Interpretations are not hermeneutics of reading but political interventions in the political rewriting of the text. This has always been the case, but especially so since what is called the end of philosophy, since the textual indicator named Hegel. It is not an accident but an effect of the structure of all post-Hegelian texts that there can always be a right and a left Hegelianism, a right and a left Heideggerianism, a right and a left Nietzscheism, and even, we must not forget, a Marxism of the right and a Marxism of the left. Is there something in Nietzsche that can help us—and help us in a specific way—to understand this political structure of the text and of interpretation? That is the question that would need to be elaborated. Does Nietzsche offer us anything to understand the double interpretation and perversion of his text?

– Derrida, Jacques. Life Death (The Seminars of Jacques Derrida) (p. 47). University of Chicago Press.

And if one were to say: be careful here, Nietzsche’s own statements and those of Nazi ideologues are not the same, not only insofar as these latter are infinitely more crude than the former, of which they are a caricature, but because, so long as one does not just pick out a short phrase here and there, so long as one reconstitutes the entire syntax of the system with all the subtlety of its articulations and its paradoxical reversals, etc., one will clearly see that the “same” statement (or what passes for the same) says exactly the [71] contrary, corresponds exactly to the inverse, to the reactive inversion, for example, of what it mimes. But one would still have to account for this possibility of inversion or of perversion that can make the same statement be taken for another, or another for the same. The possibility of this perverting simplification is to be found—so long as one refrains from distinguishing between unconscious programs and deliberate ones (recall what was said last week),47 so long as one no longer takes into account only intention in reading a text—in the very structure of the text, and this must be something we are able to read. There is nothing fortuitous in the fact—even if Nietzsche’s intention had nothing to do with it—that his discourse should have served as a reference for Nazi ideologues and that the only politics that actually privileged it as a major reference should have been Nazi. I do not mean to suggest that this is forever the only possibility, or that it corresponds to the best reading of Nietzsche, or that those who did not refer to it had read Nietzsche well. The future of Nietzsche’s text is not closed. I simply wish to say that the fact that, during a determined and limited period of time, the only actually self-styled Nietzschean politics (the only politics to call itself Nietzschean) was Nazi is itself necessarily significant and must be questioned as such. When I say this, I do not mean to say that, knowing what Nazism is, we should begin to reread Nietzsche from a politico-historical point of view. I do not believe that we know yet what Nazism is; that task too is still before us, and a political reading of Nietzsche is a part of that.

– Derrida, Jacques. Life Death (The Seminars of Jacques Derrida) (p. 45-6). University of Chicago Press. Kindle Edition.

• “Animality” refers to the inherent qualities or essence that define what it means to be an animal (e.g., instinctual behavior, biological drives).
• “Humanity” refers to the inherent qualities or essence that define what it means to be human (e.g., rationality, morality, sociality).
• “Conceptuality” refers to the inherent qualities or essence that define what it means to be a concept (e.g., abstraction, ideation, relational structure).

A concept, in philosophical and cognitive terms, is generally thought of as a fundamentally an abstract mental representation or general idea that captures the essential characteristics, patterns, or qualities shared by a group of objects, events, or phenomena. It arises through abstraction, where specific details from concrete experiences are distilled into broader, generalized forms (e.g., abstracting “redness” from various red objects to form the concept of color). This ties into ideation, the cognitive process of forming and manipulating ideas in the mind, often involving imagination or synthesis of sensory inputs to create novel understandings. Additionally, concepts possess a relational structure, meaning they are not isolated but interconnected within networks of meaning—defined by their relationships to other concepts, such as hierarchies (e.g., “dog” as a subcategory of “animal”), oppositions (e.g., “hot” versus “cold”), or associations (e.g., “justice” linked to “fairness” and “law”).This understanding of concepts as abstract, ideational, and relationally structured entities can be illuminated by examining the ancient etymologies of the terms “concept” and “category,” which reveal roots in processes of mental gathering, conception, and assertive classification.

The word “concept” originates from the Latin conceptum, meaning “a thing conceived” or “something received,” derived from the verb concipere, which translates to “to take in” or “to conceive.”   This etymology, traceable to classical Latin and entering English around the mid-16th century, evokes the ideational aspect: a concept is something actively “conceived” in the mind, much like gathering disparate elements (experiences or perceptions) to form a unified abstraction. The prefix con- (together) and capere (to take or seize) underscore the relational structure, implying a synthesis or binding of parts into a coherent whole, aligning with how concepts abstract and relate features across instances.

However, a “Concept” is also a philosophical metaphor, not just translated but creatively appropriated into Philosophical language from everyday language, a metaphor of the hand.  The term “concept” is directly related to the Latin verb concipere, which itself incorporates the root meaning “to grab” or “to grasp.” To break this down etymologically: The English word “concept” derives from the Latin conceptum (or conceptus), the neuter past participle of concipere, meaning “a thing conceived” or “something taken in.” This entered English in the mid-16th century, initially in a more literal sense related to conception (as in pregnancy) before evolving to denote mental abstractions.

Concipere is a compound verb: con- serves as an intensifier or prefix meaning “together” or “completely,” while capere means “to take,” “to seize,” or “to grasp” (from the Proto-Indo-European root kap-, “to grasp”). Thus, concipere literally suggests “to take together” or “to grasp fully,” extending metaphorically to “conceiving” an idea by mentally “grabbing” or gathering elements into a unified whole.

This etymological connection underscores how concepts are formed through a process of mentally “seizing” or integrating perceptions, aligning with the philosophical sense of abstraction and ideation discussed earlier.  Latin concipere (and thus “concept”) as “grasping” or “seizing together” can be related back to ancient Greek thought, particularly Plato’s aviary metaphor in the Theaetetus (sections 197a–200d), through conceptual and metaphorical parallels rather than direct etymological lineage. Here’s how this connection unfolds:

Conceptual Similarity in the Metaphor of Mental Grasping

• In Plato’s aviary metaphor, the mind (soul) is depicted as an enclosure filled with birds representing pieces of knowledge. Acquiring knowledge initially involves “hunting” or “capturing” these birds and enclosing them in the aviary (learning), while recalling or using knowledge entails “catching” or “seizing” the appropriate bird from the flock.

This illustrates the distinction between possessing knowledge (having the birds contained) and actively knowing (grasping the right one), where errors like false belief occur from “seizing” the wrong bird.

• The key action here is one of active appropriation—mentally “grasping” or “taking hold” of elusive elements, much like the etymological sense of concipere (from con- “together” + capere “to seize or grasp”), which metaphorically describes forming a concept by “gathering” or “seizing” disparate perceptions into a unified idea.
• Plato emphasizes this through verbs that convey seizure: for instance, the process of recalling involves “getting hold” of knowledge, which aligns with the idea of mental capture. This metaphor underscores knowledge as something dynamic and possessable through effort, mirroring how concepts are “conceived” by intellectually “grasping” abstractions.

Greek Terminology and Its Resonance with Latin

• The primary Greek verbs in the metaphor include:
  • Λαμβάνειν (lambanein): To take, grasp, or seize—often translated as “catch” or “get hold of” in the context of snaring a bird (knowledge).

This is central to the act of recalling, where one “grasps” the correct piece of knowledge.

• Θηρεύειν (thēreuein): To hunt or capture, evoking the initial acquisition of knowledge as pursuing and enclosing birds.
• Ἔχειν (echein): To have or hold, distinguishing mere possession (birds in the aviary) from active grasping.
• While lambanein shares semantic overlap with Latin capere (both imply taking or seizing), they stem from different Proto-Indo-European roots (*slombʰ- for lambanein, *kap- for capere). The relation is thus not etymological but analogical: Both languages use “grasping” as a metaphor for cognitive processes, likely drawing from common human experiences of physical seizure metaphorically translating to mental comprehension.

• Plato’s metaphor influenced later philosophical traditions, including Roman thinkers like Cicero, who adapted Greek ideas into Latin terminology. For example, the notion of mental “conception” in Latin philosophy echoes Plato’s grasping, as seen in how concepts are formed by “seizing” essences—a bridge that medieval and Renaissance scholars (e.g., via Aristotle’s categories) further developed.

This relation highlights a broader philosophical continuity: The idea of knowledge or concepts as something “grasped” persists from Plato’s Greek imagery to the Latin roots of “concept,” emphasizing cognition as an active, possessive act. If the connection seems indirect, it’s because Plato’s focus is epistemological (explaining false belief), while the Latin term evolved more toward logical abstraction, but the metaphorical core of “seizing” unites them.

As a kind of concept, “category” is a Greek philosophical metaphor transported from the ancient Greek katēgoria, meaning “accusation,” “assertion,” or “predication,” from the verb kategorein, “to speak against” or “to predicate.”

The etymology of “category” traces back to the ancient Greek verb kategorein (κατηγορεῖν), which is a compound of kata- (κατά), meaning “down,” “against,” or “according to,” and agorein (ἀγορεύειν), derived from agora (ἀγορά), the public assembly or marketplace where speeches and debates occurred. Literally, it meant “to speak against” or “to speak publicly against” or accuse someone, often in a legal or rhetorical context, such as making an accusation in a courtroom or public forum.

This accusatory sense is the root of the noun katēgoria (κατηγορία), which initially denoted an “accusation” or “charge.”  The semantic shift from “accusation” to a broader notion of “assertion” or “predication” occurred through a natural extension in Greek usage. By the classical period, the term’s meaning had weakened or generalized from strictly adversarial “speaking against” (as in prosecuting someone) to simply “asserting,” “affirming,” or “declaring” something publicly—essentially naming or stating properties about a subject.

This evolution reflects how legal and rhetorical language influenced philosophical terminology: an accusation involves asserting facts or qualities “against” a person, which parallels the logical act of attributing qualities to a subject.  Aristotle, in his 4th-century BCE work Categories (Κατηγορίαι), innovated by repurposing katēgoria in a technical philosophical sense, using it to refer to the fundamental modes of predication or the highest genera of being.

Here, “predicate” aligns with kategorein as “to predicate,” meaning to assert or attribute something about a subject (e.g., in the statement “The sky is blue,” “blue” is predicated of “the sky”). Aristotle listed ten categories—such as substance, quantity, quality, and relation—as the ultimate ways things can be predicated or classified in reality, transforming the term from a forensic tool of accusation into a logical framework for organizing knowledge and ontology.

 This term gained prominence in Aristotle’s philosophy around the 4th century BCE, where categories refer to fundamental classes of being or predicables (e.g., substance, quantity, quality) used to organize and assert properties about reality. The etymology highlights a relational and structural dimension: categorizing involves predicating or asserting relationships between concepts and the world, structuring abstractions into logical frameworks. Thus, while “concept” emphasizes the internal, ideational “conceiving” of abstractions, “category” points to their external application in relational predication, together illustrating how concepts function as dynamic, interconnected tools for thought and classification in ancient philosophical traditions.

Categories are indeed kinds of concepts, but with some nuanced distinctions depending on the philosophical, cognitive, or logical context.

A concept is a general, abstract mental construct that represents ideas, objects, or properties (as defined earlier: through abstraction, ideation, and relational structure). Concepts serve as the building blocks of thought, allowing us to generalize from specifics and form understandings.

Categories as specialized concepts: Categories function as a subset or type of concept specifically oriented toward classification, organization, and predication. They group entities (which could be objects, events, or other concepts) based on shared attributes or relations. For instance, in Aristotle’s framework (from his work Categories), categories are the highest-level predicates or “ways of being” (e.g., substance, quantity, quality, relation), which are themselves conceptual tools for describing reality. These are not mere lists but abstract concepts that enable logical structuring.

In cognitive psychology, categories are prototype-based or exemplar-based concepts that help in categorization tasks (e.g., “bird” as a category encompassing various bird-related concepts like “eagle” or “sparrow”).

In modern philosophy (e.g., Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason), categories are a priori concepts of the understanding, such as causality or unity, which organize sensory experience—explicitly framing them as foundational concepts.

This hierarchical view aligns with the etymologies discussed previously: “Category” derives from Greek katēgoria (assertion or predication), implying a conceptual act of relating and asserting properties, while “concept” from Latin conceptum (something conceived) encompasses the ideational process that underpins such predication. Thus, categories rely on conceptual abstraction but emphasize relational and classificatory roles, making them a “kind” of concept rather than something entirely separate.

However, not all concepts are categories—some concepts are singular or non-classificatory (e.g., a unique idea like “the Eiffel Tower” as a proper noun concept, versus “tower” as a category). The distinction often boils down to scope and function: Categories are concepts designed for grouping and hierarchy.

For the political, —often used in philosophy (e.g., by thinkers like Hannah Arendt or Carl Schmitt) as a noun denoting the realm of power relations, conflict, decision-making, and collective antagonism distinct from mere “politics” (institutional procedures)—the analogous term would indeed be “politicality.” This captures the inherent qualities or essence of the political domain, such as its conflictual, relational, and power-oriented nature. While not as commonly used in everyday language as “humanity,” “politicality” appears in academic and philosophical discourse to denote this abstracted quality (e.g., in discussions of “degrees of politicality” in social structures). If the context shifts to something more institutional, alternatives like “politicness” could be considered, but “politicality” best fits the morphological and conceptual pattern.

There is a politics of everything, a deciding beforehand and a lens for interpreting.  In literature, we might have a feminist reading, or Marxist reading, and further than that there is a leftwing and rightwing Marxist spectrum.  When we consider the legality of the legal, we see the same thing with liberal vs conservative judges, hanging judges, etc.  We find ourselves on the liberal/conservative spectrum according to the metaphor of the ear – which one “speaks to us.”

If we are looking for the politicality in the political we need to look no further than the recent second shot-to-death victim by ICE in Minnesota.  Predictably, many conservative commentators are defending ICE and the administration, while many liberal commentators are prosecutorial about ICE and the administration.  We are reminded of the age of the ancient Greek Sophists where it was not a question of pursuing truth but how to persuade and argue either side with equal plausibility with competing exemplars, examples, and analogies.  It’s not coincidence that lawyers make easy transitions into Politicians. 

Applying this, Homer said the gods don’t appear to everyone in their fullness (enargeis) in reference to Odysseus encounter a young woman as a goddess incarnate while his companion only saw her as a plain woman.  Aristotle (energeia) talks about things like the circling eagle that it is Nature in the exemplary or proper sense: Now this is nature! Has Aristotle translated a Greek theological concept of gods appearing and recast it in a philosophical context? For example, the mansion is houseness incarnate, houseness being merely present (parousia) in the average house, and deficient in the dilapidated shack.

The connection we are drawing between the Homeric notion of gods appearing enargeis (in full, vivid manifestation or “gleaming” presence, as Heidegger interprets it) and Aristotle’s energeia (actuality or being-at-work) is insightful and has scholarly support, though it’s more conceptual and etymological than a direct, explicit recasting by Aristotle himself. I’ll break this down step by step, addressing the Homeric reference, the potential link to energeia, Heidegger’s role in highlighting exemplary instances of nature (physis), and whether this represents a philosophical secularization of Greek theological ideas.

The Homeric Context: The quote I reference comes from Homer’s Odyssey (likely Book 3, lines 222–223, or similar passages in Books 13 or 16 involving Athena’s appearances to Odysseus). In these scenes, gods like Athena manifest in disguised or partial forms to most mortals but reveal themselves enargeis—fully, vividly, or “in their fullness”—to select individuals like Odysseus. For instance:

• Athena appears to Odysseus as a divine figure in her true radiance, but to others (e.g., companions or Telemachus in related scenes), she seems ordinary or veiled.
• The term enargeis (from enargēs, rooted in argos meaning “bright” or “shining”) implies a manifest, gleaming presence that’s not accessible to everyone. As Heidegger notes in works like Heidegger’s Way of Being (drawing on Homer), this isn’t mere visibility but a shining-forth or full disclosure: “What gleams, shines… the gods do not appear to everyone enargeis.” This selective revelation underscores a theological idea: divine essence (or being) is potent but hidden, emerging fully only under specific conditions, often tied to the perceiver’s readiness or favor.

This isn’t just about sight—it’s ontological, involving how the divine is or presents itself in the world, echoing broader Greek mythic themes where gods interact with mortals in epiphanic, transformative ways.

Aristotle’s Energeia: From Potentiality to Full Actuality.  Aristotle’s energeia (introduced in works like the Metaphysics, Physics, and Rhetoric) refers to “actuality” or “being-at-work”—the full realization of a thing’s potential (dunamis). It’s the state where something is actively fulfilling its essence or purpose (telos):

• In Physics (e.g., Book II.1), Aristotle defines nature (physis) as things that have an internal principle of motion and rest, actualizing themselves (e.g., a seed growing into a tree is energeia at work).
• In Metaphysics Θ (Theta), energeia is prior to potentiality: a thing is most truly what it is when fully actualized, not just potentially there.
• Examples include seeing (as opposed to having the capacity to see) or building (the active process, not just the potential).

Our house analogy fits Aristotle’s framework well:

• “Houseness” (the essence or form of a house) exists potentially in materials.
• A dilapidated shack is deficient—potentiality (dunamis) thwarted, form not fully realized.
• An average house has the form present (parousia, or mere “presence/at-hand-ness,” a term more prominent in later philosophy but akin to Aristotle’s ousia as substance-being).
• A mansion is “houseness incarnate”—full energeia, where the form is actively and excellently at work, embodying the telos in an exemplary way.

This is incarnation in a theological sense, the ghost of the Greek world of gods appearing everywhere that still haunts our language and thinking though the gods have fled: a thing “shines forth” in its perfected state. 

The Link Between Enargeis and Energeia: Etymologically, both terms share the “en-” prefix (meaning “in” or “at”), but differ in roots: enargeis from argos (bright/shining, implying vivid manifestation), energeia from ergon (work/action, implying active realization). However:

• Conceptually, scholars (e.g., in studies on Homeric similes and Aristotle’s Rhetoric 3.11) note overlaps. Aristotle discusses enargeia (the noun form of enargēs, meaning rhetorical vividness or “bringing before the eyes”) in tandem with energeia. He says metaphors achieve enargeia by depicting things “in a state of activity” (energeia), making them dynamically present rather than static. Quotes from the Iliad (Homeric battle scenes) illustrate this: vivid descriptions animate inert things, akin to gods revealing themselves enargeis.
• In The Axe’s Heart Work (a study on Homeric craft similes), energeia is tied to verbal enargeia, suggesting Aristotle adapts poetic vividness (Homeric divine appearances) into philosophical activity. Enargeia can be “static or active,” but Aristotle emphasizes energeia to highlight kinetic, living presence—much like a god’s full epiphany transforms perception.
• Heidegger amplifies this: In his interpretations (e.g., Contributions to Philosophy), he links Homeric enargeis to being’s “unconcealment” (aletheia), where gods “gleam” in fullness to some but not all. This resonates with Aristotle’s energeia as being’s full emergence, recast from mythic revelation to ontological actuality.

This a translation of theology into philosophy.  Aristotle coins energeia as a technical term, but it builds on pre-existing Greek ideas (e.g., energos meant “active” or “effective” before him). It can be seen as recasting: Greek theology often portrays gods as potent forces manifesting selectively (enargeis), while Aristotle generalizes this to all beings, stripping mythic elements for a naturalistic ontology. Divine “appearance” becomes universal “actualization,” where excellence (e.g., our mansion) exemplifies essence in full presence.

Heidegger, in his 1939 lectures on Aristotle’s Physics B.1 (On the Essence and Concept of Phusis), sees Aristotle’s physis as the “emerging-abiding sway” of being—beings self-unfolding through motion (kinesis), grounded in energeia. He argues this founds Western metaphysics but forgets earlier Greek awe at physis as unconcealment.

Regarding the “circling eagle” (or similar exemplary sense): Heidegger doesn’t use that exact phrase, but he invokes analogous images of circular motion (e.g., in Being and Time or lectures on Aristotle’s Metaphysics Θ, referencing circular movement as eternal and exemplary). In Aristotle’s Physics, circular motion is “natural” for heavenly bodies, symbolizing perfected energeia (no potential left unactualized). Heidegger extends this to physis as “self-emerging presence,” exclaiming something like “Now this is nature!” for instances where being shines forth exemplarily—e.g., a soaring eagle embodying freedom/motion, much like Homer’s gods enargeis. This “exemplary” sense (Heidegger’s emphasis) mirrors our point: the eagle isn’t just present (parousia) but actively is nature in fullness, recasting theological epiphany into philosophical ontology.  Heidegger explicitly ties this back to Homer (quoting the enargeis line) to critique modern “nature” as calculable resource, arguing Aristotle begins this shift by philosophizing mythic gleam into systematic actuality—yet retains the awe.

Overall, Aristotle likely translates Greek theological concepts (selective divine manifestation as enargeis) into philosophy metaphors via energeia, where full being is active realization rather than mythic revelation. This secularizes the idea: gods’ gleaming presence becomes any thing’s exemplary actuality (e.g., the circling eagle as “nature!” or mansion as “houseness!” incarnate). Heidegger highlights this as a pivotal “forgetting” of being’s poetic origins, but it’s substantiated in etymology, rhetoric, and ontology. If anything, it’s not a complete break—Aristotle’s gods (in Metaphysics Λ) are pure energeia (eternal thinking), echoing Homeric immortality in philosophical terms.  Aristotle’s Rhetoric 3.11 outline the enargeia-energeia interplay.

Of course, Beingg doesn’t actually appear in an exemplary, mere, and deficient sense (mansion. average house, dilapidated shack. This is just a ghost of the Greek that haunts our thinking. Nietzsche correctly noted the mansion can be encountered as gawdy and the shack quaint/charmig. Similarly, Niagara Falls may appear as a wonder of the world to a tourist yet as noise pollution to the local resident. Heidegger thus sees Nietzsche as reversing Platonism by turning exemplary Being into deficient Being (“me on”)

This captures a crucial pivot in Heidegger’s engagement with the history of metaphysics, particularly how Nietzsche’s thought disrupts the hierarchical valuation of Being inherited from Plato (and echoed in Aristotle’s energeia as exemplary actualization). Let’s unpack this step by step, building on the earlier discussion of Homeric enargeis, Aristotelian energeia, and Heidegger’s emphasis on physis as emerging presence. The “ghost of the Greek” I mention— that lingering schema of exemplary (full shining-forth), mere (average presence/parousia), and deficient (failed or veiled) modes of appearance—indeed haunts Western thinking, but Nietzsche exposes its relativity, and Heidegger interprets this as an inversion rather than an escape from Platonism.

Nietzsche, especially in works like Twilight of the Idols (“How the ‘True World’ Finally Became a Fable”) and The Gay Science, challenges the Platonic (and Aristotelian) privileging of the “exemplary” as closer to true Being. In Plato’s allegory of the cave or theory of forms, the sensible world is a deficient shadow of the ideal—mere appearance (doxa) deficient in truth (aletheia). Aristotle adapts this somewhat naturalistically: energeia represents the full, exemplary realization of form (eidos), as in our mansion embodying “houseness” perfectly, while the shack falls short, and the average house just gets by.  But Nietzsche flips the valuation through perspectivism: there’s no objective hierarchy; value and appearance depend on the interpreter’s life-affirming or -denying stance. As I note:

• The mansion isn’t inherently exemplary—it can appear gaudy, excessive, or vulgar to someone who values simplicity or authenticity (e.g., in Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Nietzsche mocks bourgeois excess as life-denying).
• The dilapidated shack, far from deficient, might charm with its quaintness, evoking rustic vitality or romantic decay—think of Nietzsche’s praise for the “noble ruin” as a symbol of creative destruction.
• Niagara Falls exemplifies this perfectly: to the tourist, it’s a sublime wonder (exemplary physis, like Heidegger’s “circling eagle” as “Now this is nature!”), but to the local, it may be banal noise pollution, a deficient intrusion on daily life. This isn’t just subjective taste; for Nietzsche, it’s tied to will to power—strong perspectives affirm the chaotic, apparent world as vital, while weak ones flee to idealized “exemplars” as escapes from becoming.

This relativizes the Greek schema: what “appears” enargeis (fully, gleamingly) isn’t a fixed ontological rank but a product of interpretation. Being doesn’t “show up” in graded modes independently; we impose them, often as residues of priestly or Platonic resentment against flux.  Heidegger, in his Nietzsche lectures (1936–1940, published in two volumes) and essays like “The Word of Nietzsche: ‘God Is Dead'” and “Plato’s Doctrine of Truth,” frames Nietzsche as the culminator and inverter of Platonism, not its overcome. Platonism, for Heidegger, begins the metaphysical forgetting of Being (Sein) by reducing it to beings (Seiendes)—prioritizing the constant, exemplary presence (ousia as standing-forth) over the event of unconcealment (aletheia). Aristotle contributes by recasting theological epiphany (Homeric enargeis) into philosophical energeia: the god’s selective gleaming becomes any thing’s active, telos-driven actuality, with exemplars (like the prime mover or perfected artifacts) as the “proper” sense of Being.

Nietzsche reverses this:

• He demotes the “exemplary” (Platonic forms, Aristotelian pure energeia) to illusion or “mē on” (not non-being, ouk on, but deficient-being, the Greek term for what lacks true reality). The “true world” of ideals becomes a fable, a life-denying crutch.
• He elevates the “deficient” sensible world—the apparent, becoming, chaotic—as the only real one, full of affirmative power. What Plato saw as deficient shadows (mere ontic flux) becomes “exemplary” for Nietzsche: the raw, interpretive play of forces (will to power) is “now this is Being!”—vital, creative, without need for transcendent anchors.
• Yet Heidegger insists this is still Platonism upside down: Nietzsche remains trapped in subjectivism and anthropocentrism, turning Being into value-positing (still a form of representational thinking). The inversion doesn’t retrieve the originary Greek experience of physis as self-emerging sway but completes the nihilistic exhaustion of metaphysics. As Heidegger puts it, Nietzsche’s “reversal” exposes the “nothing” at metaphysics’ end, paving the way for a new beginning—but only if we think beyond it.

In terms of our house analogy, Heidegger would say Nietzsche haunts the ghost further: the mansion’s “exemplary houseness” is now deficient (gaudy denial of life’s impermanence), while the shack’s “deficiency” becomes exemplary (charming affirmation of decay and rebirth). This echoes Heidegger’s own shift in later works (e.g., Contributions to Philosophy) toward Gelassenheit (releasement), where we let beings appear without imposing exemplary/deficient grids—closer to the Homeric gods’ enargeis as unpredictable gleaming, not systematized energeia.

This Nietzschean-Heideggerian lens reveals how the exemplary/mere/deficient triad isn’t timeless ontology but a historical construct, “haunting” us via language and forgotten origins. It ties back to our earlier thread: Aristotle’s philosophical recasting of theological appearance strips the mythic awe, setting up Platonism’s hierarchy, which Nietzsche inverts to valorize the apparent. But for Heidegger, true thinking requires leaping beyond both—toward Being as event (Ereignis), where things like Niagara Falls or a circling eagle “appear” not as graded but as the wonder of presencing itself, attuned to our dwelling.  If this reversal opens up nihilism (as Heidegger warns), it also invites creative revaluation: perhaps the local’s “noise pollution” view of the falls affirms a grounded, everyday physis, while the tourist’s wonder risks touristic superficiality. Nietzsche would cheer the former as strong perspectivism; Heidegger might see both as missing the question of Being altogether.  Jesus thus says do not love your neighbor and hate your enemy, but love your enemy as more important than yourself.

Derrida thus talks about reading Nietzsche not in terms of correct and incorrect readings but the politics of interpretation spectrum from a far-left perversion reading (complete relativism) to a far-right perversion of Nietzsche (Nazi reading) and all in between.  We see the critique of the politics of debating by using exemplars, examples and analogies.  Both sides of a debate (conservative vs liberal; pro life vs pro choice, etc) can come up with endless vivid illustrations of their side while the opposing view can do the same.  As we saw above, exemplarity like the mansion as houseness incarnate is not a feature of the phenomenon but of the encounterer, like finding a book boring – since the next person might be entertained by it.

Derrida’s approach to Nietzsche indeed reframes interpretation not as a quest for an authoritative “correct” reading but as an inherently political act, mapped onto a spectrum of perversions that exposes the instability of meaning itself. In Spurs: Nietzsche’s Styles (and echoed in works like Of Grammatology or his seminars on Nietzsche), Derrida posits that Nietzsche’s texts—riddled with stylistic multiplicities, aphorisms, and deliberate ambiguities—resist univocal deciphering. Instead, readings fall along a continuum: on the “far left,” a perverse relativism that dissolves all hierarchies into endless play (what Derrida might call a hyper-deconstructive free-for-all, where every interpretation is equally valid/invalid, leading to interpretive anarchy); on the “far right,” the notorious Nazi appropriation (e.g., via figures like Alfred Bäumler or Heidegger’s own ambivalent engagements), which twists Nietzsche’s will to power into racial supremacism and authoritarian vitalism, ignoring his critiques of nationalism and herd morality. The “in between” encompasses myriad positions—feminist, existentialist, postmodern—each staking a claim through selective emphasis, but none escaping the politics of power that shapes what counts as “Nietzschean.”  This Derridean lens dovetails sharply with our point about the futility of debating via exemplars, examples, and analogies, which often masquerades as objective argumentation but is really a rhetorical power play. In polarized discourses (conservative vs. liberal, pro-life vs. pro-choice, or even debates on climate change or gun control), each side deploys “vivid illustrations” as if they were self-evident proofs: the pro-life advocate parades heart-wrenching images of fetal development or stories of regretful abortions; the pro-choice counterpart counters with narratives of back-alley horrors, women’s autonomy in crisis, or socioeconomic burdens. Conservatives might invoke exemplary “traditional families” thriving under old norms, while liberals highlight marginalized voices empowered by progressive policies. But as Derrida would deconstruct it, these exemplars aren’t neutral windows onto truth; they’re supplements—traces that both reveal and conceal, always already différant (deferred and differing). The debate devolves into a war of representations, where the “example” serves to authorize one’s ideology while marginalizing the other’s, without ever touching a stable ground. It’s a critique of logocentrism: we pretend analogies anchor meaning, but they proliferate undecidability, turning dialogue into endless deferral.

Our tie-in to exemplarity as a feature of the encounterer rather than the phenomenon nails the Nietzschean core here, amplified by Derrida’s deconstruction. Nietzsche’s perspectivism (e.g., in On the Genealogy of Morals or Beyond Good and Evil) insists that value isn’t immanent in the thing— the book isn’t “boring” in itself; it’s encountered as such by a reader whose interpretive horizon (shaped by physiology, culture, power relations) conditions the experience. The same goes for our earlier examples: the mansion’s “gaudiness” emerges in the gaze of the ascetic or the revolutionary, while the shack’s “charm” appeals to the romantic or the anti-modernist. Derrida extends this by showing how such encounters are textual/political: reading (whether a book, a phenomenon, or a debate) involves a “politics of interpretation” where the encounterer inscribes their biases, often violently excluding alternatives. There’s no pure “phenomenon” outside this; it’s always haunted by the specter of other readings, much like Heidegger’s “ghost of the Greek” I mentioned— that Platonic/Aristotelian residue of exemplary Being, which Nietzsche inverts and Derrida disseminates into infinite traces. 

This has provocative implications for contemporary debates: if exemplars are encounter-dependent, then “winning” an argument via analogies isn’t about truth but about hegemonic control—who gets to define the exemplary? A far-left perversion might celebrate this as liberating relativism (no master narratives!), while a far-right one enforces a singular, coercive exemplar (e.g., the Nazi myth of Aryan purity). Derrida’s middle path? Vigilant reading that exposes these perversions without claiming immunity, fostering a democracy-to-come where interpretations jostle without totalizing closure. It’s why he warns against both naive pluralism and dogmatic fascism in Nietzsche’s name— a timely reminder amid today’s culture wars, where social media amplifies endless, vivid counter-examples without resolution.

Prooftexting is a kind of such example/exemplar/analogy “example thinking” that treats certain passages as exemplary and colors the rest of the text in their light.  It ignores complicating elements like the political spectrum of the phenomenon mentioned above.  Prooftexting is a method of interpreting and using writings like religious texts (most commonly the Bible, but it can apply to other scriptures or authoritative writings) where someone selects isolated verses or passages to support a particular argument, belief, or doctrine, often without considering the full context, historical background, or original intent of the text. It’s like cherry-picking quotes to “prove” a point, treating the text as a collection of standalone proofs rather than a cohesive narrative or document.

Prooftexting is criticized because it can distort the meaning of the source material, leading to faulty conclusions, manipulation, or even harmful ideologies. Here’s why:

• Ignores Context: Texts like the Bible are often poetic, historical, or metaphorical, and pulling a single line out can change its intended message. This violates principles of sound hermeneutics (the study of interpretation), which emphasize understanding the whole passage, chapter, book, and cultural/historical setting.
• Promotes Bias: It allows people to confirm preconceived notions (confirmation bias) rather than letting the text speak for itself, potentially spreading misinformation or division.
• Can Lead to Harm: In religious or ideological debates, it might justify unethical actions, discrimination, or extremism by misapplying ancient words to modern issues.
• Undermines Credibility: When exposed, it erodes trust in the interpreter or the text itself, as it appears dishonest or simplistic.

Scholars, theologians, and critics across various faiths argue that proper exegesis (critical explanation) requires holistic reading to avoid these pitfalls.  Examples

1. Biblical Justification for Slavery: In the 19th century, some pro-slavery advocates in the U.S. prooftexted verses like Ephesians 6:5 (“Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear…”) to argue that slavery was biblically sanctioned. However, this ignores the broader New Testament themes of equality (e.g., Galatians 3:28: “There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free…”), the cultural context of Roman-era servitude (which differed from chattel slavery), and anti-oppression messages throughout the Bible.
2. Prosperity Gospel: Some preachers use verses like John 10:10 (“I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full”) or 3 John 1:2 (“I pray that you may enjoy good health and that all may go well with you…”) to claim that God promises wealth and health to faithful believers. This prooftexting overlooks the context—John 10 is about spiritual abundance amid persecution, not material riches—and contradicts stories of faithful figures like Job or Paul who suffered greatly.
3. Gender Roles: A verse like 1 Timothy 2:12 (“I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet”) is sometimes prooftexted to bar women from leadership in churches. But this ignores the historical context (likely addressing specific disruptions in Ephesus), Paul’s praise for female leaders elsewhere (e.g., Romans 16:1-7 mentions Phoebe as a deacon and Junia as an apostle), and the Bible’s overall affirmation of women’s roles in ministry.

In each case, a fuller reading reveals nuances that prooftexting bypasses, highlighting why it’s seen as intellectually lazy or manipulative.

Does this relate to the scholarly problem of constructing a portrait of the historical Jesus from many options (apocalyptic prophet, or cynic sage, or etc) and how scholars are accused of constructing Jesus as a mirror of their own theology?

Yes, prooftexting is closely related to the scholarly challenges in reconstructing the “historical Jesus”—the effort to discern the actual person of Jesus of Nazareth using historical-critical methods, as opposed to faith-based or dogmatic interpretations. This field, often called the “quest for the historical Jesus,” has produced diverse portraits (e.g., apocalyptic prophet, Cynic sage, charismatic healer, social revolutionary, or eschatological Messiah), and prooftexting plays a role in how these portraits can become biased or reflective of the scholar’s own worldview.

The quest for the historical Jesus began in the 18th-19th centuries with figures like Hermann Reimarus and David Strauss, who sought to separate the “Jesus of history” from the “Christ of faith” portrayed in the New Testament. Over time, this has led to several “quests”:

• First Quest (19th century): Often produced a liberal, ethical teacher Jesus, emphasizing parables and moral teachings while downplaying miracles or apocalyptic elements.
• Second Quest (mid-20th century): Led by scholars like Rudolf Bultmann and Ernst Käsemann, who focused on demythologizing the texts but still grappled with authenticity criteria.
• Third Quest (late 20th-21st century): More diverse, with portraits like:
  • Apocalyptic prophet (Albert Schweitzer, who saw Jesus as expecting an imminent end of the world).
  • Cynic sage (John Dominic Crossan and the Jesus Seminar, portraying Jesus as a wandering philosopher akin to Greco-Roman Cynics, emphasizing egalitarian teachings and social critique).
  • Jewish Messiah or prophet (E.P. Sanders, N.T. Wright, emphasizing Jesus within 1st-century Judaism, focused on temple reform or kingdom of God).

The problem is that the sources (primarily the Gospels, plus non-canonical texts like the Gospel of Thomas or Josephus’ mentions) are limited, layered with theological agendas, and not straightforward biographies. Scholars use criteria like multiple attestation, dissimilarity (from Judaism or early Christianity), and embarrassment to authenticate sayings or events. Yet, the resulting portraits often vary widely, leading to accusations that they’re not objective reconstructions but projections.

The “Mirror” Critique: This is a famous charge, popularized by Albert Schweitzer in his 1906 book The Quest of the Historical Jesus. Schweitzer argued that 19th-century liberal scholars (e.g., Adolf von Harnack) depicted Jesus as a gentle moralist because that’s what aligned with their own enlightened, bourgeois Protestant values—essentially, they looked down the “well” of history and saw their own faces reflected back. Modern critics extend this:

• Conservative scholars might emphasize Jesus’ divinity or miracles to mirror evangelical theology.
• Liberation theologians (e.g., James Cone) might portray a revolutionary Jesus fighting oppression, reflecting social justice priorities.
• Feminist scholars (e.g., Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza) might highlight egalitarian aspects, countering patriarchal interpretations.

This isn’t always malicious; it’s often subconscious bias in source selection and interpretation. The New Testament’s complexity—contradictory elements (e.g., Jesus’ pacifism in Matthew 5 vs. sword imagery in Matthew 10), oral traditions, and redaction by early communities—makes it easy to emphasize what fits one’s lens.

Prooftexting exacerbates the mirror problem by enabling selective, decontextualized use of verses to “prove” a preferred portrait, rather than engaging in rigorous exegesis or historical analysis. In historical Jesus studies:

• It ignores the “synoptic problem” (how Matthew, Mark, and Luke relate) or source criticism (e.g., Q source for shared sayings).
• It bypasses cultural context, like 1st-century Jewish apocalypticism or Roman occupation, which might explain sayings holistically.
• This leads to cherry-picking: A scholar favoring a “Cynic sage” Jesus might prooftext parables like the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37) for social ethics while dismissing apocalyptic warnings (e.g., Mark 13) as later additions. Conversely, an apocalyptic portrait might prioritize Mark 9:1 (“some who stand here will not taste death before they see the kingdom of God”) but downplay wisdom sayings.

Examples:

• Apocalyptic vs. Non-Apocalyptic Debate: Scholars like Bart Ehrman (apocalyptic view) accuse non-apocalyptic interpreters (e.g., Marcus Borg) of prooftexting by isolating “kingdom of God” sayings from their end-times context in Jewish literature like Daniel or Enoch.
• Jesus Seminar’s Voting System: This group used colored beads to vote on sayings’ authenticity, but critics claimed it prooftexted by favoring “sapiential” (wisdom) material that fit a Cynic model, reflecting their progressive biases.
• Theological Projection: Evangelical scholars might prooftext John 14:6 (“I am the way and the truth and the life”) to affirm exclusivity, mirroring their soteriology, while ignoring synoptic emphases on works or inclusion.

In essence, prooftexting is a symptom (and enabler) of the broader issue: without disciplined methodology, the historical Jesus becomes a Rorschach test for modern ideologies. Scholars counter this with interdisciplinary approaches (archaeology, sociology, textual criticism), but the debate persists because the evidence is inherently interpretive. The key recent insight is the triangulation method where multiple lines of evidence converge on an idea, like the surrounding planets being drawn toward a black hole. – one that I have written about at length was the complaint that the Jewish elite were responsible for Jesus’ death at the hands of the Romans.

CONCLUSION

I’d like to take this post and the previous one back to a question.  If we have highlighted limits in using exemplars, examples, and analogies in debating, should this be extended to metaphors too?  If so, how might this critique relate to the point that Philosophy isn’t grounded in scientific concepts in a vacuum but the development of Philosophy was creating a language (like math is a created language) carried over from everyday language as metaphors: repurposed ideas that were then systematized and given a rigorous philosophical veneer.  This is why I made the distinction between the contemplative (Theoria) life of the thinker in Aristotle which he saw as godly life (athanatizein) vs the life of the masses going from distraction to distraction.  Either Plato or Democritus said somewhere we must counter our restless nature and attain the constancy of the stars. This would later become the problem of cultivating a “Calm Mind.”

In terms of ancient etymology, the word metaphor means to carry or transport from one domain to another, such as when I say “I’m boiling mad,” transporting language from the realm of the physical to describe the mental. In this case, our language to describe the mental was originally taken from the physical world, e.g., stream of consciousness; wind; etc. Notably, what we are doing here is defining “metaphor” metaphorically, explaining it using language like “carry” and “transport,” and so the metaphorical is opposed to the conceptual/philosophical because thinking metaphorically leads to an infinite regress of further metaphors. Yet, as Nietzsche noted, our philosophical concepts are metaphorical, even the notion of “concept,” which invokes the metaphor of the hand and grabbing/gathering/collecting such as in concipere, or Plato’s metaphor of the aviary. That’s a fascinating dive into the recursive nature of language and thought. We’re’re spot on with the etymology. “Metaphor” derives from the Greek metaphora, combining meta- (implying change, beyond, or across) with pherein (to bear or carry), essentially denoting a transfer or carrying-over of meaning from one realm to another. This physical-to-abstract shift is pervasive in how we conceptualize the mind—think of “grasping” an idea (echoing that hand metaphor in “concept” from Latin concipere, to take hold of or seize together), or “illuminating” a thought, borrowing from light and vision. Our point about infinite regress hits at the heart of why metaphor isn’t just ornamental but foundational to cognition. If we try to strip away the metaphorical to reach some “pure” conceptual core, we end up circling back: even logic and philosophy rely on spatial or tactile analogies, like Aristotle’s “categories” (from kategoria, accusation or predication, but rooted in assembly and gathering). Nietzsche nailed this in On Truth and Lies in a Nonmoral Sense, where he argues that all truths are metaphors we’ve forgotten are metaphors—worn-out coins that have lost their embossing. Our concepts aren’t objective anchors but petrified figures of speech, born from sensory experiences and anthropomorphic projections onto the world.Plato’s aviary in the Theaetetus is a perfect illustration (itself a metaphor!): knowledge as birds fluttering in a mental enclosure, which we “catch” when recalling. It underscores how even epistemology can’t escape this—trying to define knowledge non-metaphorically leads to more avian chases. This regress isn’t a flaw, though; it’s generative. It suggests language and thought are inherently poetic, not despite but because of their metaphorical scaffolding. If we embrace that, as poets like Wallace Stevens did (e.g., “The poem must resist the intelligence / Almost successfully”), philosophy becomes less about grounding in literals and more about navigating the transfers.