“Da-sein is disposed toward the stillness of the passing by of the last god. Creating within this basic disposition of Da-sein, the human being becomes the steward of this stillness.”
Heidegger, Martin. Contributions to Philosophy (Of the Event) (Studies in Continental Thought) (p. 16). Indiana University Press. Kindle Edition.
The days leading up to Christmas were probably the most excruciating experience I had of patience, or lack there of. Advent calenders, only made me want December 25th to come faster. Nothing sasiated me, no Christmas carols, movies or secret santas. That childish yearning seems trivial compared to the waiting that is built into the human condition.
Many of us do not quite know what we are waiting for, or that we are in limbo. This is because we are too distracted to listen to the symptoms, which leads to displacement of our frustrations. I am speaking from experience, angry with how slow others are moving, only to realize I am to blame. It is something within. Patience is a virtue, so I have been told.
I signed up for my first Meet Up this month, it is a Zoom meeting discussing Martin Heidegger’s (shocking I know) Contributions to Philosophy (Of The Event). Today’s lecture was heavily focused on this concept of waiting. One could say that Martin Heidegger himself was an expert in waiting. He retreated to the Black Forest, in his small hut, all in preparation for a call that may never come. That call is from Be-ing itself. 1
Be-ing, can be viewed as the originary experience of the Greeks, their encounters with truth, as it was revealed.2 I bring this up because the modern world is disenchanted to borrow Weber’s term. In the progress of the Industrial revolution, accelerationism and machination, we have lost the ability to speak with God. That is the sacred dimension that ennobles existence. Only in communion with the sacred are we able to breath life into our souls.
The muteness that techno-capital3 engenders compounds Nietzsche’s death of God. Not in the bodily sense, nihilism is the afterbirth of this loss, the gods abandonment. 4 The older I get the more I understand the curse of God’s silence. Wanting to believe, hoping and praying one day you can get him on the phone again.
Modernity has been marching ceasely disguised as progress, and it has brought its own miracles from modern medicine to free information exchange. The problem is in all its splendour, the world is still dull, gray and empty. Disenchanted. Lacking substance, flavor.
Someone in class todays mentioned that waiting for Be-ings return, for Heidegger’s Last God is a Christian eschatological problem. One of waiting patiently for the hour that no one knows, except the Father. Whether this is true or not is up for philosophical/religious debate and inquiry. And is beyond the scope of this essay.
What I want to note is the excruciating aspect of the waiting, we are all born into a ship that has a hole inside it, no matter how much we bail, or try to plug it, nothing but God can repair it. We can try to enjoy the adventure, sail the 7 seas, become rich, lovers, writers, the worlds our oyster. However, knowing that this lack we all experience is innate, inescapable is depressing to say the least.
It is a burden to exist in some sense because we cannot jump start the process, skip ahead to Christmas. Or can we? That is what Heidegger was pondering in the Black Forest (among other things, I am sure). Poets, craftsman, and temples are his answer.
Those artisans and wordsmiths attempt to find the language to speak to God or Be-ing again. This takes pushing matter to its limit, as well as our synapses. Finding new connections, uncovering the few remnants of being, that are accessible to our senses. This takes a keen awareness, and that obstinate patience we all abhor.
As the days to Christmas get closer, all I can do is try to find those concealed traces, and find meaning in the waiting. The Nativity scene, can shelter be-ing, and allow one to meditate on the birth of Christ. All aspects that nurture the holy spirit, and fight against the alien god of progress, known as disenchantment.
We must remember:
The seeking is itself the goal.
Heidegger, Martin.
I am using the dash in the spirit of Daniela Vallega-Neu’s new translation of Beyng, to connotate the difference from Sein or Being. It may look arbitrary but it marks the distinction from the original Greek experience with Be-ing and Beyng’s flight. Which I will touch on in more detail above.
Aletheia is the Greek term Heidegger uses for truths unconcealment.
To mirror Nick Land’s hybrid term, emphasizing the link between technology and the rampant growth of capitalism.
I will be using Be-ing, being, God, and gods interchangeably, not for poetic flair but to show the relational aspect of the terms. Its all metaphors, turtles all the way down..