Abstract

This dissertation intends to work out the relation of Heidegger's ontological reflection to theology in terms of a correlation which traces the intersection of two autonomous spheres of reflection without dissolving one into the other. This correlation is developed in terms of possibilities which Heidegger himself discloses yet does not pursue. ;Chapter One, the introduction, sketches the context of the investigation. Chapter Two analyzes Heidegger's notion of ontology within the framework of Sein und Zeit, as developed against the backdrop of his early theological education and his preoccupation with early Christianity. Heidegger's approach here is characterized as reflexive thinking: the self-reflection on the being of human being in order to discover the meaning of being-itself. This serves as background for Chapter Three on Heidegger's "Phanomenologie und Theologie," where he presents the relation of theology to ontology as that of the positive science of Christian existence to the over-arching transcendental science of ontology. Chapter Four elaborates Heidegger's notion of "onto-theo-logy" as the essential unity of ontology and theology within the metaphysical tradition, a tradition which he seeks to deconstruct. Metaphysics, according to Heidegger, represents the being of beings in their unity and in their totality , but it never thinks the ontological difference as such between being and beings. Heidegger's proposal is initially simply to dwell on this ontological difference. ;Heidegger breaks with the metaphysical construction of the relation of being and God and in so doing lays the groundwork for a non-metaphysical construction of this relation, namely in terms of the mutual appropriation of the two. Chapter Five, the conclusion, examines some of Heidegger's linguistic strategies as they illuminate both his own project and that of this new possible relationship of God and being. The investigation explicates a particular formulation of Heidegger's later thought which reflects on human words as the echo of the self-bespeaking of being. This formulation is then correlated with theological reflection upon the symbol of incarnate deity, as the appearance of God in the non-divine