Dr. J. Glenn Friesen

Studies relating to Herman Dooyeweerd Linked Glossary of Terms

© J. Glenn Friesen 2003-2007

Linked Glossary of Terms
(references to De Wijsbegeerte der Wetsidee, unless indicated. See concordance for correlation with pages in the New Critique. The concordance is in pdf format.)

In his farewell leture [afscheidscollege] on Oct 16, 1965, Dooyeweerd refers to the horizon of our experience, our 'ervaringshorizon':

En onder ‘ervaringshorizon’, een term die ge in de Wijsbegeerte der Wetsidee herhaaldelijk zult tegenkomen, verstond ik het begrenzende apriorisch (in de zin van voorafbepaald) kader, waarbinnen zich alle mogelijke menselijke ervaring beweegt, maar welks onuitputtelijk gecompliceerde structuur, die in het wijsgerig onderzoek slechts stuksgewijs en op altijd feilbare wijze te benaderen valt, in de goddelijke scheppingsorde gegrond is, die all creatuurlijk bestaan en eerst mogelijk maakt, zodat de ervaringshorizon tegelijk de bestaanshorizon is van de mens en van de wereld, waarin hij zich geplaatst vindt.(“Het Oecumenisch-Reformatorish Grondmotief van de Wijsbegeerte der Wetsidee en de grondslag der Vrije Universiteit,”Philosophia Reformata 31 (1966)3-15, at 6-7)

[And by ‘horizon of experience,’ a term which you will repeatedly come across in the Philosophy of the Law-Idea, I understood the limiting framework, which is a priori (in the sense of fixed in advance), and within which all possible human experience takes place. But its inexhaustibly complicated structure, which philosophical research can only approximate in a partial and always fallible way, is grounded in the divine order of creation, which first makes all creaturely existence possible. So the horizon of experience is at the same time the horizon of existence for man and for the world in which he finds himself placed.]

Our horizon of experience is therefore an ontical framework which is given in advance, and not constructed by our rational thought.

The horizon of our human experience has several dimensions or levels: the religious, the temporal, the modal, and the dimension of individuality structures. The religious level is the supratemporal level of our selfhood. From there we descend to the temporal level. It includes the modal level. And the temporal and modal levels together encompass the fourth level, that of individuality structures.

These dimensions give our experience a perspectival nature:

All human experience remains bound to a perspective horizon in which the transcendent light of eternity must force its way through time. In this horizon we become aware of the transcendent fullness of the meaning of this life only in the light of the Divine revelation refracted through the prism of time (II, 561).

The horizon of human experience "manifests itself" in concrete things and events, and also in typical structural relations of human society in their enkpatic interlacements (NC II, 557).

But our experience is not limited to the temporal functions of consciousness:

But if our experience were limited to our temporal functions of consciousness, or rather to an abstractum taken from our temporal complex of experiential functions, as is taught by the critical and the positivistic epistemologies, it would be impossible to have true knowledge of God, or of ourselves, or of the cosmos. (NC II, 561).

If we lose our sense of the transcendent, we lose our ability to experience the world in this perspectival manner:

Naarmate het transcendente-besef van den mensch verzwakt, verzwakt ook zijn zelf-bewustzijn en zijn vermogen de perspectivische structuur van de tijd te ervaren ("Het Tijdsprobleem in de Wijsbegeerte der Wetsidee," Part II Philosophia Reformata 1940 p. 209)

[To the degree that man's understanding of the transcendent is weakened, so also is weakened his self-consciousness and his ability to experience the perspectival structure of time].

Revised Jul 23/07