed the phenomenological turn provides a rich ground for rethinking the traditional the Catholic tradition of providing proofs for God's existence right so I think this is what's interesting about this I want to conclude by recommending you to some further reading if you're interested in this the first is a just the serendipitous I was at spec this past weekend which is the Society for phenomenology and existential philosophy it's sort of our big yearly gathering of geek it's if you're in you know what Trekkie conferences are that this is very very similar people dresses they're famous favorite phenomenologist and do roleplay but Duquesne University in Pittsburgh has a yearly lecture series in phenomenology it's called the Simon Silverman lecture series and phenomenology and this year in fact as you can see their subject is phenomenology and the theological term so you know they're following my lead obviously and in fact uh jean-luc Valley young will be coming from the Sorbonne to give a talk there so this is something which you could see he's a very very good lecture and Richard Kearney from Boston College those green Oh Kearney thank you that Irish thing will be responding to my journals paper Kearney has taken up these things the other book for those of you who think this might be all just bunk or for those of you who think that really this is a complete betrayal of what phenomenology really is could look at this wonderful book by summoning uncle which is entitled phenomenology and notice it's in quotes the theological turn Dominika Yonko was a big criticize er of the theological turn she thought he felt that it was not being true to who sterling Heidegger's original insights so wrote this essay on how it betrayed phenomenology and in this edition for which can be gotten online it's wonderful because it has a young close essay but then it has responses by the major figures within the theological turn by kutzia Jean Francois 15 Michel on the Gianluca Vialli and paul ricoeur so it was also another member so it's a very neat book both a good way to introduce yourself to the thoughts if you just skip over it can cause a si or to find some criticism for the thought some South Pacific Islanders are small barriers very soon I'll hopefully find out that some scare each other down I I mean how do you know that you gotta put on with this you can do doing something trusted in the Western responses but it depends who you ask there's two responses to that of course I mean why don't I'll give what but what I would consider to be the more traditional response and then I can give another response I think that the initial thing is well oh all philosophy is based on certain assumptions right the assumption that there are but we are talking about the same thing because if course the question you ask well for example how do I know that the phenomenon I'm talking about is the same phenomena you're talking about or the phenomenon I'm talking about actually occurs in such a way that it appears to all people in the same way I mean at that point when we ask that question we're asking the exact same question which is how do I know that when I use a word you understand by that word the same thing I do and I take it that when you start asking those questions though they're philosophically important questions you break down fundamentally the ability to do what what I cook we call real philosophy in a sense and the reason is because at some point it becomes impossible to know right and I think I think we're very familiar with the way in which that can kind of ultimately lead to a kind of sort of goofy skepticism where the only appropriate response I can have to this item kick you or ask you to leave right or any sort of nonsense I draw so I think the first thing is to say well there is some assumption that there is a universality to phenomenal it's a phenomenal realm that there is such a thing as the human right and that the human though it may have different cultural iterations is the same in all things and that this is a basic human phenomenon that would be the assumption and the way to make sure that it is a basic human assumption as opposed to a cultural phenomenon is of course to look at the way in which it manifests in all cultures so for example the shame we feel or the response that we have to a beggar period that's eleven AUSA's point now he says look it may manifest as shame here that may be a cultural response that's true but the very fact that we can't close ourselves off to the beggars who call that we feel that we must make a response right whether that response be staring them down cuffing them in the ears and it may be in the case of BA or you know you know or or or in my case you know of crawling up into a corner at home and crying in the fetal position because you know that there's nothing you can do to appease their suffering okay we all have our hangups but so those are maybe three different cultural iterations but the fact remains that when we're confronted with the need of another human being we must respond we must make a response now let me now says this proves that there was a fundamental now listen to his play on words here responsibility to the other now that responsibility itself is what he's interested in what he says is that there's a significance that it shows that we as human beings are not kind of closed off monads without windows but are fundamentally open to another but more over than just open it shows it the other in this case the beggar has a kind of priority over me can reorient my actions such that though before I was sort of walking about the street concern with my own issues all of a sudden when confronted by the other I have to make a response even if that response is to sort of you know slap him on the head and say get a real job you know are you're a lazy you know unproduced member of society the very fact that I have to make a response or even if I choose to ignore when I'm choosing to ignore it's a form of response shows that the other has a way of redirecting me and a sense is it has more possession over my being and what I'm doing than I do so so there's an assumption that this is a universal phenomenon that though it may take different cultural iterations it's two universes on them so that's one way of responding to your question it's the way I would respond I do believe there is such a thing called the human I do think we share certain common traits an example I could give and this may be why I didn't get this job as I interviewed at Emory last year somebody says well how do you know that we all experience something cuz I wrote my dissertation on belonging how do we how do you know we all experience something called human longing what would you say if I said to you I've never experienced something called human longing my response to the interview he was well I don't know what a pity you or despise you because I don't know whether you're lying to me of being polemical or whether and you really haven't experiences in which case you see himself sort of somehow subhuman to me and I would go so far as saying something but you know maybe you're a robot or an animal and no offense to you but I think certain analytical philosophers do fall within that category okay so so that's that's one possible response I do think that there is a basic human phenomena another possible response but made by many of the so-called post modern thinkers is to say well look these sorts of assumptions about universal phenomenon necessarily bear a kind of power move in the power discourse right as we talked about them and the flucos thing I'm exercising my particular Western understanding of what a human is is on other people and as indicated when you don't fit that I think you're either an animal or you're lying right and they go well that's clear that you're just a sort of power discourse and so to do proper phenomenology it would always have to be what you would be calling sociology of cultural iterations right you're just sort of ignore anthropology maybe you're just exploring this cultural response and so while it may be fruitful it's only fruitful within a limited context right today I would say well that may be true but in which case all philosophy becomes reduced to this kind of cultural anthropology so in fact even when we start talking about what are the conditions for truth or what is it what what what is God these things we can only say what are the conditions for truth within my particular socio-cultural context and my particular neighborhood Mike reticular cultural iteration and ultimately my own mind right so there are two different approaches and there's different ways of responding does that help at all yeah all right yeah well we're dinner I beg to return to the beggar the beggar has to respond to me so I'm not sure what the point is humans respond to other humans and of all kinds of different situations so what I mean that the idea that the beggar suddenly has power over me because I because I have to respond to him my container on a sacred the bigger than has to respond to me so I had however the beggar well I'd say who encounters the one first or what I mean yeah to me that you're not saying anything yeah I'll respond to humans well let me last would say the your most the phenomena yeah he'd say that well that may be the case but he'd say you don't know because you've never been that beggar you've only ever been you and since as we said the phenomenology starts with what's that yeah you may have been a beggar so yeah big that's true but in which case you only ever been that Megan you particularly you've not been other people other beggars the phenomenology again it starts with the assumption right that what we mean by being a things which appear but of course that applies nothing up here where to me so in a sense I can't know what it's like to be you I can't make any assumptions I can't make that in a sense reversible loop of intersubjectivity I can't assume that what my experiences are before the beggar are similar to the beggars experience it before me all I can do is infer based on how beings appear to me so in fact let me nos wants to destroy intersubjectivity he doesn't think that we can assume that the beggar experience that that this is simply a blueberry and I am thou relationship in fact he criticizes uber what we don't understand what that we are all customers Wow how about this one as with Windows yeah maybe that's all it is that's sure sure that's the way of putting it we are monads oh where in which flashes of light which could not possibly have appeared from uhsome occur and indeed that's why I let me know it really takes up des cartes philosophy you know in a very very real way why what does Descartes say we'll look when I perform the Phyllis of the reduction let's call it the phenomenological reduction Descartes doesn't call it that but occlusal does of saying I can't be certain about anything so I'm gonna cancel out the world until I can find one thing uncertain about what's the one thing I can be certain of well that I am what because I'm thinking I'm thinking that I am so I must be certain about that but here's something strange women this n monadic existence the I am something else appears an idea what's the idea the idea of the infinite an idea which I could not possibly have been the author of right because how could I ever come up with an idea what you could displace me from the center of my own existence if indeed I am this monad which is closed off to the other world how can I come up with something which would have a power over me right why would I have done that but the fact is I do have this so that means that there has to be this God now extend that now and how loving us does is phenomenology yeah it's true be is always oriented around you you go about the world or you think things around you right I mean you see things in your perspective you can't see things from my perspective and those of us who are in relationships know that you get in problems as soon as you start thinking you know how the other perceives you or sees things right well I thought you'd like to have tuna noodle casserole to celebrate your birthday ya know why didn't you ask me etc all right um so the strange thing is in that world as we go through existence we're constantly being displaced from the center of our existence so for example we can feel a shame we can't feel sorry we can't feel apology we can't feel responsible to another this responsibility to the other is analogous for loving us to that idea of the infinite something you discover in your monadic existence that you could not have possibly been the author of did that you know and and and thus that sort of bears the trace out to God so for him the other who appears the beggar the orphan the widow in a sense is what God was for Descartes you know if the subjectivity other is closed off and yet you claim there is the universal community then what it's like for you to encounter baggert must be somewhat like what it's like for me too well now we're talking about what we're mixing two different questions there though the first thing that was responding to the question of how do we know the phenomenology has it as a pool or as a technique isn't very into sort of random sociology and I didn't want to say I said look you've got two different ways in which you can address that question and either way to salad now lemme nasus wouldn't have answered that question in the exact same way who's letting us oh would not say that there is something called the humans remember as I mentioned is that letting us would not say if they're the only Universal from having us is the I which is the sort of again to talk about in the heidegger's language the horizon upon which all things appear but within that horizon this thing appears which can't be reduced to the eye which can displace the eye right so let me now shouldn't actually say that there is the universal that's letting off this way a bit so again each of these guys are using phenomenology in a new and different way they're all different angles so I don't want you to see it I hope I didn't portray it as one seamless sort of egg alien the dialectical development that these guys attack the traditional phenomenology different ways there have been different sort of developments outside of that they each go about in every way so for example mother Yeol wants to take up heidegger's concept of being as certain things so for him this concept of the other is not so fecund cuts yan on the other hand does write ma VL is much more happy with this kind of idea of a universal there there is this thing you know why is it that it doesn't is the phenomenon of the supersaturated phenomenon the firm Arianna from a personal taste that is the thing that strikes one supersaturated might strike another is non supersaturated so this is really just a I might feel I might feel that Louis bizarre supersaturated yeah or or or mathematics in your case we've had this conversation effect so it's a great question and in a sense you're directing that question for Mario and you're saying well look what's the difference between an icon a painting is the only difference is the difference inherent to the object itself or is the difference somehow in my orientation to the object right and maori-owned would say a little bit of both so of course you may contemplate an icon and have great religious reverence right other people may go on a vacation to Greece and by all icons can they think they're pretty and they can decorate their you know room with them but the point is in any case if you know but likewise you may look at the Eucharist and say look this is the body of Christ right and somebody else may go and that's bread that you just mumbled some some goofy phrase it's over okay and you may say well how do we conceive of that in the Catholic tradition is it purely one's orientation to the Eucharist which makes it the body of Christ certainly not not according to the Catholic traditionally right it's not simply that you take it in faith that it becomes the body of Christ it actually is the body of Christ and yet you realize that only with the eyes of faith can you recognize it to be the body of Christ did that make sense so you say well look this thing actually is saturated but it's only recognized as saturated through a certain orientation and since the orientation opens you to recognize the thing itself this is from a viola a way of re understanding whose roles phenomenological redundant right how so well whose role says look all the time you perceive things and you think you're perceiving them as they are so for example I may see this and you may see this and we go out what is that that's a watch because well that's not actually what appears what appears it's a certain silver surface which is towards me it's only in my mind that I synthesize right the different appearances and have the idea watch which I then attribute to these different appearances so the only way in which I could really understand this thing is when I set aside my everyday interaction with it as watch and I start seeing it as it actually is a series of appearances which occur as Luke who shal says and adumbration and only i synthesize in my mind now mommio takes that up in a similar way but with faith look in your everyday interaction you may say that see the host is just a piece of bread but you can perform a kind of phenomenological reduction which is taking on the eyes of faith in which you can see it not as it appears in this everyday interaction but as it actually is right as this second-rate knowing as this sort of Eucharist does that make sense is that a way of unpacking it for you according I give that somebody else way of doing it backgrounds near point that you in the case of that analysis of I wonder how that pop figures into perception of the bank and I wonder if it's insane okay along these lines phenomenology started out as descriptive psychology as you know it was highly scientific dry careful and let's go home studies of perception for instance the sort of thing that is now done by psychologists how it started and I think in the beginning at any rate whose role was that ends of things very careful very scientific philosophy as a science very careful study of perception human experiences at that level when you start talking about the bigger like jumping 11 correct um it's very complicated the bigger too perhaps suppose it's true the banker to a Hindu was a person that a necklace rebirth who's that a certain point not but what can we do about that everybody has their karma everybody we might hope for a better for that person in the future but it doesn't have the same claim on my attention I don't think if I have that type of background scheme as as it would if I'm looking at probably consumer standpoint the Bible we're told to you or once or for do you have to give my church and organize it with your shirt and zone don't charges over them and all those things regarding Hebrew Scriptures there in the Christian Bible so we have because we've heard all this is there a the French are Stephen we've heard all this so here we are perceiving the bigger half somebody who has a claim on us because we have a certain background perspective now how can you scientifically study this phenomenon what bob was talking about the careful sociology the careful psychology and so on that's what I'm not like okay well I think there's a couple different responses I'll have to your question because it seems that there are a few few different questions there tucked into it the first is how can we do it without what we wouldn't do it without of course you would do a careful and I mean also as does money on it does detail a very careful studies of the way in which these things appear and indeed many of lemme nasus followers have gone on a one great example with the a guy named Alan Finkel clouds was a student webinars went on to work out this in lots of her cultural traditions actually the way that the response to to the face occurs so of course you have to do those things if I remember correctly Bob's question wasn't how do you do it without he goes like what makes this still philosophy and not simply a kind of cultural anthropology yeah of course the unity doing any phenomenology especially phenomenology of human phenomena requires a kind of cultural anthropology but that's not all it is it does more than right so those are two slightly different questions so of course you need to do those things we have to remember that who strolled himself didn't work out all of these things he saw that as the work of his followers right and indeed many of them did so for example the phenomenology of empathy of course was very famously worked out by Edith Stein right so one of his students write in the same way let me not saw himself doing groundbreaking work and solve it it would be up to the you know a lot of its followers to work the details these things out and do the kind of details concrete philosophical anthropology so you need that you need both of course that's the first thing the second one is we have to be careful not to collapse Lebanon Somalia again there are two different thinkers within the this French theological term they have two different ways of addressing these things so again whereas Latinos would say look it is a universal they would absolutely everyone Universal in the sense that everyone has this response to the beggar right everyone has this response to the state right ma Bo may say ah but only those who see the beggar with the eyes of faith there who or who Coco oh they only do it through their cultural iteration of it he may say that way so they would have two different answers to that question you know for example what's the difference between a Hindu response to the face and the Christian response to the face mommy you would say they're seeing through different cultural iterations that may have different phenomena may appear saturated in it but the point is in any case for him that already implies that the background phenomenon are saturated and it simply is a matter of unlocking it through different cultural iterations right from Lebanon there are certain phenomenon which in all cases are always working in the same way so they would have two different ways of responding for that how does that help you don't seem satisfied is very careful scientific yeah if it has been what I'm hearing country girl reasons about webinars and not though it began very careful in scientific and it wound up you know I'm not being fair here that's catchy and literary yeah but there's two ways we could respond to that one we can say well perhaps phenomenology is outgrown its origins simple one so just because it started off that way certainly doesn't mean that that's the best way right but but in any case but I wouldn't necessarily say that I'd simply say well it still is very detailed I think you should you did seated not only in letting us who does very good detailed work but especially in the followers of these people just like shine is working out what who should all started people like so I only introduced you to the big thinkers here so I mean there are people like Alan Finkel crop who's working out let me knots his thoughts in a very detailed very scientific very culturally aware way and with multiple multiple documentation so no not at all in fact I feel like that's what's so rich about this is that it's a burst open to conversation so I get to a site out on Finkel crowds if I may he's a talking head on French television as was Deming on his time so when you know there was a big national crisis or scandal they got the philosopher on TV these guys to help them back and forth so I it's not close at all in fact I'd say it's opened the conversation such that I get over the close conversation in many ways I mean but Bobby doesn't le da have anything invited people to the table who wouldn't have otherwise been there yeah I'm curious but how you would give a phenomenological justification for you to identify the essential feature term that is that when you were doing this that somehow something within the phenomena essentially pointed to something that was outside of phenomenon and that's what we would require for a real theological discussion you wanted to talk about not just what people felt but yeah so how would you what would be the difference on the one hand between the phenomena that would indicate to you that it would then it was pointing toward something beyond the phenomena and haida gariand phenomena that that required a background yeah or yeah alien phenomena that pointed beyond it to an all-encompassing spirit that existed outside yeah I should perhaps newly be more nuanced about that again the idea was to be a very general witch and being general and speaking in a general way oftentimes you know the the necessary danger that is that you end up covering over nuance but of course the big people on stairs there is nothing beyond a phenomenal they take very seriously Heidegger and who Scholes claims right this is a poor claim I would say to phenomenology you knock out this Newman 'el idea of that which is beyond the phenomenal so what are we talking about when we talking about God then right well it's it's a God as these supersaturated phenomenon so for example that mean also was very famously said look every other is absolutely other so what do I mean when I talk about the other as the divine of precisely this other who appears before me the orphan the widow and yet not the right so it's this curious sort of deconstructing of these distinctions right not something beyond something imminent and yet not fully imminent not able to be contained within the imminent so it introduces a kind of paradox a kind of operatic talk which Derrida was very fond of saying it's in this a Perea it's in this impossibility that is that we that that is the divine that are real vital concept of the divine exists yeah three cousins poster over Heidegger kind of handles time supply as I understand it was a calm way of pointing directly after don't think we can't know about it okay it's still sort of envy yeah you know it's interesting you aspect Oh Nagano it really doesn't talk about it Heidegger it wrote one book on the problems of calm and he really also never addressed the sublime to my knowledge whose role never addresses the sublime although maybe in some of his later unpublished writings and notes but I personally think that the sublime is a very rich way of talking about that the only problem with the sublime know again it's there for Kant the sublime is in a sense yes the royal road is it were to the new middle for the phenomenologist there is no beyond so the sublime for them would again just be a phenomenal appearance which seems to break with the very understanding we have of the phenomenal realm so for them a phenomenology of the sublime would be a perfect way of talking about how the infinite appears in the finite as impossible as that may sound yeah that's I think that the sublime is always a perfect example and again it would really support especially what levy Nazis as well when you're encountering these sort of curious phenomenon like the sublime right how much you're displaced how much you're all the sudden made passive you're no longer the active center of your own subjectivity or identity you're thrown back on yourself in a sense yeah i think i think the sublime is a wonderful way of teasing that out yeah i would also add to that that we in a sense it's a way of also re understanding rough autos distinction of the newman all right so you have these experiences of dread and horror and fear before the the infinite these are real phenomena anxiety oh yeah that's right yeah it's not some ideal content it's a very real phenomenon and they say that phenomenon right there is the this sort of beacon appearance of God because I'm driving them from the room and roads maybe this is a sign that we should yeah yeah I think I think we could bring the formal part of the discussion to a close the informal part can continue and thank you very much thank you

Channel: Eidos84

Views: 19,121

Rating: 4.8730159 out of 5

Keywords: Phenomenology, Theological, Turn, Husserl, Heidegger, Levinas, Derrida, Marion

Id: deE2qoyVf-0

Length: 64min 11sec (3851 seconds)

Published: Sun Feb 06 2011

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[u/Qwill2]

An audio lecture.

Professor Drew Dalton on "Phenomenology and the Divine: Understanding the French Theological Turn".

The talk deals with 20th and 21st century developments in the phenomenology founded by Husserl and Heidegger that allow the discussion of the Divine within phenomenology. The Turn began with Emmanuel Levinas and Jacques Derrida, but the heart of the turn includes: Michel Henry, Jean-Louis Chretien, Jean-Yves Lacoste, and finally Jean-Luc Marion (you could also include Jean-Francois Courtine and Paul Ricoeur, but these weren't discussed in the lecture).

You should also check out the sample at Google Books of this book, Phenomenology and the Theological Turn: The French Debate by Dominique Janicaud.