10.13125/CH/5196
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2533-1825
5196
2
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urn:nbn:it:unica-28217
Marco Castagna
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Critical Hermeneutics
Editors’ Introduction
Text.Serial.Journal
https://ojs.unica.it/index.php/ecch
5
Articles
2022-04-13
2022-04-13
2022-04-14
2022-04-14
I-VIII
1
Marco Castagna
2021
10.13125/CH/5196
I
2533-1825
2
VIII
urn:nbn:it:unica-28217
Editors’ Introduction
https://ojs.unica.it/index.php/ecch/article/download/5196/5087
5
Critical Hermeneutics, 5(2) (2021)
Biannual International Journal of Philosophy
http://ojs.unica.it/index.php/ecch/index
ISSN 2533-1825 (on line); DOI 10.13125/CH/5196




                                  Editors’ Introduction




This collection of essays is a response to a challenge that is
undoubtedly paradoxical: to introduce in Italy an author who is already
known and appreciated by scholars who have encountered his work,
and, often, followed his teachings. While the transmission of knowledge
has traditionally been through both exoteric and esoteric teachings (the
former intended for the general public, and the latter for a small group
of researchers), this divide is reproduced constantly through the
distinction     between       ‘institutionalised’   knowledge   found   even   in
‘philosophy manuals’, and the knowledge that animates the research
and discussions of researchers. If we keep in mind this distinction, we
will undoubtedly better understand the influence and role of the work
of Jean Greisch (born in 1942), within the Italian hermeneutical
tradition from the second half of the last century. If on the one hand,
the work of this philosopher is still not much known to the general
public (owing to the lack of Italian translations), on the other hand it
is difficult, if not impossible, to meet a scholar in the field of
hermeneutical tradition who has not been engaged with at least some
of Greisch’s works, and who has not suggested or not recommended
their     reading      to    junior     researchers   interested   in   acquiring
hermeneutical reason. This gradual dissemination of Greisch’s work
has led to the building of a growing community of scholars gathered
around his work, a community that goes beyond all pretentious
‘Rubicon’ divide between German and French hermeneutics.
        Jean Greisch is thus a philosopher capable of stirring philosophical
passion that transcends ‘nationalistic’ boundaries which are often
arbitrarily imposed in philosophy; a philosopher who cannot be ignored
by the many Italian researchers who have already encountered him
Editors’ Introduction




through his lectures as well as his books. If this volume is born of a
paradoxical challenge for the reasons just mentioned, the paradox
intensifies when one realises that it is edited by group of scholars
working between Italy, India, and England, and who have assumed the
good risk of embarking on this adventure, with the hope that it will
foster the dissemination and translation in Italy of this vast
philosophical oeuvre.
      ‘Vast’ because Greisch’s philosophical itinerance started in the
1970’s with an analysis on the relationship between hermeneutics and
grammatology, and has now arrived at foraging a new understanding
of the term ‘meta’ in his latest book Transcender. Libres méditations
sur la fonction méta (published in 2021), thus accomplishing the arc of
an reflection which, instead of following trends, swims against
philosophical currents.
      In fact, after its incipit which tackled themes whose novelty in
philosophy was indisputable in the 1970’s, Greisch’s work bravely
developped        against     the   mainstream,    affirming   its   passion   for
hermeneutics in a French philosophical milieu that was preoccupied, if
not dominated, by structuralism, humanities, and later on by
phenomenology. This non-conformist practice of doing philosophy is
evident in his commentary on Sein und Zeit (one of the most extensive
and widely quoted commentaries of this work), as well as in his studies
dedicated to the free-spirited genius Stanislas Breton. Ever faithful to
this freedom of mind, Greisch has devoted much effort to understand
the relationship between philosophical and biblical hermeneutics, as is
evident in the trilogy Le Buisson ardent et les Lumières de la Raison
(2002-2004),            and   Entendre   d’une    autre   oreille.   Les   enjeux
philosophiques de l’herméneutique biblique (2006). There is yet
another time that he swam against the current (and how can we not
recall this?), and that was when in the age of post-truth, Greisch
authored a book in which truth itself is presented as inescapable
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                                              Critical Hermeneutics, 5(2) (2021)




because of the ‘rendezvous’ it makes with every human who chooses
to listen. A post-truth to which Greisch proposes a new age of reason
that finds its fulfilment in the concepts of responsibility and testimony,
one that fits within the very same framework of his French translation
of Hans Jonas’ work. Again, in the post-human or trans-human era,
Greisch wrote his phenomenological reflections Qui sommes-nous?
Parcours phénoménologique vers l’homme (2009); and when the so-
called new realism was striving to impose itself in philosophy, he
published L’herméneutique comme sagesse de l’incertitude (2016),
and Désirer comprendre. Court traité des vertus herméneutiques
(2019).
    These are but a few of the volumes that trace the arc of a work so
vast that it cannot be summarized, except perhaps with the fragment
of Archilochus: “the fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows
one big thing, but it is famous.” In fact, while commenting on this
excerpt in Le Buisson ardent et les lumières de la raison Greisch applies
it to himself stating “For better or for worse, I belong more to the race
of foxes than to that of hedgehogs!” (Greisch, 2002-2004, vol.1 p.8).
The Minimal Bibliography that we publish in this issue will witness to
the one who belongs to the “race of foxes”, and enabling the reader to
grasp the full extent of this philosopher’s work; an oeuvre to which no
Introduction would ever do justice. But if Greisch’s work can neither be
summarized, nor presented, then how best to justify this collection?
    This question becomes even more urgent when we realise that
there is no dearth of tributes to Jean Greisch, and that his thought-
provoking work has received numerous recognitions. Worth noting are
the two major collective publications, Le souci du passage (a Festschrift
offered by his friends and colleagues, and edited by Philippe Capelle-
Dumont, Genevieve Hebert, and Marie-Dominique Popelard in 2004),
and Jean Greisch, les trois âges de la raison. Métaphysique,
phénoménologie, herméneutique (edited by Stefano Bancalari, Jérôme
                                                                              III
Editors’ Introduction




de Gramont, and Jean Leclercq in 2016). As regards his academic
career, Greisch was a Professor at the Faculty of Philosophy, Institut
Catholique de Paris, where he also served as Dean (1985-1994). He
also held several prestigious academic chairs worldwide, notably, the
Hans Georg Gadamer Chair (Boston College, 2006), the Chaire de
Philosophie Chretienne (Villanova University, 2007), the Chaire
Cardinal Mercier (Institut Supérieure de Philosophie, Louvain-la-neuve,
2006), the Guardini Lehrstuhl (Humboldt University of Berlin, 2009-
2012), and the Chaire Etienne Gilson (2011-2012). His active
participation in numerous scientific committees and conferences (too
long to be enumerated here), should not be overlooked. To these
tributes we must also add the Doctorate honoris causa conferred on
him in 2016 by the Pontificio Istituto Sant’Anselmo, Rome. Such being
the case, we return once more to our question: how best to justify this
edition of Critical Hermeneutics?
      This issue does not pretend to offer an exhaustive presentation of
Jean Greisch’s work. As noted earlier, the extent of his philosophical
engagement would not allow this, or do it justice. Neither does this
issue claim to be a tribute on par with those that have already been
rendered to his work. Rather, we wish to draw the attention to those
Italian scholars, who have already encountered some aspects of the
richness of his work, to the totality of his work, and thus promote
further studies on this original interpretation of the philosophy of our
times. The objective of these collected essays is therefore to diffuse
Greisch’s thought in Italy, which we would like to do by presenting the
contributions that friends and former students have dedicated to him
and on his work, in the hope that other contributions will be added
later. These contributions will begin with a bilingual translation of the
Prélude of his book Rendez-vous avec la verité, trusting that this is a
prelude to the translation of the entire book, as well as of his other
works. The translations will be followed by articles that colleagues have
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                                              Critical Hermeneutics, 5(2) (2021)




dedicated to him, as well as by texts that engage in a ‘hand-to-hand’
combat with his work. To announce some of these texts: Emmanuel
Falque (Professor, and Honorary Dean of the Faculty of Philosophy at
the Institut Catholique de Paris), has dedicated in our philosopher’s
honour a text inspired by Greisch’s research in the philosophy of
religion entitled “Apres la mort de Dieu et la mort d’homme: au fil
conducteur du corps”. Incidentally, this is Falque’s third text in honour
of Greisch; the other two– Le tournant de la facticité and Pascal et
l’inquiétude de la foi – focus on Greisch’s oeuvre.
    Jean-Claude    Gens and     Christian   Berner, two        of Greisch’s
colleagues in the ‘Hérmi-Herméneutique Mythe Image’ research group,
have also dedicated essays to him. Gens’ essay “La pensée du corps
dans le cadre de l’anthropocosmisme en Orient et en Occident” pursues
the hermeneutical path in a perspective complementary to that of
Greisch’s, responding to Griesch’s hermeneutics of the Bible with a
“Book of nature”. Berner’s text “Accord et différence. La raison
herméneutique entre écriture et oralité à la lumière du débat entre
Gadamer et Habermas” extends the ‘conflict’ of interpretations, that
Greisch highlights in L’âge herméneutique de la raison, by placing it at
the heart of the tension between ‘classical’ hermeneutics and critical
theory. As to texts that confront directly Greisch’s work, we have
Jérôme de Gramont’s “Le testament perdu et la trace” (Gramont is
Professor, and former Dean of the Faculty of Philosophy at the Institut
Catholique de Paris). Additional texts include that of Carla Canullo and
Virgilio Cesarone, and as mentioned earlier, we expect to publish more
articles on Greisch and his work in the forthcoming issues, as that of
Annie Kunnath, Greisch’s student in Paris, who proposes a re-reading
of the philosophical fables with which the author engaged. And last but
not least, in order to account for the magnitude of Greisch’s oeuvre,
and also as an indispensable source for researchers, we have published
a Minimal Bibliography of the philosopher’s works, that (as mentioned
                                                                              V
Editors’ Introduction




earlier), bears witness to the attitude of a “fox” who “knows many
things”, an attitude which our philosopher recognises as his own. Now
“these many things” that Greisch knows, while they cannot be
summarised, at least converge in this current journal that the
philosopher has tasked us with, a work that is only the start of a new
beginning.
      That is why, we conclude this Introduction with a new beginning,
thus attesting and conforming to the open and inclusive nature of
Greisch’s work. It is the metaphysical culmination of a rich thought first
initiated in Le cogito herméneutique (2000), where our philosopher
continues the dialogue on the “meta-function” of transcendence, a
dialogue initiated by Stanislas Breton and Paul Ricoeur. This is also the
conclusion of his book Transcender. Libres méditations sur la fonction
méta, which ends its six open reflections with the affirmation that the
act of transcending is rooted in existence: “To exist is to transcend. In
the context of philosophical experience, this verb can be understood in
fur senses – transascendence, transdescendence, transpassibility, and
transpossibility. These six open meditations, which refer to the multi-
millennial history of metaphysics, but which are also informed by art
and literature, not forgetting the data of psychopathology, engage in a
thorough investigation on the play of these four terms, with the view
of deriving a new understanding of “meta function”. By focusing on the
different meanings of the prefix ‘meta’, which gave rise to the term
‘metaphysics’, these meditations challenge the widespread prejudice
that metaphysical desire is henceforth without an object”.
      It will not be difficult to find in this issue of Critical Hermeneutics
the themes outlined in the ‘Call for papers’ (and which resulted in this
edition), namely, “Hermes and Hestia: the hermeneutic ellipse”;
“Towards a new discipline: philosophical and biblical hermeneutics”;
“The wisdom of uncertainty and the ‘rendezvous’ with truth and
metaphysical passion”; “Narrating life: the philosophical and the extra-
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                                                  Critical Hermeneutics, 5(2) (2021)




philosophical”. These are all themes that philosophy deals with, for
they stem from existence; four thematic axes that this issue of Critical
Hermeneutics intends to address so that other variations and open
reflections can be carried out by attesting to the freedom of the act of
philosophising that is at the very heart of Jean Greisch’s work, and that
he taught us and is still teaching us today. A freedom capable of defying
philosophical trends, because its aim is nothing short of responding to
the “rendezvous with Truth”, a rendezvous for which it is now time.


                                                                   Carla Canullo
                                                                Annie Kunnath
                                                               Marco Castagna




References
Bancalari, S., de Gramont J. e Leclercq J., a cura di, (2016). Jean
Greisch, les trois âges de la raison. Métaphysique, phénoménologie,
herméneutique. Paris: Hermann.
Capelle-Dumont, Ph., Hébert, G., e Popelard, M.-D., a cura di, (2004).
Le souci du passage. Paris: Cerf.
Greisch,   J.   (2000).   Le   cogito    herméneutique.       L’herméneutique
philosophie et l’héritage cartésienne. Paris: Vrin.
Greisch, J. (2002-2004). Le Buisson ardent et les Lumières de la
Raison. Paris: Cerf.
Greisch,   J.   (2006).   Entendre      d’une   autre   oreille.    Les    enjeux
philosophiques de l'herméneutique biblique. Paris: Bayard.
Greisch, J. (2009). Qui sommes-nous? Parcours phénoménologique
vers l‘homme. Louvain-Paris: Peeters.
Greisch, J. (2016). L’herméneutique comme sagesse de l'incertitude.
Paris: Le Cercle Herméneutique.


                                                                                 VII
Editors’ Introduction




Greisch, J. (2019). Désirer comprendre. Court traité des vertus
herméneutiques. Louvain-La-Neuve: PUL.
Greisch, J. (2021). Transcender. Libres méditations sur la fonction
méta. Paris: Hermann (coll. De Visu).




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