Abstract

The function of the formal indication is the mediation between concept and thing. This mediation is the concretization of the concept. I show that the formality of formal indications is the specific generality (Allgemeinheitscharakter) of philosophical concepts. This formality is their principality (Prinzipialität). Accordingly, a formally indicating concept would be a concept which gives the direction for the concretion as principally as possible. A principality which secures the repeatability and comprehensibility of philosophical insights. Looking at Heidegger’s lecture of the winter semester 1921/22, it is shown that 1) Heidegger understands the principality as the Being of beings, 2) that philosophical language is about the mediation between the principality of concepts and the concreteness of things; and 3) that this principality is identified with the formality of the formal indication. This early lecture is decisive for Heidegger’s whole philosophy because it lays bare the necessary relation between ontology and philosophy of language.