Abstract

Reaction to the thought of Martin Heidegger has ranged from enthusiastic and sympathetic acceptance to total rejection. To be sure Heidegger's work has a character and language all its own, still his thought is not dogmatic. His intention is to call to fellow travelers along thought's way. The issue of this dissertation is the one of access to Heidegger's thought. Access means a way of listening in the direction of the work; it is the fruitful entry into the situation of the work. This entry opens a place where the matters questioned can be approached. Genuine acceptance of a way of thought or rejection of it can only arise from a shared situation of thought. ;The situation of Heidegger's thought can be provisionally called the mutuality or correlation of Sein and the human essence, Dasein. The dynamic togetherness of Sein and Dasein is the place from which Heidegger attempts to think Being. The correlation is a circle of dialogue, of mutual need and dependence. This unbreakable togetherness within the question of Being provides access to Heidegger's work. ;The dissertation follows this guiding thought and studies Heidegger's major works. These works despite the many steps they take never relinquish the togetherness named by Da-sein. Being and Time, On the Essence of Truth, An Introduction to Metaphysics, and Early Greek Thinking among others are studied in detail yielding a clear if thought-provoking scheme of Heidegger's thought. ;The results of this attempt to gain access to Heidegger's work points to Unconcealment as the unique lighting of the correlation of Sein and Dasein. Unconcealment, with its structure of openness and simultaneous closure, is the way of the shining of Being and the human essence. Unconcealment is Heidegger's one thought. It is the experience which leads him to take the step out of metaphysics and into thought. ;My conclusion, underway in the essential concealment of Unconcealment, recognizes our responsibility toward the things that are and each other. We are the place of the arrival and fullness of the presence of the present beings