Abstract
In philosophy, personhood is normally discussed from the perspective of unity or identity. Early phenomenological research on this topic was no exception. Upon closer inspection, though, it turns out that the topic of the unity of the person undergoes a noteworthy transformation there. The following study is guided by the thesis that the structure of personhood becomes fundamentally more dynamic so that the talk of “unity” requires a rethinking of what one means by “unity.” The following study will (1) begin by identifying the starting point for Stein’s definition of the person in her lectures on “The Construction of the Human Person” from 1932/33 and compare it to Husserl’s basic ideas in Ideas II, then (2) examine Scheler’s remarks on the topic in his Formalism in Ethics and Non-formal Ethics of Value from 1913, before (3) returning to Stein’s approach once again, against the background of Scheler’s and Husserl’s expositions of the problem, exhibiting the perspectives that her definition of the person and its unity open up and that represent an advance over their thinking on the matter.
Translated from German by Thomas Nenon.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
This article was realized at the Faculty of Humanities of the Charles University Prague in the context of the research project Life and Environment: Phenomenological Relations between Subjectivity and Natural World (Grantová agentura ČR, č. 401/15-10832S).
- 2.
“Human being is living out of its soul, which is the centre of its being.” (Stein 2010b: 191)
- 3.
“All ensouled is rooting in the core.” (Stein 2010b: 191)
- 4.
Nishida Kitaro described an analogous relationship between the self and the person already in 1911 when he characterizes the unity of the acts of consciousness as a “self” and the person as the guarantor of this unity the “power of unity,” which “cannot be discovered by an analysis of the individual contents of consciousness” (Nishida 1989, ch. III.10, 170).
- 5.
This meontic character plays a prominent role in analyses carried out by representatives of the Kyoto School. Whereas Nishida emphasized that the unifying force as the epitome of the person cannot be derived from single contents of consciousness, Nishitani Keiji later states that the person is an “appearance” behind which there is nothing that could come to appear”; a person for him is first “being”: what comes forth into appearance, but this “being” appears only in virtue of the “absolute nothing” of which it is an appearance and with which it “becomes one” (Nishitani 1986, ch. II.5, 132).
- 6.
See the chapter “Jouissance et independance” (Levinas 1961: 86–88).
- 7.
Concerning the concept of the Oikological, see Sepp 2011.
- 8.
See Stein 2006: 501–525.
- 9.
There are at least three senses of “absolute” that are relevant here: one must distinguish what merely purports to be absolute from that which is described above as “ab-solute” and from what is “absolute” in view of the séparation of individual existence that was described above as well.
- 10.
The result is a two-fold intentional relation whereby, from Husserl’s perspective , life in the finally constituted products is contrasted with that which its transcendental genesis reveals, and, from Levinas’ point of view, finite desire is contrasted with the infinite.
- 11.
See, for example, Scheler 1954: 83ff.
References
Husserl, Edmund. 1960. Cartesian Meditations. Trans Dorion Cairns. Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff.
———. 1970. The Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology. An Introduction to Phenomenology. Trans. David Carr. Evanston: Northwestern University Press.
———. 1983. Ideas pertaining to a Pure Phenomenology and Phenomenological Philosophy Book One. Trans. Fred Kersten. Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff.
———. 1989. Ideas Pertaining to a Pure Phenomenology and to a Phenomenological Philosophy. Second Book: Studies in the Phenomenology of Constitution. Trans. R. Rojcewicz and A. Schuwer. Dordrecht: Kluwer.
Levinas, Emmanuel. 1961. Totalité et infini. Essai sur l’extériorité, Phaenomenologica. Vol. 8. La Haye: Martinus Nijhoff.
Nishida, Kitaro: 1989. Über das Gute. Eine Philosophie der reinen Erfahrung [Zen no kenkyū, 1911]. Trans. Peter Pörtner. Frankfurt am Main: Insel.
Nishitani, Keiji: 1986. Was ist Religion? [Shūkyō towa nanika, 1980]. Trans. Dora Fischer-Barnicol. 2nd ed., Frankfurt am Main: Insel.
Scheler, Max 1954. Vom Ewigen im Menschen (Gesammelte Werke, vol. V). Ed. Maria Scheler. Bern/München: Francke.
———. 1973 Formalism in Ethics and Non-formal Ethics of Value. Trans. Manfred Frings and Roger Funk. Evanston: Northwestern University Press.
Sepp, Hans Rainer. 2011. Grundfragen einer phänomenologischen Oikologie. AUC Interpretationes. Studia Philosophica Europeanea [Praha] 1, 217–241.
Stein, Edith. 2004. Einführung in die Philosophie (Edith Stein Gesamtausgabe, vol. 8). Ed. Claudia Mariéle Wulf. Freiburg: Herder.
———. 2006. Endliches und ewiges Sein. Versuch eines Aufstiegs zum Sinn des Seins (Edith Stein Gesamtausgabe, vol. 11/12). Ed. Andreas Uwe Müller. Freiburg: Herder.
———. 2010a. Der Aufbau der menschlichen Person. Vorlesungen zur philosophischen Anthropologie (Edith Stein Gesamtausgabe, vol. 14). Ed. Beate Beckmann-Zöller. 2nd ed. Freiburg: Herder.
———. 2010b. Individuum und Gemeinschaft [1919], Beiträge zur philosophischen Begründung der Psychologie und der Geisteswissenschaften (Edith Stein Gesamtausgabe, vol. 6). Ed. Beate Beckmann-Zöller. Freiburg: Herder.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2017 Springer International Publishing AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Sepp, H.R. (2017). Edith’s Stein Conception of the Person Within the Context of the Phenomenological Movement. In: Magrì, E., Moran, D. (eds) Empathy, Sociality, and Personhood. Contributions To Phenomenology, vol 94. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-71096-9_3
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-71096-9_3
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-71095-2
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-71096-9
eBook Packages: Religion and PhilosophyPhilosophy and Religion (R0)