The Transformational Model of Authenticity Towards The Global Hermeneutic Circle of Being and Time

This paper focuses on the question concerning the order of priority between authenticity and inauthenticity in Heidegger’sBeing and Time.Heidegger’s own words suggest sometimes that authenticity precedes inauthenticity,sometimes the opposite.This has given rise to a dispute,not only about exegesis,but also about the normative implication of the book.Engaging with interpreters like Dreyfus,Zimmerman,Stambaugh,andGuignon,I argue that it is problematic to assume a distinct mode of“undifferentiatedness”apart from the modes of authenticity and inauthenticity,for the model neither finds textual support nor is systematically tenable.Textual analysis shows that what Heidegger calls a“modal undifferentiatedness”does not itself constitute a distinct undifferentiated mode.Systematic examination shows that the assumption of a distinct mode of undifferentiatedness would oblige the interpreter to assume a“seed”of inauthenticity in this undifferentiatedness,which,once taken seriously,would make superfluous the distinction between undifferentiatedness and inauthent-icity.Moreover,this interpretation leaves incomprehensible how one begins to pursue authenticity.I suggest,instead,a“transformational model”of authenticity,for which philosophical understanding entails a transformation of one’s way of living.To make sense of Heidegger’s seemingly contradictory claims,I distinguish between the existential and the existentiell level of discourse.Authenticity is prior to inauthenticity at the existential level(of understanding),while inauthenticity is prior to authenticity at the existentiell level(of factical existence).I demonstrate that,thanks to a dialogue between these two levels,a global hermeneutic circle is at work in the overall project ofBeing and Time,where authentic living feeds into authentic understanding and vice versa.This makes the tension between authenticity and inauthenticity productive rather than aporetic;it also gives an idea of how the book would‘work’,in an intertwinement of two levels,for a reader as a Dasein.