We’ve been approaching Hölderlin’s talk of gods and their abandoning in an essential way, not merely relying on Hölderlin’s text nor secondary literature on Hölderlin. What is demanded, rather is orienteering through the depths of our own existence to let Hölderlin’s signposts point us to what is to be found there or what could be. … (Part 4) Heidegger’s Reading of Hölderlin’s Poem “The Ister”

Parmenides famously said, “apprehension and Being are the same,” and Heidegger quipped (I think in his Parmenides lecture course from the 40’s) such a thought makes you lose the desire to write books if you really understand it, which becomes obvious when it falls apart.  For example, we might apprehend movement fractionally, which starts out … (Part 3) Heidegger’s Reading of Hölderlin’s Poem “The Ister”

Hölderlin’s rivers are not symbolic images of a higher level or a deeper religious content.  They are not a placeholder for already familiar existing German essence and life.  Hölderlin’s hymnal poetry after 1799 was not concerned with symbolic images at all.  The end of The Ister says “Yet what that one does, that river, no … (Part 2) Heidegger’s Reading of Hölderlin’s Poem “The Ister”