ABSTRACT
The fact that phenomenology has renounced the position of first philosophy is the starting point of Marion’s own reflection on phenomenology; a reflection leading to the question of whether another first philosophy is possible. This chapter presents the concept of “first philosophy” and addresses two tightly related although different questions: In what sense should philosophy be understood as “first” philosophy? Or, differently put, what is the meaning of such “primacy”? To what extent could phenomenology legitimately claim the title of “first philosophy”? These two questions will eventually take us to specify the different meanings that the concepts of “metaphysics” and “ontology” acquire in the phenomenological tradition. Husserl was well aware of the historical process of emancipation of particular sciences with respect to philosophy. It was Jean Cavailles, who, in a single shot, would somehow reshape the phenomenological movement itself, turn upside-down its apparently harmonious order, and redesign its borders.
