Abstract

Heidegger, in his Platons Lehre von der Wahrheit, recognizes that the “image of the cave” is the central point of Plato's thought. According to Heidegger, this image is Plato's “doctrine” on truth, offered in order to “put in light the essence of the paideia“, for “an essential rapport unites the formation and the truth”. “The being of the ‘formation’”, he says, “is founded on the being of ‘truth’;”. But in the myth of the Cave, Plato passes, according to Heidegger, from the alêtheia as not-veiling to an alêtheia as exactitude. The truth for Plato, according to Heidegger, is found not in things, but in ideas: “from the not-veiling of the essent, truth has become exactitude of the regard”; it is the “agreement” or “conformity” of essent and knowledge. Truth is thus ”under the yoke” of the idea. We note in Plato, according to Heidegger, ”a change in the essence of truth”, and “Plato treats and speaks of alêtheia, when he actually thinks of orthotês”. Here, claims Heidegger, lies Plato's “ambiguity”: “Is it not then alêtheia which forms the main object of the ‘myth of the Cave’? Certainly not. And nevertheless it remains certain that this myth contains Plato's ‘doctrine’ on truth. For it is founded on an event he does not mention, namely that the idea is above alêtheia.”