Metaphysics

Philosophy of Existence

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Karl Jaspers

1938

Philosophy of Existence is Jaspers's most concise statement of his existential philosophy — a compressed but powerful account of what philosophy is, what it cannot be, and why it matters. Jaspers argues that philosophy cannot be a science, because its subject matter — Existenz, the free self-determining being of the individual — cannot be objectified without being destroyed. Genuine philosophy arises from boundary situations: the inescapable limit experiences of death, suffering, struggle, and guilt that break through the complacency of everyday life and confront the individual with the question of who she is and what she wills. In these moments, Transcendence — Jaspers's name for the Being that encompasses and grounds all reality — speaks through the "ciphers" of philosophical and religious tradition. Philosophy of Existence introduces the three fundamental concepts of Jaspers's thought: Dasein (being-there, empirical existence), Existenz (authentic selfhood, freedom), and Transcendence (Being itself, the Encompassing), and shows how genuine philosophical life requires moving between all three.