The dialectics of power and the irrevocability of time (Unwiderruflichkeit der Zeit)

Abstract

Power is not merely something external or imposed or a problem to be solved. Rather, power is a task calling for understanding as the mode of being in the world with Others. Power has creative and destructive, challenging and inspiring aspects. As finite human beings thrown into a seemingly overpowering world, we find ourselves in the midst of dynamics and dialectics of power. We have powerful experiences that empower us to respond, to take up the power of faith and the decision to think and be here and now. The hermeneutic experiences of the Gospel, prayer, poetry and art, conversations with ourselves and others, the lives of philosophers, and the power of language all reveal the need for radically responsible approaches to power in lived time. Rather than merely critiquing power, the hermeneutics of power calls for cultivating human attentiveness to power, recognizing the power in and of our lives, and transforming our experiences of power into meaningful events that empower our capacity for timely understanding.