Homo Abyssus: The Drama of the Question of Being

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Homo Abyssus THE DRAMA OF THE Q.!!ESTION OF BEING __________________________

FERDINAND ULRICH Translated by D. C. Schindler

Humanum Academic Press

Copyrigh t © rn18 by Hu manum Academic Press. All rights reserved. No part ofchis pu blication may be reproduced or transmicted in any form or means, electronic or mechanical, including phorography, recording, or any ocher info rmation storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Requests for permission to make copies of any part ofthe work should be directed to: PontificalJohn Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and Family The Catholic Universit y ofAmerica McGivneyHall 307 620 Michigan Avenue, NE Washington, DC 2.0064 2.02-s26-9691 Distributed by: The Catholic University of America Press c/oHFS P.O. Box 50370 Baltimore, MD 2.12,1, soo-s37-5481 Library ofCong ress Control Number: 2.0189372.77 Jacker lmage: UniversalMan, illumination from Hildegard von Bingm's Liber Divinorum Operum, or Book ofDivine IHmh, 1165. Courtesy ofakg-imagcs / Werner Forman. Printed in che Unired Scares ofAmerica. ISBN: 978-1-948195•01·0

CONTENTS

Translator's Note and Acknowledgments xiii Introduction, by Martin Bieler x-v

Preface

I

A. To Be and the Being of Beings __________

7

I. 1he Operatio of Speculative Thought as an Oncological Enactment of Hope 9 Being and the Movement ofThought 9 2.. "CirclingThoughc" 12. 1.

3. Being as the "Center" ["lvfitte"] of the Act ofSpeculativeThought

17

II. A Preliminary Elucidation of the "Crisis of Being" from the Perspective of Bonitas 22. 1.

• Experience ofthe Thought's Struggle and Temptation in the "Sense ofBeing" ["Seins-sinn"] 1.2.

2.. How Should We Undersrand rhe "Sense ofBeing" in Light of Divine Goodness? 2.3 3. The Goodness of God as the Necessity of Being's "Pure Mediation": The Beginning of the Speculative Temptation 2.6

III. Being and "Nothing": The Temptation of1hought 28 1.

Esse as Completum et Simplex, Seel non Subsistens: The "Convertibility" [selbige Verwendung] of Being and "Nothing" 2.8

2.. Elucidation of the Origins of the Convertibility ofBeing and "Nothing" and che Greek Situation ofThought 30

V

Contents

yj

een •To Be" and Existing 3. The Twofold False Continuity betw Entities 36 ntradiction "in Being": 4. Being "in Contradiction" and Co Subsistence as Telos 38 5. Contradiction and Being's Movement into Subsistence: The Identity ofBcing 42. 6. The Movement into Subsistence as Via in Ens in Thought's Temptation: First Glance at che Relationship between Time and Being 44

IV. The Crisis of Being and Its Exp osition [Auslegung] in the Difference between Being and Beings 47 1. 2,

The Movement into Subsistence and the Ontological Difference

47

The Crisis ofBeing and the Decision of the Movement into Subsistence

49

3. The Temptation That Arises in the Unfolding ofthe Movement into Subsistence 51 4. The Movement into Subsistence and the Sublation of the Ontological Difference in God's Absolute Identity S3 5. The Theological A Priori in the Pseudo-Speculative Unfolding of Difference in God 56

V The Necessary Sense of Being [Seins-sinn]

61 61

1.

and chc Not-Wendige ("Ne e dRelieving") The N ecessarium

l.

The Good, "Pneumatic Reason," and the "Necessary Sense ofBeing": The "Finitizing" ofBeing 62.

3. The Phases of the Movement into Subsistence

68

A. The Twofold Sense of the Gilt/Task [Azifgabe] ofBeing B. Being "in" the Movement of Subsistence i. Being and Essence

68

71

71

ii. Unity and Mulripliciry in the Ground of the Good c. Being and the Non-Other

74

78

4. Being "in" the Essence: The Obedience of Being

8o

5. "Positive Reality" and che IncervaJ between "Being and Essence" A. The Real Distinction ofPrinciples [der Griinde] and Thought's Progression into Reality 8s

8s

Contents

vii

13. TI,c Positing ofthe Essence and Rc.:ality: A Pach hcvond Realiry 87

Excursus: The Problem of rhc "Positive Reality" from a TI,eological Perspective 91

..

c.TI,e Positing ofReality and the Real Distinction as the Root of the Distinctio Rationis of the Principles

9�

VI. The Unfolding of Being in the Three Ontological Moments of Reality, Ideality, and Bonicity 97 1. ldeating [Jdeeierende] Reason and the Ideality ofBeing in the Dimension of the Movement of Finitization 98

A. The Ambiguiry of che "Nothing" as Reason's Basic �ieamrc [M�p'grund] 98

B. The Absolute Step to Reality and Idealicy through chc Neuu.1lizing of the Necessary Sense ofBeing 103

c. Toward the lndifferenciation ofthe Necessary Sense of Being

2..

o. The Unfolding of Being in Light ofSupernatural Revelation

•

10+

10-

The Resolution of the Crisis ofBeing "beyond" the Dimension of Parricipation 114

A. Being as "the First of Created 'TI1ings" and the Positive Rt'ality

11 +

13. Participation and Causality as Rooted in the Necessary Sense ofBeing 119

c. Participation and the Uncaused Character ofBeing as Being 12.+ o. The Exemplar Causality of Being

12.7

3. Being in the Unfolding ofldeality and Reality

119

A. TI1e Procession and Positing ofthe Principles in the Dimension ofldeality and Reality: Toward the Hidden Unfolding of

•

Modern Metaphysics

I

l9

L Essence "Juxtaposed" to Being

1l9

ii. The lsolarion of che Essence as Being's "Ideal Vacillation" B. The Reality ofBeing and the Participation in Being through "Similarity" and "Composition" 141 C. Reality and the ldcality Mediated by Finite Reason

4. Reality, Ideality, and Bonicity

r 46

14+

135

Contents

viii

VII. Ontological Spatiotemporality

162

1.

Ontological Spatiotemporality and the Movement into Subsistence

2.

A Consideration ofPhysical Temporality: Some of the Aberrations Thar Occur in che Unfolding of Time and Ontological Spatiotcmporality 166

3. Ontological Spatiotemporality and the Concrete Substance

168

4. Ontological Spaciotemporalicy and the Reception of Being

r70

5. Oncological Spatiotemporality and the "Fullness ofTime"

172

162

VIII. Some of the Consequences That Arise When Finite Reason Falls Victim to Temptation 177 1.

The Dissociation of Possibility and Actuality in the Indifferentiation ofrhe Necessary Sense of Being 177 A. The "Ontological Monads" at the Origin of Ideality

B. Ideal Validity l.

177

182

ldeal Validity and "Infinite Longing": Speculative Aberration and "Metaphysics as Reenactment" 185

,. The Essence as "Material \Vomb": Materialism as Absolute System 188 4-. Being's Pseudo-Subsistence and the Self-Enclosed Essence 5. Being and the Absolute Essence: Nihilism

IX. Being and the Analogia Entis 1.

2.

196

197

2.01

The Division [Scheidung] ofBeingand Nonbeingand the Positive Reality

The Division of Being and Nonbeing and the Path toward God

3. The Division of Being and Nonbeing and the Pach toward the Analogy of Being 2.03 4.The Root of the Analogy of Being and Being's Movement of Finicizacion: Equivocal and Univocal Predication 2.06 5. Univocal Predication and Essencialized Being 2.09 6. The Analogy of Being: The Descensio and Imitatio of Being

7. The Indeterminate Excessus of the Infinite over the Finite and che Analogy ofBeing 2.13 8. Being and the Ana!ogia Proportionalitatis

9. The Acts of God and che Analogy of Being

10.

2.15 218

Tasks Emailed in the Unfolding of Being in Analogy

22.0

2.11

202.

201

Contents

IX

B. Man as Tatum Potest�llit·um:

Unfolding the Human Essence from the Perspective of Being's �1ovement ofFinitization 22. � __________ I. A Speculative Unfolding of De T 'erit.zte 1 . 1 1

.

2.

u5

The Path Thought Follows in the Lnfolding of the Transcendentals

ll5

Reason in Its "Apprchemion" of Being: The Root� ot· the "First Principles" 226

3. 1J1e Prima Principia in Demon.O tno ,n: (annoc draw the difference of being from God .1, Gnd':-. fim t· f·frn in a linc1r w.1y by tixing on the absolute as its ,c.1nin� point. wTI,c being which inhere, i n cre.Hures umwt he understood CXU'f'I ,:.; dfrit·td Ji·t,m the di1w,· hoilg."' It i, onl\' the inc.ii t{6se that allows m ro make chc:: �J chc point of dep arture fr,r speculation and posit­ ing cnntr�J iction at the out,ct. lnc rramccnJcmal co,v,rirurion of the good or of being as love pre�erves chi� specularin: begi nning, without binding ir in chc logicized, rationally cal­ culated hyposca,i'> of the onrologic1l \'acillation. Being as being does not dif� !Ji /"•/ ; \. ,, ,\/ 1.,, 4 �-

To Be and the Being of Beings

2.6

fuse itself"out ofits o wn resources" ["aus sic�"]. To be sure, it is the highest like­ but it is also non subs ness of God and represents a completum et simplex, istens_ 10 . Listening obedience to the sense of being therefore reveals forther th at being's absolute self-diffusion may not be hypostasized into a "specuI attve » realm on the basis of an absolute self-diffusion, because it is not part·ICtp . at. . d out in the fi.n1te. ed in as a self-enclosed part next to God that 1s apportione This latter is the temptation we face whenever we interpret participation in being as the mere composition of being with a recipient subject. Being is instead participated in "according to the diffusion of its pro­ cessions" out of God. 1 1 The diffusion therefore never begins from a point next to God, just as God himself does not first start in the state of not-yet­ having-been-emptied (in se) as a mere essence sealed up in itself, in order subsequently to mediate himself to himself. Instead, the divine nature is al­ ways already shared in the actuality of God's inner life [im innergottlichen Selbstvollzug]. Thus being unveils itself in its origin as "pure mediation."12

3. The Goodness of G od as the Necessity of Being's "Pure Mediation": The Beginning of the Speculative Temptation What we just said is decisive for reason's speculative reaching out [ausgreifen] coward and achieving a foregrasp [vorgreiftn] of being as being. The specula­ tive act has its beginning in the existing entities that lie before us, in which we are always already involved and in the midst of which we find ourselves as existing beings . 13 If we therefore begin with what lies before us as given,

..

10. Depot. 1.1. What concerns us here is, nor least. a dialogue with Hegel, who. as we will show in a lacer work, brought ro completion the course of modem rhoughr, which srands in the destiny [da.s Ges· chick] of the hypostasizing of being. It is not possible in the present context co enter into all ofthis, since such an endeavor would lie beyond the framework of chis scudy. 11. ST 1.75.5.1. The nonsubsiscence of being makes .impossible the pantheistic emanation of God ac· cording to the processio of his primus effeccus, but esse as completum er simplex unveils itselfas che full. ness of God's gift par excellence, which, as "pure mediation� overcomes the deistic division of God and world as absolute essence and finite res. 12.. G. Siewerth has che same point in view in Der Thomismus als Identitiitssystem, 76: "As pure, Si'.11p�e universal icy, beingis therefore not a reality next to God, but it is necessarily an 'idea: the reality of,�hich�s rooted in divine thought itself. But its structure is to be ideal mediation." Conversely, the substannahze. ' � fixed being in its abmact, unmediaced identity is only a likeness of the lifeless. solitary God. the cssen� infinita, which requires the wealth of spirit in order co mediate itself. But "although che angels _and t � souls of the saints are always with God, nevertheless, if plurality ofpersons did not exist in God, ir wou 1 follow that He would be alone or solitary," ST 1.31.3.1. Ul 13· Cf. Louis Lavelle, La Presence Total£ (Paris: Aubier, 1934), 11: "It [consciousness] �rasp! the act ics very exercise, not isolated of course but always cied to emergent scares and appearing obiects.

•

..,

..

.,,,

...

Preliminary Elucidation of the "Crisis of Being" then reason's foregrasp of being as being is in a certain sense a transcend­ ing re-view, a looking back [Ruck-sicht] upon being, on the basis of which the entity is called a being. This re-view (speculatio), however, does not get mired in being as such. The passage into being does not end in an ultimate, sublimated extension of the ens, in which reason would necessarily have to situate and secure being on the ground ofthe finite, and thus hand it over to contradiction. The speculative foregrasp stands within the necessity of de­ riving just this being from God; that is, it stands in the tribunal of being's nonsubsistence. Thus, in one and the same act, the speculative act swings "backward" into the dimension of being as being even while the nonsubsis­ tence ofbeing calls it to swing "forward" into the dimension ofthe world of beings. In this back and forth swing, being is unveiled as "pure mediation" and precisely not dissolved as the accus essendi, qua accus ofthe concrete. We also thereby overcome the temptation to fix the "to be" as the summit ofthe basic store offinite, "certain;' and conceptually graspable substances. If, however, the speculative view ofbeing as being in the analectical fore­ grasp on the basis of the finite ens is the same as the katalectical deductum ab esse divino, to use Thomas's language, then in the same moment in which the understanding throws a "substantializing veil" over being as something that has a reality "in itself,' so as to be able to master it on the basis of the ens, it also reduces the divine being ro the level ofthe finite as its original life source. le is in the end one and the same thing co sublimate being in a merely linear way on the basis ofthe ens as the ultimate horizon that circumscribes it, which ends with the fixed quantity of"empty" being, and co derive being from God, next to whom being clings to itsel£ If we hypostaSize being, then we neces­ sarily posit at the same time a loveless, greedy God, impotent to create, a God who cannot comm unicate being because he is enclosed in himself, a God who keeps being from emptying itself and therefore opens space for the pseudo-god of being's hyposcasis, which finite reason erects for itself in this undertaking. God's love is frozen into a block of absolute essence. Reason now has to sec itselfto work and reintroduce the negation (the lost nonsubsistence) in order to redeem self-withholding being and thereby to free the God who has been fixed as essence from his inseicy [aus seinem An-sich] in the whirl ofnegations. Bue even the acrobatics ofthe absolute contradiction do not get us any further. We are gradually coming co see what we will experience more thorough­ goingly as the speculative temptation that besets the thinking ofbeing.

III

Being and «Nothing'' T H E T E �i P T AT I O :,.; 0 F T H O l" G H T

1.

Esse a.