305

§72 [441-42]

as a formal indication of the 'as'. This relation belongs to the structure of the statement. The statement is something that is true or false, i.e., that provides information about something in keeping with whatever the proposition is about, makes it manifest. If we look closely, the entirety of these relations between the 'as'-relation and the propositional structure and propositional truth comes to light in the first decisive interpretation Aristotle provides of the λόγος. This comes to light in such a way, however, that we cannot immediately see or get a grip on the 'as'-phenomenon, nor on the character of the 'as a whole'.

To provide some general orientation as to the way in which I develop the problem of the λόγος as regards metaphysics and its context, I shall point to those places where I have dealt with the logos-problem, and done so in a form that deviates from our present approach (in the context of our present problem we shall pursue other directions of questioning): Being and Time, §§7B, 33, and 44; Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics, §§7, 11, and the entire third part of the book; On the Essence of Ground, first section: the problem of the λόγος in Leibniz in the context of the metaphysical question concerning being. These are merely major stages within the history of the problem; they do not provide a complete orientation regarding the development of the problematic itself.


a) The λόγος in its general conception: discourse as meaning
(σημαίνειν), giving something to be understood. The occurrence
of agreement that holds together (γένεται σύμβολον—κατὰ
συνθήκην) as condition of the possibility of discourse.


We shall first consider what Aristotle says in general about the λόγος. λόγος means discourse, everything that is spoken and sayable. The Greeks really have no word corresponding to our word 'language'. λόγος as discourse means what we understand by language, yet it also means more than our vocabulary taken as a whole. It means the fundamental faculty of being able to talk discursively, and accordingly, to speak. The Greeks thus characterize man as ζῷον λόγον ἔχον—that living being that essentially possesses the possibility of discourse. The animal, as the living being that lacks this possibility of discourse, is ζῷον ἄλογον. This definition of man then passed over into the traditional conception of man, in keeping with which (for reasons we shall not pursue now) λόγος, was later translated by the Latin ratio. It was then said that man is animal rationale, a living being with reason. From this definition you can see how the decisive problem in antiquity, where man is defined from the perspective of discourse and language, now becomes lost, and how language is only introduced again as an afterthought, whereby the whole problematic is left without its roots. If in antiquity the λόγος represents that phenomenon with


Martin Heidegger (GA 29/30) The Fundamental Concepts of Metaphysics

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