MAN IN EXISTENTIAL PHENOMENOLOGY

1. The father of existentialism

The father of Existentialism is Soren Kierkegard, a Danish

thinker who lived and worked in the last century.

2. What is existentialism

Existentialism is the reaction to the depersonalization, the

dehumanization, the loss of the uniqueness of the
individual during the Industrial Revolution.

3. Roger Troisfontaines

Roger Troisfontaines defines the existentialism as

philosophy of subjectivity or selfhood, whose fundamental
doctrine proclaims man’s freedom in the accomplishment
of his destiny, and whose principal method is consequently
that of description of phenomenology.

4. Enumerate and explain the three remarks

First remark is from Paul Tillich, a leading German

Protestant theologian, who found a haven in the United States from the
Nazis. He clarifies the main issue between “existentialism and
essentialism” by saying that the quarrel between the two initiated the
existentialism of the nineteenth and the twentieth century. It was the
unacceptance of Hegel’s perfect essentialism by existentialists who
saw what it had done to the concept of the society.

Second remark is from John Wild, author of the

authoritative book The Challenge of Existentialism. John Wild remarks
that Soren Kierkeegar was influenced in hi interest in practical or
existential thinking by earl Greeks and in his insight into the individual
person by Christianity.

Jean Paul Sartre is usually pitted against Gabriel Marcel –

the atheistic versus the theistic existentialist. But Sartre and Marcel as
well as Heidedder: all are empiricists. Man is being-in-the-world. John
Wild says “ No world, no subjective existence” This is a formula they
would accept.

Third remark is: There are many existentialists, but not two
of them are exactly alike. However, there are certain elements that
seem common in their writings. These are given below. The first three
are discussed by Troisfontaines in his article, “ What is Existentialism?”

1. Importance of subjectivity
2. Freedom: a value
3. Use of Phenomenology
4. Interest in the individual person and his dignity
5. Emphasis on immediate data of experience
6. The preference for authentic over inauthentic is existence
7. Awareness of mood and feeling: feeling that existence is hard;
that life is alien and absurd; the feeling of dread.
8. The need for commitment or engagement
9. The need to be-with-others
10. The faith that man is responsible for his existence and the
kind of being he will return out to be.

5.Troisfontaines’ what is existentialism discusses it in three parts.

a. What is existentialism is not.

To him, existentialism is not

1. a sort of postwar dilettantism: Eccentric young men

and women who frequented the night clubs near the
café where Sartre wrote misunderstood him. They
thought that being individuals meant they should be
different and that they could do anything they liked.
 2. identifiable with the philosophy of Jean Paul Sartre:
There were others, like Marcelo, who had written
ahead of Sartre. Sartre himself admitted as much.
But he was certainly the one who popularized the
existentialism.

b. What existentialism is involves the elements of;

1. Subjectivity

Object refers to the thing, subject to a person.

Objectivity indicates something that can be studied
from all angles. Subjectivity indicates something
more personal, more intimate something that can
hardly put into the words. Gabriel calls it mystery, in
contrast to problem his term for object . Subjectivity
is the true interpretation of reality.

2. Freedom

There are two aspects to be noted, according to

Transfoines:

a. There are matters imposed on me, matter over

which I have no control, like my birth, my
family, my country, my physical features.
Marcel calls his existence from the term ex-
sistere, Latin for to be outside of, while Sartre
calls this “facticity”, from the fact.
b. There are matters I can choose, like my
friends. This Marcel calls “project” or
“commitment”, and Sartre calls “engagement”.
Ultimately a man realizes he alone makes
decisions for himself. He alone decides what
kind a man he will be. He alone can say yes or
no to God.

3. Phenomenology
 Just what is phenomenology? Is it a method or
an attitude or both?
As method, it has the following characteristics:

a. Description: In the traditional philosophy, there are

many definitions. Here, there are still definitions,
but a minimum. There is rather description of what
is immediately given in experience (phenomenon).
b. Circular description: It does not form a vicious
circle. Different terms are used to describe the
same phenomenon, with the end result of new
insights grasped by the subject. The initial
knowledge grows and grows until the person knows
that now he knows.
c. Use of examples as well as literary forms: such as
the drama, poetry, short story, and the novel.
Existentialists philosophers are empiricists and
pragmatists. They distrust speculation and the
abstract. They want their works to be read. They
“sugar-coat” their philosophical insights.

As an attitude it involves three steps:

a. A bracketing of what one already knows. In so

doing, one can approach the object of knowing
with fresh unprejudiced eyes.
b. A first, then a second reflection.
c. The truth coming out of concealment.

c. The two divergent tendencies of existentialism according to

Troisfoines:

1. Atheistic or inauthentic, as in the writings of Jean Paul

Sartre.
2. Christian or Theistic or Authentic, as in the writing of
Gabriel Marcel.

6. The Christian existentialist viewpoint on man according to Engelbert

J Van Croonenberg.
 1.Experience of one’s own existence: It is the only through
his own being that man comes in contact with reality. The experience
of self necessarily has many modalities, but there is one basic
experience which makes all others possible and without which they
could not be. It is the experience of one’s own existence.

2.To exist is to stand out: The word existence composed of

the Latin words, ex which means “out, beyond, above,”
and sistere, which mean “to stand out”.

3. Man and his body: ‘Have” in “I have a body”, means

possession. Now this is different from “ I have a book”
although both statements refer to possession. First,
because I cannot dispose of my body the way I can
dispose of a book; second, “ I” is not equal to “my
body,” I am more than my body.

4. Being-in-the-world: I am in contact with things and

persons. I am part of the space structure and time
constellation, which are inherent in this world.

5. Being-in-situation: Situations stands here for that zone

reality which is influenced by me and influences me.
Many elements of my situation are not my own making.
I did not choose my parents, my country, the time of my
birth. On the other hand, there are elements where my
free action is decisive: choose of my friends, my
interest, my activities.

6. I and my life: I am more than my life. “I live my life” is

different from “ My life is lived”. The first means I am
the master of my life. The second means I am a slave,
dictated upon others, such as the media.

7. A value to be realized within ourselves: Our authentic

growth takes place in the here and now of concrete
situation. Our giving way to a driver during peak hours
is such a value realized only within ourselves.

8. Values we have and values we are: Values we have are

on the object level, while values we are on the subject
level and, thus, enhance our existence.
 9. The vocation of man: Simply put, the personal vocation
of man is the perfecting of life and personality to the full
measure to which he has been destined.

10. Creative Fidelity: It is the actual continuation of the

original dedication to one’s personal vocation. Fidelity
means loyalty to a given word and commitment in spite
of adversities. This fidelity is dynamic and creative.
“Creativity” refers to the man’s being a “homo viator
and, therefore, in need of transforming his life to a
continuous growth- to authenticity. Creative also means
man’s ability to adapt to constantly varying
circumstances.

11. Pain and suffering: Fidelity to vocation is severely

tested when a man is faced with pain and suffering. The
proper attitudes are: (a)accept them, for these also
have existential value, and(b) try to find out their
meaning in your life.

12. Being-unto-death: As an embodied being, man is also

a being-for-death. The common man tries to avoid its
very possibility, but the philosopher, who wants to come
to the ultimate root of all, reality cannot leave it
unconsidered.

13. Gain in Loss: The unfolding of the human personality

is a mixture of joy and pain. It is characteristic of this
unfolding that the higher can be reached by leaving
behind the lower. This is due to the peculiar structure of
man, where materiality and spirituality are the two
antipodes.

14. a super-temporal dimensions: When a man commits

himself to his personal vacation, his decision is based
upon that which is permanent in his being and, thus, he
transcends the changing elements of time and space.
He knows that with the emergence of his spirit his real
self will find its highest expression.
7. The most Prominent Existentialist

1.Soren Kierkegard was born in Copenhagen in 1813 and

died in 1855. This Danish thinker was about to become a minister in
the Danish church when he realized there was a discrepancy between
the religion which was preached and the religion as it might really be
lived. He became a loner, devoting his life to writing.
This Danish thinker, steeped in the knowledge of
greek philosophy, is accepted as the father of Existentialism. It does
not mean though that he is the originator of all modern existentialist
theme, but the claim is richly backed p by his works. The most
important of these are:

a. Either/Or- where he analyzes the aesthetic and the

ethical modes of life.
c. Fear and trembling – where he analyzes the biblical story
of the sacrifice of Isaac, introducing us to the “absurd,” an
existentialist.

3. Karl Jasper, born in 1883, was a german professor

who produced Psychology of World Views (1919)
Philosophy (1932), and Philosophical Logic (1947). He
is the nearest to Kierkegaard in beliefs. He considers
the individual as the “unique existent, the being who
freely transcend what he already is and creates
himself, as it were, through the exercise of his
freedom. Indeed, from this point of view man is
always in the making, his own making.
Though with an unstable essence, Jasper says man
can be seen from the two inseparable phases of is
being: Dasien and Existenz. Dasien refers to myself
as object and includes my reality. Existenz is very
myself, purely subjective. It cannot analyzed nor
defined. It is free. But my “existenz is in my dasien
and all acts of the former are manifested in the
latter.

4. Jean Paul Sartre, born in 1905 and died April 15, 1980, is
the French philosopher mostly credited with the popularizing