and thus the abandonment of the idea that phenomenology should be “a space of possible
truths” (2000, 27, 94, emphasis added). He has in mind the phenomenological reduction,
the epoche, in which the natural standpoint is bracketed or suspended and with it the
question of the empirical actuality of what is given to consciousness. Once again, Marion
is in full agreement: “Between phenomenology and theology the frontier passes between
revelation as possibility and revelation as historicity. Between these two domains there is
no possible
end p.481
danger of confusion” (1997, 293; compare 280). Speaking of the phenomenon that is
central to mystical theology, he sees the task of phenomenology as conceiving “the
formal possibility of the phenomenon which seems to demand an absence of divine names' and our entering into the Name. Let this be noted: We have saidto conceive its
formal possibility' and nothing more than this possibility, since phenomenology cannot,
and therefore must not, venture to make any decision about the actuality of such a
phenomenon—this question is entirely beyond its scope. Phenomenology is to make
decisions only about the type of phenomenality which would render this phenomenon
thinkable” (1999, 39).
Beyond these methodological considerations, Marion's phenomenology is substantive. It
involves a revision of the subject-object relation as portrayed by Husserl in terms of the
correlation of noesis (intentional act) and noema (intentional object). In two of his
theological works (1991 and 2001), Marion presents a phenomenological distinction
between the idol and the icon. The distinction is theologically neutral since it does not
concern the content of the intentional object but rather the mode in which it is intended. It
follows, of course, that the same content could be an idol in one situation and an icon in
another. An object of presumptive religious significance is an idol when the gaze comes
to rest on it, assuming that it is fully present to the gaze and that there is no need to think
about that which has surpassed and escaped the gaze. The (re)presentation is fully
adequate to what is given. In this way, the object becomes a mirror of the gaze, which in
turn becomes the measure of the object. Whatever my net doesn't catch isn't a fish. The
icon is just the opposite. It is apprehended as that which cannot be fully grasped by the
gaze but always exceeds its constituting activity. This does not make the icon a sign, for
what is given in the icon does not point beyond itself to something other than itself, but
rather to itself as exceeding its givenness. Marion argues that the distinction between idol
and icon applies to our concepts just as much as to our images.
The notion of an icon is elaborated by the notion of the saturated phenomenon. Because
physical objects are given to vision in perspectives or aspects (Abschattungen), it might
seem that every visible is an icon. But, drawing on Kant and Husserl, Marion draws a
distinction. On Husserl's analysis of ordinary perception, the idea or intention of the
object always exceeds what is given in intuition, since I can never observe an object from
every possible perspective, though I intend it as having those aspects not yet given to me.
Similarly, in the case of what Kant calls the rational idea, no experience (read: intuition)
can be given that is adequate to the concept (for example, “God”). In both cases,
adequation fails because intuition is lacking. Marion asks, “To the phenomenon that is
supposed to be poor in intuition can we not oppose a phenomenon that is saturated with