for example, looking at colors—perception is always true. This means that looking always discovers colors, hearing always discovers tones. What is in the purest and most original sense "true"—that is, what only discovers in such a way that it can never cover up anything—is pure νοεῖν, straightforwardly observant apprehension of the simplest determinations of the being of beings as such. This νοεῖν can never cover up, can never be false; at worst it can be a nonapprehending, ἀγνοειν, not sufficing for straightforward, appropriate access.
[34]What no longer takes the form of a pure letting be seen, but rather in its indicating always has recourse to something else and so always lets something be. seen as something, acquires with this structure of synthesis the possibility of covering up. However, "truth of judgment" is only the opposite case of this covering up; it is a multiply-founded phenomenon of truth. Realism and idealism alike thoroughly miss the meaning of the Greek concept of truth from which alone the possibility of something like a "theory of Ideas" can be understood as philosophical knowledge.
And because the function of λόγος lies in letting something be seen straightforwardly, in letting beings be apprehended, λόγος can mean reason. Furthermore, because λόγος is used in the sense not only of λέγειν but also of λεγόμενον (what is pointed to as such), and because the latter is nothing other than the ὑποκείμενον (what always already lies present at the basis of all relevant speech and discussion), λόγος qua λεγόμενον means ground, ratio. Finally, because λόγος as λεγόμενον can also mean what is addressed, as something that has become visible in its relation to something else in its "relatedness," λόγος acquires the meaning of relation and relationship.
This interpretation of "apophantic speech" may suffice to clarify the primary function of λόγος.
C. The Preliminary Concept of Phenomenology
When one brings to mind concretely what has been exhibited in the interpretation of "phenomenon" and "logos" one is struck by an inner relation between what is meant by these terms. The expression "phenomenology" can be formulated in Greek as λέγειν τὰ φαινόμενον. But λέγειν means ἀποφαίνεσθαι. Hence phenomenology means: ἀποφαίνεσθαι τὰ φαινόμενα—to let what shows itself be seen from itself, just as it shows itself from itself. That is the formal meaning of the type of research that calls itself "phenomenology." But this expresses nothing other than the maxim formulated above: "To the things themselves!"
Accordingly, the term "phenomenology" differs in meaning from such expressions as "theology'' and the like. Such titles designate the objects of the respective disciplines in terms of their content. "Phenomenology" neither designates the object of its researches nor is it