No More Learning

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h roducers for the public. " What, consequently, is the mimetes? ~epcopieris ho tou tritou gennematos apo tes physeos (597 e); he is epistates; "he presides and rules over" one way in which Being, the "dea is brought to outward appearance, eidos. What he manufactures ~thepainting-is to triton gennema, "the third kind of bringing- forth," third apo tes physeos, "reckoned in terms of the pure emer- gence of the idea, which is first. " In the pictured table, "table" is somehow manifest in general, showing its idea in some way; and the table in the picture also manifests a particular wooden frame, and thus is somehow what the craftsman properly makes: but the pictured table shows both of them in something else, in shades of color, in some third thing. Neither can a usable table come forward in such a medium, nor can the outward appearance show itself purely as such. The way the painter pro-duces a "table" into visibility is even farther removed from the Idea, the Being of the being, than the way the carpenter produces it.
The distance from Being and its pure visibility is definitive for the definition of the essence of the mimetes. What is decisive for the Greek-Platonic concept of mimesis or imitation is not reproduction or portraiture, not the fact that the painter provides us with the same thing once again; what is decisive is that this is precisely what he cannot do, that he is even less capable than the craftsman of duplicating the same thing. It is therefore wrongheaded to apply to mimesis notions of "naturalistic" or "primitivistic" copying and reproducing. Imitation is subordinate pro-duction. The mimetes is defined in essence by his position of distance; such distance results from the hierarchy estab- lished with regard to ways of production and in the light of pure outward appearance, Being.
But the subordinate position of the mimetes and of mimesis has not yet been sufficiently delineated. We need to clarify in what way the painter is subordinate to the carpenter as well. A particular "real" table offers different aspects when viewed from different sides. But when the table is in use such aspects are indifferent; what matters is the particular table, which is one and the same. Me ti diapherei aute heautes (598 a), "it is distinguished (in spite of its various aspects) in no way from
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itself. " Such a single, particular, and selfsame thing the carpenter can manufacture. In contrast, the painter can bring the table into view only from one particular angle. What he pro-duces is consequently but one aspect, one way in which the table appears. If he depicts the table from the front, he cannot paint the rear of it. He produces the table always in only one view or phantasma (598 b). What defines the character of the painter as mimetes is not only that he cannot at all produce any particular usable table, but also that he cannot even bring that one particular table fully to the fore.
But mimesis is the essence of all art. Hence a position of distance with respect to Being, to immediate and undistorted outward appear- ance, to the idea, is proper to art. In regard to the opening up of Being, that is, to the display of Being in the unconcealed, aletheia, art is subordinate.
Where, then, according to Plato, does art stand in relation to truth (aletheia)? The answer (598 b): Porroara pou tou alethous hemimetike estin. "So, then, art stands far removed from truth. " What art pro- duces is not the eidos as idea (physis,) but touto eidolon, which is but the semblance of pure outward appearance. Eidolon means a little eidos, but not just in the sense of stature. In the way it shows and appears, the eidolon is something slight. It is a mere residue of the genuine self-showing of beings, and even then in an alien domain, for example, color or some other material of portraiture. Such diminution of the way of pro-ducing is a darkening and distorting. Tout' ara estai kai ho tragoidopoios, eiper mimetes esti, tritos tis apo basileos kai tes aletheias pephykos, kai pantes hoi alloi mimetai (597 e). "Now, the tragedian will also be of such kind, if he is an 'artist,' removed three times, as it were, from the master who rules over the emergence of pure Being; according to his essence he will be reduced to third place with regard to truth (and to the grasp of it in pure discernment); and of such kind are the other 'artists' as well. "
A statement by Erasmus which has been handed down to us is supposed to characterize the art of the painter Albrecht Diirer. The statement expresses a thought that obviously grew out of a personal conversation which that learned man had with the artist. The statement
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runs: ex situ rei unius, non unam speciem sese oculis offerentem ex- primit: by showing a particular thing from any given angle, he, Durer the painter, brings to the fore not only one single isolated view which offers itself to the eye. Rather-we may complete the thought in the following way-by showing any given individual thing as this particular thing, in its singularity, he makes Being itself visible: in a particular hare, the Being of the hare; in a particular animal, the animality. It is clear that Erasmus here is speaking against Plato. We may presume that the humanist Erasmus knew the dialogue we have been discussing and its passages on art. That Erasmus and Diirer could speak in such a fashion presupposes that a transformation of the understanding of Being was taking place. *
In the sequence of sundry ways taken by the presence of beings, hence by the Being of beings, art stands far below truth in Plato's metaphysics. W e encounter here a distance. Yet distance is not discord- ance, especially not if art-as Plato would have it-is placed under the guidance of philosophy as knowledge of the essence of beings. To pursue Plato's thoughts in that direction, and so to examine the further contents of Book Ten, is not germane to our present effort.
*Compare to the above Heidegger's reference to Albrecht Diirer in Der Ursprung des Kunstwerkes, Reclam edition, p. 80; "The Origin of the Work of Art," in Poetry, Language, Thought, p. 70.
23. Plato's Phaedrus: Beauty and Truth in Felicitous Discordance
Our point of departure was the question as to the nature of the discord- ance between art and truth in Nietzsche's view. The discordance must loom before him on the basis of the way he grasps art and truth philosophically. According to his own words, Nietzsche's philosophy is inverted Platonism. If we grant that there is in Platonism a discordance between art and truth, it follows that such discordance would in Nietzsche's view have to vanish as a result of the cancellation which overturns Platonism. But we have just seen that there is no discordance in Platonism, merely a distance. Of course, the distance is not simply a quantitative one, but a distance of order and rank. The result is the following proposition, which would apply to Plato, although couched in Nietzsche's manner of speech: truth is worth more than art. Nietz- sche says, on the contrary: art is worth more than truth. Obviously, the discordance lies hidden in these propositions. But if in distinction to Plato the relation of art and truth is reversed within the hierarchy; and if for Nietzsche that relation is a discordance, then it only follows that for Plato too the relation is a discordance, but of a reverse sort. Even though Nietzsche's philosophy may be understood as the reversal of Platonism, that does not mean that through such reversal the discord- ance between art and truth must vanish. We can only say that if there is a discordance between art and truth in Plato's teaching, and if Nietzsche's philosophy represents a reversal of Platonism, then such discordance must come to the fore in Nietzsche's philosophy in the reverse form. Hence Platonism can be for us a directive for the discov-
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ery and location of the discordance in Nietzsche's thought, a directive that would indicate by way of reversal. In that way Nietzsche's knowl- edge of art and truth would finally be brought to its sustaining ground.
What does discordance mean? Discordance is the opening of a gap between two things that are severed. Of course, a mere gap does not yet constitute a discordance. W e do speak of a "split" in relation to the gap that separates two soaring cliffs; yet the cliffs are not in discordance and never could be; to be so would require that they, of themselves, relate to each other. Only two things that are related to one another can be opposed to each other. But such opposition is not yet discord- ance. For it is surely the case that their being opposed to one another presupposes a being drawn toward and related to each other, which is to say, their converging upon and agreeing with one another in one respect. Genuine political opposition-not mere dispute-can arise only where the selfsame political order is willed; only here can ways and goals and basic principles diverge. In every opposition, agreement pre- vails in one respect, whereas in other respects there is variance. But whatever diverges in the same respect in which it agrees slips into discordance. Here the opposition springs from the divergence of what once converged, indeed in such a way that precisely by being apart they enter into the supreme way of belonging together. But from that we also conclude that severance is something different from opposition, that it does not need to be discordance, but may be a concordance. Concordance too requires the twofold character implied in severance.
Thus "discordance" is ambiguous. It may mean, first, a severance which at bottom can be a concordance; second, one which must be a discordance (abscission). For the present we purposely allow the word "discordance" to remain in such ambiguity. For if a discordance pre- vails in Nietzsche's inverted Platonism, and if that is possible only to the extent that there is discordance already in Platonism; and if the discordance is in Nietzsche's view a dreadful one; then for Plato it must be the reverse, that is to say, it must be a severance which nevertheless is concordant. In any case, any two things that are supposed to be able to enter into discordance must be balanced against one another, be of the same immediate origin, of the same necessity and rank. There can
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be an "above" and "below" in cases of mere distance and opposition, but never in the case of discordance, for the former do not share an equivalent standard of measure. The "above" and "below" are funda- mentally different; in the essential respect they do not agree.
Therefore, so long as art in the Republic remains in third position when measured in terms of truth, a distance and a subordination obtain between art and truth-but a discordance is not possible. If such discordance between art and truth is to become possible, art must first of all be elevated to equal rank. But is there as a matter of fact a "discordance" between art and truth? Indeed Plato speaks-in the Republic, no less (607 b)-in a shadowy and suggestive way of the palaia men tis diaphora philosophiai te kai poietikei, "of a certain ancient quarrel between philosophy and poetry," which is to say, be- tween knowledge and art, truth and beauty. Yet even if diaphora here is to suggest more than a quarrel-and it is-in this dialogue it is not and cannot be a matter of "discordance. " For if art must become equal in rank with truth, so as to become "discordant" with it, then it becomes necessary to consider art in yet another respect.
That other respect in which art must be viewed can only be the same one in which Plato discusses truth. Only that one and the same respect grants the presupposition for a severance. W e must therefore investi- gate in what other regard-in contrast to the conversation carried on in the Republic-Plato treats the question of art.
If we scrutinize the traditional configuration of Plato's philosophy as a whole we notice that it consists of particular conversations and areas of discussion. Nowhere do we find a "system" in the sense of a unified structure planned and executed with equal compartments for all essential questions and issues. The same is true of Aristotle's philos- ophy and of Greek philosophy in general. Various questions are posed from various points of approach and on various levels, developed and answered to varying extents. Nevertheless, a certain basic way of pro- ceeding prevails in Plato's thought. Everything is gathered into the guiding question of philosophy-the question as to what beings are.
Although the congelation of philosophical inquiry in the doctrines and handbooks of the Schools is prepared in and by the philosophy of
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Plato, we must be chary of thinking about his questions on the guide- lines of particular dogmatic phrases and formulations found in the later philosophical disciplines. Whatever Plato says about truth and knowl- edge, or beauty and art, we may not conceive of it and pigeonhole it according to later epistemology, logic, and aesthetics. Of course that does not preclude our posing the question, in relation to Plato's medita- tion on art, of whether and where the issue of beauty is also treated in his philosophy. Granted that we must allow the whole matter to remain open, we may ask about the nature of the relation between art and beauty-a relation that long ago was accepted as a matter of course.
In his discussions Plato often speaks of "the beautiful" without taking up the question of art. To one of his dialogues the tradition has appended the express subtitle peri tou kalou, "On the Beautiful. " It is that conversation which Plato called Phaedrus, after the youth who serves as the interlocutor in it. But the dialogue has received other subtitles over the centuries: peri psyches, "On the Soul," and peri tou erotos, "On Love. " That alone is enough to produce uncertainty con- cerning the contents of the dialogue. All those things-the beautiful, the soul, and love-are discussed, and not merely incidentally. But the dialogue speaks also of techne, art, in great detail; also of logos, speech and language, with great penetration; of aletheia, truth, in a quite essential way, of mania-madness, rapture, ecstasy-in a most compel- ling manner; and finally, as always, of the ideai and of Being.
Every one of these words could with as much (or as little) right serve as the subtitle. Nevertheless, the content of the dialogue is by no means a jumbled potpourri. Its rich content is shaped so remarkably well that this dialogue must be accounted the most accomplished one in all essential respects. It therefore may not be taken to be the earliest work of Plato, as Schleiermacher believed; just as little does it belong to the final period; it rather belongs to those years which comprise the akmi of Plato's creative life.
Because of the inner greatness of this work of Plato's, we cannot hope to make the whole of it visible at once and in brief; that is even less possible here than it was in the case of the Republic. Our remarks concerning the title suffice to show that the Phaedrus discusses art,
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truth, speech, rapture, and the beautiful. Now we will pursue only what is said concerning the beautiful in relation to the true. We do this in order to estimate whether, to what extent, and in what way, we can speak of a severance of the two.
Decisive for correct understanding of what is said here about the beautiful is knowledge of the context and the scope in which the beautiful comes to language. To begin with a negative determination: the beautiful is discussed neither in the context of the question of art nor in explicit connection with the question of truth. Rather, the beautiful is discussed with the range of the original question of man's relation to beings as such. But precisely because Plato reflects upon the beautiful within the realm of that question, its connection with truth and art comes to the fore. W e can demonstrate that on the basis of the latter half of the dialogue.
W e will first of all select several guiding statements, in order to make visible the scope in which the beautiful is discussed. Second, we will comment upon what is said there about the beautiful, while remaining within the limits of our task. Third, and finally, we will ask about the kind of relation between beauty and truth which confronts us there.
Turning to the first matter, we note that the beautiful is discussed with the scope characteristic of man's relation to beings as such. In that regard we must consider the following statement (249 e): pasa men anthropou psyche physei tetheatai ta onta, e auk an elthen eis tode to zoion. "Every human soul, rising of itself, has already viewed beings in their Being; otherwise it would never have entered into this form of life. " In order for man to be this particular embodying/living man, he must already have viewed Being. Why? What is man, after all? That is not stated in so many words; it remains tacit and presupposed. Man is the essence that comports itself to beings as such. But he could not be such an essence, that is to say, beings could not show themselves to him as beings, if he did not always ahead of time have Being in view by means of "theory. " Man's "soul" must have viewed Being, since Being cannot be grasped by the senses. The soul "nourishes itself," trephetai, upon Being. Being, the discerning relation to Being, guaran- tees man his relation to beings.
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If we did not know what variation and equality were, we could never encounter various things; we could never encounter things at all. If we did not know what sameness and contrariety were, we could never comport ourselves toward ourselves as selfsame in each case; we would never be with ourselves, would never be our selves at all. Nor could we ever experience something that stands over against us, something other than ourselves. If we did not know what order and law, or symmetry and harmonious arrangement were, we could not arrange and construct anything, could not establish and maintain anything in existence. The form of life called man would simply be impossible if the view upon Being did not prevail in it in a fundamental and paramount way.
But now we must catch a glimpse of man's other essential determina- tion. Because the view upon Being is exiled in the body, Being can never be beheld purely in its unclouded brilliance; it can be seen only under the circumstance of our encountering this or that particular being. Therefore the following is generally true of the view upon Being which is proper to man's soul: magis kathorosa ta onta (248 a), "it just barely views being [as such], and only with effort. " For that reason most people find knowledge of Being quite laborious, and consequently ateleis tes tou ontos theas aperchontai (248 b), "the thea, the view upon Being, remains ateles to them, so that it does not achieve its end, does not encompass everything that is proper to Being. " Hence their view of things is but half of what it should be: it is as though they looked cockeyed at things. Most people, the cockeyed ones, give it up. They divert themselves from the effort to gain a pure view upon Being, kai apelthousai trophei doxastei chrontai, "and in turning away are no longer nourished by Being. " Instead, they make use of the trophe doxaste, the nourishment that falls to them thanks to doxa, i. e. , what offers itself in anything they may encounter, some fleeting appearance. which things just happen to have.
But the more the majority of men in the everyday world fall prey to mere appearance and to prevailing opinions concerning beings, and the more comfortable they become with them, feeling themselves con- firmed in them, the more Being "conceals itself" (Janthanei) from man. The consequence for man of the concealment of Being is that he is
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overcome by lethe, that concealment of Being which gives rise to the illusion that there is no such thing as Being. We translate the Greek word lethe as "forgetting," although in such a way that "to forget" is thought in a metaphysical, not a psychological, manner. The majority of men sink into oblivion of Being, although-or precisely because- they constantly have to do solely with the things that are in their vicinity. For such things are not beings; they are only such things ha nyn einai phamen (249 c), "of which we now say that they are. " Whatever matters to us and makes a claim on us here and now, in this or that way, as this or that thing, is-to the extent that it is at all-only a homoioma, an approximation to Being. It is but a fleeting appearance of Being. But those who lapse into oblivion of Being do not even know of the appearance as an appearance. For otherwise they would at the same time have to know of Being, which comes to the fore even in fleeting appearances, although "just barely. " They would then emerge from oblivion of Being. Instead of being slaves to oblivion, they would preserve mneme in recollective thought on Being. Oligai de leipontai hais totes mnemes hikanos parestin (250 a 5): "Only a few remain who have at their disposal the capacity to remember Being. " But even these few are not able without further ado to see the appearance of what they encounter in such a way that the Being in it comes to the fore for them. Particular conditions must be fulfilled. Depending on how Being gives itself, the power of self-showing in the idea becomes proper to it, and therewith the attracting and binding force.
As soon as man lets himself be bound by Being in his view upon it, he is cast beyond himself, so that he is stretched, as it were, between himself and Being and is outside himself. Such elevation beyond oneself and such being drawn toward Being itself is eros. Only to the extent that Being is able to elicit "erotic" power in its relation to man is man capable of thinking about Being and overcoming oblivion of Being.
The proposition with which we began-that the view upon Being is proper to the essence of man, so that he can be as man-can be understood only if we realize that the view upon Being does not enter on the scene as a mere appurtenance of man. It belongs to him as his most intrinsic possession, one which can be quite easily disturbed and
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deformed, and which therefore must always be recovered anew. Hence the need for whatever makes possible such recovery, perpetual renewal, and preservation of the view upon Being. That can only be something which in the immediate, fleeting appearances of things encountered also brings Being, which is utterly remote, to the fore most readily. But that, according to Plato, is the beautiful. When we defined the range and scope in which the beautiful comes to language we were basically already saying what the beautiful is, with regard to the possibility and the preservation of the view upon Being.
We proceed now to the second stage, adducing several statements in order to make the matter clearer. These statements are to establish the essential definition of the beautiful and thereby to prepare the way for the third stage, namely, a discussion of the relation of beauty and truth in Plato. From the metaphysical founding of communal life in Plato's dialogue on the state we know that what properly sets the standard is manifested in dike and dikaiosyne, that is, in the well- wrought jointure of the order of Being. But viewed from the standpoint of the customary oblivion of Being, the supreme and utterly pure essence of Being is what is most remote. And to the extent that the essential order of Being shows itself in "beings," that is to say, in whatever we call "beings," it is here very difficult to discern. Fleeting appearances are inconspicuous; what is essential scarcely obtrudes. In the Phaedrus (250 b) Plato says accordingly: dikaiosynes men oun kai
sophrosynes kai hosa alla timia psychais ouk enesti phengos ouden en tois teide homoiomasin. "In justice and in temperance, and in whatever men ultimately must respect above all else, there dwells no radiance whenever men encounter them as fleeting appearances. " Plato contin- ues: alla di' amydron organon magis auton kai oligoi epi tas eikonas iontes theantai to tou eikasthentos genos. "On the contrary, we grasp Being with blunt instruments, clumsily, scarcely at all; and few of those who approach the appearances in question catch a glimpse of the original source, i. e. , the essential origin, of what offers itself in fleeting appearances. " The train of thought continues as Plato interposes a striking antithesis: kallos de, "With beauty, however," it is different. Nun de kallos monon tauten esche moiran, host' ekphanestaton einai
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kai erasmiotaton (250 d). "But to beauty alone has the role been allotted [i. e. , in the essential order of Being's illumination] to be the most radiant, but also the most enchanting. " The beautiful is what advances most directly upon us and captivates us. While encountering us as a being, however, it at the same time liberates us to the view upon Being. The beautiful is an element which is disparate within itself; it grants entry into immediate sensuous appearances and yet at the same time soars toward Being; it is both captivating and liberating. * Hence it is the beautiful that snatches us from oblivion of Being and grants the view upon Being.
The beautiful is called that which is most radiant, that which shines in the realm of immediate, sensuous, fleeting appearances: kateilepha- men auto dia tes enargestates aistheseos ton hemeteron stilbon enarge- stata. "The beautiful itself is given [to us men, here] by means of the most luminous mode of perception at our disposal, and we possess the beautiful as what most brightly glistens. " Opsis gar hemin oxytate ton dia tou somatos erchetaiaistheseon. "For vision, viewing, is the keenest way we can apprehend things through the body. " But we know that thea, "viewing," is also the supreme apprehending, the grasping of Being. The look reaches as far as the highest and farthest remoteness of Being; simultaneously, it penetrates the nearest and brightest prox- imity of fleeting appearances. The more radiantly and brightly fleeting appearances are apprehended as such, the more brightly does that of which they are the appearances come to the fore-Being. According to its most proper essence, the beautiful is what is most radiant and
*Heidegger translates erasmiotaton as das Entriickendste, modifying it now as das Beriickend-Entriickende. Although both German words could be rendered by the En- glish words "to entrance, charm, enchant," their literal sense is quite different. Riicken suggests sudden ~hangeof place; the prefixes (be-, ent-) both make the verb transitive. But beriicken suggests causing to move toward, entriicken causing to move away. Heidegger thus tries to express the disparate, i. e. , genuinely erotic character of the beautiful, which both captivates and liberates us, by choosing two German words that manifest a kind of felicitous discordance. The same formulation appears in "Wie wenn am Feiertage . . . " (1939-40) in Martin Heidegger, Erlauterungen zu Holder/ins Dich- tung, pp. 53-54.
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sparkling in the sensuous realm, in a way that, as such brilliance, it lets Being scintillate at the same time. Being is that to which man from the outset remains essentially bound; it is in the direction of Being that man is liberated.
Since the beautiful allows Being to scintillate, and since the beautiful itself is what is most attractive, it draws man through and beyond itself to Being as such. W e can scarcely coin an expression that would render what Plato says in such a lucid way about radiance through those two essential words, ekphanestaton kai erasmiotaton.
Even the Latin translation from Renaissance times obscures every- thing here when it says, At vero pulchritudo sola habuit sortem, ut maxime omnium et perspicua sit et amabilis ["But true beauty alone has beendestined to be the most transparent of things and the loveliest of all"]. Plato does not mean that the beautiful itself, as an object, is "perspicuous and lovely. " It is rather what is most luminous and what thereby most draws us on and liberates us.
From what we have presented, the essence of the beautiful has become clear. It is what makes possible the recovery and preservation of the view upon Being, which devolves from the most immediate fleeting appearances and which can easily vanish in oblivion. Our capac- ity to understand, phronesis, although it remains related to what is essential, of itself has no corresponding eidolon, no realm of appear- ances which brings what it has to grant us into immediate proximity and yet at the same time elevates us toward what is properly to be understood.
The third question, inquiring about the relationship between beauty and truth, now answers itself. To be sure, up to now truth has not been treated explicitly. Nevertheless, in order to achieve clarity concerning the relation of beauty and truth, it suffices if we think back to the major introductory statement and read it in the way Plato himself first In- troduces it. The major statement says that the view upon Being is proper to the essence of man, that by force of it man can comport himself to beings and to what he encounters as merely apparent things. At the place where that thought is first introduced (249 b), Plato says,
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not that the basic condition for the form of man is that he tetheatai ta onta, that he "has beings as such in view ahead of time," but ou gar he ge mepote idousa ten aletheian eis tode hexei to schema, that "the soul would never have assumed this form if it had not earlier viewed the unconcealment of beings, i. e. , beings in their unconcealment. "
The view upon Being opens up what is concealed, making it uncon- cealed; it is the basic relation to the true. That which truth essentially brings about, the unveiling of Being, that and nothing else is what beauty brings about. It does so, scintillating in fleeting appearances, by liberating us to the Being that radiates in such appearances, which is to say, to the openedness of Being, to truth. Truth and beauty are in essence related to the selfsame, to Being; they belong together in one, the one thing that is decisive: to open Being and to keep it open.
Yet in that very medium where they belong together, they must diverge for man, they must separate from one another. For the opened- ness of Being, truth, can only be nonsensuous illumination, since for Plato Being is nonsensuous. Because Being opens itself only to the view upon Being, and because the latter must always be snatched from oblivion of Being, and because for that reason it needs the most direct radiance of fleeting appearances, the opening up of Being must occur at that site where, estimated in terms of truth, the me on (eidolon), i. e. , nonbeing, occurs. But that is the site of beauty.
When we consider very carefully that art, by bringing forth the beautiful, resides in the sensuous, and that it is therefore far removed from truth, it then becomes clear why truth and beauty, their belong- ing together in one notwithstanding, still must be two, must separate from one another. But the severance, discordance in the broad sense, is not in Plato's view one which arouses dread; it is a felicitous one. The beautiful elevates us beyond the sensuous and bears us back into the true. Accord prevails in the severance, because the beautiful, as radiant and sensuous, has in advance sheltered its essence in the truth of Being as supersensuous.
Viewed more discerningly, a discordance in the strict sense lies here as well. But it belongs to the essence of Platonism that it efface that
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discordance by positing Being in such a way that it can do so without the effacement becoming visible as such. But when Platonism is over- turned everything that characterizes it must also be overturned; what- ever it can cloak and conceal, whatever it can pronounce felicitous, on the contrary, must out, and must arouse dread.
24. Nietzsche's Overturning of Platonism
We conducted an examination of the relation of truth and beauty in Plato in order to sharpen our view of things. For we are attempting to locate the place and context in Nietzsche's conception of art and truth where the severance of the two must occur, and in such a way that it is experienced as a discordance that arouses dread.
Both beauty and truth are related to Being, indeed by way of unveil- ing the Being of beings. Truth is the immediate way in which Being is revealed in the thought of philosophy; it does not enter into the sensuous, but from the outset is averted from it. Juxtaposed to it is beauty, penetrating the sensuous and then moving beyond it, liberating in the direction of Being. If beauty and truth in Nietzsche's view enter into discordance, they must previously belong together in one. That one can only be Being and the relation to Being.
Nietzsche defines the basic character of beings, hence Being, as will to power. Accordingly, an original conjunction of beauty and truth must result from the essence of will to power, a conjunction which simultaneously must become a discordance. When we try to discern and grasp the discordance we cast a glance toward the unified essence of will to power. Nietzsche's philosophy, according to his own testi- mony, is inverted Platonism. We ask: in what sense does the relation of beauty and truth which is peculiar to Platonism become a different sort of relation through the overturning?
The question can easily be answered by a simple recalculation, if "overturning" Platonism may be equated with the procedure of stand- ing all of Plato's statements on their heads, as it were. To be sure, Nietzsche himself often expresses the state of affairs in that way, not
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only in order to make clear what he means in a rough and ready fashion, but also because he himself often thinks that way, although he is aiming at something else.
Only late in his life, shortly before the cessation of his labors in thinking, does the full scope required by such an inversion of Platonism become clear to him. That clarity waxes as Nietzsche grasps the necessi- ty of the overturning, which is demanded by the task of overcoming nihilism. For that reason, when we elucidate the overturning of Plato- nism we must take the structure of Platonism as our point of departure. For Plato the supersensuous is the true world. It stands over all, as what sets the standard. The sensuous lies below, as the world of appearances. What stands over all is alone and from the start what sets the standard; it is therefore what is desired. After the inversion-that is easy to calculate in a formal way-the sensuous, the world of appearances, stands above; the supersensuous, the true world, lies below. With a glance back to what we have already presented, however, we must keep a firm hold on the realization that the very talk of a "true world" and "world of appearances" no longer speaks the language of Plato.
But what does that mean-the sensuous stands above all? It means that it is the true, it is genuine being. If we take the inversion strictly in this sense, then the vacant niches of the "above and below" are preserved, suffering only a change in occupancy, as it were. But as long as the "above and below" define the formal structure of Platonism, Platonism in its essence perdures. The inversion does not achieve what it must, as an overcoming of nihilism, namely, an overcoming of Plato- nism in its very foundations. Such overcoming succeeds only when the "above" in general is set aside as such, when the former positing of something true and desirable no longer arises, when the true world-in the sense of the ideal-is expunged. What happens when the true world is expunged? Does the apparent world still remain? No. For the apparent world can be what it is only as a counterpart of the true. If the true world collapses, so must the wqrld of appearances. Only then is Platonism overcome, which is to say, inverted in such a way that philosophical thinking twists free of it. But then where does such thinking wind up?
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During the time the overturning of Platonism became for Nietzsche a twisting free of it, madness befell him. Heretofore no one at all has recognized this reversal as Nietzsche's final step; neither has anyone perceived that the step is clearly taken only in his final creative year (1888). Insight into these important connections is quite difficult on the basis of the book The Will to Power as it lies before us in its present form, since the textual fragments assembled here have been removed from a great number of manuscripts written during the years 1882 to 1888. An altogether different picture results from the examination of Nietzsche's original manuscripts. But even without reference to these, there is a section of the treatise Twilight of the Idols, composed in just a few days during that final year of creative work (in September of 1888, although the book did not appear until 1889), a section which is very striking, because its basic position differs from the one we are already familiar with. The section is entitled "How the 'True World' Finally Became a Fable: the History of an Error" (VIII, 82-83; cf. WM, 567 and 568, from the year 1888. *)
The section encompasses a little more than one page. (Nietzsche's handwritten manuscript, the one sent to the printer, is extant. ) It belongs to those pieces the style and structure of which betray the fact that here, in a magnificent moment of vision, the entire realm of Nietzsche's thought is permeated by a new and singular brilliance. The title, "How the 'True World' Finally Became a Fable," says that here a history is to be recounted in the course of which the supersensuous, posited by Plato as true being, not only is reduced from the higher to the lower rank but also collapses into the unreal and nugatory. Nietz- sche divides the history into six parts, which can be readily recognized as the most important epochs of Western thought, and which lead directly to the doorstep of Nietzsche's philosophy proper.
*In these two complex notes Nietzsche defines the "perspectival relation" of will to power. Whereas in an earlier note (WM, 566) he spoke of the "true world" as "always the apparent world once again," he now (WM, 567) refrains from the opposition of true and apparent worlds as such: "Here there remains not a shadow of a right to speak of Schein . . . ," which is to say, of a world of mere appearances.
Nietzsche's Overturning of Platonism 203
For the sake of our own inquiry we want to trace that history in all brevity, so that we can see how Nietzsche, in spite of his will to subvert, preserved a luminous knowledge concerning what had occurred prior
to him.
The more clearly and simply a decisive inquiry traces the history of
Western thought back to its few essential stages, the more that his- tory's power to reach forward, seize, and commit grows. This is espe- cially the case where it is a matter of overcoming such history. Whoever believes that philosophical thought can dispense with its history by means of a simple proclamation will, without his knowing it, be dis- pensed with by history; he will be struck a blow from which he can never recover, one that will blind him utterly. He will think he is being original when he is merely rehashing what has been transmitted and mixing together traditional interpretations into something ostensibly new. The greater a revolution is to be, the more profoundly must it plunge into its history.
W e must measure Nietzsche's brief portrayal of the history of Plato- nism and its overcoming by this standard. Why do we emphasize here things that are evident? Because the form in which Nietzsche relates the history might easily tempt us to take it all as a mere joke, whereas something very different is at stake here (cf. Beyond Good and Evil, no. 213, "What a philosopher is," VII, 164 ff. ).
The six divisions of the history of Platonism, culminating in emer- gence from Platonism, are as follows.
"I. The true world, attainable for the wise, the pious, the virtuous man-he lives in it, he is it. "
Here the founding of the doctrine by Plato is established. To all appearances, the true world itself is not handled at all, but only how man adopts a stance toward it and to what extent it is attainable. And the essential definition of the true world consists in the fact that it is attainable here and now for man, although not for any and every man, and not without further ado. It is attainable for the virtuous; it is the supersensuous. The implication is that virtue consists in repudiation of the sensuous, since denial of the world that is closest to us, the sensuous
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world, is proper to the Being of beings. Here the "true world" is not yet anything "Platonic," that is, not something unattainable, merely desirable, merely "ideal. " Plato himself is who he is by virtue of the fact that he unquestioningly and straightforwardly functions on the basis of the world of Ideas as the essence of Being. The supersensuous is the idea. What is here envisioned in the eyes of Greek thought and exis- tence is truly seen, and experienced in such simple vision, as what makes possible every being, as that which becomes present to itself (see Vom Wesen des Grundes, 1929, part two). Therefore, Nietzsche adds the following commentary in parentheses: "(Oldest form of the idea, relatively sensible, simple, convincing. Circumlocution for the sen- tence '1, Plato, am the truth. ')" The thought of the Ideas and the interpretation of Being posited here are creative in and of themselves. Plato's work is not yet Platonism. The "true world" is not yet the object of a doctrine; it is the power of Dasein; it is what lights up in becoming present; it is pure radiance without cover.
"2. The true world, unattainable for now, but promised for the wise, the pious, the virtuous man ('for the sinner who repents'). "
With the positing of the supersensuous as true being, the break with the sensuous is now expressly ordained, although here again not straightaway: the true world is unattainable only in this life, for the duration of earthly existence. In that way earthly existence is denigrated and yet receives its proper tension, since the supersensuous is promised as the "beyond. " Earth becomes the "earthly. " The essence and exis- tence of man are now fractured, but that makes a certain ambiguity possible. The possibility of "yes and no," of "this world as well as that one," begins; the apparent affirmation of this world, but with a reserva- tion; the ability to go along with what goes on in this world, but keeping that remote back door ajar. In place of the unbroken essence of the Greek, which while unbroken was not without hazard but was passion- ate, which grounded itself in what was attainable, which drew its defini- tive boundaries here, which not only bore the intractability of fate but in its affirmation struggled for victory-in place of that essence begins something insidious. In Plato's stead, Platonism now rules. Thus:
Nietzsche's Overturning of Platonism 205
"(Progress of the idea: it becomes more subtle, insidious, ungraspable -it becomes woman, it becomes Christian. . . . )" The supersensuous is no longer present within the scope of human existence, present for it and for its sensuous nature. Rather, the whole of human existence becomes this-worldly to the extent that the supersensuous is inter- preted as the "beyond. " In that way the true world now becomes even truer, by being displaced ever farther beyond and away from this world; it grows ever stronger in being, the more it becomes what is promised and the more zealously it is embraced, i. e. , believed in, as what is promised. If we compare the second part of the history with the first, we see how Nietzsche in his description of the first part consciously sets
Plato apart from all Platonism, protecting him from it.
"3. The true world, unattainable, indemonstrable, unpromisable, but even as thought, a consolation, an obligation, an imperative. "
This division designates the form of Platonism that is achieved by the Kantian philosophy. The supersensuous is now a postulate of prac- tical reason; even outside the scope of all experience and demonstration it is demanded as what is necessarily existent, in order to salvage ade- quate grounds for the lawfulness of reason. To be sure, the accessibility of the supersensuous by way of cognition is subjected to critical doubt, but only in order to make room for belief in the requisition of reason. Nothing of the substance and structure of the Christian view of the world changes by virtue of Kant; it is only that all the light of knowl- edge is cast on experience, that is, on the mathematical-scientific inter- pretation of the "world. " Whatever lies outside of the knowledge possessed by the sciences of nature is not denied as to its existence but is relegated to the indeterminateness of the unknowable. Therefore: "(The old sun, basically, but seen through haze and skepticism; the ide~ rarified, grown pallid, Nordic, Konigsbergian. )" A transformed world -in contrast to the simple clarity by which Plato dwelled in direct contact with the supersensuous, as discernible Being. Because he sees through the unmistakable Platonism of Kant, Nietzsche at the same time perceives the essential difference between Plato and Kant. In that way he distinguishes himself fundamentally from his contemporaries,
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who, not accidentally, equate Kant and Plato-if they don't interpret
Plato as a Kantian who didn't quite make it.
"4. The true world-unattainable? In any case, unattained. And as unattained also unknown. Consequently, also, not consolatory, re- demptive, obligating: to what could something unknown obligate us?
With the fourth division, the form to which Platonism commits itself as a consequence of the bygone Kantian philosophy is historically attained, although without an originally creative overcoming. It is the age following the dominance of German Idealism, at about the middle of the last century. With the help of its own chief principle, the theoretical unknowability of the supersensuous, the Kantian system is unmasked and exploded. If the supersensuous world is altogether unat- tainable for cognition, then nothing can be known about it, nothing can be decided for or against it. It becomes manifest that the supersensuous does not come on the scene as a part of the Kantian philosophy on the grounds of basic philosophical principles of knowledge but as a conse- quence of uneradicated Christian-theological presuppositions. * In that regard Nietzsche on one occasion observes of Leibniz, Kant, Fichte, Schelling, Hegel, and Schopenhauer, "They are all mere Schleiermachers" (XV, 112). The observation has two edges: it means not only that these men are at bottom camouflaged theologians but also that they are what that name suggests-Schleier-macher, makers of veils, men who veil things. In opposition to them stands the somewhat halfhearted rejection of the supersensuous as something unknown, to which, after Kant, no cognition can in principle attain. Such rejection
is a kind of first glimmer of "probity" of meditation amid the
*Unerschiitterter theologisch-christlicher Voraussetzungen. The formulation is remi- niscent of Heidegger's words in Being and Time, section 44 C: "The assertion of 'eternal truths' and the confusion of the phenomenally grounded 'ideality' of Dasein with an idealized absolute subject belong to those residues of Christian theology in philosophical problems which have not yet been radically extruded [zu den Hingst noch nicht radikal ausgetriebenen Resten von christlicher Theologie innerhalb der philosophischen Prob· lematik. ]"
Nietzsche's Overturning of Platonism 207
captiousness and "counterfeiting" that came to prevail with Platonism. Therefore: "(Gray morning. First yawnings of reason. Cockcrow of positivism. )" Nietzsche descries the rise of a new day. Reason, which here means man's knowing and inquiring, awakens and comes to its senses.
"5. The 'true world'-an idea which is of use for nothing, which is no longer even obligating-an idea become useless, superfluous, conse- quently, a refuted idea: let us abolish it! "
With this division Nietzsche designates the first segment of his own way in philosophy. The "true world" he now sets in quotation marks. It is no longer his own word, the content of which he himself could still affirm. The "true world" is abolished. But notice the reason: because it has become useless, superfluous. In the shimmering twilight a new standard of measure comes to light: whatever does not in any way at any time involve man's Dasein can make no claim to be affirmed. Therefore: "(Bright day; breakfast; return of bon sens and of cheerful- ness; Plato's embarrassed blush; pandemonium of all free spirits. )" Here Nietzsche thinks back on the years of his own metamorphosis, which is intimated clearly enough in the very titles of the books he wrote during that time: Human, All Too Human (I 878), The Wander- er and His Shadow (1880), The Dawn (1881), and The Gay Science (1882). Platonism is overcome inasmuch as the supersensuous world, as the true world, is abolished; but by way of compensation the sensu- ous world remains, and positivism occupies it. What is now required is a confrontation with the latter. For Nietzsche does not wish to tarry in the dawn of morning; neither will he rest content with mere fore- noon. In spite of the fact that the supersensuous world as the true world has been cast aside, the vacant niche of the higher world remains, ami so does the blueprint of an "above and below," which is to say, so does
Platonism.