Abstract
One serious defect of the polemical writings that straightforwardly
charge Heidegger with Nazism is that they mostly represent a
poor knowledge of his philosophy. Heidegger’s writings are painfully
difficult, even to specialists, and his concepts can be easily misinterpreted,
especially by those who, instead of searching for truth, embrace
a prosecutor’s zeal. For example, in his influential book, Farias
completely avoids asking philosophical questions. On the internet, one can easily
find hundreds of articles by authors who claim that Heidegger’s
guilt has already been decided. My objective is not to blame or to exonerate
Heidegger before investigating the relationship between his
philosophy and politics in depth. Obviously, given the limited nature
of my presentation, I cannot consider Heidegger’s entire philosophical
opus. I intend to concentrate chiefly on his critique of the Western
metaphysical tradition and on an interpretation of his most controversial
statement from An Introduction to Metaphysics about the “inner
truth and greatness” of National Socialism. I investigate the essence of Heidegger's philosophy, the quest for the meaning of Being, deduce a political theory from his ontology, and arrive at his politics.