Fundamental Ontology and the Hermeneutics of Time in Heidegger’s Early Philosophy

Abstract

This article examines the problem of time within Martin Heidegger’s philosophical project, taking as its point of departure the transformation he brought about in the status of time within the ontological question. The study begins by elucidating the limitations of traditional conceptions of time, particularly those of Aristotle, Augustine, and Kant, in which time was associated with motion or the soul, or conceived as an a priori form of inner sense. By contrast, Heidegger seeks to move beyond the reduction of time to the present and succession and to disclose its ontological structure through the concept of temporality. The article demonstrates that time does not constitute an external framework within which Dasein exists; rather, it constitutes the primordial structure through which Dasein’s being-in-the-world is determined, encompassing care, openness to possibility, finitude, and death. The study therefore concludes that temporality is not a property added to Dasein’s Being but the very horizon for the understanding of Being itself. Consequently, the question of time is inseparable from the question of Being, thereby providing the ontological foundation for Heidegger’s project of overcoming the metaphysics of presence.