Life Phenomenology

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The phenomenological life (even radical phenomenological life or substantive phenomenology of life ) goes to the French philosopher Michel Henry back (1922-2002). It differs from classical phenomenology insofar as it traces the possibility of worldly appearance back to an original appearance of life. Internal phenomenological critics accuse life phenomenology, however, of the fact that its recourse to the appearance of life is methodologically unconvincing. This approach currently has an international and interdisciplinary effect.

Michel Henry

In 1963, in his early major work L'essence de la manifestation , Michel Henry subjected the occidental ontological tradition, which has recently revived in German idealism and which, according to him, has not been revised radically enough in classical phenomenology, to a fundamental critique. Henry finds the initial (self-) apperception of the thinking subject in life, almost forgotten in this tradition , especially in Maine de Biran . Henry wanted to continue this approach, as he formulated in his later work Incarnation , "the movement of that thinking" which understands what comes before him: the self-giving of absolute life, in which this itself becomes future. " To accept such a phenomenological priority of life over thought and any other intentionality has a downright disruptive effect on the traditions examined. After this "overthrow" not only of phenomenology but of Western thought in general, it seemed necessary to Henry to rethink crucial areas of our culture - such as politics and economics, psychology, art and religion.

criticism

In 1991, the French philosopher and historian of philosophy Dominique Janicaud , a year before the approach of life phenomenology became known to wider circles in the German-speaking area through Henry's publication Radical Life Phenomenology , suggested in a pamphlet whether there might be some approaches of the more recent French phenomenology (besides Henry in this context also Emmanuel Lévinas , Jean-Luc Marion and Jean-Louis Chrétien mentioned ) a methodological reflection on the possibility of their exceeding what is immediately apparent is missing. Apparently, so the reproach, apodictic abbreviations were taken here for the principle of appearance also sought by Husserl , from which phenomenology initially avoided.

Theodor W. Adorno formulated in his essay The Actuality of Philosophy of May 7, 1931, a criticism of the idealistic character of material phenomenology :

“Husserl cleaned idealism of any speculative excess and brought it to the level of the highest reality that it could achieve. But he didn't blow it up. As with Cohen and Natorp, the autonomous spirit rules in his domain; only he has renounced the claim of the productive power of the spirit, of Kantian and Fichte's spontaneity, and is content, as only Kant himself did not, to take possession of the sphere of what is adequately attainable to him. [...] The transition to 'material phenomenology' is only apparent and at the cost of the reliability of the findings which alone provides the legal basis of the phenomenological method. "

Life Phenomenology Today

The phenomenology of life did not only move into wider circles after Henry's death: With regard to the continuation of his approach in Germany, the work of Rolf Kühn should be mentioned first, next - from an international perspective - the work of Ruud Welten (Netherlands), Jad Hatem and Rerverend Father Jean Reaidy (both Lebanon), by Gabrielle Dufour-Kowalska (Switzerland), Marc Maesschalck, Jean Leclercq and Raphael Gély (all Belgium), Frédéric Seyler, partly by Jean-Francois Lavigne (France) and Florinda Martins (Portugal ), Adnen Idey (Tunisia) and Yorihiro Yamagata (Japan). In Italy and in the English-speaking area, the situation is a little more complicated for different reasons, but there is also a broad reception in these countries.

From a German perspective, László Tengelyi and Hans-Rainer Sepp, among others, should be mentioned among those who cannot actually be described as life phenomenologists, but who deal with it constructively and critically . There is also a certain affinity with regard to content to the depth phenomenology of José Sánchez de Murillos , insofar as here and there a revelation in life takes precedence over all other superficial revelations.

From an interdisciplinary perspective, there has been a noteworthy reception of life phenomenology in the field of psychotherapy in the German-speaking area for a long time (especially in the context of existential analysis and individual psychology ). Some results of this very fruitful encounter are reflected in the 2006 yearbook for psychotherapy, philosophy and culture psycho-logik .

In addition, one can observe how the phenomenology of life is currently gaining attention in theology and Christian religious philosophy (for example with Hanna-Barbara Gerl-Falkovitz and Markus Enders ). A larger reception in the theory of the arts and in political and economic research (which would be offered on the part of the life-phenomenological range of topics) has not yet emerged.

literature

  • Michel Henry: Radical Life Phenomenology. Selected studies on phenomenology. Translated and edited by Rolf Kühn . Alber, Freiburg, Munich 1992, ISBN 978-3-495-47737-3 .
  • Michel Henry's Radical Phenomenology. In: Studia Phaenomenologica. Volume IX, 2009.
  • Rolf Kühn: Practice of Phenomenology. Exercises into the unimaginable. Alber, Freiburg, Munich 2009, ISBN 978-3-495-48357-2 ( Soul, Existence and Life. Volume 12).
  • Rolf Kühn: Inner certainty and living self: Basic features of the phenomenology of life. Königshausen and Neumann, Würzburg 2005, ISBN 978-3-8260-2960-8 .
  • Rolf Kühn: corporeality as vitality. Michel Henry's phenomenology of absolute subjectivity as affectivity. Alber, Freiburg, Munich 1992, ISBN 3-495-47738-1 .
  • Rolf Kühn, Michael Staudigl (eds.): Epoché and reduction in phenomenology. Königshausen and Neumann, Würzburg 2003, ISBN 978-3-8260-2589-1 ( Orbis phaenomenologicus. 3).
  • Jean-Michel Longneaux (ed.): Retrouver la vie oubliée. Critiques et perspectives de la philosophie de Michel Henry. Presses Universitaires de Namur, 2000.
  • Sophia Kattelmann, Sebastian Knöpker (ed.): Life phenomenology in Germany. Homage to Rolf Kühn. Alber, Freiburg i. Br., Munich 2012, ISBN 978-3-495-48520-0 .
  • Julia Scheidegger: Radical Hermeneutics. Michel Henry's Phenomenology of Life. Alber, Freiburg, Munich 2012, ISBN 978-3-495-48519-4 .
  • Marco A. Sorace:  Henry, Michel. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 26, Bautz, Nordhausen 2006, ISBN 3-88309-354-8 , Sp. 689-693.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Michel Henry: L'Essence de la manifestation . Presses Universitaires de France, Paris 1963 (2nd edition in one volume 1990); engl. The Essence of Manifestation . Translated by Girard Etzkorn, Nijhoff, Den Haag 1973.
  2. ↑ Michel Henry: Incarnation. A philosophy de la chair . Paris 2000; quoted from Michel Henry: Incarnation. A philosophy of the flesh . Translated by Rolf Kühn, Freiburg / Munich 2002, p. 151.
  3. ↑ Michel Henry: Radical Life Phenomenology. Selected studies on phenomenology . Translated and edited by Rolf Kühn, Freiburg / Munich 1992.
  4. ↑ Dominique Janicaud: Le tournant théologique de la française phénoménologie . Édition de l'éclat, Combas 1991. Dt .: The theological turn of French phenomenology . Turia + Kant, Vienna / Berlin 2014.
  5. ^ Theodor W. Adorno: The actuality of philosophy . In: Collected Writings . Vol. 1: Early philosophical writings . Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main 1997.