History and hermeneutics

Paul RICOEUR

pp. 3-20

in: Yirmiahu Yovel (ed), Philosophy of history and action, Berlin, Springer, 1978

Abstract

In this paper, I shall attempt to promote a reciprocity of arguments between philosophical hermeneutics and the method of historical inquiry. In the case of philosophical hermeneutics — on which I am focusing the discussion here — this concern for hearing arguments presented by the other side is not a frequent occurrence. Hermeneutics is better prepared to take the "way upward," the path of the Rückfrage which carries it from the historical inquiry of historians towards the consideration of the historicity of human experience in general. The "way downward" towards historical inquiry is a path less known to it. Yet it is on this path that we encounter the most significant questions for hermeneutics itself. The dialectic of the "way upward," Plato has taught us, is arduous. But how much more so is this 'second navigation!"

Cited authors

Plato