English
EXTENDED ABSTRACT
The phenomenology of Life from Michel Henry: introduction and possible
contributions to psychology of religion
KARIN H. KEPLER WONDRACEK1
Abstract
The phenomenology of Life deepens questions raised in the dialogue between Freud and Pfister. His
criticism of the directions of Western thought points to effects of Galilean reductionism on
ontological monism. Henry proposes the duplicity of appearance and the inversion of the
phenomenological method in order to encompass the phenomenalization of the life that donates
itself as affection in immanence. Henry's journey through Christianity as a phenomenological
proposal of access to the truth of Life: Christianity bestows a paradigm to Philosophy, which is still
little explored, proposing the understanding of life in the intelligibility of the invisible Logos that
generates everything visible. The Human condition is that of Son, born in the absolute Life. The
Henryan reading of Psychoanalysis proposes that Psychoanalysis shelters life amidst the barrenness
of Western thought, but is also affected by it, especially its approach to affection. At end, we
pointed out the contributions of Phenomenology of Life to clinic and psychology of religion.
Keywords: Phenomenology of Life; Michel Henry; philosophy of Christianity; psychoanalysis
1.1 Introduction
We began this study taking up Pfister’s dual position (1998), to be both a disciple of Freud
and an independent thinker. In the latter position, we follow him in his quest to put the unconscious
into a fuller sphere of reality.
We have two starting points: The theoretical and the clinical, in which we are mapping the
periods of fruitfulness and sterility in the clinic. We find significant contributions in Michel Henry’s
1
Psychologist and psychoanalyst in Porto Alegre, RS, Brazil. Bachelor’s of psychology at PUCRS (1981);
psychoanalytical training at Sigmund Freud Associação Psicanalítica (1992), master’s and Ph. D in Theology
at Faculdades EST-São Leopoldo) (2002; 2010). Adjunct professor of psychology and pastoral counseling at
Faculdades EST. Her research is on the interface between theology, phenomenology and psychoanalysis.
E-mail [email protected]
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thought that get to the heart of the issues raised by Pfister (1925, 1999). For Rosa: "The
phenomenology of life, while inaugurating a philosophical 'other beginning,' rediscovers the
thought that was in the origin of modern and contemporary philosophy, and can therefore go to a
stage prior to the traditional dispute between reason (natural knowledge) and revelation
(supernatural knowledge) (2007, p. 135).
The thought of Michel Henry basically consists of two movements: 1. Criticism of the
direction of Western thought and its genealogical influence on psychoanalysis; 2. Proposition to
make a phenomenological investigation of life, illuminating the human condition through a
philosophical approach to Christianity. (Henry, 1963, 2003)
I.2 The critic
In Genealogy of Psychoanalysis (2009) we find the best Henryan explanation of the
direction of Western thought The book's central thesis is that neglecting life as self-affective and
self-impressive induces modern and also contemporary philosophy to relegate the coming of life as
affection, and to favor the appearing in its exteriority and take it as foundational to life.
For Descartes, the intent of ensuring method and establishing science won the day, diverting
him from his previous goals and finally relegating them to oblivion. Thus, his emphasis shifted
from immediate knowledge of "to think or to see" [videor] to "to think something” or “to see
something" [Videre]. This shift was taken up by Kant (I as "I represent myself"), passed on to
Husserl (I as "intentionality"), and ended up with Heidegger (I as "being-in-the-world"). Henry says
that the quest for live subjectivity reappears in Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, but that they reduced it
to the scope of the anonymous, wild, impersonal, and thus transmit this tone upon philosophy and
culture. This “loss of the phenomenon in the lightning of its appearing” not only leaves
undetermined the principle of self-knowledge (the domain of anthropology), but also achieves
therapeutic possibilities (the domain of clinical treatment). And nearing to our issue, also influences
reductionistic understanding of religious sense.
1.3 Some basic concepts
Ontological Monism at the base of Western thought: the set of assumptions that underlies the
process of knowing, which refers to the manner of presenting the phenomenon while maintaining
the subject-object "phenomenological distance," affirming that the phenomenon presents itself
distinct from us and separate from us. From this, Being will always be thought of in its
transcendental exteriority, in an original break and separation – a common feature of classical
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philosophy and modern philosophy of consciousness since its Greek origins. It is this achievement
that made possible the opposition – classical since Descartes - between the consciousness and the
thing. To know is always to know a something, within that distance considered as necessary.
Duplicity of appearing: Beyond the movement described above, there is another way of
knowing, earlier and more original, a purely immanent movement, which generates both the
impressive and the reflective mode. The being of the ego is the very element of this movement. The
ego is a power, the cognant does not mean 'I think' but 'I can' "(Lipsitz, 2009). This "I can" is
understood as inner knowledge, an immanent cogito. Henry supports his claim here via Maine de
Biran: the ego knows through the immanent sense of effort, identified with the action by which it
continuously changes the world. In the case of pain, someone do not need the representation of pain
to know it because he feels it in the immediacy of its revelation in his own immanence; so it is also
with joy, sadness, etc.
Other basic assumptions of the Phenomenology of Life, outlined here:
- "The invisible is the first and basic determination of phenomenality, the phenomenological
way of revelation of the affectivity in its immanent self-affection." (Lipsitz, 2008). Therefore, it is
necessary to make the phenomenology of the invisible more primary than the visible.
- The radical immanence is the foundation of transcendence: "the impressionable being as
such, while exempt in itself of all transcendence”, without any distance between what is revealed
and the seizure of it. (Henry, 2010, p. 6)
- Life gives itself in pathos as affection, in this mix of passion and passivity. Original Pathos
is this relationship of oneself to oneself in life, this original relationship of suffering and enjoying.
- Pain and pleasure are not original, but revealing of a power prior to their distinction: the
power to experience oneself in life, the proving of oneself, the suffering of oneself. Living entails a
suffering of oneself, and this is possible if there is an internal adhesion to the self, consent to be the
pure experience of oneself.
- Transcendental birth is our condition: This is the original birth [Ur-naissance] whereby the
“I” comes to itself, it is born of this Self-generation of the absolute Life. To be born means to this
living being, to become a transcendental oneself alive among all those who are, as each of us is.
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2. The Phenomenology of Life and Christianity
In his quest to propose the invisible as the origin of the visible, Henry points out the great
analogy and also coincidence between the phenomenology of Life and the foundational texts of
Christianity, particularly the writings of John. Christianity offers a unique contribution to
understanding of the human being, little explored by philosophy: here we find "the first known
exposure to a transcendental theory of man" (Lipsitz, 2004, p. 63).
In his last three books, Henry focuses on Christianity as a basis for understanding the human
condition.
2.1 I am the truth: towards a philosophy of Christianity (1998)
The prologue of [the Gospel of] John is studied as philosophy. Concerning the relationship
between the Logos and humans one can comprehend their condition: the decisive thesis of
Christianity says that the Truth of Life is irreducible to the truth of the world and therefore does not
appear in it. The real phenomenological Life finds in the Truth of Christianity its explanation.
(Henry, 1998, p. 49).
2.2 Incarnation: towards a philosophy of the flesh (2001)
The central theme of the Incarnation: a philosophy of the flesh is the arrival of life as flesh.
The Johannine concept of flesh is investigated in order to deepen the description of incarnated
subjectivity, and thus "restore full intelligibility of transcendental genesis of the living" (Lipsitz,
2004, p. 73)
Flesh is that transcendental body that is nothing more than the immanent embodiment that
finds its essence in life. The invisible flesh is the "primitive self-giving", "the original affection," "a
kind of wisdom peculiar to the original state of innocence," the "timeless memory of our powers,"
in which they experience themselves internally "without remembering or anticipating” ( Lipsitz,
2004, p. 73). To be born is to experience oneself in the flesh.
2.3 Words of Christ (2002)
The last book reaffirms that life is given in the Logos, the Word of Life. Located in the heart
of reality as his original revelation, the Word of Life "is the great forgotten [element] in
contemporary reflection and in traditional philosophical thought." (P. 80). The Word of Life is
revealed as affection without ever leaving himself. The human being defines himself by the
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connection to that word, as a recipient of that Word and by his nature which consists in hearing this
Word.
3. Psychoanalysis, phenomenology and psychology of religion
Starting with the phenomenology of Life it is possible realize the presence of another
dimension, complementary to that taught by psychoanalysis, as sensitiv knowledge (Bangel, 2015).
It is as if, simultaneously, while listening to the patient, it’s possible feel in him and in the self - a
movement not toward externalization, but in the opposite direction - a movement into the body, and
Henry would say, into the flesh, to a core of pure affect, of the flow of life.
In another text (2011) I pointed out the fecundity of Michel Henry’s phenomenology of Life
for the understanding of religiosity, as paths that are only beginning:
Being a son/daughter born in the absolute Life in Henry’s language implies acknowledge the gift of
life beyond the biological parents, and opens to re-creations of vital ties with the sacred, inside and
with each other. In the Henryan paradigm of double appearing, both processes are considered - the
visible and the invisible affiliation, joined together in a paradoxical way, exchanging energies and
intensities. Religious, therefore, it is also covered in the double registration – of the representation
and of affection, unrepresentative, and so ingrained and meaningful.
This is the beginning of a lively dialog…
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