ABSTRACT
Perhaps the most prominent concept in Heidegger’s philosophy is that of a clearing in which entities can be, a space or realm of illumination in whose light things can show or manifest themselves to people. Heidegger’s central concern, throughout his philosophical career, was to understand the nature and constitution of this clearing. In his earlier writings, the clearing is identical with human existence because the light that constitutes the clearing is human understanding, the lumen naturale in man.1 In his later writings, however, Heidegger no longer identifies the clearing with human understanding. The light in whose illumination things manifest themselves to us is something distinct from human understanding and existence, and the latter are now viewed as that by which we apprehend (in Heidegger’s language, are “open for”) this light and what appears in it.
