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PHENOMENOLOGICAL INTERPRETATIONS

end of action in question. As beings becoming unveiled and available through the ἀληθεύειν of φρόνησις, πρακτά[actions] are as a “not yet being such and such.” As “not yet such and such” and, indeed, as the toward-which of concern, they are at the same time already such and such, i.e., insofar as they are a toward-which that belongs to a concrete readiness for dealings, the constitutive illumination of which is provided by φρόνησις. This “not-yet” and this “already” need to be understood in their “unity,” i.e., on the basis of an original givenness, with reference to which they are particular explicata. We say “particular” because here the objects in question are placed under determinate aspects of movement. The concept of στέρεσις [privation] is the category of the above-mentioned explicata. It is in this category that Hegelian dialectic is rooted within intellectual history.

Ἀλήθεια πρατική [practical truth] is nothing other than the whole unveiled moment (at the particular time) of factical life in the how of its decisive readiness for dealings with itself, and this how is within life’s factical relation of concern to the world it is presently encountering. Φρόνησις is epitactical [ibid., Ζ 10, 1143a8]: it brings beings to givenness in their basic character that they are something one should be concerned with in this or that way, and within this point of view it provides and maintains each definite aspect of the moment (the particular how, what-for, to-what-extent, and why at the particular time). As epitactical illumination, it brings one’s dealings into their basic orientation of a readiness for . . . , breaking out toward. . . . The kinds of toward-which one intends here, i.e., the beings within the moment, stand within the point of view of their significance for . . . , their being a concern one is able to attend to, their being something one needs to do right now. Φρόνησις is a looking κατὰ to; συμφέρον πρὸς τὸ τέλος [from the point of view of what is conducive to the end] (ibid., Z 9, 1142b32). Because it is the true safekeeping of the moment as a whole, circumspection in the authentic sense is what genuinely maintains the “for the sake of which” of action (i.e., its ἀρχαί) in true safekeeping. The ἀρχή always is what it is only in its concrete reference to the moment. In being seen and being seized upon, it is there for one in the moment and for it.

Our interpretation of φρόνησις also provides a concrete description of the method Aristotle uses to explicate this phenomenon, namely, descriptive comparison and elimination, which is done in accord with the different phenomenal points of view of being-related to . . . , the toward-which of the relation, and the how of the actualization of the relation. His description is always actualized by simultaneously holding the different ἕξεις [states of having] up against one another. Especially instructive in this regard is his analysis of εὐβουλία [deliberating well] (ibid., Ζ 9), which is the concrete way of actualizing the λέγειν immanent in φρόνησις. From out of the moment itself it brings into view for circumspection the how of the fitting way to set to work and authentically achieve the end in question.

However, not only does Aristotle’s interpretation bring into relief the kinds of beings and the basic characteristics of their being that φρόνησις takes into


Martin Heidegger - Supplements: From the Earliest Essays to Being and Time and Beyond