Abstract
Ricoeur’s distinctive mode of philosophizing may capture the imagination of a philosophical generation. Its significance will depend upon the person who examines it. To the phenomenologist, the significance of Ricoeur’s thought will be found in his revision of the phenomenological method. To the analytic thinker, the measure of Ricoeur’s work may be in his plunge into an analysis of language. The structuralist may find the significance of Ricoeur’s thought in his attempt to reconsider the relationship of language and speech. The hermeneut may find the measure of Ricoeur’s achievement in his attempt to incorporate a hermeneutic into a philosophical program. To those who are interested in myth and symbolism, the significance of Ricoeur’s thought may be found in his distinctive mode of interpretation of that primary phenomenon. As the introduction of this essay stated, Ricoeur’s thought, like the symbol, is multivalent. Our analysis simply has attempted to bring these multivalent themes together and thereby to understand its unity and direction.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsPreview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
We have seen how the assumption that modern man is somehow beyond the realm of primary mythic-symbolic forms has been an initial problem. With Ricoeur it was the positive evaluation of symbolic forms plus the desire to see mythic-symbolic language as a necessary contribution to a global anthropology that allowed freedom from the difficulties presented by etiological definitions and associated anthropological assumptions. Assumptions about a distinction between the modern and the pre-modern were rejected and the way was opened for a positive correlation.
Edmund Husserl, “Philosophy as Rigorous Science,” Phenomenology and the Crisis of Philosophy, trans. by Quentin Lauer (Harper Torchbook; New York, Evanston, London: Harper and Row, Publishers, 1965), pp. 71–147.
Edmund Husserl, Cartesian Meditations, trans. by Dorion Cairns (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1960), p. 36.
In one of his earliest essays, Husserl spoke directly to this problem in his criticism of Weltanschauung philosophy. Husserl, Phenomenology and the Crisis of Philosophy, pp. 122-47.
In terms of the original criticism contained in this discussion, is not this the very thing that Bultmann and the secular, God is dead, religious thinkers do? Do they not desire an existential interpretation of myth which would support this desire for an anthropological dimension? The similarity is obvious but superficial. In their case the existential interpretation occurs at the expense of the original mythic-symbolic form. The form is judged to be an inadequate false modality which intends another thing than it expresses. However, from this phenomenological perspective, it is the form itself that is important. The problem in the case of the former is to find a means of incorporating this phenomenon into modern consciousness. In the case of the latter, it is the form itself which is affirmed. In Ricoeur’s case one turns to the form of symbol and myth to uncover consciousness. In terms of the phenomenological alternative the only judgment that is made about the mythic-symbolic form is that the form can contribute to consciousness because it constitutes a dimension of human experience.
Paul Ricoeur, The Symbolism of Evil trans. by Emerson Buchanan (New York, Evanston, & London: Harper & Row), 1967.
Ricoeur, The Symbolism of Evil, p. 167.
Ricoeur, The Symbolism of Evil, p. 167.
Friedrich Schleiermacher, The Christian Faith (Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark, 1928), p. 5
Paul Ricoeur, “The Hermeneutics of Symbols and Philosophical Reflection,” International Philosophical Quarterly, II, No. 2 (1963), 204.
Paul Ricoeur, “The Hermeneutics of Symbols and Philosophical Reflection,” International Philosophical Quarterly, II, No. 2 (1963), 217.
Paul Ricoeur, “The Hermeneutics of Symbols and Philosophical Reflection,” International Philosophical Quarterly, II, No. 2 (1963), 210.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 1971 Martinus Nijhoff, The Hague, Netherlands
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Rasmussen, D.M. (1971). Toward a Working Theory of Language Correlated with a Philosophical Anthropology. In: Mythic-Symbolic Language and Philosophical Anthropology. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-9327-6_6
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-9327-6_6
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-94-011-8563-9
Online ISBN: 978-94-011-9327-6
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive