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Dear murugappan,

As I have told you the topic of hermeneutics has evolved over time from biblical interpretation to other religious texts as well. I shall describe in detail some of the important scholars on this area,

HISTORY OF HERMENEUTIC  DEVELOPMENT  :

Here I discuss some of the theories proposed by various important scholars in hermeneutics. The hermeneutics eventually is the core concept in my entire work. My letters to you are basically a hermeneutics of sivasiddhantham. Therefore the prominent concepts must be made explicit. Here I addressed some of the core issues of the latest developments in hermeneutics by FREIDREICH.D. SCHLEIRMACHER to PAUL RICOER.

Hermeneutics as a science is increasingly becoming influential in western philosophy circles. The  universality of hermeneutics  can be explained in two ways which correspond to the two big directions in the development of this discipline.

 In the first sense, the aim of the hermeneutics is to establish a universal method for text interpretation. The second, meaning of universality of hermeneutics, the “understanding” is a phenomenon constituent to all human beings. In this conception interpretation is not limited only to the text, it becomes a way in which we relate to the world.

In the first point, we talk about a normative or a methodic hermeneutics (from Antiquity to the nineteenth century), in the second case, we have a phenomenological or philosophical hermeneutics (in the twentieth century).At the end of the eighteenth century and the beginning of the nineteenth, hermeneutics was theorized as method of interpreting all the texts, specially the humanities texts. Instead of the particular rules of interpretation which are applied only to certain texts (the Bible, in special), the main concern now is finding the rules of understanding in general.

Let us look at some of the important theories of hermeneutics,

FREIDREICH.D. SCHLEIRMACHER (1768-1834):” understanding”

This attempt belonged first to Friedrich D. Schleiermacher who theorized two types of understanding: grammatical interpretation and psychological (or technical) interpretation.

If the first one, concerns the understanding of an expression in relationship with the language as part of it, the second one understand a utterance as a part of a speaker’s life process.

The main task of psychological interpretation is to understand how the author   thinks the meaning of the texts.  But understanding cannot be fully achieved because any time can be a part which we don’t understand properly.

The ‘understanding’ is primordial and it can never be clear away definitive ( in this way Schleiermacher found the universality of the hermeneutics on the universality of misunderstanding).

WILHELM DILTHEY(1833-1911): “historicism “

The epistemological foundation of hermeneutics was continued by Wilhelm Dilthey.

He says,the understanding becomes a “category of life”.

In the attempt to provide a philosophical foundation for the human science, Dilthey says that the task of this science is to understand the manifestation of lived experience.

 The lived experience mean not only the experience which is given but the “inner experience”. The experience is conditioned by inner factors. In this way,  lived experience must be seen as a matrix of relationship between a practical agent and his historical context, which become explicit in expressions. This expression can be understood only if we re-experience them.  He says only if we clarify the historical context which are embodied in them we can understand them.

In this way beginning with Dilthey the term of understanding has assumed the meaning of existential principle. The hermeneutics became not just a way of knowledge for the human sciences, but a characteristic of historical human existence.

MARTIN HEIDEGGER(1889-1976): “understanding, interpretation, and assertions”

 Heidegger defines the terms such as understanding, interpretation, and assertions in hermeneutics.

Understanding:

Understanding, in Heidegger's account, is neither a method of reading nor the outcome of a willed and carefully conducted procedure of critical reflection. It is not something we consciously do or fail to do, but something we are. Understanding is a mode of being, and as such it is characteristic of human being, of Dasein.The pre-reflective way in which Dasein inhabits the world is itself of a hermeneutic nature.

Our understanding of the world presupposes a kind of pragmatic know-how that is revealed through the way in which we, without theoretical considerations, orient ourselves in the world. The world is familiar to us in a basic, intuitive way.

Most originally, Heidegger argues, “we do not understand the world by gathering a collection of neutral facts by which we may reach a set of universal propositions, laws, or judgments that, to a greater or lesser extent, corresponds to the world as it is. The world is tacitly intelligible to us”.

“The fundamental familiarity with the world is brought to reflective consciousness through the work of interpretation. Interpretation, however, does not have to be of a propositional nature. At stake is the explicit foregrounding of a given object”.

Interpretation:

“Interpretation makes things, objects, the fabric of the world, appear as something “ Heidegger puts it. Still, this as is only possible on the background of the world as a totality of practices and intersubjective encounters, of the world that is opened up by Dasein's being understandingly there.

 For Heidegger understanding is an existential phenomena. This means that it is an a priori structure which reveals the manner in which the Dasein  exists. As existential, understanding operates by projecting before the Dasein and its possibilities. These projections are “works out by interpretation” which have the role to make explicit.

He says, behind every interpretation is the fore-structure of understanding, every interpretation is grounded in something we have in advance – fore-having,  in something we have seen in advance –fore-sight  and in something we grasp in advance – fore-conception .

With Heidegger is the hermeneutics no longer a reflection about the human science but a explication of the ontological ground on which this science can be build. The hermeneutics is not understood now as a method, but as the fundamental way in which the human being is related to the “being and to the world” (dasein).

Assertions:

Heidegger’s Characterization of Assertions:

 An assertion is the form of discourse which gives beings a definite character. For Heidegger, there are

three significations to the term ‘assertion’ all of which are made possible on the basis of ready-to-hand

encounters  with the world.

1.First, the most primary signification of asserting is pointing out . This signification lets the entity, “be

seen from itself” .

Example:

To illustrate, Heidegger provides us with the assertion, “The hammer is too heavy”. Seemingly, this

assertion allows the hammer to remain within its ready-to-hand context if we interpret the assertion as

a means of saying,

 “This hammer is too heavy for me to use in the project that I am currently engaged in”.

In other words, I need another hammer. Furthermore, this statement would only make sense to

someone who understood the context in which I was operating because it assumes knowledge of

that context. If one construction worker were to make that assertion to another construction

worker, for instance, the other construction worker would know precisely what she meant.

However, if the construction worker were to call her husband and make that assertion, he might

wonder, “…too heavy for what?”.

2.The second signification of assertion is predication . Assertions

predicate thereby giving the object of the assertion a definite character.

Example:   The assertion,

 “The hammer is too heavy” gives the hammer the character of heaviness. In this assertion it is not the

predicate that is put forward but the hammer itself; however, it is a narrow conception of the hammer

that is brought into view and this limits our understanding of the hammer to the definite

character of heaviness the assertion gives it . Heidegger contends that the

second characterization is grounded in the first. “Within this pointing-out, the elements which

are articulated in predication—the subject and the predicate—arise” . It is not

through the predication that the hammer shows itself; it is through the pointing out. When we

predicate we actually limit our view of the hammer to what we have predicated.

3.The third signification for assertions is communication . Assertions are a

way of communicating something about a being to someone else. This signification is grounded

in the first and second significations because they provide the basis for communication. “It is

letting someone see with us what we have pointed out by way of giving it a definite character”.

Example:

When I assert to someone else that the hammer is too heavy, I share my way

of  Being-towards what has been pointed out. The person does not necessarily have to be there

with me for me to share this assertion. In sharing the events of my day, I might explain that the

hammer I was using earlier was too heavy, and this is a way of communicating my Being towards-the-

hammer to someone who was not physically there to share in it.

At the end of this analysis Heidegger provides his final definition of assertions. An

assertion, he says, “is a pointing-out which gives something a definite character and which

communicates” . He goes on to argue that it is necessary to recognize that

assertions are not, “…a free-floating kind of behavior which, in its own right, might be capable

of disclosing entities in general in a primary way: on the contrary, it always maintains itself on

the basis of Being-in-the-world” .

example:

 Hence, I cannot make an assertion about a hammer being too heavy if I have not encountered the

hammer through my Being-in-the-world, or if I have had someone else disclose the hammer to me by

pointing out that it is too heavy.When I do make the assertion that the hammer is too heavy, it is

implied that I have a foreconception of the hammer based on my encounter with it through Being-in-

the- world!

JURGAN HABERMAS1929-): “linguistic turn”

Hermeneutics means to investigate the structures of natural language, and engage in a ‘reflective use of communicative competence.’

 Linguistics is limited to ‘linguistic competence’, as distinct from communicative competence. This linguistic competence refers to the ability of an ideal speaker who has full command of the abstract rule system of a natural language.

Linguistics is concerned purely with the deep structure that produces our ideas), whereas hermeneutics takes into account the dimension in which langue is transformed into parole (a specific instance of speech or writing).

“ the goal of linguistics is a reconstruction of the rule system which underlies the production of all the various grammatically correct and semantically meaningful elements of a natural language, whereas hermeneutics reflects on the principle experiences of a communicatively competent speaker -whose linguistic competence is tacitly presupposed.”

Hermeneutics brings to light for the knowledge seeker his inherent freedoms and dependencies with regards to language.

However, philosophical hermeneutics cannot define communicative competence. This is the task of linguistics. This means, according to Habermas, that the subjectivity of the speaker remains fundamentally untouched in the field of hermeneutics.

The ways in which hermeneutics is significant:

1) “Hermeneutical consciousness demolishes the objectivistic self-conception of the traditional human sciences. Given the bond between the interpreting scholar and the hermeneutical situation from which he starts, it follows that impartiality of understanding cannot be secured by abstraction from preconceived ideas, but alone through reflection on the effective historical relationship in which the knowing subject always stands to its object.”

2) “hermeneutical consciousness calls to the attention of the social sciences problems which arise from the symbolic ‘fore-structuring’ of their investigation field.” Essentially, all observation is theory laden and must be treated as such with regard to the scientific method.

3) “.. natural language always plays the role of an ‘ultimate’ metalanguage for all theories expressed in formal language.. ” This explains the epistemological rank of colloquial language in the research process.

4) “... the translation of momentous scientific information is interpreted into the language of the social world at large in the hermeneutic process.”

This is a new territory for hermeneutics argues Habermas:

“Hermeneutical consciousness originates in reflection on our activity within natural language, while the interpretation of the sciences for the world at large must mediate between natural language and monlogical language systems.”

 By monological language systems Habermas is referring to sciences characteristic ability to produce knowledge and make statements about things by proceeding via controlled observation, where the ‘mirror’ (reflection) of human speech needs no attention.

Habermas questions the validity of hermeneutics claim to universality,

“Is it possible to have an understanding of colloquial configurations of symbols themselves that is not bound by the hermeneutical presuppositions of context-dependent processes of understanding, that in this sense cheats the natural language of its role as ultimate meta-language?”

 “Since hermeneutical understanding must always proceed ad hoc and cannot be developed into a scientific method (can at most reach the level of an art through discipline and training), this question is equivalent to asking whether there can be a theory appropriate to the structure of natural languages which provides the basis for a methodologically ensured understanding of meaning.”

Habermas suggests two avenues of inquiry to find an answer to this problem:

1) the application of hermeneutical understanding is limited by undertakings of explanation by psychoanalysis and critique of ideologies (in so far as it involves collective behavior), and

 2) the search for a universal theory of linguistics, which amounts to the reconstruction of a rule system which would adequately define universal linguistic competence.

Of the first, the primary suggestion is that the subject who expresses himself is unaware of his own intentions:“A theory of colloquial communication, consequently, must first open the way to pathologically buried meaning. If the claim to produce such a theory were to prove valid, an explanatory understanding were then possible which would be able to pass beyond the limits of hermeneutical understanding of meaning.”  Of the second, the goal is to assign a structural description from the theoretical language unequivocally to every element of natural language.

The structural descriptions expressed in the theoretical language would be able to take the place of hermeneutical understanding of meaning. 

Habermas asserts that psychoanalysis is a critical science.

Habermas seeks to replace the problem of subjectivity and structure of language as a dominant force, with a system of analysis, which in turn equals a system of analysis control.

HANS GEORG GADAMER:(1900-2002): “historicism”

 Hans gadamer says that an understanding is a process of history (effect of history).

Hermeneutics he says is a historically effected unconscious.  The hermeneutical situation is a phenomenological exersice and he calls this as “horizon”. Understanding and interpretation thus always occurs from within a particular ‘horizon’ that is determined by our historically-determined ‘situatedness’. The horizon of understanding keeps changing as per our knowledge of history.

The “understanding” is not, however, imprisoned within the horizon of its situation—indeed, the horizon of understanding is neither static nor unchanging. It is always subject to the effects of history. Just as our prejudices are themselves brought into question in the process of understanding.

 In the encounter with another, the horizon of our own understanding susceptible to change. It is a matter of negotiation between oneself and one's partner in the hermeneutical dialogue. It such ‘ a process of understanding ‘can lead to an ‘agreement’ about the matter at issue. 

     

All understanding involves a process of mediation and dialogue between what is familiar and what is alien. In this process ‘both knowledge’ get affected. This process of horizontal engagement is an ongoing one, that never achieves any final completion or complete elucidation.

 Our own history and tradition is itself constitutive of our own hermeneutic situation as well as being itself constantly taken up in the process of understanding.  The process of unconscious engagement is continuous. 

Our historical and hermeneutic situation can never be made completely transparent to us. Gadamer says the understanding is  not confined  to a method or technique. He  insists that “understanding” is an ongoing process and  has no final completion.

PAUL RICOEUR(1913-2005):

The universal hermeneutics of Gadamer and the depth hermeneutics of  Habermas were reunited in the philosophical conception of Paul Ricoeur. 

The conclusion of Ricoeur about this debate is that we need a  critical stance toward civilization in which interests are  reduced almost to mere  Instrumentality . we only witness daily the ‘industrialization and manipulation ‘of all dimensions in our cultural life.

Hie says” this critical stance would enable us to preserve the difference, between the idea of good life introduced and discussed by philosophers and the growth of material goods that is the principle aim in industrial and post-modern system of the world”.

SEBASTIAN GARDNER: “symbolism”

Sebastian Gardner- a contemporary philosopher- analyses the central theme in symbolizing capacity of mind. Unconscious does not intentionally communicate with the external world.

He says the unconscious is structured, it recovers memories systematically.

The operation of censorship is important in the unconscious. The true meanings appear in disguised forms due to the censorship. This results in syntactically characterized operations. They are the intrapsychic symbolic relations between different mental contents and extra psychic symbolic relations (between mental contents and external objects).

Desires are plastic and are able to mutate by changing their objects.

Gardner offers to resurrect symbolism. He says,”symbolic mechanisms exploits the presupposition and propositional borders. Desires involves the exercise of certain dispositions that are object hungry. Symbolic mechanisms provide a path to the phenomenology  of the objects. There is a shared phenomenology between symbol and object”.

 Apparent relationship of meanings between symbols and objects is in memory. Constant conjunction of symbols with the object and its role is satisfaction of a desire is sufficient justification for positing rules of meanings and semantics of desire. A symbolic qualification may fail if the symbol is inadequate.

 In short he says there ‘exists’  a symbolic relationship between the systems of symbolic meanings and the meanings found in art, religion, language and human culture.

However Gardner says there are no innate symbolizing function for the unconscious. He feels it comes from the interaction with the environment over the ages. This interaction leads to the symbolizing function.

SAIVA HERMENEUTICS: hermeneutics of the agamas and the development of  “saiva siddhantha”

That is the ancient agamas were studied by later siddhanthists and the hidden meanings were explored. These hidden meanings were refined into books like Sadasiva agamam ( thirumanthiram).  Still later  these agamic texts into sivagnanabodham and the fourteen sastra texts. These were furthered by the pandara sastras and the padiyam( bashyam)texts. So the process of exploring hidden meanings are already had taken place.     

Saiva siddhantha studies are also hermeneutics in many sense. Because studying the siddhantha text gives us the knowledge of the mind and the psycho-analysis itself.  In tamil this process was already explored. Tholkapiam also mentions about hermeneutic concept as “nool neri”(நூல்நெறி). Saiva siddhantham studies are in a hermeneutic -psychoanalytic direction. The historicism,symbolism, understanding ..etc are already used in the development of the saiva tenets. When we try to explore them what we see is eventually a psycho analytic conceptualization within the saiva siddhantha texts.

To make it simpler to you , we read the hidden meanings in saiva siddhantham we find many meanings which gives us an exploration of the unconscious. These unconscious connotation were derived from the agamas. The agamas were expressions of pure human mind of the early civilisations. Instead of studying the psychology in clinical psycho-analytic experiments the same is derived by studying the ancient texts. This process is hermeneutics of the saiva siddhantha or “saiva exegesis”!  The details of which will be given to you regularly in the following letters.

Modern hermeneutics in saiva texts were also actively done in Malaysia and tamil diaspora. Alexis Anderson  in the united kingdom is doing important contribution in delineating the core differences among the various saiva sects in india based on the ontological grounds. This aspect of saivism is a new trend and  authors like PROF.K.LOGANATHAN OF PENANG has done a great work on these areas . Such an interpretation is yet to gain momentum in  tamil nadu.