But what if no “ontological” connection between place and Being exists? What if that proposition is delusional? What if, in fact, the “ontological Jew” more accurately reflects reality, that there is no Being but only beings on the move? Heidegger’s ontology does not point toward a revolution in metaphysics; it reinforces Western philosophy’s urge to reduce complexity to simplicity (Being). That he pontificates in nationalistic terms only exposes his philosophy as symptomatic of the Western tendency since the 1600s to see the world in terms of nations, despite all borders being fundamentally arbitrary. Taking a long view, we see over time cultures, nations, and civilizations emerge, evolve, and, frequently, disappear, with continual migrations and comingling, and all along there emerge identities that have longer or shorter lifetimes depending on little more than chance, a Grand Whac-A-Mole of History. If this is the case, the wandering ontological “Jew” seems a truer description of Dasein than the immobile German. After all, looking back, Heidegger’s project seems the consummate Liebestod of Western Civilization’s centuries old flirtation with a nationalism that culminated in two world wars. As moderns we still struggle with questions about the nation-state — ISIL’s expansion across several national borders symbolizes the paradox of contemporary nationalism’s failure and tenacity. Indeed, elsewhere in the Middle East, some might argue that the state of Israel, ipso facto, consists of non-“Jews,” that the “Jewish state” is not the “‘Jewish’ state,” the moniker being simply an ontological oxymoron. It may be time we start to confront what has always been the case: borders are illusory; peoples have, do and always will migrate; and nomadism might point the way to a real ontological revolution, one that can find its model in “the Jews.”
Posted on: Sun, 09 Nov 2014 18:25:22 +0000
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