Man is not the lord of beings. Man is the shepherd of Being.

Man loses
nothing in this "less"; rather, he gains in that he attains the truth of
Being. He gains the essential poverty of the shepherd, whose dignity
consists in being called by Being itself into the preservation of Being's
truth." (Letter on Humanism, 1964)

In the introduction to Parmenides,

Heidegger always makes his intentions clear, and those intentions

revolve
around providing what he calls a preparatory meditation on the name
and the word aletheia and its corresponding counter -essence. This
meditation, of course, is an examination of aletheia from its Greek
roots, where Heidegger begins his investigat
ion by carefully considering two critical Greek thinkers. For Heidegger,
Parmenides and Heraclitus are two Greek thinkers that, as
contemporaries in the decades between 540 and 460, were concerned
with thinking the truethat is, as Heidegger explains: to experience
the true in its essence and, in such essential experience, to know the
truth of what is true. The notion of thinking true in the thought of
the two thinkers
Parmenides and Heraclitus, has, as Heidegger
contends, never been affected by the passing of the years and
centuries. One reason for this, as Heidegger proceeds to argue, is that
what is thought in [their] thinking is precisely historical, preceding
and thereby anticipating all successive history. In effect, the degree to
which this kind of thinking precedes and determines all history
makes it possible to call the thought of Parmenides and Heraclitus the
beginning
the thinking of these two thinkers denotes them asprimordial
thinkers.
In order to access the thought of these primordial thinkers and subvert
the intention to reflect today on the thinking of Parmenides and
Heraclitus through doubts and objections, Heidegger suggests that we
must embark on the task of think[ing] the thoughts that both
[of]these thinkers have thought. Such a task is unavoidable. To be
sure, the unavoidable requirement involves attending to the words of
these thinkers. In this regard, Heidegger turns to Parmenides, whose
words have the linguistic form of verses that seem to be a poem.
But, the poem of Parmenides presents a philosophical doctrine it
can be best characterized as a
doctrinal poem or a didactic poem functioning as a teaching
device in very much the same vein as the Didache, or Teaching of the
Twelve Apostles
 from the 2nd century. Perhaps, just as an early Christian followed the
Didache text, Heidegger proposes that we must follow
Parmenides text, since it is the most secure way to learn what is said
and thought in the wordsof Parmenides.

Even in following the text, Heidegger concedes that, despite the

interpretation, neither the translation nor the clarification of the text
carries much weight so long as what is thought in the word of
Parmenides does not itself address us. What this means, then, for
Heidegger, is that everything is how we follow the text depends on our
paying heed to the claim arising out of the thoughtful word. This is the
only way for us to pay heed to the claim and know the dictum. The
relationship between heeding and knowing concerns the being in its
ground essential knowing, or heedfulness, is a retreat in face of Being
[so that] in retreating we see and we perceive essentially more This
is what Heidegger calls thoughtful heedfulness, which especially
comes to bear on his exegesis of lines 22-32 from a fragment of a
Parmenides poem
or, specifically, exegetical work on lines 22, 25, 30, and 32. The
lines that Heidegger highlights tell of a goddess who greets the thinker
Parmenides as he arrives at her home in the course of his travels. The
goddess
greeting is accompanied by an announcement of the revelations she
has in store for the thinker as he goes his way. Consequently,
Heidegger contends that everything the thinker says in the
subsequent fragments of the didactic poem is the word of this
goddess not only does Heidegger arrive as the proposition that the
goddess is the goddess truth, but the truth itself is the goddess.

The connection that Heidegger makes between the goddess and

truth has implications
not just in translating the Greek aletheia, but also the conflictual
character of unconcealness as concealment. The implications call
for, as Heidegger offers, a fourfold directive for translating the word
aletheia. The first two directives pertain to changing the emphasis in
the word unconcealness with the intent of recognizing, once
extracting un, unconcealness points to concealness. This, of
course, directly leads into the third directive as outlined in Part One:
what Heidegger calls the realm of the opposition between aletheia
and lethe in the history of Being. In Part Two, Heidegger discusses
the fourth directive as the open and free space of the clearing of
Being this fourth directive is particularly predicated on the
insufficiency of unconcealness, from which Heidegger arrives at the
following: aletheia is
the essence of the true: the truth [and] truth dwells in everything that
comes to presence; it is the essence of all essence: essentiality.

Dasein and Being

Heidegger argued that, to understand Being, one must first understand

the human kind of being, Dasein ("Being-there"), the kind of Being who
asks the question of Being. To even ask the question, remarks
Heidegger, implies that at some level the answer is already
understood. As a student of Husserl, Heidegger felt that phemenology,
which lets the phenomena "show itself from itself in the very way in
which it shows itself from itself," was the only method by which to do
ontology, the study of Being. On the other hand, for Heidegger,
modern philosophy had forgotten the question of Being; that is,
modern philsophy has become concerned with the ontic (beings), and,
thus, covers over that which makes such an understanding of beings
possible: the "isness" (Being) of beings such that beings can presence.
And the concealing-revealing presencing of Being is Dasein. However,
contrary to Husserl's Transcendental Phenomenology, Heidegger
argues that ontology as phenomenology must necessarily be
hermeneutic, or interpretive. For Heidegger, truth or aletheia is always
both concealing and revealing. When one interpretation is opened up,
other interpretations are necessarily closed off. In this sense, ontology
is always provisional.

attention to the etymology of the Greek word a-letheia. According to

Heidegger,
this term contains an alpha-privative, which the modern term truth
erases. For the
early Ancient thinkers (Heidegger often says that Parmenides and
Heraclitus were
the thinkers rather than the philosophers) Being is that which
enables the disclosure
of beings. Following from our analyses above, this means that Being is
truth in
its original sense. The Essence of truth itself is disclosure
(Erschlossenheit).19 And so,
aletheia is still unhiddenness (Unverborgenheit) in its primordial
sense as given
originally in early Greek thought.20
But these early (and primordial) thoughts of Heraclitus and Parmenides
would
soon undergo a transformation in Plato and Aristotle. This turning
point, Heidegger
argues, marked the real beginning of Western metaphysics. With the
rise of
Socrates polemic with Sophists, and mainly with the rise of Platonic
dialectics, the
focus on Being as un-concealment was lost.21 Heidegger analyzes
Platos simile of
the cave given in Book VII. of the Republic, and tries to show that a
decline, which
sets the stage for modern thinking, already takes place here. The
process of degeneration
began with the Platonic idea of truth as correctness of perception
(orthotes)
which supplants the Presocratic notion of truth as disclosedness of
being
(aletheia).22 Heideggers analysis, which reconstructs this
transformation, centers on
what he calls Platos ambiguous attitude towards Being. When Being
becomes an
Idea situated in an eminent position, then truth which should have
been understood
as the un-hiddenness of Being becomes the correct perspective of a
superior
being. Truth becomes the correspondence between thought and the
idea.23 Correspondingly,
the place of truth shifts from the original unhiddenness of Being to the
correct statement of man.

Truth

"Heidegger's way of understanding the originary phenomenon of truth

is to "make clear the mode of being of the cognition itself." His starting
point is a proposition that is not based on intuition. Someone says with
his or her back to the wall: this picture hangs askew. The proposition
embodies the claim to have discovered the picture (as a being) in the
"how" (the mode) of its being. The proposition displays this "how" of
being in language. In the attempt to verify the proposition by sensuous
experience, the recognition, according to Heidegger, is directed only to
the intended being (the picture) and not to the proposition. It is
directed to the being itself (which is to be verified by perception) in its
mode of uncoveredness ( Entdeckt-heir), i.e., in its showing-itself.
Confirmation ( Bewhrung) means this showing-itself of the being in
the same way in which it is intended in the proposition.
A true proposition shows the being in its mode of uncoveredness. The
phenomenon of "originary truth" does not have the character of
correspondence. It is the ground of the concept of truth in the sense of
correspondence and propositional truth. By unfolding the meaning of
altheia Heidegger shows us a more originary sense of truth as
unconcealment (Unverborgenheit). He wants to show that this concept
coincides with the first and originary concept of truth in Greek thinking.
In this primary sense only the discovering human Dasein can be "true"
while it is Being-discovering ( Entdeckend-Sein). On the other hand,
beings ( Seiendes) that we can find in the world can only "be" in a
secondary mode, i.e., as being-discovered (Entdecktsein). They can
only make a claim to uncoveredness. Their fundament is the Being-
discovering of the human Dasein. The being-true of a discovered being
is only possible as being discovered by human Dasein as being-in-the-
world.
The authentic Being of Dasein, the being-in-the truth, presupposes
disclosedness ( Erschlossenheit) of the world in states-of-mind
( Befindlichkeiten), understanding, and discourse, i.e., the constitution
of the being (Seinsverfassung) of human Dasein as thrownness
( Geworfenheit) and project ( Entwurf). The mode of being of Dasein is
characterized equiprimordially ( gleichursprnglich) by the possibility
of both authenticity (being-in-the-truth) and the deficient mode
(Verfallsform) of inauthenticity. In the mode of the "they" (das Man), of
obstruction ( Verstelltheit), of gossip ( Gerede), Dasein is in untruth.
Thus the being-in-the-world of human Dasein is determined at the
same time by truth and untruth. We must always fight anew for the
truth of Dasein (Being-discovering). Following Heidegger, the negative
expression "a-ltheia" expresses the fact that hiding itself is a main
characteristic of Being. In the hiding-itself of Being, human Dasein is
hidden for itself in the mode of untruth.
Heidegger wants to make evident how the transition from the originary
concept of truth as altheia to "correspondence" came about. He
wants to make clear that correspondence is only a derived form of
truth: in a proposition Being should be displayed in the mode of its
uncoveredness. In the inauthentic forms of mere reproducing and
hearsay, the proposition becomes itself something ready-to-hand
( Zuhandenes). Thus we have to engage in the demonstration of the
uncoveredness that is preserved in the proposition. In this way the
relation between proposition and discovered being then itself becomes
something present-at-hand ( Vorhandenes) and can be understood as a
correspondence of proposition and being ( intellectus and res). The fact
that we are used to disregarding the originary dimension of truth is an
aspect of our forgetfulness of Being ( Seinsvergessenheit).
The originary dimension of truth in human Dasein "is given" ( gibt es)
only as long as there is Dasein. All truth is relative to the being of
Dasein. Thus the claim that there could be "eternal truth" seems to
Heidegger to be "fantastic." Against the background of this relativity of
truth to the being of Dasein, Heidegger asks anew: why must we
presuppose that truth "is given"? His answer is that the possibility of
truth (authenticity) and untruth (inauthenticity) belongs to the facticity
of human Dasein. From the point of view of existential ontology, the
being of human Dasein (its disclosedness) and truth are synonims.

MTHos and LOGOs

inbrief,mythosandlogosdescribesthetransitioninancientGreek
thoughtfromthestoriesofgods,goddesses,andheroes(mythos)tothe
gradualdevelopmentofrationalphilosophyandlogic(logos).Theformeris
representedbytheearliestGreekthinkers,suchasHesiodandHomer;the
latterisrepresentedbylaterthinkerscalledthepreSocraticphilosophers
andthenSocrates,Plato,andAristotle.(Seethebook:FromMythto
Reason?StudiesintheDevelopmentofGreekThought).

Intheearliest,mythosstageofdevelopment,theGreekssaweventsof
theworldasbeingcausedbyamultitudeofclashingpersonalitiesthe
gods.Thereweregodsfornaturalphenomenasuchasthesun,the
sea,thunderandlightening,andgodsforhumanactivitiessuchas
winemaking,war,andlove.Theprimarymodeofexplanationof
realityconsistedofhighlyimaginativestoriesaboutthese
personalities.However,astimewenton,Greekthinkersbecamecriticalof
theoldmythsandproposedalternativeexplanationsofnaturalphenomena
basedonobservationandlogicaldeduction.Underlogos,thehighly
personalizedworldviewoftheGreeksbecametransformedintooneinwhich
naturalphenomenawereexplainednotbyinvisiblesuperhumanpersons,but
byimpersonalnaturalcauses.

However,manyscholarsarguethattherewasnotsuchasharpdistinction
betweenmythosandlogoshistorically,thatlogosgrewoutofmythos,
andelementsofmythosremainwithustoday.

Forexample,ancientmythsprovidedthefirstbasicconceptsused
subsequentlytodeveloptheoriesoftheoriginsoftheuniverse.Wetakefor
grantedthewordsthatweuseeveryday,butthevastmajorityofhuman
beingsneverinventasinglewordororiginalconceptintheirlivesthey
learnthesethingsfromtheirculture,whichistheendproductofthousands
ofyearsofspeakingandwritingbymillionsofpeoplelongdead.Thevery
firstconceptsofcosmos,beginning,nothingness,anddifferentiation
fromasinglesubstancethesewerenotpresentinhumancultureforall
time,butoriginatedinancientmyths.Subsequentphilosophersborrowed
theseconceptsfromthemyths,whilediscardingtheoverlypersonalistic
interpretationsoftheoriginsoftheuniverse.Inthatsense,mythosprovided
thescaffoldingforthegrowthofphilosophyandmodernscience.(See
WalterBurkert,TheLogicofCosmogonyinFromMythtoReason:
StudiesintheDevelopmentofGreekThought.)

Anadditionalissueisthefactthatnotallmythsarewhollyfalse.Many
mythsarestoriesthatcommunicatetruthsevenifthecharactersandevents
inthestoryarefictional.SocratesandPlatodenouncedmanyoftheearly
mythsoftheGreeks,buttheyalsoillustratedphilosophicalpointswith
storiesthatweremeanttoserveasanalogiesormetaphors.Platosallegory
ofthecave,forexample,ismeanttoillustratetheabilityoftheeducated
humantoperceivethetruerealitybehindsurfaceimpressions.CouldPlato
havemadethesamephilosophicalpointinaliterallanguage,withoutusing
anystoriesoranalogies?Possibly,buttheimpactwouldbeless,anditis
possiblethatthepointwouldnotbeeffectivelycommunicatedatall.

Someofthetruthsthatmythscommunicateareabouthumanvalues,and
thesevaluescanbetrueevenifthestoriesinwhichthevaluesareembedded
arefalse.AncientGreekreligioncontainedmanypreposterousstories,and
thenotionofpersonaldivinebeingsdirectingnaturalphenomenaand
interveninginhumanaffairswasfalse.ButwhentheGreeksbuilttemples
andofferedsacrifices,theywerenotjustworshipingpersonalitiesthey
wereworshipingthevaluesthatthegodsrepresented.Apollowasthegodof
light,knowledge,andhealing;Herawasthegoddessofmarriageandfamily;
Aphroditewasthegoddessoflove;Athenawasthegoddessofwisdom;and
Zeus,thekingofthegods,upheldorderandjustice.Theresnoevidenceat
allthatthesepersonalitiesexistedorthatsacrificestothesepersonalities
wouldadvancethevaluestheyrepresented.Butabasicrespectforand
worshipfuldispositiontowardthevaluesthegodsrepresentedwaspartof
thefoundationofancientGreekcivilization.Idontthinkitwasa
coincidencethatthecityofAthens,whosepatrongoddesswasAthena,went
ontoproducesomeofthegreatestphilosopherstheworldhasseenlove
ofwisdomistheprerequisiteforknowledge,andthatloveofwisdomgrew
outofthecultureofAthens.(TheancientGreekwordphilosophialiterally
meansloveofwisdom.)

Itisalsoworthpointingoutthatworshipofthegods,forallofits
superstitiousaspects,wasnotincompatiblewitheventhegrowth
ofscientificknowledge.Modernwesternmedicineoriginatedinthehealing
templesdevotedtothegodAsclepius,thesonofApollo,andthegodof
medicine.BothofthegreatancientphysiciansHippocratesandGalenare
reportedtohavebeguntheircareersasphysiciansinthetemplesof
Asclepius,thefirsthospitals.Hippocratesiswidelyregardedasthefatherof
westernmedicineandGalenisconsideredthemostaccomplishedmedical
researcheroftheancientworld.Asloveofwisdomwastheprerequisitefor
philosophy,reverenceforhealingwastheprerequisiteforthedevelopment
ofmedicine.

KarenArmstronghaswrittenthatancientmythswerenevermeanttobe
takenliterally,butweremetaphoricalattemptstodescribearealitythatwas
toocomplexandelusivetoexpressinanyotherway.(AHistoryofGod)I
amnotsurethatscompletelyaccurate.Ithinkitmostlikelythatthemassof
humanitybelievedintheliteraltruthofthemyths,whileeducatedhuman
beingsunderstoodthegodstobemetaphoricalrepresentationsofthegood
thatexistedinnatureandhumanity.Somewouldarguethatthisuseof
metaphorstodescriberealityisdeceptiveandunnecessary.Butaliteral
understandingofrealityisnotalwayspossible,andmetaphorsarewidely
usedevenbyscientists.

TheodoreL.Brown,aprofessoremeritusofchemistryattheUniversityof
IllinoisatUrbanaChampaign,hasprovidednumerousexamplesofscientific
metaphorsinhisbook,MakingTruth:MetaphorinScience.Accordingto
Brown,thehistoryofthehumanunderstandingoftheatom,whichcannot
bedirectlyseen,beganwithasimplemetaphorofatomsasbilliardballs;
later,scientistscomparedatomstoplumpudding;thentheycomparedthe
atomtooursolarsystem,withelectronsorbitingaroundanucleus.There
hasbeenagradualimprovementinourmodelsoftheatomovertime,but
ultimately,thereisnosingle,correctliteralrepresentationoftheatom.Each
modelillustratesanaspectoraspectsofatomicbehaviornoonemodel
cancaptureallaspectsaccurately.Eventhenotionofatomsasparticlesis
notfullyaccurate,becauseatomscanbehavelikewaves,withoutaprecise
positioninspaceaswenormallythinkofparticlesashaving.Thesame
principleappliestomodelsofthemoleculeaswell.(Brown,chapters,46)
Anumberofscientistshavecomparedtheimaginativeconstructionof
scientificmodelstomapmakingthereisnosingle,fullyaccuratewayto
maptheearth(usingaflatsurfacetodepictasphere),soweareforcedto
useavarietyofmapsatdifferentscalesandprojections,dependingonour
needs.