Heidegger

In a message dated 2/25/2008 7:00:52 AM Eastern Standard Time,
michael at sandwich-de-sign.co.uk writes:

mP:

>> A quote from Howard Jacobson’s excellent novel (about Jewishness, about
>> Jewing):
>>
>> “They sang songs in Buchenwald. Figure that. … True, they were ironic
>> songs about _Schicksal_, but a song’s still a song.
>>
>> “_Schicksal_ — meaning fate or destiny.
>>
>> “Shikse — meaning floozie. From which shikseh — meaning Gentile girl…
>>
>> “They used to say that character was destiny, but now they know that
>> language is.”
>>
>> [from Howard Jacobson ‘Kalooki Nights’]
>>
>> You see, the hero of the novel keeps marrying shiksehs; his destiny…
>>
>> Language = Destiny: Remind anyone of anyone?

>> ps: above, I kept mistyping ‘destiny’ as desyiny (daseiny, anyone?)

Bernard:

> Yes, of course, MichaelP, but in Heidegger’s case the destiny was reversed
> (qua his love affair with a jewess) to the effect of removing ‘theos’ from
> the ‘onto-theo-logic’ embedded in language and by which his philosophy is
> destined.

Yeh, but, two points I didn’t make clearly enough:

What interested me most about Jacobson’s point is that it is language (not
what they used to say: character) that destines, that language sends/posts
ahead of its present/presence; that this notion that the people of the
book/word (jews) know is so reminiscient of Heidegger’s notion of
geschichte, of be-ing-historical, of the linguistic sending of be-ing
(logos, physis, ousia, idea…), of language be(-)ing the dwelling of
be-ing, etc.

Also, on reflection, that it seems (to Jacobson’s hero at least) the jew’s
destiny is to en-gage/mate-with/marry its negative (the goyish, the
shiksehs), that it is, that its be-ing is consumed/consummated in the heat
of apophatic minglings; thus the (possibly etymologically unsound)
paronomasiac coupling of schicksal-shikseh (and, of course, ge-schichte).

And, Bernard, it never occurred to me to think Heidegger’s coupling with
Hannah Arendt as a reverse schicksal-shikseh. Cheers.

michaelP

Also, Michael, the term *shaygetz* applies here, meaning a rodent such as a
rat indicating as such the gentile woman as unclean in the same sense that an
uncircumcised male is “unclean.” Aside from that I would speculate that the
more general traffic for a male Jew would be with a non-Jewish prostitute and as
if taking a vicarious dip into filth. The language qua destiny (shicksal)
association enters the picture if a Jewish male has the misfortune to marry such a
woman who not only did not speak Hebrew or Yiddish but was morally and
physically unclean. In my psychological researches I refer to such a woman as the
“other woman” and that is to say other than mother, sister or wife. The
mistress, as such, has a special appeal to men, whether Jewish or gentile, because
she represents the unclean qua unconscious side of life and were sexual
liberties are indulged not fit for the marital bedroom. Such are the secret male joys
of “apophatic mingling.” In Heidegger’s case the tables are turned and we find
the Jewess as as the unclean and hence desireable woman. This “dirtyness”
would also include a modicum of intelectual brilliance, insight and imagination
that would be typical only to the male. This was also the case with C.G. Jung
and Sabina Speilrein. In either case there is implied a certain amount of
homoerotic indulgence for the “other woman” who is otherwise prematurely
“liberated” and taken on the ambiance and priveleges traditionally reserved for the
male.
sincerely, Bernard

Posted on Monday, February 25th, 2008 at 7:50 pm
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