With
the existential determination of the essence of man, therefore, nothing is
decided about the "existence of God" or his "non-being," no
more than about the possibility of gods. Thus it is not only rash but also an
error in procedure to maintain that the interpretation of the essence of man
from the relation of his essence to the truth of Being is atheism. And what is
more, this arbitrary classification betrays a lack of careful reading. No one
bothers to notice that in my essay "On the Essence of Ground" the
following appears: "Through the ontological interpretation of Dasein as
being-in-the-world no decision, whether positive or negative, is made
concerning a possible being toward God. It is, however, the case that through
an illumination of transcendence we first achieve an adequate concept of
Dasein, with respect to which it can now be asked how the relationship of
Dasein to God is ontologically ordered." If we think about this remark too
quickly, as is usually the case, we will declare that such a philosophy does
not decide either for or against the existence of god. It remains stalled in
indifference. Thus it is unconcerned with the religious question. Such
indifferentism ultimately falls prey to nihilism.
But does the foregoing
observation teach indifferentism? Why then are particular words in the note
italicized--and not just random ones? For no other reason than to indicate that
the thinking that thinks from the question concerning the truth of Being
questions more primordially than metaphysics can. Only from the truth of Being
can the essence of the holy be thought. Only from the essence of the holy is
the essence of the divine to be thought. Only in the light of the essence of
divinity can it be thought or said what the word "God" is to signify.
Or should we not first be able to hear and understand all these words carefully
if we are to be permitted as men, that is, as ek-sistent creatures, to
experience a relation of God to man? How can man at the present stage of world
history ask at all seriously and rigorously whether the god nears or withdraws,
when he has above all neglected to think into the dimension in which alone that
question can be asked? But this is the dimension of the holy, which indeed
remains closed as a dimension if the open region of Being is not cleared and in
its clearing is near man. Perhaps what is distinctive about this world-epoch
consists in the closure of the dimension of the hale [des Heilen].
Perhaps that is the sole malignancy [Unheil].
"Letter on Humanism," in Martin Heidegger: Basic Writings (New York: HarperCollins, 1993), 253-254.