¶ 45· The Outcome of the Preparatory Fundamental Analysis of Dasein, and the Task of a Primordial Existential Interpretation of this Entity [231]
WHAT have we gained by our preparatory analysis of Dasein, and what are we seeking? In Being-in-the-world, whose essential structures centre in disclosedness, we have found the basic state of the entity we have taken as our theme. The totality of Being-in-the-world as a structural whole has revealed itself as care. In care the Being of Dasein is included. When we came to analyse this Being, we took as our clue existencei, which, in anticipation, we had designated as the essence of Dasein. This term "existence" formally indicates that Dasein is as an understanding potentiality-for-Being, which, in its Being, makes an issue of that Being itself. In every case, I myself am the entity which is in such a manner [dergestalt seiend]. By working out the phenomenon of care, we have given ourselves an insight into the concrete constitution of existence—that is, an insight into its equiprimordial connection with Dasein's facticity and its falling.
What we are seeking is the answer to the question about the meaning of Being in general, and, prior to that, the possibility of working out in a radical manner this basic question of all ontology. But to lay bare the horizon within which something like Being in general becomes intelligible, is tantamount to clarifying the possibility of having any understanding of Being at all—an understanding which itself belongs to the constitution of the entity called Dasein.ii The understanding of Being, however, cannot be radically clarified as an essential element in Dasein's Being, unless the entity to whose Being it belongs, has been Interpreted primordially in itself with regard to its Being.
Are we entitled to the claim that in characterizing Dasein ontologically qua care we have given a primordial Interpretation of this entity ? By what criterion is the existential analytic of Dasein to be assessed as regards its
1 'Dasein und Zeitlichkeit'. In this heading and in others which follow in this Division, we have capitalized such words as 'temporal' and 'constitution' in accordance with normal practice in titles, even when this violates the orthographic conventions of our translation.