Het Tijdsprobleem in de Wijsbegeerte der Wetsidee

[The Problem of Time in the Philosophy of the Law-Idea]

By Herman Dooyeweerd

Philosophia Reformata 5 (1940) 160-192, 193-234

Translated by Dr. J. Glenn Friesen

The text below is a provisional translation. Copyright is held by the Dooyeweerd Centre, Ancaster, Ontario, and publishing right is held by Mellen Press, Lewiston, New York. A definitive translation will be published in the series The Collected Works of Herman Dooyeweerd.

Download pdf version of this article.

Note by translator: This is an important article, written by Dooyeweerd a few years after publication of his De Wijsbegeerte der Wetsidee. Although some of what he says in this article was incorporated into the English translation and revision of that work, A New Critique of Theoretical Thought, many ideas seem to be more clearly and succinctly expressed in this article. In particular, it clearly expresses Dooyeweerd’s emphasis of the importance of the experience of our supratemporal selfhood, and the relation of that experience to theoretical thought.

All footnotes with arabic numerals are by Dooyeweerd himself. I have included endnotes with my own annotations, which are clearly marked with my initials, and referenced with lower case roman numerals. I have translated some passages from other languages; these are shown in square brackets. I am grateful to Janet Danielson for her comments and editorial advice.

Part 1 [*]

I

The experience of time and the boundaries of
concepts and definitions in theoretical knowledge

“Quid est tempus? Si nemo a me quarat, scio, si quarenti explicari velim, nescio.”[1] [What then is time? If no one asks me, I know; but if I want to explain it to a questioner, I do not know.] This well-known saying by Augustine contains a truth of universal validity, which again and again seems to have been forgotten in philosophical discussions about the problem of time, as soon as people seek an understanding of time as such in a theoretical concept.

It is not open to contradiction that we have a sense of time. But the question now arises, whether this sense is not rooted in a deeper layer of our experience than the level that is accessible to our theoretical concepts. That such a deeper level is present in our experience is something that must be evident to everyone who gives an account of the separate boundaries of the theoretical attitude of thought in contrast to the immediate experience of reality of a non-theoretical character. Each theoretical analysis and each definition has its internal boundaries, which first make possible such analysis and definition. That which is irreducible in theory is at the same time indefinable,

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and each true definition rests in the final analysis on such irreducible moments. Without immediate insight into the indefinable, a real concept of what is definable is excluded. And “insight” itself remains rooted in a final foundation of experience [beleving], which oversteps the boundaries of the theoretical attitude of knowledge, and which excludes an absolute split between theoretical and pre-theoretical experience. Only in experience does the knowledge of reality become our own, and the sense of it being our own is the first condition for real knowledge [i]. That which is foreign in principle to our knowing selfhood also then in principle falls outside the boundaries of the human ability to know [2].

When reading the above, those who are trained in modern philosophy will be immediately inclined to think of the role of intuition or of “intuition of essences” [wezensaanschouwing], or of “empathy” [invoeling] or “experience” [beleving] as these ideas are put forward by phenomenology or vitalist philosophy [levensphilosophie] respectively, which they regard as an immediate mode of knowledge in contrast to merely mediated or symbolic knowledge.

Now as we shall see, true insight into time in fact involves true insight into how our concrete experience of time is outside the boundaries of theoretical abstraction. In other words it involves true insight into how theoretical abstraction necessarily takes away from [aftrekt] the full experience of time.

But in the philosophical investigation of time, as long as one holds to the self-sufficiency or the complete autonomy of theoretical knowing, there will be a characteristic vicious circle in any attempt to use intuition or experience to overstep the boundaries of the abstract theoretical concept. And this is done by modern phenomenology by its demand for the theoretical reduction or for the methodical epoché of the whole “natural worldview,” with its pretension of thereby being able to grasp in an adequate manner the essence of what is given in experience. This assumption of self-sufficiency is also made by the metaphysical vitalist philosophy of Henri Bergson, with its demand to eliminate everything that falls outside of the évolution créatrice of the psychical durée, in order

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in this way to place oneself in the metaphysical essence of true time. For this whole elimination or reduction is only possible by means of the path of theoretical abstraction, and this becomes absolutized whenever it carries the pretension of disclosing in an adequate manner the essential givenness of the experience of time.

In order to give an account of this, we need to first briefly pause to consider the characteristic distinction between the theoretical and the non-theoretical or naïve attitudes of thought.

The former, which is a conditio sine qua non not only for the special sciences, but also for philosophy itself, is characterized by the theoretical distance taken by logical thought over against its field of research, through which this field really becomes the “Gegenstand” of thought.

From out of this theoretical distancing is born the characteristic consciousness of problems [probleem-bewustzijn], which is proper only to theoretical experience.

In contrast, naïve experience as such does not know any problem in this theoretical sense, because naïve thought has no “Gegenstand.” The “Gegenstand” is the product of a theoretical splitting apart of temporal reality. In its logical side, naïve experience remains wholly fitted into [in-gesteld] temporal reality; it knows no dualism between knowing and what is known [ii]; it understands both the logical and the post-logical functions of things–in what I later describe as the structural subject-object relation–essentially as elements [bestanddeelen] of full reality as it is given to us. It experiences reality as held together and not split apart [in-een en niet uit-een]. Temporal reality is first split apart by theoretical analysis and synthesis, without which it is not possible to have real theoretical knowledge of what is being investigated.

And in this said analysis, our logical function of thought is active in the theoretical attitude of thought, which as such can never free itself from the spell [ban] of theoretical concepts.

Since theoretical analysis always works by abstraction, it is only by means of theoretical concepts that it can split apart temporal reality, as that reality gives itself to our naïve experience. Theoretical analysis takes something away [trekt af] from the full temporal reality, and such abstraction is necessary in order to obtain articulated insight into a definite structure

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of this reality, which in naïve experience never comes explicitly to consciousness, but only implicitly.

The two basic structures of temporal reality.

We will call this determined structure the structure of the modal aspects of temporal reality. As we shall see, this is not the only structure displayed by temporal reality, but it is implied in a second, more concrete structure, in which this reality gives itself immediately to naïve experience.

We will call the latter structure the individuality structure of temporal reality. In it, concrete things, events, actions, acts and social forms reveal themselves as individual totalities, which only function [fungeren] in the modal aspects.

As we shall see, insight into the fundamental distinction between these structures, as well as their mutual coherence, is of fundamental importance for a true view of the problem of time. Therefore we need to subject them one after the other to a closer investigation.

When we do this, it will be self-evident why time as such is inaccessible to theoretical concepts, and why time is an essential presupposition of all theoretical knowledge, a presupposition that is accessible as such only to the depth dimension [diepte-laag] of experience, which oversteps the boundaries of theoretical concept formation.

But we shall at the same time be on our guard against the wrong point of departure of phenomenology and vitalist philosophy, which, although perhaps unintentionally, have tried to twist into the framework of theoretical abstraction either the intuition of time or the experience of time.

The modal aspects of time
and time’s cosmic continuity.

Temporal reality functions [fungeert] in a variety of modal aspects, which are not themselves subjected to change within time, but rather form a constant and foundational modal

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framework, in which the individual changing things, events, acts, actions and social relations have their varying functions, and which first make possible such variable functioning.

In the modal structure, what is revealed is not the concrete what (as is the case in the individuality structure), but rather the how of reality. The modal structure is a functional mode of being, a modality or a modal aspect of reality.

In its general theory of the law-spheres, the Philosophy of the Law-Idea has as of this date brought to light fourteen of such modal aspects of temporal reality, which will here be named law-spheres in accordance with their law-regular [wetmatige] structure. They are: quantity, spatiality, the aspect of movement, the biotic aspect, the feeling (or psychical) aspect, the analytical (or logical) aspect, the historical aspect, the aspect of symbolic meaning, that of society, the economic, the aesthetic, the juridical, the moral and the aspect of faith.

In the theoretical-philosophical analysis, these modalities are really split apart from each other in a theoretical dis-continuity.

However, in temporal reality they are instead fitted together into a continuous cosmic coherence and this cosmic coherence is, as we shall see, a coherence of time.

As modal aspects of temporal reality, they are implicitly modal aspects of time. That is to say, in each modality of reality, time comes to expression in a separate way, but it cannot be reduced [opgaan] to any of these modalities. The modal structure of reality is itself enclosed within cosmic time.

The current opposition of time and space and the
general theory of relativity. Is the opposition between
time and the measurement of time a purely logical one?

This statement will appear to be highly problematic for those who are used to the abstract visions of reality in current philosophy.

Now one of the most deeply rooted presuppositions of the current view of time is that time only reveals itself in motion and in change. In this way, time and space are set over

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against each other, whether as equal in value and sharply distinguished ordering schemas of experienceable reality that are already related to each other in movement, or as reciprocally excluding each other as a “stream of experience” contrasted with a “mathematical conceptual construction.”

It is true that the current view, that space as such is nontemporal, is regarded as a serious problem in the general theory of relativity.

But until now, the current philosophical view of time appeared little inclined to give itself over to Minkowski’s and Einstein’s view that time and space cannot be separated. One tried to save himself from this view with the apparently logically irrefutable distinction between time and measurement of time. The general theory of relativity would then only concern the measurement of time, but not be able to teach us about the nature of time itself.

The view of time as a “fourth dimension” would then only be a perspectival-mathematical way of understanding, which could in part be explained from the circumstance that the general theory of relativity has accepted the transmission of light as the physical measurer of time and thereby has accepted the ray of light for time itself.[3]

Can in fact a measure of time be anything other than a definite duration of time, and can the “measurement of time” occur outside of time?

If not, then the opposition between time and measure of time, or between time and the measurement of time, loses its unity of meaning and its exclusive character, and without further precision it becomes logically unusable.

If one nevertheless assumes a mutually exclusive contrast between time and measurement of time, then he confuses himself, as we shall see, in insoluble contradictions.

As we shall see, the opposition between time and measurement of time is not in the least logically irrefutable, because the word ‘time’ must have a more limited meaning in the second term than in the first, if the whole concept of measurement of time is not to dissolve into internal antinomies.

In any event, the fundamental distinction between time and measurement of time does not at all mean that we should accept the current view of classical physics

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concerning the non-temporality of space.

The connection of the current opposition
between time and space with the metaphysical
idea of substance. All “definitions” of time are
in essence definitions of modal aspects of time.

On the contrary, in this view, time appeared to be a necessary presupposition in the definition of space itself [4], whereas it was evident that one could not really define time itself. Rather, in this supposed definition of time, we are only able to mathematically approach the modal aspect of movement, in which time is again presupposed.

Now whenever the difference between time and space is represented as a continuous flowing of succeeding moments of equal duration over against a static continuous extensiveness, then it is clear that the concept of motion is included in the concept of flowing. For its part, such movement is only possible in time. And in the concept of the static continuous extensiveness, there is hidden the idea of spatial simultaneity, which presupposes time just as much. Moreover, simultaneity is possible not only in the static sense of space, but just as much, although in a different way, in the modal meaning of movement, in that of organic life, in that of feeling, in that of logical analysis, in that of historical development, etc. etc.. [In all these modalities], as we shall see, spatial simultaneity is presupposed.

Finally, the view that space as such is non-temporal, was dependent from the very beginning on the metaphysical conception of matter as an extended substance, which, since it was timeless, could only in its “operations” [werkingen] be subjected to time [5]. And it is just this view that was fundamentally affected both by the general theory of relativity, which no longer physically separates space and time, as well as by quantum theory concerning the transmission of energy.

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In truth, all so-called definitions of time appear to be only definitions of modal aspects of time, in which time itself is always presupposed as indefinable. And from the very start, it must be regarded as impermissible to give a modal definition as a definition of the time.

This holds then just as much for Newton’s “absolute” mathematical time, as for Einstein’s relative physical kinematic time; just as much for Bergson’s “feeling duration” as for Spengler’s or Heidegger’s “historical time,” just as much for Kant’s view of time as “transcendental sensory form of perception” as for Hobbes’ empirical-sensory conception of time as phantasms of movement.

In each of the modal aspects, time
expresses itself in a particular meaning.

The Philosophy of the Law-Idea has indeed demonstrated that time comes to expression in all modal aspects of reality in separate ways. I will now parade in procession, one after the other, the modal aspects of time that have been distinguished. I can here only give a summary indication of the characteristics of modal time.

In the aspect of quantity, time takes on the modal meaning of numerical relations. In the series of numbers there is an irreversible order of time of earlier and later [6], which is in no way dependent on our

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subjective counting, but much rather is implied in the law-regular structure of the modal numerical aspect itself. Earlier and later do not in the least express a succession of movement in the series of numbers, but they express a relation of the quantitative value of time. To say, “2 is earlier than 3 in the series of numbers” means that 2 is less than 3. [7]

In the spatial aspect, time takes on the modal meaning of continuous extension. The static simultaneity of spatial relations is modally distinguished both from the time order of numbers as well as from that of the succession of movement.

Spatial simultaneity has nothing to do with supra-temporality or time-lessness, with which Parmenides already confused it in his conception of timeless “being.” It is only understandable within the cosmic order of time (which encloses all aspects of time), and it has a temporal coherence both with arithmetical time as well as with the time of movement. (Spatial simultaneity can approach the succession of movement in its “anticipatory function”).

Without a static spatial time, we would not be able to speak of a time of movement. This is so true, that Newton’s conception of “absolute motion,” to which his mathematical view of time was oriented, needs the static simultaneity of spatial coordinates for a concept of the equal duration of moments of motion.

In the aspect of movement, which must certainly not be understood in the mechanical sense of classical mechanics, and in which e.g. the qualitative electro-dynamic phenomena also function, time reveals itself in the modal sense of succession of movement, in which as such no static spatial simultaneity is possible, and in which all simultaneity–according to the modal meaning of movement itself–can carry only a relative character. “Absolute rest” is only understandable in its original sense of spatial extensiveness. However, movement presupposes

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this static spatial simultaneity. It is not in spatial extensiveness [8], but it is possible as an irreducible new aspect of temporal reality only on the basis of the sptail extensiveness [9].

In the biotic aspect, time reveals itself in the modal meaning of organic development of life, in which the biotic phases of development play an essential role. This biotic time of development cannot in any way be reduced to the modal time of motion. Development of life is not the same as “motion,” but can only take its course on the basis of the modal functions of movement. Mathematical-physical measures of time necessarily retain an external character over against the internal biotic order of time. They do not concern the internal modal nature of the biotic phases of time of birth, maturity, aging and death, which carry no homogenous character and do not allow themselves to be mathematically delimited from each other.

The question, “When is an individual born?” is an intrinsically biological question of time, which can only be answered from a biological standpoint, although undoubtedly there are boundary questions [grensvragen] that arise here that are difficult to answer.

In the psychical aspect, time reveals itself in the modal meaning of the life of feeling [10]. The modal order of time, to which the life of feeling is subjected, gives its own character to the succession of movement of feelings, in that earlier experience feelings or sensory impressions do not, like the moments of movement, simply disappear in the later ones. They either continue in the totality of a mood lasting a longer or shorter time in my consciousness, or they are suppressed in the bottom layer [onderlaag] of consciousness, what has been called “the subconscious,” or respectively “the unconscious,”

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from where they can continue to work [11] through into the conscious life of feeling, and from where they can also be reproductively taken up anew in our conscious stream of feeling in dream or memory–although perhaps in modified form. This modal order of time reveals itself just as much in the order of feeling-associations, which are not in the least to be explained in a mechanical way [12], but which possesses its own feeling nature.

Regarded from the subjective side, the time of feeling is a non-homogenous feeling of duration [13], in the sense intended by Henri Bergson. In this duration, feelings push themselves through in a continuous stream, which cannot be mathematically divided anymore than we can divide the biotic duration of development. Furthermore, in the subject-object relation of duration of feeling, which presents itself in awareness time (discussed in more detail below), the subjective moments of feeling are not points of time, like the moments in spatial time, but rather indivisible phases of time (cf. what has been called ‘presence time’ or the ‘specious present’ [14]), which are actually phases of the movement of feeling in the perception of sensory objects in the space of awareness [15]).

In the logical aspect, time reveals itself in the modal-analytical meaning of the logical prius and posterius, and in logical simultaneity.

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The order of time here takes on a normative modal character, which it also retains in all post-logical aspects. The current view that we should not speak here of a real order of time, is burdened by the presupposition that logical relations as such should be timeless. One then expressly sets the logical earlier and later over against the temporal earlier and later.

But the logical prius and posterius is, just as much as the order of logical simultaneity, a real modal order of time, which in the logical movement of thought, or of the thought process, retains its normative character over against the psychical and pre-psychical aspects of time.

Just as logical simultaneity (the logical characteristics) holds for each subjective conceptual synthesis and for each logical predicating, so does the logical earlier and later (of grounds and conclusion) hold for each logical argument.

Although the abstract discursive form of the syllogism is revealed only in theoretical thought [16], this certainly does not exclude the order of the logical prius and posterius from playing any role in pre-theoretical thought. Whoever wants to maintain that will have to demonstrate that the principle of sufficient ground finds no application in everyday thought, which is naturally impossible.

The principle of the sufficient ground cannot be applied outside of the modal order of time of the logical prius and posterius. [17]

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The logical ground precedes the conclusion, and not the other way around. The naïve thinker also knows that.

In the historical aspect, time reveals itself in the modal meaning of development of culture [18]. The historical “periods” are periods in the execution of the human task of forming and of having dominion. These periods are not mathematically delimited from each other; the living cultural factors from an earlier period are taken up in those of later periods in the total form of the new image of time. In tradition, the historical time of development fuses past, present and future. Just like all aspects of time still to be discussed, this order of time also carries a normative modal character. It sets before the human race a normative task of forming; with its demand of the future, it opposes any inert resting in the historic present or any vegetating in the past. Historical “reaction” is the anti-historical reaching back towards a past that has died away; it turns itself in a reactionary way against the historical norm of development [19].

In the linguistic aspect, time reveals itself in the modal meaning of symbolic meaning. The pause between two acts of speech, the slowing down or speeding up of the tempo of speech or of a gesture, all have symbolic meaning, as does also the objective duration of a signal of sound or of light. The subjective duration of a symbolic meaning, or of the objective duration of a sign are subjected to the normative order of time of the linguistic aspect. The normative meaning of this modal order of time is evident whenever we consider that it can also be applied in an inaccurate way, that is, in conflict with the linguistic norms.

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In the social aspect, time takes on the modal meaning of social forms. To let someone precede you who in a social sense is a higher placed person has the meaning of social politeness or courtesy. Tact in society requires that one should not make a certain visit at an inopportune time. Politeness forbids a guest from appearing too late at a meal. Festival days carry an express social character, in which the demands of conviviality come to be held in force. The normative character of time is also immediately evident in this modal aspect.

In the economic aspect, time takes on the modal meaning of saving of values. The businessman says “Time is money,” and this proverb is more than purely metaphorical. Indeed the economic order of time is the normative weighing of the value of the passing away of the saving of time. The whole economic phenomenon of interest rests on a higher valuation of present above similar future goods. The distinction between wages based on time and those based on piecework, between fixed capital and liquid capital, expressions such as “futures market” and “discounted rate of interest,” etc. etc. have meaning only within the modal framework of the economic order of time, which as such cannot be reduced to any other modal aspect of time.

In the aesthetic aspect, time reveals itself in the modal meaning of beautiful harmony. The classical form of unity of time (and place) for drama had only aesthetic meaning. The aesthetic order of time does not tolerate any aesthetically empty moments. Whenever a novelist loses sight of this separate modal character of the aesthetic order of time, and confuses this order of time with the historical, then he may well be able to write a more or less faithful historical story, but he can give no real work of art.

In the juridical aspect, time reveals itself in the modal meaning of justice, or retribution that harmonizes interests. Lateness or delay as a form of nonperformance, superannuation as a way of receiving rights, or the coming to naught [over time] of claims and contracts, determinations of time in agreements, the age of majority or minority, etc. etc., are real modal-juridical embodiments [iii]of time of a normative juridical character. The same can be said for the time of coming into force of a law or order (cf.

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also the embodiment of “retroactive force” in transitional laws).

Whenever a merchant in Amsterdam makes an order by telephone or telegraph from London or New York, which is then accepted, there is then the question, when the relevant agreement came into existence. This is a true juridical question of time, which can only be answered in accordance with juridical norms, because only in the juridical order of time is there a place for juridical consequences.

In the moral aspect, time reveals itself in the normative modal meaning of moral love of neighbor [20]. The failure to give help or support within one’s reach, where this is urgently required, is loveless and immoral. In its moral aspect, all of time is filled by the demand for love. One’s fatherland calls in times of danger to the duty of love of country; the duties of love for one’s elders or one’s children, the love of marriage, comradeship, etc. etc., require our time. Jesus’ saying, “The poor you have always with you, but you do not always have me,” is a succinct illumination of the time of love, which especially requires sacrifice in face of death.

Finally, in the faith aspect, time reveals itself in its transcendental boundary function, in its pointing within time to that which lies hidden behind time, in its pointing to eternity. In the majestic beginning words of the book of Genesis: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth,” the time of faith refers to God’s creative act, which first called time into existence.

Whenever we as Gereformeerde people believe that rebirth precedes conversion, then what is intended is certainly not a temporal succession in the sensory perceptible side of clock time, but much rather an order of time, which only has meaning in the boundary function of faith. If the heart, the religious centre of existence, is not first reborn through God’s Spirit, conversion can also not reveal itself in our temporal expressions of life [iv]. But rebirth itself can only be understood in the time of faith, as the mystery of God’s work in the heart of the sinner, which is hidden behind his temporal existence.

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The necessity in the theoretical attitude of thought
of an abstraction from the continuity of time.
The difference from the naïve attitude of thought.

In the foregoing summary description of the modal aspects we have really done nothing other than to give a theoretical explication of what one already can know implicitly in the pre-theoretical view of time. The current philosophical views of time, which attempt to identify time with a modal aspect of time (e.g. the physical aspect of movement, the psychical aspect or the historical aspect) are definitely in conflict with what is given in naïve experience. In order to avoid confusion, we shall from now on refer to the full time, in distinction from its aspects, as cosmic time. [v]

In our theoretical analysis we must really cut off [uitschakelen] cosmic time itself in its continuity that overarches all the aspects, in order in an articulated way to be able to split apart its modal aspects from each other, and in order to obtain them in the grasp of a theoretical concept. And this is what the naïve experience of time cannot do. The naïve experience of time remains wholly fitted within [in-gesteld] time, even in its logical-analytical aspect. It does not set itself in its logical function of thought over against abstracted modal aspects as its “Gegenstand” or problem.

And just because it [naïve experience] lacks every setting-over-against attitude of thought, and also because it remains wholly fitted within the cosmic continuity of time, the modal diversity of the aspects of time remains wholly implicit in the continuous unity of the cosmic experience of time. The continuity of time covers up [overdekt] the diversity of modal aspects in the naïve attitude of experience.

Whenever I look at my watch, I experience–perhaps in part only in my subconscious–uno intuitio [an intuition] of cosmic time in its various modal aspects, without these aspects delineating themselves in an articulated distinction in my experience. The normative aspects in particular cannot be set outside of our consideration without making time a theoretical abstraction that is foreign to our life. That the clock urges me to

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my duties is one of the most elementary givens of naïve experience. Only a scientific theory that fails to recognize its boundaries can arrive at the thought of denying these normative aspects of time.

But why then must the theoretical attitude of thought shut out from the contents of its concepts the cosmic continuity of time, and with it time itself? Because time is a transcendental presupposition for theoretical analysis and synthesis; in other words because it determines and first makes possible theoretical conceptual forming itself.

Cosmic time and the problem concerning the
possibility of a knowledge-acquiring synthesis. Why
Kant could not bring a real solution to this problem.

In Kant’s critical question, “How are synthetic a priori judgments possible?”, the epistemological problem concerning theoretical synthesis was brought forward for the first time.

From his standpoint he could not really find a solution. The synthesis of our theoretical act of knowing is always a synthesis between the logical-analytical conceptual function and the non-logical modal aspects of reality that are set over against it, and which are theoretically analyzed in the concept. How is such a connection possible?

Undoubtedly due to his critical point of departure, Kant set out the problem in too narrow a way–as concerning purely the so-called transcendental-logical categories [21] and the psychical sensory manifold. The sensory manifold was to deliver to us only the brute “matter of experience,” ordered in the transcendental sensory forms of perception of time and space. But he thereby proceeded from the presupposition of the self-sufficiency of the theoretical attitude of thought.

In relation to this, he limited time to the modal structural

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function of an a priori sensory form of perception, whereas, according to him, the logical “forms of thought” as such were timeless.

He now sought a “third” outside of the sensory matter of experience and the category, in order to make possible a synthesis between these completely differing modal aspects of consciousness–differing always according to their nature And as the third “third” instance, he put time on the stage, in which the categories, with the help of the “transcendental power of imagination” were to schematize themselves.

But “time” in the sense of a purely modal aspect of sensory forms of perception can certainly not fulfill this role of mediator between “reason” and the “sensory manifold.” Since the structure of the logical forms of thought are themselves supposed to be timeless, they remain irreconciled both over against the “sensory matter of experience” as well as over against “time as the sensory form of perception.”

Only when all modal aspects without exception, including the logical-analytical, are enclosed within time can the time really be understood as the transcendental condition for theoretical synthesis.

The immanence standpoint
in current philosophy.

But this state of affairs can only be seen and acknowledged by giving up the immanence standpoint in philosophy. This standpoint is characterized by the fact that man seeks the point of departure for philosophy–from out of which the diversity of aspects is to be understood, and which the Philosophy of the Law-Idea calls the ‘Archimedean point’ of philosophy–immanently in theoretical thought itself. When we critically consider this thought, it is seen to be irreconcilable with the acknowledgement that theoretical thought in its transcendental-logical structure is enclosed within time, and thus determined by the cosmic order of time. Rather, this standpoint implies the postulate of self-sufficiency, of the autonomy of theoretical “Vernunft.”

From out of its Christian point of departure, the Philosophy of the Law-Idea has radically broken with this immanence standpoint, and has demonstrated the uncritical dogmatic character of the postulate of the supposed autonomy of theoretical thought. It is also true to say that

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the immanence standpoint is no purely theoretical standpoint; the postulate of the self-sufficiency of theoretical thought is a dogmatic presupposition of current philosophy, a presupposition that in its deepest sense has a religious character, but one which is in flagrant conflict with the whole structure of the temporal cosmos. The postulate of self-sufficiency, even if the limitation “in its own area” is added, implies a primary absolutization of the theoretical synthesis, i.e. of a theoretical thought abstraction through which all of reality is theoreticized and the great givenness of naive experience is falsified.

The said postulate [or self-sufficiency] is only seemingly given up in the modern irrationalistic vitalist philosophy.

Bergson’s psychical “durée” is in fact itself a theoretical abstraction, the product of a theoretical analysis of the feeling aspect of time according to its subjective side. By virtue of the primary absolutization of the theoretical (in this case psychological) synthesis, this is then represented as the true and complete time. The same holds for Heidegger’s (phenomenological) “historische Zeit” [historical time] as the “horizon” that also applies to thought. For in this case there is an absolutization of a “phenomenological” abstraction, which itself can only be the product of theoretical analysis and synthesis.

Heidegger also proceeds from out of the self-sufficiency of the theoretical attitude of knowledge–or more precisely, the phenomenological attitude, twisted around by him in an irrationalistic sense. He rejects each acknowledgement of a supra-theoretical determinateness (“Bedingtheit”) of the phenomenological investigation.

Only in the religious center of his existence
does man transcend time. The uncritical
character of the immanence standpoint.

Why is this presupposition of the “self-sufficiency of theoretical thought in its own area” uncritical and dogmatic? Because theoretical thought in its modal-logical aspect (and that is what is here intended) cannot by its own power [eigenmachtig] determine its relation over against

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the remaining modal aspects of reality. In the “cogito” [Descartes’“I think”], the thinking selfhood is active, which as such functions not only in the logical-analytical aspect, but equally in all aspects of reality. At the same time, this selfhood is the concentration point of temporal human existence. If all aspects are equally enclosed by cosmic time and thus have an intrinsically temporal character, then the concentration point of human existence, in which all temporal aspects come together in one focus (brandpunt), cannot itself be of a temporal, but must be of a supratemporal, transcendent character. The theoretical synthesis is determined both by cosmic time as well as by the supratemporal transcendent selfhood.

The immanence standpoint can only seemingly be maintained, by–following the so-called critical philosophy–unexpectedly identifying the thinking selfhood with the so-called transcendental-logical subject of thought (in Kant, “the transcendental-logical unity of apperception”). In this identification, the selfhood is shriveled up into a transcendental-logical formal unity, which is then again sharply distinguished from the individual, temporal so-called empirical psychological selfhood. This “transcendental subject of thought” then serves as the theoretical-logical point of concentration, which as “the immanent subjective pole of thought (Theodor Litt), could never be made into the “Gegenstand” of thought, because it should be the necessary universally valid condition for all thinking that is directed towards a “Gegenstand.”

The dogmatic character of the “transcendental-logical” conception of the selfhood is really apparent whenever one considers that it is a theoretical abstraction and as such is itself the thought product of the thinking selfhood. The thinking selfhood identifies itself in an uncritical way with its thought product.

A “transcendental-logical” selfhood exists even less than an “empirical-psychological” selfhood. The selfhood certainly has modal psychical and logical functions, but it is itself the necessary transcendental concentration point, not only of the psychical and logical, but equally of all its temporal modal functions.

A transcendental-logical unity above the theoretical diversity of thought categories, such as Kant wanted to find in his transcendental subject of thought, does not exist. Within the

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modal structure of the logical aspect there exists only logical unity in the logical diversity. This unity cannot be of a transcendent character.

The doctrine of the transcendental subject of thought is nothing other than the nominalistic, epistemological formalizing of the old doctrine of scholastic psychology concerning the anima rationalis [rational soul] as substance. In this metaphysical psychology, man sought for the “unity and simplicity” of the soul in the intellect as its essence, its centre of being, which would also overprint [opdrukken] a rational character on the other human “faculties of the soul.”

This idea itself of the soul came from out of Aristotelian psychology, and corresponded with the Aristotelian view of divinity as “pure nous” (actus purus). The scholastics tried in vain to fit this view to the Christian doctrine concerning the simplicity and indivisibility of the soul [22].

In vain I say. For the “anima rationalis” intrinsically lacks the simplicity of being that the Christian doctrine correctly accepted for the “soul.” As a metaphysical abstraction, it [anima rationalis] remained caught in the diversity of the temporal functions. Thought, which was supposed to comprise the essential character [of the soul], is in the final analysis only one of its modes of revelation [openbaringswijzen] [vi]. Neither willing nor feeling allow themselves to be reduced to mere modalities of thought. Only in the religious concentration point of existence are all temporal functions and acts brought together in their deeper unity.

But because of its point of departure, immanence philosophy is forced to seek the centre of being of temporal existence in thought itself.

And because of its view of the concentration point of human existence, immanence philosophy could also acquire no insight into cosmic time. In Aristotelian-Thomistic scholasticism, time was understood merely as the” measure of motion.”

According to this view, the “anima rationalis,” to which “immortality” was always attributed, is only “accidentally” subjected to time, in its connection with the “material body.” According to its substantial “rational being,” it is “supratemporal,”

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and is only measured by the “aevum” [23] (Thomas Aquinas).[24]

A real sense of time supposes a transcendent
centre of experience of time. Kuyper’s -
understanding of the transcendent centre.

Now it is indeed correct that we could have no true sense of time unless we did not go above time in the deepest part of our being. All merely temporal creatures lack a sense of time.

All absolutizing of time rests on a lack of critical self-reflection.

But we cannot learn to know of the true concentration point, the supratemporal root of our existence, from a self-empowered philosophy, which necessarily remains closed up within the horizon of time. We can only learn it from the divine Word revelation. Only this Revelation discovers us to our selves. As Calvin remarks in his Institutio, we can only come to true self-knowledge through true knowledge of God. I call this the religious law of concentration of human existence.

The “soul” of human existence, which according to the testimony of Scripture is not affected by temporal death, but which continues to exist even after the putting off of the “body,” i.e. of all of the temporal forms of existence closed up in individuality structures, is the religious root of human existence. Scripture also calls it the “inward man” or the “heart” of man, “out of which proceed the issues of life” and “in which eternity is laid.” It is, as Kuyper expresses in his Stone Lectures, “that point in our consciousness in which our life is still undivided and lies comprehended in its unity…”

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According to Kuyper, that concentration point is

And then Kuyper uses not only the image of the religious root, but also that of the focus [brandpunt]:

This religious root of individual human existence can however not be understood atomistically as an “autarchic individual,” but rather as created by God in the religious root community of the human race, which fell away from God in its first head Adam, but in the second head Jesus Christ was again restored in its religious community with God. That religious root community of humanity is the true supratemporal concentration point of the whole temporal cosmos. This also explains how Adam’s fall did not only drag with it the human race, but also the whole of the temporal cosmos, just as in Jesus Christ the whole cosmos is saved in the root.

A real Christian philosophy of time is then also not possible whenever theoretical thought is not directed to the true supratemporal concentration point of the temporal cosmos. Theoretical thought is never self-sufficient in philosophy, but, because of the structure of creation itself, it is necessarily religiously determined, whether in an apostate direction, or in the direction to the true Origin of all things, as revealed itself in Jesus Christ.

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Dooyeweerd's Footnotes to the Text

[*] Note by Dooyeweerd: In this paper, which also appears separately in the publications of the Gereformeerde Psychology Study Group [Geref. Psychologische studievereeniging], readers of Philosophia Reformata will find for the first time a completed [afgeronde] view written by me concerning the problem of time. In particular, I have not previously published my view of the problem of the measurement of time. Apart from this article, I hope that a continuing series of historical studies about the problem of time in immanence philosophy will be published in this journal.

[1] Augustine: Confessions, XI, 17.

[2] Cf. my extensive discussion of this in De Wijsbegeerte der Wetsidee II, 414ff.

[3] Cf. for example, J.A. Gunn: The Problem of Time (London, 1929), 206.

[4] Even before Minkowski, this was brought to light by the Hungarian thinker Palágyi (Ausgewählte Werke III Zur Welt-mechanik, 2), who moreover was later known as a principal opponent of the general theory of relativity.

[5] Cf. B. Bavink: Ergebnisse und Probleme der Naturwissenschaften (5th ed., 1933), 179.

[6] This modal order of earlier and later is, as we shall see below, necessarily related to the subjective duration of time, and reveals just in this fact its essential time character.

It is not correct that the order of succession in the series of numbers, which we here understand as a real modal order of time, is reversible.

Of course we can just as well count from the front to the back as from the back to the front. But in this is presupposed the irreversible modal order of time of the numbers themselves. Counting backwards remains counting backwards, and it cannot be regarded as counting forwards. One may also not interpret the said order of succession in a logicistic way as a purely logical interpretation. The logical order of prius and posterius, as we shall see, is just as much a modal order of time, but as such it is not an order of succession in the meaning of quantity. The view that the series of numbers is timeless leads to an obvious antinomy in the so-called measurement of time.

Temporal duration cannot be measured by the timeless, and yet in each measurement of time the order of numbers plays an essential role. The same holds for the order of spatial relationships [ruimtedeelen; See NC I, 31, fn1].

[7] Herman Cohen, in his Logik der reinen Erkenntnis, p. 155, calls the + sign in arithmetic “the symbol of anticipation” and the “herald’s staff of time.” According to him, anticipation is the characteristic of time, and he has therefore, in contrast to Paul Natorp, acknowledged the time character of the series principle for numbers, although he has logicized the arithmetical time order. Kant saw in number a schematization of the categories of quantity in time as “transcendental forms of intuition.”

[8] Each attempt to eliminate the modal boundaries between space and movement, by reducing the dynamic course of movement to a static line, necessarily leads to the antinomies of Zeno the Eleatic. Each attempt to reduce a modal aspect to another must lead to typical antinomies, as I have demonstrated in the WdW.

[9] Spatial extensiveness and motion are here intended in their original sense of separate modal aspects. One should therefore not confuse them with the sensory awareness of space and the sensory image of movement; these are analogies of space and motion in the psychical aspect.

[10] “Feeling’ must not be understood in the current psychological sense, but in the sense of a modal aspect, of a modal nature. Cf. here note 33 of this article.

[11] As is known, the same also holds for the logical life of thought.

[12] Cf. A. Prandtl: Assoziations-psychologie (Einführung in die neuere Psychologie), ed. E. Saupe, 2nd and 3rd ed. 1928), p. 88 ff.

[13] With respect to the relation of time order and time duration (whether subjective or objective), see the discussion below.

[14] Cf. J.A. Gunn: The Problem of Time (London, 1929), 391:

[15] That the “specious present” is really a current time of feeling, or a time of sensory awareness, and not something that can be brought back to memory as Reid thought in his Essays on the Intellectual Powers, is forcefully brought to light by Wildon Carr in a conference of the Aristotelian Society held in 1915/-16, and mentioned by Gunn. He gave there a critical analysis of our awareness in the seeing of a shooting star. In this he remarks,

Bergson has also placed all emphasis on this in his opposition of the “duration of feeling” and the mathematical concept of time. In a similar sense W. James and Gunn, op. cit. p. 394 and others.

[16] Cf. A. Messer: Psychologie, 5th ed. (1934), p. 259:

The further statement of this writer, “Über das Denkgeschehen selbst sagt sie (scl. die Logik) nichts aus” is burdened by the criticalistic view of reality with its fundamental separation of “sollen” [ought] and “sein” [is].

[17] Schopenhauer saw in the principle of the sufficient ground itself the unifying origin of time, which he with Kant only allowed to hold as a form of consciousness for phenomena. In agreement with the foundations of his philosophy, which viewed temporal reality as merely a “representation,” he actually immediately falls into an overextension of the mode of time that reveals itself in the logical movement of thought, and which for him as a consequence takes on not a modal-logical, but a knowledge-theoretical meaning. In his Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung I, s 4 (Sämtliche Werke, 12 vols., Stuttgart und Berlin: Cotta’sche Buchhandlung Nachfolger, Vol. 1-2, p. 35), we read,

[18] According to the subject side of its modal meaning, “culture” is viewed as “formative control ” [beheerschende vorming].

[19] For the normative character of the historical aspect see my Wijsbegeerte der Wetsidee, Vol. II, and my Recht en Historie (1938).

[20] This temporal aspectual meaning of love may not be confused with the religious fullness of love, which is the “fulfillment of the law.”

[21] From his standpoint, Kant could certainly not admit that in these categories there was already hidden a synthesis between the logical aspect and non-logical aspects (quantity, space and motion). To acknowledge this would have meant the giving up of Kant’s transcendental-logical point of departure, which seeks the origin of all determination of the “matter or experience” in the free formative activity of the so-called transcendental subject of thought.

[22] Cf. for further information my article “Kuyper’s Wetenschapsleer,” Philosophia Reformata 4 (1939), 203.

[23] The “aevum” has since Boethius been distinguished both from time as well as from eternity, and has been understood as a sort of intermediate state between both. According to Thomas, time has both an earlier and a later; the aevum however has in it no earlier and later, but the later can be linked to it; eternity has neither earlier and later, nor can it be combined with them (Summa theol. I, qu. X, art. V).

[24] Summa theol. I qu. X art. V: “Sed aevum dicitur esse mensura spiritualium substantiarum.” Cf. here my article “Het tijdsprobleem en zin antinomieën op het immanentiestandpunt,” Philosophia Reformata 4, 2ff.

[25] Cf. here my article “Kuyper’s Wetenschapsleer,” 211.

[26] This understanding of the religious centre of existence is irreconcilable with the traditional scholastic idea of the soul, which however Kuyper maintains in his scientific-theological works, nor with the traditional view of dichotomy.

[27] JGF: There is no footnote 27 in the original document, due to a numbering error in the original text.

[28] Also within the modal aspects! In this way the arithmetical and spatial relations first acquire subjective differing durations within concrete things, events, etc. For example, five people find themselves at the same time for a period of five minutes in the same square space. After the five minutes have elapsed, one leaves to go to an adjoining room, so that after this first departure now four remain. The first numerical and spatial relation lasted only five minutes. The modal aspects of this duration of time follow the modal orders of time: the duration of number follows that of the numerical aspect; the spatial duration follows that of the spatial aspect (of simultaneous extension).

In the structures of the modal aspects of number and space we find only modal time order, and no subjective duration. The same holds for the logical aspect of time. That some do not hold the logical prius and posterius to be real figures of time, can be explained in this way: they have thought that they could understand the subjective logical movement of thought, in which the logical aspect of time reveals itself as logical duration in subjection to the logical order of time, completely separately from the logical time order, as a kind of “psychical natural event,” which only asks for a “causal explanation.” In a logical discursive process of thought there is however implied a subjective logical time duration, in which the logical order of time subjectively differently realizes itself (one person makes logical conclusions faster and more accurately than another), and in which one can also argue non-logically (but not a-logically). Whenever one cuts off the logical meaning from the subjective duration of the thought, one is in fact eliminating the thought process itself, and one can no longer speak of a thought duration. And such logical meaning is eliminated whenever one thinks he can separate the thought duration from the logical order of time.

Things have a logical duration in an objective sense (compare p. 17 following in the text) [JGF: p. 218?]in accordance with their objective-logical characteristic, which in their temporal individual existence in fact come into existence and disappear with things, in contrast to the constant individuality structures (with the therein implied logical types), in which they function.

The objective-logical function of a thing may in no way be identified with the subjective logical concept, nor with the constant individuality structure, which first makes possible the individual coming into being and disappearance of the thing in time, or with the constant structure of the logical aspect, in which it functions with its objective-logical characteristics. Of course the subjective concept that I have formed of a certain thing, is independent of the continued existence of it. Moreover, this holds just as much for sensory representation. But the current logical object function of a thing is with the thing as a whole just as perishable in time as its objective historical, economic, aesthetic or juridical function. Just as a thing by its perishing ceases to be beautiful, economically valuable, a cultural article or object of law, so also and just as much does it thereby lose its objective-logical characteristics. A building that collapsed into a heap of rubble no longer retains the logical characteristics of a building.

The subjective concept has it its subjective-logical duration and is just as perishable in time. In human society, the contents of such a concept are objectified in linguistic symbols, whereby it also remains preserved for posterity. A concept objectified in this way, in its acceptance by a relatively constant community of things, receives a social-logical duration of validity, which is independent from individual acceptance, and ends only when the community changes its manner of thinking. However, a concept is never timeless, as idealism supposed.

The matter stands totally differently whenever we bring into play the truth validity of judgments. The Truth is essentially not of a logical, but of a supratemporal religious character, since it carries a totalitarian and central character. The judgment “Socrates was a man,” is not true “in itself.” Its truth depends on the meaning in which one understands the word ‘man.’ It is certainly untrue whenever one has a false unbelieving view of “being a man”–for example when one understands him to be merely a higher kind of animal. And the judgment “2 X 2 = 4” is also not true in itself, since it immediately acquires a false meaning whenever we separate the truth validity of this judgment from God’s creative sovereignty.

[29] The Archimedean point, as we have seen above, is the concentration point for thought, from out of which the thinker must understand the modal aspects of reality in the theoretical view of totality. This Archimedean point is the point of departure for philosophical thought and must transcend time and its modal points of refraction.

[30]Also the identification of subject and substance in scholastic metaphysics has disturbed the idea of subject.

[31] “Duration” is here simply made into a dependent reflex of the mathematical time order.

[32] That the linguistic function first unfolds itself after the rudimentary logical development of the child is also acknowledged by A. Messer: Psychologie, 5th ed (1934), p. 245, where he remarks:

Even in adults, it can happen that

[33] The modal meaning of feeling definitely includes more than psychology general understands under it. Undoubtedly what has been called ‘Empfindung’ or sensory awareness also falls under it. Sensory awareness of a visual, tactile or other typical structure, according to its modal character, is viewed just as pleasure or displeasure are viewed–as a phenomenon of feeling. Ever since Tetens, the prejudice has worked its way into psychology to deny the nature of feeling to sensory awareness, merely because of its normal subject-object relation. Only the apparently pure subjective feelings of pleasure and displeasure are acknowledged as having this character [of feeling]. As is known, Tetens was himself not consistent in his distinction of “Gefühl” and “Empfindung,” insofar as he ascribed both to the same faculty of feeling or “Empfindung.” Kant was the first to be consistent in this line, when he no longer classified “Empfindungen” under “feeling,” but under the “faculty of knowing.”

Undoubtedly, a one-sided epistemology and doctrine of reality oriented to the natural sciences played an essential role in this. The modern psychological view of “Empfindung” as “(relative) einfache Wahrnehmungsinhalt” [(relatively) simple content of awareness] (cf. A. Messer, Psychologie, 5th ed. (1934), p. 152) derives from the atomistic association psychology, which sought to build up all of consciousness from out of elementary elements.

It has however still not succeeded in providing a real modal difference between “feeling” and “Empfindung.” Just as there is also no mention of this in the naïve experience, as it has found its expression in what has been called “the psychology of everyday life.” Neither the criterion of subjectivity, nor that of polarity and affectivity, nor that of the so-called actuality (Külpe) is suitable to really modally delineate feeling from “Empfindung.” The first and the third of these criteria are already excluded from consideration since they are not oriented to the aspect structure, but in general to the subject-object relation. But the second criterion is also not useable in this regard. One need only to think of the awareness of pain and of temperature, which are classified as “Empfindingen,” although they undoubtedly have a polar and affective character.

Moreover, the modal feeling moment of emotionality (movement of feeling) may not, as does Messer for example, be confused with the typical affectivity of the feeling of pleasure and displeasure. In a modal sense the subjective feeling of colour is also proper to the moment of movement of feeling. Otherwise we could not be aware of the greater or lesser intensity of colours, for this awareness presupposes a sensory movement of feeling. On the other hand, logical feeling for instance is only with difficult able to be classified in the schema of the affective feelings of pleasure and displeasure.

The lack of insight in the modal structure of feeling is also the cause that in the schema of spiritual feelings (or essentially normative feelings), as they have been worked out by Messer following Jodl, such as formative (cultural) feeling, the linguistic feeling, the societal feeling, economic feeling etc. have been left wholly outside of consideration. And except for what are called “Persongefühle,” only the logical, aesthetic, ethical and religious (Sachgefühle!) have been included.

 

Translator's Endnotes

[i] JGF: Dooyeweerd’s use of the phrase “our own” relates to our appropriation of temporal events by our supratemporal selfhood. Dooyeweerd says that we have an immediate enstatic experience of temporal reality as our own (WdW II, 414; NC II, 479). The aspects are our own "cosmically" (WdW II, 409; NC II, 474). Even the identification of a sensation such as a sweet taste would be impossible without intuition:

[ii] JGF: This is a remarkable statement. It also occurs in Dooyeweerd’s Response to the Curators of the Vrije Universiteit. If there is no dualism between knower and known in naïve experience, then it is for Dooyeweerd a kind of nondual experience.

[iii] JGF: The term ‘figure’ [figuur] is important in Dooyeweerd’s philosophy. A figure is an anticipation of what an individuality structure in the temporal world may become, but which is presently only a potential reality. In finding the figure within the temporal world, and in realizing it and embodying it, we form history, and we fulfill the reality of temporal structures. God’s law or Wisdom gives the connection between this internal figure of our imagination and the modal aspects in which our body and other temporal structures of individuality function. See my extensive discussion of these issues in my article, “Imagination, Image of God and Wisdom of God: Theosophical Themes in Dooyeweerd’s Philosophy,” (2006), online at [http://www.members.shaw.ca/hermandooyeweerd/Imagination.html]

[iv] JGF: Rebirth is therefore supratemporal; conversion is its temporal consequence.

[v] JGF: Vollenhoven denied Dooyeweerd’s whole idea of cosmic time, including Dooyeweerd’s view of time as a prism refracting the meaning nuclei of the aspects. And Vollenhoven denied that our selfhood is in any way supratemporal. For him, the selfhood was totally within time, and merely pre-functional. Dooyeweerd vigorously opposed such a view. See NC I, 31-33, fn 1. See my article, “Dooyeweerd versus Vollenhoven: The religious dialectic within reformational philosophy,” Philosophia Reformata 70 (2005) 102-132 [‘Dialectic’].

[vi] JGF: Dooyeweerd uses the word ‘revelation’ [openbaring] to refer to the temporal unfolding of our life, directed from our supratemporal central heart and root. This use of the term ‘revelation’ to refer to the unfolding from a higher to a lower ontical level, is also found in Franz von Baader.

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Dec. 26/05, revised June 29/06