Volume 82, Issue 1, Winter 2008
Edith Stein
Angela Ales Bello
Pages 143-159
Edmund Husserl and Edith Stein
The Question of the Human Subject
The goal of this article is to analyze the way in which Edith Stein describes the human subject throughout her research, including her phenomenological phase
and the period of her Christian philosophy. In order to do this, I trace essential moments in Husserl’s philosophy, showing both Stein’s reliance upon Husserl and
her originality. Both thinkers believe that an analysis of the human being can be carried out by examining consciousness and its lived experiences. Through such
an examination Stein arrives at the same conclusion as Husserl, namely, that the human subject is formed of body, psyche, and spirit (Geist). Stein’s originality
consists in a further development of the complexity of the human being. She maps this out, providing detailed analyses of the I, the soul, the spirit, and, ultimately,
the person. She makes use of medieval philosophical anthropology, including that of Thomas Aquinas and Augustine of Hippo.