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Homo Abyssus: The Drama of the Question of Being
Homo The Drama of the Question of Being is one of the most significant works of Catholic philosophy in the twentieth century. In this speculative appropriation of Aquinas, Ferdinand Ulrich lays out a vision of being as an image of divine goodness, drawing out as-yet-undiscovered treasures from Aquinas's texts through a fundamental engagement with modern philosophy, above all Hegel and Heidegger. One of the most unique features of this vision is, as Hans Urs von Balthasar observed, "It stands face-to-face with the innermost mysteries of Christian revelation, and opens them up, without ever departing from the strictly philosophical sphere. In this respect, it overcomes the baleful dualism between philosophy and theology perhaps more successfully than any previous attempt."
The first part of the book offers a fundamental metaphysics, expounding in detail the basic structure of being in the light of creation ex nihilo interpreted as an act of radical generosity. This discussion presents novel insights into traditional themes such as the real distinction between essence and existence, participation, causality, and the analogy of being; and it explores from the same perspective of radical generosity themes associated more with modern philosophy, such as the relationship between being and nothingness, the ontological difference, and being and time. The second part of the book is a speculative anthropology, which proposes to think through the constitution of the human being as a kind of dynamic exemplar of the meaning of man not only shows the meaning of being, but co-enacts it in his relation to himself, to the world, and to God.
In addition to offering the first major work of Ulrich to appear in English, this translation includes a substantial introduction by Martin Bieler, and a helpful lexicon to help elucidate the book's unusual vocabulary.
The first part of the book offers a fundamental metaphysics, expounding in detail the basic structure of being in the light of creation ex nihilo interpreted as an act of radical generosity. This discussion presents novel insights into traditional themes such as the real distinction between essence and existence, participation, causality, and the analogy of being; and it explores from the same perspective of radical generosity themes associated more with modern philosophy, such as the relationship between being and nothingness, the ontological difference, and being and time. The second part of the book is a speculative anthropology, which proposes to think through the constitution of the human being as a kind of dynamic exemplar of the meaning of man not only shows the meaning of being, but co-enacts it in his relation to himself, to the world, and to God.
In addition to offering the first major work of Ulrich to appear in English, this translation includes a substantial introduction by Martin Bieler, and a helpful lexicon to help elucidate the book's unusual vocabulary.
522 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1961
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June 3, 2024
"Man is the concretely subsisting grateful reception of being in person, the guiding pattern and the fundamental form of the ontological difference of being from that which is and the subject of participation in being that God most ultimately intended" (1).
D. C. Schindler is to be congratulated for what can only have been a monumental, herculean effort of translation. Stylistically, Ulrich is the Heidegger of Thomism. His writing is dense, difficult, impenetrable at times. One gets the feeling while reading that his massive book is in an almost constant three-way conversation between Thomas, Hegel, and Heidegger. He freely utilizes old, Latin terms, classic German idealist terms, and neologisms of his own. He always has one eye on the past and the other on the present/future, which is to say his writing is historically adept and eschatologically hopeful; Ulrich intends for a metaphysical ressourcement to lead to renewal in the modern world.
Yes, this is a difficult work. Ulrich's major ideas end up running off in so many different directions that it's impossible to come up with a fully comprehensive summary of it all. Indeed, Ulrich repeatedly writes asides such as, "This provides the basis for a critique with all of German Idealism! But we cannot go into it in more detail now." (He also writes with a couple of exclamation points per page.) Yet, the point he returns to again and again is that the substantializing of being, that is, the nominalist notion that there is no difference between 'res' and 'esse,' between a thing and 'to be,' leads to the positing of substance alongside of God and independent of Him, putting God Himself under an ontological category. When God and 'stuff' are separate and distinct, then naturalistic and mechanistic explanations of 'stuff' end up dispensing with the need of a 'God-concept,' and materialism and atheism result. This is what Duns Scotus set in motion, for he was the first thinker to posit that 'esse' was nebulous and had no real existence except in particular things which can be empirically deduced.
The book is written in two major parts: "To Be and the Being of Beings" and "Man as Totum Potestativum: Unfolding the Human Essence from the Perspective of Being's Movement of Finitization." The first half is essentially an exploration of what 'esse' is and why things that receive being can be called 'beings.' In it are numerous critiques of the nominalists and Hegel/Heidegger. Substantial quotations of Aquinas are found on basically every page and in innumerable footnotes. Ulrich shows how Thomas is not outdated, but how his ontology has something to say to the modern age as a corrective. Being is an 'effect' of God; it is the outpouring of God's love, received by essences that are His good pleasure to form. Being is kenotic; it involves an 'exaninitio,' a "pouring out," for God does not retain 'being' as a possession or as an entity alongside Himself. Being, properly speaking, is 'nothing;' it has no substance. Rather, substance or matter is the receptive matrix of being. And being is the likeness of God's goodness. Acts 17 is key: "In Him we live and move and have our being." Being is super-essential, not essential. The essential is that which gratefully receives being, poured out from God.
The second part is theological-anthropological. Ulrich follows Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Thomas, etc. in saying that "man is a microcosm." Man is the "blueprint of being's exaninitio" (374). That is because man gratefully receives being; he is "incarnate gratitude" (383) so that his "thinking must be thanking" (German: denken als danken). Quoting Cusa, Ulrich asserts that "A likeness of creation shines forth in every act of intellectual nature" (297), meaning our human intellectual activity (i.e., all ordering, creating, making) is a sign and participation of God's gift of being. Man pours himself out on his fields, his books, his children because God is the Giver and man is in the image of God. Mary is the focal point for she receives the Word's exinanitio (kenosis) and is kenotic herself (Luke 1:38), pointing the way for all humans to be virginal (open, empty, receptive) and motherly (creative, generative, fecund) at the same time. Matter is the 'simile' of super-essential being (309) for matter also does not have an independent existence, as if one might see matter floating about. Rather, like being, matter is 'nothing' - nothing but the receptivity for God's pure act of mediation: the love that is the gifted exaninitio of being. In this second part Ulrich also meditates at length on the meaning of truth, and the procession of truth and goodness from being.
After finishing it, I feel the desire to go back to Thomas in earnest, which is probably what Ulrich wants from his reader above all. I also want to read more of Nicholas of Cusa, who is another thinker who seems to grasp being contra the nominalists. What this book helped me to say was the giftedness of being, and the fact that all things participating in being are intimately connected to God. I can't quite use Plotinian 'emanationist' language, because I don't see the kenotic-receptive aspect of ontology in Plotinus. But in Thomas it is clear: Being is super-essential; it is nothing; it is pure mediation; it is the likeness of God's goodness; it is love.
D. C. Schindler is to be congratulated for what can only have been a monumental, herculean effort of translation. Stylistically, Ulrich is the Heidegger of Thomism. His writing is dense, difficult, impenetrable at times. One gets the feeling while reading that his massive book is in an almost constant three-way conversation between Thomas, Hegel, and Heidegger. He freely utilizes old, Latin terms, classic German idealist terms, and neologisms of his own. He always has one eye on the past and the other on the present/future, which is to say his writing is historically adept and eschatologically hopeful; Ulrich intends for a metaphysical ressourcement to lead to renewal in the modern world.
Yes, this is a difficult work. Ulrich's major ideas end up running off in so many different directions that it's impossible to come up with a fully comprehensive summary of it all. Indeed, Ulrich repeatedly writes asides such as, "This provides the basis for a critique with all of German Idealism! But we cannot go into it in more detail now." (He also writes with a couple of exclamation points per page.) Yet, the point he returns to again and again is that the substantializing of being, that is, the nominalist notion that there is no difference between 'res' and 'esse,' between a thing and 'to be,' leads to the positing of substance alongside of God and independent of Him, putting God Himself under an ontological category. When God and 'stuff' are separate and distinct, then naturalistic and mechanistic explanations of 'stuff' end up dispensing with the need of a 'God-concept,' and materialism and atheism result. This is what Duns Scotus set in motion, for he was the first thinker to posit that 'esse' was nebulous and had no real existence except in particular things which can be empirically deduced.
The book is written in two major parts: "To Be and the Being of Beings" and "Man as Totum Potestativum: Unfolding the Human Essence from the Perspective of Being's Movement of Finitization." The first half is essentially an exploration of what 'esse' is and why things that receive being can be called 'beings.' In it are numerous critiques of the nominalists and Hegel/Heidegger. Substantial quotations of Aquinas are found on basically every page and in innumerable footnotes. Ulrich shows how Thomas is not outdated, but how his ontology has something to say to the modern age as a corrective. Being is an 'effect' of God; it is the outpouring of God's love, received by essences that are His good pleasure to form. Being is kenotic; it involves an 'exaninitio,' a "pouring out," for God does not retain 'being' as a possession or as an entity alongside Himself. Being, properly speaking, is 'nothing;' it has no substance. Rather, substance or matter is the receptive matrix of being. And being is the likeness of God's goodness. Acts 17 is key: "In Him we live and move and have our being." Being is super-essential, not essential. The essential is that which gratefully receives being, poured out from God.
The second part is theological-anthropological. Ulrich follows Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Thomas, etc. in saying that "man is a microcosm." Man is the "blueprint of being's exaninitio" (374). That is because man gratefully receives being; he is "incarnate gratitude" (383) so that his "thinking must be thanking" (German: denken als danken). Quoting Cusa, Ulrich asserts that "A likeness of creation shines forth in every act of intellectual nature" (297), meaning our human intellectual activity (i.e., all ordering, creating, making) is a sign and participation of God's gift of being. Man pours himself out on his fields, his books, his children because God is the Giver and man is in the image of God. Mary is the focal point for she receives the Word's exinanitio (kenosis) and is kenotic herself (Luke 1:38), pointing the way for all humans to be virginal (open, empty, receptive) and motherly (creative, generative, fecund) at the same time. Matter is the 'simile' of super-essential being (309) for matter also does not have an independent existence, as if one might see matter floating about. Rather, like being, matter is 'nothing' - nothing but the receptivity for God's pure act of mediation: the love that is the gifted exaninitio of being. In this second part Ulrich also meditates at length on the meaning of truth, and the procession of truth and goodness from being.
After finishing it, I feel the desire to go back to Thomas in earnest, which is probably what Ulrich wants from his reader above all. I also want to read more of Nicholas of Cusa, who is another thinker who seems to grasp being contra the nominalists. What this book helped me to say was the giftedness of being, and the fact that all things participating in being are intimately connected to God. I can't quite use Plotinian 'emanationist' language, because I don't see the kenotic-receptive aspect of ontology in Plotinus. But in Thomas it is clear: Being is super-essential; it is nothing; it is pure mediation; it is the likeness of God's goodness; it is love.
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