PHENOMENOLOGY AND THE GIVENNESS OF THE HERMENEUTIC CIRCLE

James Mensch, Faculty of Humanities, Charles University, Prague

The relationship between hermeneutics and phenomenology has

always been problematic. If a single doctrine can be said to

characterize hermeneutics, it is that of the circle of

interpretation. At its broadest, the circle relates the

interpreter to the text he wishes to understand. The text, at

work in determining the historical tradition in which the

interpreter works, determines his interpretation in determining

this tradition. His interpretation, however, contributes to this

tradition and, hence, plays its part in determining the text that

is presented through it. Here, text and interpretation enter

into a circle of mutual determination. Phenomenology, however,

was initially conceived as a method that allows us to avoid such

circularity. Its most characteristic moment, that of the epoché,

was conceived with this in mind. As Roman Ingarten points out,

its purpose is to avoid the reasoning in a circle that arises

when we assume, as part of our demonstration, the conclusion we

wish to prove (Ingarten, p. 12). To prevent this, we perform the

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epoché: we suspend all our judgments regarding the world and

focus on the evidence we have for them. Thus, from the

phenomenological perspective, we have to suspend the thesis that

our interpretations are determined by a historical tradition.

Only then can we examine the intuitive evidence for such

determination. The same, a fortiori, applies to the thesis of

the hermeneutic circle. The phenomenological question is: what

is the evidence for assuming such a circle? This, however, is

precisely the question that hermeneutics considers illegitimate.

It claims that there is no “intuitive foundation” for our

judgments that is “ultimate” (Ricoeur, p. 91). In fact, to

assert that there is amounts to misunderstanding what it means to

understand. Understanding, it claims, is essentially circular.

In what follows, I will first examine hermeneutics’ account of

the circular structure of the understanding. I will then raise

the question of the intuitive evidence for this structure.

Heidegger and the Circular Nature of the Understanding

For Heidegger, the claim that the understanding is circular—

i.e., always involves presuppositions—comes as a response to the

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inevitable circularity that arises in our raising the question of

being. As he observes, “Everything we talk about, everything we

have in view… is being; what we are is being, and so is how we

are” (Heidegger, p. 26.) Given this, must we not presuppose

being in asking about it? The nature of this presupposition

becomes clear when, in a move reminiscent of Descartes (and

Husserl), he chooses to begin his investigation by examining the

subjects who engage in it. The success of the inquiry, he

claims, depends on our making transparent the Dasein—the human

existence—that conducts the inquiry.1 This reflexive turn to the

being of the subject raises the question of the circle: Are we

not presupposing being in our definition of Dasein and employing

1 ENDNOTES

? In his words, “Looking at something, understanding and

conceiving it, choosing, access to it—all these ways of

behaving are constitutive for our inquiry, and therefore are

modes of Being for those particular entities which we, the

inquirers, are ourselves. Thus to work out the question of

Being adequately, we must make an entity—the inquirer—

transparent in his own Being” (Heidegger, pp. 26-7).

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this presupposition in our inquiry into the nature of being? As

Heidegger expresses this: “If we must first define an entity in

its Being, and if we want to formulate the question of Being only

on this basis, what is this but going in a circle? In working

out our question, have we not ‘presupposed’ something which only

the answer can bring?” (Heidegger, p. 27). His response to this

question is highly ambiguous. On the one hand, he asserts that

the circularity in question is not “vicious,” as would be the

case were the presupposition that of a “concept” used as a basis

for deductive reasoning. On the other hand, he admits that, in

starting with Dasein, he does presuppose a certain understanding

of being. This is the “average understanding of Being in which

we always operate and which in the end belongs to the essential

constitution of Dasein itself” (ibid., p. 28). In explicating

Dasein, he will explicate this understanding. There will be a

“back and forth relation” between the question of being and that

of this average understanding (ibid.). Thus, Heidegger’s

response to the question of circularity is not to deny it, but

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rather to analyze our “average understanding” of being in terms

of the constitution of Dasein.

According to this analysis, Dasein’s relation to the world

is essentially pragmatic. Things appear to Dasein as

“equipment,” i.e., as means for his projects. Thus,

understanding how to cross a lake in a sailboat, Dasein takes the

wind as wind to fill his sails; understanding how to make a

bookcase, he interpret nails and wood accordingly, and so on.

Such understanding is inherent in acquiring and using the objects

that we need. The interpretation that makes this explicit is

based on this tacit understanding. The “essential constitution”

of Dasein that this points to is that of our projective being.

For example, in deciding to cross the lake, I grasp this as a

possibility I am capable of and project it forward as the future

I will actualize. Engaging in this activity, I not only disclose

my being as the person who has crossed the lake in a sailboat, I

also exhibit both the boat and the wind as means for my purposes.

This grasping of crossing the lake as a possibility is part of my

understanding of how I make my way in the world. Understanding

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something as something, e.g., wind as wind to fill my sails, and

projecting myself forward as the person who will accomplish something,

e.g., cross the lake, are one and the same. In Heidegger’s words,

“As understanding, Dasein projects its Being upon possibilities.”

This “Being-towards-possibilities, which understands, is itself a

potentiality-for-Being, and it is so because of the way these

possibilities, as disclosed, exert their counter-thrust

[Ruckschlag] upon Dasein” (Heidegger, p. 186). Their counter-

thrust is their role in the defining of Dasein’s being as having

realized one of his possibilities.

If understanding and projecting are the same, then we never

initially grasp anything as it is in itself apart from the uses

to which we can put it. Such uses and, hence, our understanding,

involve the ensemble of things required for our projects. The

nail, for example, is grasped with the hammer; and both are

understood in relation to the boards we are nailing. The thing

that we are making, say, a bookcase, is intelligible in terms of

the books that we are making it for; and these books, themselves,

are grasped in terms of further references. Things, then, are

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always interpreted in terms of their relations with other things,

the ensemble corresponding to the possibilities we have of

engaging with them. Granting this, all interpretation of things

involves presuppositions. In Heidegger’s words, “An

interpretation is never a presuppositionless apprehending of

something presented to us” (Heidegger, pp. 191-2). It

articulates a tacit understanding—a way of being in and using the

world—that is given in advance.

Having explicated this average, tacit understanding,

Heidegger raises again the question of the circle. If all

interpretation presupposes a pregiven understanding, “how is it

to bring any scientific results to maturity without moving in a

circle?” (Heidegger, pp. 194). The circle consists of the

results of interpretation presupposing the understanding that

interpretation makes explicit. Heidegger’s response to this is

not to deny such circularity, but, rather, to affirm the circular

nature of human understanding. To see the circle as vicious, he

claims, is to misunderstand the act of understanding—i.e. its

basis in projection (ibid.). The interpretations that follow

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from Dasein’s understanding express his projecting himself

forward in terms of the possibilities he has to use things. In

his words, “the forestructure of understanding and the as-

structure of interpretation show an existential-ontological

connection with the phenomenon of projection.” This points back

to “to a primordial state of Dasein’s Being” (ibid., p. 192).

Given this, we have to affirm that “[t]he ‘circle’ in

understanding belongs to the structure of meaning, and the latter

phenomenon is rooted in the existential constitution of Dasein,

that is, in the understanding that interprets. An entity for

which, as Being-in-the-world, its Being is itself an issue, has,

ontologically, a circular structure” (ibid., p. 195). The

reference here is to Dasein, defined as the entity that must

choose what he will be—this through the projects that he engages

in. The projective grasp of himself involved in such projects

gives his being this “circular structure.”

This structure affects our “historical interpretation” of

the world. Such interpretation can never be without

presuppositions. It is always circular and, thus, can never “be

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as independent of the standpoint of the observer as our

[scientific] knowledge of nature is supposed to be” (Heidegger,

p. 194). The point follows since understanding expresses the

possibilities that we project forward in our engagement with the

world. Such possibilities, however, are rooted in both our

personal histories as situated, finite beings and in the

transpersonal history that defines our common historical

situation. Both change overtime. The possibilities of our

childhood are distinct from those that we now possess as adults.

Similarly, the possibilities available to the ancient Greeks are

distinct from our own. In each case they express different

pragmatic engagements with the world. Does this mean that

historical knowledge is less rigorous than that of the exact

sciences of nature? According to Heidegger, for a science to

make this claim is a sign that it misunderstands its own

understanding, i.e., the historical presuppositions that the

understanding involves. For Heidegger, as we cited him,

“interpretation is never a presuppositionless apprehending of

something presented to us.” This holds for the interpretations

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engaged in by the exact sciences. This means that “the

ontological presuppositions of historical knowledge transcend in

principle the idea of rigor held in the most exact sciences.”

They do so insofar as the “existential foundations relevant for

it” are broader (ibid., p. 195). Those of mathematics, for

example, “lie within a narrower range” than history. Given this,

historical research can never be completed. The interpretations

that it advances are not independent of the standpoint of the

researcher, and this standpoint changes with the advance of

history. By implication, the same holds for science.

Do these conclusions also apply to Heidegger’s inquiry into

the nature of being? In the latter part of Being and Time,

Heidegger restates the problem of attempting to derive the sense

of being from the being of Dasein. He again asks: “Does it not

then become altogether patent in the end that this problem of

fundamental ontology, which we have broached, is one which moves

in a ‘circle’?” (Heidegger, p. 362). The reply is the same as

that given earlier: human understanding is, as such, circular.

In Heidegger’s words, “We have indeed already shown, in

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analyzing the structure of understanding in general, that what

gets censured inappropriately as a ‘circle,’ belongs to the

essence and to the distinctive character of understanding as

such” (ibid.). What is presupposed is not “some proposition from

which we deduce further propositions.” It is, rather, something

that has “the character of an understanding projection” (ibid.)

As such, it is rooted in the nature of Dasein’s understanding.

Thus, “[w]e can never ‘avoid’ a ‘circular’ proof in the

existential analytic” (ibid., p. 363). We cannot, because

“Dasein is already ahead of itself. As being, it has in every

case already projected itself upon definite possibilities of its

existence; and in such existentiell projections it has, in a pre-

ontological manner, also projected something like existence and

Being” (ibid.). Thus, the inquiry into the question of being, as

an research carried out by Dasein, “is itself a kind of Being

that disclosive Dasein possesses.” Given this, “can such

research be denied this projecting which is essential to Dasein?”

(ibid.). For Heidegger, it cannot. The objection of moving in a

circle, thus, “fails to recognize that entities can be

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experienced ‘factually’ only when Being is already understood,

even if it has not been conceptualized.” In other words, it

“misunderstands understanding” because it fails to grasp Dasein’s

“circular being” (ibid.).

Given this response, we have to say ontological research is

in the same position as historical research. Like the latter, it

cannot be completed. The Dasein that has “projected something

like existence and Being” is a finite situated being. His

interpretations are never independent of his standpoint, and this

changes over time. What is ultimately indicated here is a

transformation of the notion of philosophy. Our inability to

avoid the circle indicates an inability to remain within the

boundaries that traditionally distinguished philosophical

argumentation—namely, those set by premises and conclusions

linked by syllogistic reasoning. What remains seems to be a kind

of Denken, a thinking that, aware of its own interpretative

presuppositions, embraces its circular structure.2

2 Whether or not this is the inevitable result of having

to presuppose being in the investigation of being is, of

course, another issue.

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The Transformation of the Hermeneutic Circle

To see how such thinking transforms hermeneutics, we have to

note that, traditionally, hermeneutics also embraced a circular

conception of the understanding, one involving the relation of

part to whole. The circle arises because we cannot understand

the one without the other, which means “that we must understand

the whole in terms of the detail and the detail in terms of the

whole.” (Gadamer, p. 258). Thus, the meaning of a sentence is

understood in terms of the meanings of the words composing it.

Such meanings, however, can vary widely. They depend upon the

context in which the words are used. Given this, we have to

understand the meanings of the words in terms of the meaning of

the sentence in which they occur. The same argument can be

applied to the sentence, whose sense is also dependent on its

context. As Gadamer relates, for Schleiermacher, this relation

of part and whole can be expanded through a series of concentric

wholes, one where, just “[a]s the single word belongs in the

total context of the sentence, so the single text belongs in the

total context of a writer’s work, and the latter in the whole of

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the literary genre of the literature” (ibid., p. 259). The

ultimate whole here is the historical-cultural tradition to which

the work belongs. Now, in spite of this expansion, traditional

hermeneutics keeps intact the norm of a correct, final

understanding of the text. As Gadamer expresses it: “The harmony

of all the details with the whole is the criterion of correct

understanding” (ibid.). Such harmony signifies that all the

details are fully comprehensible in terms of the whole, and the

whole itself is fully comprehensible in terms of the details.

When we achieve this, the work of interpretation is done. The

interpretation is no longer something intended—i.e., projected.

It articulates an “actual,” fully confirmed understanding of the

text (ibid., p. 261).

When we understand this circular part-whole relation in

terms the circular structure of Dasein, this criterion is no

longer available. As Gadamer notes, “Heidegger describes the

circle in such a way that the understanding of the text remains

permanently determined by the anticipatory movement of fore-

understanding” (ibid. italics added). This means that there is

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no final interpretation, no transformation of fore-understanding

(or projecting) into an actual, fully confirmed interpretation.

Rather, we have to see the understanding “as the interplay of the

movement of tradition and the movement of the interpreter”

(Gadamer, p. 261). In this interplay, “[t]he anticipation of

meaning that governs our understanding of a text … proceeds from

the commonality that binds us to the tradition” (ibid.). Such

commonality determines us even as we contribute to it through our

interpretations. Given this, we can never abstract ourselves

from the “prejudices” that are part of the “fore-having” of this

tradition. Just as the understanding of the part determines the

understanding of the whole, which, in turn, determines the

understanding of the part, so the interpreter, through his

interpretations, determines the tradition, which determines the

interpreter in his projective understanding of the tradition. As

Gadamer expresses this: “Tradition is not simply a permanent

precondition; rather, we produce it ourselves inasmuch as we

understand, participate in the evolution of tradition, and hence

further determine it ourselves.” Here, “the circle of

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understanding” is not simply a technique of hermeneutics, “but

describes an element of the ontological structure of

understanding” (ibid.).

Implicit in the above is a radical historization of our

understanding of texts. According to Gadamer, “Every age has to

understand a transmitted text in its own way.” The age focuses

on the aspects of the tradition that interests it. It does so in

the interests of its own self-understanding. As for the text

itself, its “real meaning … is always co-determined by the

historical situation of the interpreter and hence by the totality

of the objective course of history” (Gadamer, p. 263). Since the

historical situation is ongoing (and, hence changes over time),

“the discovery of the true meaning of a text … is never finished;

it is, in fact, an infinite process (ibid., p. 265). Thus,

through careful hermeneutic practice we can attempt to eliminate

the projections that are not born out by the text. But, the

movement of history brings in “fresh sources of error” as well as

“new sources of understanding.” (ibid., pp. 265-266). In such a

context, the “correct” or “true” meaning of a text is the very

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process that results in the continuous transformation of our

relation to the text (ibid., p. 267). For Gadamer, then, “true

historical thinking must take account of its own historicity”

(ibid.). To do so is to recognize that the “true historical

object is not an object at all.” It is continually constituted

in the ongoing relation between “the reality of history and the

reality of historical understanding” in their mutual

determination (ibid.). True historical thinking is, thus, an

example of the Denken mentioned above. Like ontological

research, its examination of its own interpretative

presuppositions can never be completed.

Ricoeur’s Critique of Phenomenology

Heidegger is noticeably reticent in criticizing Husserl.

Gadamer, as well, does not make explicit the impact of his

position on Husserl’s phenomenology. For this, we have to turn

to Paul Ricoeur’s “Phenomenology and Hermeneutics,” which focuses

on “the development of the antithetical position between the two

projects” (Ricoeur, p. 86). At issue is the role of experience

in validating our claims. In Ricoeur’s reading of Husserl, all

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our assertions must be founded on intuition. In his words, “The

principle foundation is on the order of intuition; to found is to

see” (Ricoeur, p. 86). This means that “the first truth” for

phenomenology is “‘an experience.’ In opposition to every

‘speculative construction,’ every radical question is decided at

the level of vision” (ibid., p. 87). For hermeneutics, however,

experience is not ultimate. What is ultimate is the “belonging

to”—the subject’s “adherence to the historically lived”—that

links the experiencing subject to the world. Enmeshed in

history, the subject’s lived experience is not an independent

source of evidence. Rather, “[t]o the ‘lived’ of phenomenology

corresponds, on the side of hermeneutics, consciousness exposed

to historical efficacy” (ibid., p. 98). In other words, the

experiencing consciousness is itself historically determined.

The same holds for its interpretations. For phenomenology,

interpretation directs itself to experience: To interpret is to

make a claim about what we are experiencing; and the validity of

this claim depends upon the intuitive experience that either

fulfills or fails to fulfill our interpretation. By contrast,

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“the hypothesis of philosophical hermeneutics is that

interpretation is an open process that no single vision closes”

(ibid., p. 91). In fact, once we admit that a subject’s

experiences are not an ultimate foundation, we cannot even say

that the author’s interpretation of his text in terms of his

situation and those he addresses is definitive. Interpretation

is subject to the efficacy of history, which means that, for

hermeneutics, “the meaning of the text has become autonomous in

relation to the intention of the author, the critical situation

of discourse, and its first addressee.” What we encounter in the

ongoing, historical process of interpretation is “a polysemy of

text which invites a plural reading” (ibid., p. 90).

It would be a misreading of Ricoeur’s position to claim that

he is entirely negative with regard to phenomenology.

Hermeneutics, he points out, shares at least two presuppositions

with phenomenology and, in this sense, can be said to presuppose

it. The first is the view that questions about being are

actually about “the meaning of being.” This “choice for meaning is the most

general presupposition of all hermeneutics” (Ricoeur, p. 96). The second,

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closely related presupposition is that sense is not to be reduced

to “merely linguistic meanings” (ibid., p. 98). For

hermeneutics, “[c]onsciousness, as exposed to the effects of

history, which makes total reflection on prejudices

impossible …, is not reducible to only linguistic aspects of

the transmission of the past” (ibid.).3 What Ricoeur does

oppose is Husserl’s idealism—namely, his belief that we

attain sense through the suspension of our “Seinsglaube,”

i.e., our belief in the being that we are investigating. Here,

Ricoeur takes the reduction as the way phenomenology reduces

being to sense—the sense that consciousness makes of its

experiences. For Ricoeur, this idealism is absent in

Husserl’s Logical Investigations. In it, “one discovers a state of

phenomenology in which the notions of ‘expression’ and ‘meaning,’

3 Ricoeur also compares phenomenology’s epoché with

hermeneutics’ “recourse to distantiation” (Ricoeur, p. 97).

In his view, the epoché “involves a moment of distantiation,

placing at a distance ‘lived’ experience” (ibid.). This

distantiation allows us to interpret what we experience by

signifying it.

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of consciousness and intentionality, of intellectual intuition,

are elaborated without the ‘reduction,’ in its idealistic sense,

being introduced” (ibid., p. 96). Husserl’s phenomenology is,

thus, capable of being reformed as long as it “keeps being

submitted to the critique of hermeneutics” (ibid., p. 102).

The Phenomenological Response

Ricoeur’s reference to the Logical Investigations is surprising

given the focus of this work, which is that of securing knowledge

from all forms of relativism. Husserl defines “relativism in the

widest sense of the word as a doctrine which somehow derives the

pure principles of logic from facts” (Husserl 1968, I, 122).

Thus, psychologism is a form of relativism insofar as it derives

these principles from the factual conditions of our reasoning.

For Husserl, such psychologism would include Heidegger’s account

of the circular structure of our understanding. The fact that we

project, and thus presuppose what we claim to discover, has no

bearing on the truth of logical principles. To assert that it

does is simply to fall into a form of relativism. Husserl’s

insistence on this point can be put in terms of the priority of

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the epistemological or knowing relation. Whenever some other

relation is taken as prior to this, we fall into a self-

undermining skepticism. This holds not just for the attempt to

understand knowing in terms of the psychological make-up of the

knower. It also obtains for the relationships of history,

language, culture, and so on when we take them as external to the

knowing relationship and as determinative of its content. The

point follows, since to justify the claim that some particular

relationship is the determining one, one has to argue for its

truth—i.e., attempt to justify it as an item of knowledge. But,

to do so is to presuppose the independence and priority of the

knowing relationship—the very thing that one is attempting to

deny. Here, we may note that a number of things have been

asserted as determining our understanding: history, economics,

language, our evolutionary origins, etc. How are we to know

which is correct? In the absence of any criteria, we can fall

prey to ideological conflicts.

For Ricoeur, Husserl’s belief in the deciding role of

intuitive evidence is itself an ideology. The appeal to

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intuitive evidence presupposes that the subject is transparent to

himself, that he possesses a self-knowledge that is capable of

attaining such evidence without its being distorted by external

factors. But “the critique of ideologies and psychoanalysis”

make this implausible (Ricoeur, p. 91). The phenomenological

question, however, is that of the evidence for this critique. In

the absence of such evidence, we have no way to adjudicate its

claims. Once again, we return to Husserl’s insistence on the

priority of the epistemological standpoint. His position is that

“epistemology must not be understood as a discipline that follows

metaphysics or even coincides with it, but rather as one which

precedes metaphysics just as it precedes psychology and all other

disciplines” (Husserl 1968, I, 224). As prior, it determines

their claims to knowledge. Because it does, it cannot take its

standards from them, but must supply these standards itself.4 It

does so in appealing to intuitive evidence. Such evidence can be

more or less clear, more or less detailed, etc. In allowing us

to gauge these differences, it manifests its own internal

standards. Given that claims to knowledge find their

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justification in the evidence presented for them, the internal

standards of intuitive evidence are those set by the

epistemological standpoint. Thus, for Husserl, the escape from

ideology is provided by intuitive evidence. His “return to the

things themselves” is a return to the evidence we have for them.

The epoché, in its suspending our various judgments about them,

is simply a method for focusing on the evidence that supports

them. In the absence of such evidence, nothing confirms our

claims. We constantly presuppose what we claim to know and

reason in a circle. The point holds for Heidegger’s ontological

research. To claim, as Heidegger does, that the process of

understanding is essentially circular and, hence, such research

cannot “be denied this projecting which is essential to Dasein,”

is to undermine the arguments that lead to his claim.

4 From a phenomenological perspective, this point also

holds for Heidegger’s fundamental ontology. As prior,

epistemology cannot derive its notion of being from any

other science—including such ontology. It must establish

this in its own context.

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Hermeneutics cannot, in fact, avoid the question of

evidence. It is inherent in the notion of a “correct”

interpretation. Heidegger implies such correctness when he

writes, “In the circle [of the understanding] is hidden a

positive possibility of the most primordial kind of knowing.” We

grasp this “only when, in our interpretation, we have understood

that our first, last, and constant task is never to allow our

fore-having, fore-sight, and fore-conception to be presented to

us by fancies and popular conceptions, but rather to make the

scientific theme secure by working out these fore-structures in

terms of the things themselves” (Heidegger, p. 195). This remark

is crucial for Gadamer since it delineates the task of the

hermeneutics that adopts Heidegger’s view of the understanding.

Gadamer writes with regard to it: “All correct interpretation

must be on guard against arbitrary fancies and the limitations

imposed by imperceptible habits of thought, and it must direct

its gaze ‘on the things themselves,’ (which, in the case of the

literary critic, are meaningful texts, which themselves are again

concerned with objects)” (Gadamer, p. 236). The question he

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faces is: how are we to do this? How, given the circular

structure of the understanding, are we to know that our

interpretation is “correct”? To call understanding “circular”

means that it is always projective. In Gadamer’s words, “A

person who is trying to understand a text is always performing an

act of projecting. He projects before himself a meaning for the

text as a whole as soon as some initial meaning emerges in the

text” (ibid.). How does he gauge the accuracy of this

projection, i.e., know whether the meaning is correct?

Responding to this, Gadamer turns to the text itself—i.e., to the

evidence that it provides. The text either supports or fails to

support the projected meaning. In the latter case, the

interpreter revises it “in terms of what emerges as he penetrates

into the meaning” of the text. What we have here is a “constant

process” of projection and revision. The intended meaning is

revised when it proves inadequate. In Gadamer’s words,

“interpretation begins with fore-conceptions that are replaced by

more suitable ones. This constant process of new projection

constitutes the movement of understanding and interpretation.”

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Suitability, in this process, signifies that the projected

meanings are “borne out by the things themselves”—i.e., by the

text in question (ibid.). Those that are not borne out “come to

nothing in [their] being worked out” (ibid., p. 237). He adds

that we have the sense of their failure through “the experience

of being pulled up short by the text. Either it does not yield

any meaning at all or its meaning is not compatible with what we

had expected” (ibid.) What guides this process, he later

remarks, is the belief “that only what really constitutes a unity

of meaning is intelligible” (ibid., p. 261). The individual

meanings that we project must fit together. If the text supports

contradictory ones, “we start to doubt the transmitted text”—

i.e., suspect that it has, in some way, become corrupted in the

process of its transmission.

The process that Gadamer is describing is essentially that

of the Husserlian relation between “intention” and “fulfillment.”

To intend to see something is to try to make sense of what we

perceptually experience. The goal is a “unity of meaning.” The

process of intending such a meaning is apparent when we regard a

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visual illusion—for example, that of an arrow that seems to be

pointing inward and then outward from the page. As we regard it,

the two senses of the arrow appear alternately. This is not by

chance since visual illusions are constructed to provide data

that support different interpretations. Such illusions, in fact,

show that “perception is interpretation.” As Husserl explains

this: “It belongs to perception that something appears within it,

but interpretation makes up what we term appearance - be it correct

or not, anticipatory or overdrawn. The house appears to me

through no other way but that I interpret in a certain fashion

actually experienced contents of sensation. I hear a barrel organ -

the sensed tones I interpret as barrel organ tones. … They are

termed “appearances” or, better, appearing contents precisely for

the reason that they are contents of perceptive interpretation

(Husserl 1984, p. 762). Husserl’s point is that to intend to see

something is, concretely, to form an interpretative intention.

It is to attempt to interpret what one sees in terms of a unitary

sense. As experience shows, not every intention is fulfilled.

Our interpretative intentions are constantly adjusted in term of

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the perceptual evidence. For example, what looked like a rabbit

hiding under a bush can turn out, on closer inspection, to be

merely a play of light and shadows. As Husserl makes clear, this

process of adjustment between intention and perceptual

fulfillment is one where neither side dominates the other. Even

though every sense of the object is a sense intended by

consciousness, consciousness in its intending the object cannot,

in its act of interpretation, inform the object with every

possible sense (see Husserl 1968, II/2, 74; ibid., II/2, 188).

Only those senses that are fulfilled or embodied by the intuitive

presence of the object pertain to it as such (see ibid., II/2,

93). In other words, consciousness’ interpretive, intending

sense informs the object’s intuitive presence only to the point

that the object’s intuitive presence fulfills or embodies this

interpretive sense.

The distinction between this view and that which informs

hermeneutics is readily apparent. For Husserl, to know is to

see, and seeing (be it sensual or intellectual) involves

interpretation. Now, according to Ricoeur, hermeneutics also

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embraces “a universal concept of interpretation, which has the

same extension as that of comprehension” (Ricoeur, p. 89).

Hermeneutics, however, opposes interpretation to intuition. In

Ricoeur’s words, “The Husserlian exigency of the return to intuition is opposed by

the necessity for all comprehension to be mediated by an interpretation (ibid.).

That this opposition is more apparent than real is shown by

Gadamer’s adoption of Husserl’s mutually determining relation

between intention and fulfillment. His return to the “things

themselves” in the form of “meaningful texts” would be useless

were it not for the materials such texts provide for our

interpretations. Such materials, of course, include more than

just the text itself. Ultimately they include the whole

historical, cultural tradition that informs the writing of the

text and our subsequent reception of it. To the point that the

sense of the text is informed by this tradition, correct

interpretation must avail itself of the evidence it offers.

The Evidence for the Hermeneutic Circle

Given the above, we have to say that evidence for the

hermeneutical procedure comes from the perceptual process itself.

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The relation of intention and fulfillment, which hermeneutics

presupposes, is given by Husserl’s analysis of the perceptual

process. With this, we may raise the question of the evidence

for the hermeneutical circle. Is this also to be found in the

analysis of perception? To answer this, we must first recall the

circle’s origin. Gadamer takes it from Heidegger’s description

of the understanding, a description that interprets this in terms

of the essential structures of Dasein. These are the structures

of Dasein’s projective being. Thus far, we have described such

being in terms of Dasein’s pragmatic engagements with the world.

But, for Heidegger, such descriptions are not ultimate. His aim

is to exhibit “temporality as the meaning of the being that we

call Dasein.” This, he adds, involves “the repeated

interpretation … of the structures of Dasein … as modes of

temporality” (Heidegger, p. 38, trans. modified). Given this,

the evidence for Gadamer’s hermeneutical circle can be traced

back to that for our projective being; and the evidence for this

can be sought in the relations between the “modes” of past,

present, and future that underpin its structures.

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For Heidegger, these relations are essentially teleological.

As underpinning our projective being, the future is understood as

determining the way Dasein regards his past, which, in turn, is

taken as determining his present activity. Suppose, for example,

I wish to build a book case. This goal determines how I regard

the materials I previously accumulated. I see the hammer, nails,

and boards I find in my basement as materials for my purpose.

Regarding them as such, I engage in my present activity of

constructing the book case. In the temporality of this goal-

directed activity, the past and the future exhibit the same

mutual dependence that we find between intention and fulfillment.

As Heidegger notes, without the possibilities given by my own

past and the “past of my generation,” I could not project at all.

But without my being able to be ahead of myself in projecting a

future, such possibilities would not exist as possibilities.

Thus, by virtue of my own past, I have the materials needed for

the book case. Their presence makes its construction possible.

By virtue of the “past of my generation,” there are such things

as books and bookcases and, hence, the possibility of forming the

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intention of constructing a bookcase. But for a being that is

incapable of projecting—and, hence, of projects—such

possibilities do not exist. This means, as Heidegger writes,

“Dasein can authentically be past only insofar as it is futural.

Pastness originates in a certain way from the future” (Heidegger,

p. 326). The pastness, here referred to is not that of clock

time. To be “authentically” past is have a storehouse of

possibilities. But these are such only for a being that is

“futural”—i.e., capable of goal-directed activity.

Given the equivalence between understanding and projecting

one’s being on possibilities, the same goal-directed temporality

is to be found in the understanding. As based on Heidegger’s

account of the understanding, the hermeneutic circle must,

therefore, also exhibit this teleological temporality. It must,

accordingly, show the same mutual dependence between past and

future. Now, in the context of hermeneutics, the future is the

meaning that I am attempting to project on the text in the back

and forth process that Gadamer describes. The past is the text

grasped within its historical context—a context that includes the

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tradition of interpreting it. Text and context, as representing

the past, are similar respectively to the materials needed to

construct a bookcase and to the tradition that includes such

things as bookcases and books. Both text and context are

required for my project of understanding a text. They give me

the range of possibilities for my interpretation. They also

provide its confirming evidence. As I read the text, certain

possibilities are confirmed and others are ruled out. The same

thing happens when I address myself to the context. I realize,

for example, that a certain historical element in my

interpretation is anachronistic, while another is accurate. As

this back and forth process continues, the possibilities for

interpreting the text narrow and my projected meaning becomes

more definite. Such possibilities, however, would not be present

at all if I had not had the project of interpreting the text.

Where I not capable of projecting a meaning on it, they would

never have arisen. Thus, once again we find the same goal-

directed temporality, which signifies that the evidence for the

circle is to be found in such temporality.

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The phenomenological question is whether such temporality

can be exhibited without presupposing it. Both our pragmatic

relations to the world and our interpretive relations to the text

in its context presuppose a goal-directed temporality. As such,

they cannot be used as evidence for it. Is there a source of

evidence for such temporality once we bracket them? For Husserl,

this source is provided by the perceptual process itself. The

process exhibits lived time as teleological. It is inherent in

our attempt to interpret what we see. This becomes clear when we

consider the process of attempting to see a rabbit hiding under a

bush. Regarding the bush from a distance, we seem to see a

rabbit and project this meaning. As we move to get a better

look, its features seem to become more clearly defined. One part

of what we see appears to be its head, another its body, still

another its paws. Based upon what we see, we anticipate that

further features will be revealed as we approach: this pattern of

light and shadow will be seen as the rabbit’s ears, another will

be seen as its eyes, and so forth. If our interpretations are

correct, then our experiences should form a part of an emerging

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pattern that exhibits these features, i.e., that perceptually

manifests the object we assume we are seeing. If, however, we

are mistaken, at some point our experiences will fail to fulfill

our expectations. What we took to be a rabbit will dissolve into

a collection flickering shadows and light. As this example

indicates, to interpret is to anticipate. It is to expect a

sequence of contents that will present the object. This

expectation, even if we are not directly conscious of it, makes

us attend to some contents rather than others. It serves, in

other words, as a guide for our connecting our perceptions

according to an anticipated pattern. It also allows us to see

the perceptions we have as either fulfillments or disappointments

of our interpretative intention. Now, if we had never seen a

rabbit, we would never form this expectation. What would guide

us would be some schematic representation based on our past

experience of seeing small creatures. Our past, here, forms the

context of our seeing. It gives us the possibilities for our

interpretive intention. In this, it is like the text in its

context. As we read the text in its context, the meaning we

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project on the text refines itself and achieves clarity. The

same thing happens in the perceptual process. As we approach the

object, what we experience both fulfills and makes more definite

the intended sense that guides us. Such experience, as it

accumulates, contributes to our “past” in the Heideggerian sense.

This past includes the whole history of our perceptual life, a

history that includes seeing small animals, including rabbits.

The possibilities of interpretation preserved in this history are

essential to our seeing. Without them, we would have no

possibilities to anticipate, i.e., to project a meaning on our

visual experience.

We would thus be unable to interpret our experience as an

experience of some object. To reverse this, we can say that such

possibilities are only there for us if we can project. Without

the relation to the future given by our anticipation, they

vanish.

As the example makes clear, perception exhibits the

teleological temporality presupposed by the hermeneutical circle.

Given this, we cannot, as Ricoeur does, oppose interpretation to

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Husserl’s demand that we return to intuition. Returning to it,

we find that it exhibits the temporality assumed by the

hermeneutical process. Such temporality is, in fact, implicit in

Gadamer’s accounts of reaching the “correct” interpretation. It

also underlies hermeneutics “choice for meaning,” once we realize

that meaning in the interpretative process is not merely a

signitive or empty intending. As projected, it demands

fulfillment. It exists as a goal seeking to embody itself in the

text and its context. Now, the evidence that phenomenology

provides for the teleological structure of interpretation is

prior to all the claims that hermeneutics makes about the

historical determination of our interpretations. It is not, per

se, historical. Because it is not, it cannot be relativised.

Given this, hermeneutics must presuppose phenomenology—not in the

general sense that Ricoeur urges—but rather in order to sustain

the integrity of its interpretative work.

References:

Gadamer, Hans-Georg (1988). Truth and Method, trans. Garrett Bardenand John Cumming. New York: Crossroads Publishing Company.

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Heidegger, Martin (1962). Being and Time, trans. John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson. New York: Harper and Row.

Husserl, Edmund (1968). Logische Untersuchungen, 5th ed., 3 Vols. Tübingen. Max Niemeyer.

______ (1984). Logische Untersuchungen, ed. Ursula Panzer, the Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, Husserliana, XIX/2 (used to cite from the first edition).

Ingarten, Roman (1975) . On the Motives which led Husserl to Transcendental Idealism, trans. A. Hannibalsson. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff.

Ricoeur, Paul (1975). “Phenomenology and Hermeneutics.” Noûs, Vol. 9, No. 1, pp. 85-102.

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