There are two books, in my opinion, which are absolutely essential reading for anyone who is serious about understanding Heidegger's Being and Time and this is one of them (the other is Heidegger's lecture course on Plato's Sophist). This is not an introductory book and so it should not be the first book you read on Heidegger or on Being and Time, but if you have already read Being and Time and have at least a basic idea of what Heidegger is attempting to do in Being and Time this book will deepen that understanding a hundred fold.



Kisiel attempts to locate the origins of some of the major concepts of Being and Time (such as facticity, hermeneutic situation, falleness, etc.) in some of the lecture courses Heidegger was giving both before and during the time when he was working on Being and Time. Heidegger was often a far more lucid lecturer than he was a writer (one of the reasons I place so much value on his lecture course on Plato's Sophist) so focusing on his lecture courses is a good way of getting to the heart of what Heidegger is trying to do with his new vocabulary and neologisms without getting bogged down in them. Heidegger's course on the phenomenology of religion (as discussed in this book) is especially illuminating in that regard. I'm not sure anyone can fully understand what Heidegger is doing when he determines Dasein's being as care without reading what he has to say about Augustine in those courses and without understanding Heidegger's claim that Augustine's "restless heart in search of God" penetrates much more deeply into the self-world and factic life of Dasein than Descartes's cogito ergo sum. As a bonus many of the lecture courses Kisiel discusses are now available in English translation for the reader who would like to compare the lectures themselves to Kisiel's descriptions.



Kisiel also points out the importance of the notion of formal indication in understanding Heidegger's concepts. This whole problematic arises out of Heidegger's confrontation with the Neo-Kantians (who are not widely read anymore). The problem, put simply, is a question as to how it is possible to approach the nonobjectifiable subject matter of phenomenology without already inflicting an objectification on it? (pg. 48). Or, to put it another way, how is it possible to describe the concrete movement of life reflectively without falsifying it? Formal indication is Heidegger's solution to this problem. With formal indication the philosopher searches for a concept that is drawn from the actual temporal intentional movement of experience and which "says to show" as opposed to a concept which subsumes a particular under an abstract universal. This is the method Heidegger uses in Being and Time and it is part of what makes Being and Time so difficult for those who are new to Heidegger.



I should point out quickly that the first 50 to 100 pages of Kisiel's book are the most challenging. I had to read the first sections of this book three or four times before they started to sink in, but the later sections, while not easy by any means, are at least easier. So do not be discouraged if you are having a hard time making it through the beginning sections. I would suggest just plowing through, trying to make sense out of what you can, and then returning when you have digested the later sections of the book.



When I have time I intend to add to my review and provide a fuller summary of the contents of this wonderful book, but for now I will simply give it my wholehearted endorsement and encourage anyone who is at all serious about Heidegger to get a copy as soon as possible. It is a book you will want to read and return to over and over.



-Brian