Microsoft Word Jurnal 1 13 ed doc

Fəlsəfə və sosial-siyasi elmlər – 2013, № 1
 
 
 
 
128
Stein’s intellectual trajectory was also influenced by other 
phenomenologists of the Göttingen circle, particularly Max Scheler, who 
had introduced to phenomenology two research fields that Husserl had neg-
lected: the reflection on ethics and the religious problem. In the years 1913-
14 Stein followed courses taught by Scheler focusing on the phenolme-
nological investigation of the religious ‘type’, particularly holiness. It was 
for her nothing less than a revelation: «This was my first encounter with this 
hitherto totally unknown world. It did not lead me as yet to the Faith. But it 
did open for me a region of “phenomena” which I could then no longer 
bypass blindly»
1
. This opening was facilitated by the phenomenological 
method itself, as she herself recognised: «With good reason we were 
repeatedly enjoined to observe all things without prejudice, to discard all 
possible “blinders”. The barriers of rationalistic prejudices with which I had 
unwittingly grown up fell, and the world of faith unfolded before me»
2
. The 
question of faith then emerges in the framework of philosophical research: 
her conversion to Catholicism was progressively prepared by her 
philosophical willingness to consider the spirituality of human beings and 
by the contact with Scheler, Reinach and Conrad-Martius, who facilitated a 
significant change of perspective in her reflections. 
Among the factors that fuelled her opening up to religious experience 
a significant role was also played by her research into empathy, in which, 
wondering how it was possible to constitute an inter-subjective sphere, she 
                                                                                                                            
to return to idealism. Nor could his oral interpretation dispel our misgivings. It was the 
beginning of that development which led Husserl to see, more and more, in what he called 
“transcendental Idealism” (which is not to be confused with the transcendental idealism of 
the Kantian schools) the actual nucleus of his philosophy and to devote all his energies to 
its establishment. This was a path on which, to his sorrow as well as their own, his earlier 
Göttingen students could not follow him» (E. S
TEIN
,  Aus dem Leben einer jüdischen 
Familie und weitere autobiographische Beiträge, pp. 200-201 [English translation, p. 
250]). A further clue to the theoretical reasons that lie behind the break with Husserl is 
found in her essay comparing the thought of Husserl to that of Thomas Aquinas: what 
distinguishes Husserlian phenomenology from the philosophy of Aquinas is the 
‘anthropocentric’ vision of the former with respect to the ‘theocentric’ approach of the 
latter (see A. A
LES 
B
ELLO
, Edith Stein. La passione per la verità, pp. 20-22). 
1
 Ibid., p. 211 [English translation, p. 260]. 
2
 Ibid. 

---

 
 
129
observed that of all perceptive acts it is precisely the empathetic gesture that 
allows us to come out of ourselves. The phenomenological analysis of this 
act characterised her doctoral thesis, Zum Problem der Einfühlung, in which 
the  Einfühlung was considered as a fundamental experience from which 
arises every type of encounter with the other, considered in its integrity and 
totality. Empathy expresses the opening up of human nature to communion 
with other spiritual subjects and forms the basis of the constitution of an 
inter-subjective sphere
1
. 
In her essay of 1929, “Husserls Phänomenologie und die Philosophie 
des heiligen Thomas von Aquino. Versuch einer Gegenüberstellung”, 
written in honour of Husserl’s seventieth birthday, Stein compares the 
thought of Husserl with that of Thomas Aquinas, setting out an initial basis 
for her own personal synthesis between her previous phenomenological 
training and her new-found Catholic faith. What the two philosophers share 
is the conception of philosophy as ‘rigorous knowledge’. In Stein’s view it 
is legitimate to speak here of philosophia perennis, understood as the spirit 
of the authentic philosophy that lives in every true philosopher, i.e. in those 
who are irresistibly driven by an inner necessity to seek the logos or the 
ratio of this world. The aspiration of a philosophia perennis reflects the 
conviction that reason is able to overcome all barriers, whether they be 
linguistic, chronological, cultural or geographical. In addition, if 
consistently applied, human reason always orients itself towards the 
possibility of agreement. The truth is not duplicated and it conserves its 
integrity. However, as Stein points out in Endliches und ewiges Sein, «There 
is indeed only one truth but it unfolds itself to our human perspective in a 
manifold of individual truths which must be conquered step by step. If we 
succeed in penetrating to a certain depth in one particular direction, a larger 
horizon will be opened up, and with this enlarged vista a new depth will 
                                                 
1
 See E. S
TEIN
,  Zum Problem der Einfühlung, Eingeführt und bearbeitet von M. A. 
Sondermann, ESGA 5, Herder, Freiburg-Basel-Wien 2008, pp. 133-136; English translation 
On the Problem of Empathy  (The Collected Works of Edith Stein, III), by W. Stein, 
Introduction to the third edition by M. C. Baseheart, ICS Publications, Washington (DC) 
1989, pp. 115-118; T. C
APUTO
, La ricerca della verità. L’itinerario teologico fondamentale 
in Edith Stein, Il Pozzo di Giacobbe, Trapani 2009, pp. 23-29. 

---