laszlo tengelyiand the 90s, to what he describes as a “theological turn.” It is a
compulsion that may be expressed, more adequately, as having recourse
to a term coined by the later Heidegger. Indeed, Janicaud speaks not
only of a “theological turn,” but also of different attempts to elaborate
a “phenomenology of the inapparent.”^13
What he misses in these attempts is solely a methodological re-
flection upon the possibility of transcending the limits of what appears
and shows itself, i.e., the limits of the phenomenon – and this not in a
metaphysics, but in a phenomenology. However, Janicaud is far from
excluding, from the outset, this possibility. What he insists upon is the
requirement of a “methodological atheism”^14 formulated, for the first
time, in § 58 of Husserl’s Ideen^15 and accentuated, once again, in
Heidegger’s last Marburg lecture on Leibniz.^16 Taken in this sense, the
notion of a theological turn does not mean anything other than a new
inclination towards disregarding this methodological requirement.
However, formulated in this manner, the main objection raised by
Janicaud against the new phenomenology in France is not entirely
justified. Evidently, Michel Henry, for his part, does not care much
about the methodological requirement just mentioned. Marion, on
the contrary, takes it seriously. In his work of 1997, which has been
published under the title Being Given, he considers it a rule to be
followed up in every phenomenological enquiry.^17 Moreover, he is
convinced that he did not violate this rule in his earlier work of 1989
on Réduction et donation, either. That is why he decidedly repudiates
the objection raised against him by Janicaud.^18
- Martin Heidegger,. Martin Heidegger, Questions, trans. J. Beaufret, F. Fédier, J. Lauxerois et G.
Roëls, Paris: Gallimard, 1976; in German: Martin Heidegger, „Seminar in Zähr-
ingen“, Vier Seminare, ed. C. Ochwadt, Frankfurt am Main: V. Klostermann, 1977. - Cf. Janicaud,. Cf. Janicaud, La phénoménologie éclatée, 43 (and passim): “athéisme méthodolo-
gique.” - Edmund Husserl,. Edmund Husserl, Ideen zu einer reinen Phänomenologie und phänomenologischen
Philosophie, Vol. I, Husserliana, Vol. III/1, ed. K. Schumann, Den Haag: M. Nijhoff,
1976, 124f. - Martin Heidegger,. Martin Heidegger, Metaphysische Anfangsgründe der Logik im Ausgang von Leib-
niz, Gesamtausgabe, Vol. 26, ed. K. Held, Frankfurt am Main: V. Klostermann,
1978, 177 and 211, note. - Jean-Luc Marion,. Jean-Luc Marion, Étant donné, Paris: PUF, 1997, 57: “athéisme de méthode.”
- Ibid., 103–108.. Ibid., 103–108.