ABSTRACT
Martin Heidegger is the greatest philosopher of our time. His only rival for this accolade is Ludwig Wittgenstein. Both philosophers exhibited the rare power to shake the foundations of how we understand ourselves as human beings. Heidegger’s impact outside philosophy, for example, on the rest of the humanities and the social sciences has been profound. He was ein Meister aus Deutschland – a master-thinker from Germany – who has at many points mastered us and our moral-metaphysical world. This truth reaches beyond the powers of even a great poet to deny. On the subject of Heidegger, Paul Celan’s famous dictum will not stand.
