Robert Farrugia

Michel Henry radicalizes subjectivity by removing all traces of objectivity and transcendence in order to secure its absolute immanence. He articulates this purification as a «flight from the world» towards life, which will be analysed here as a phenomenological transformation from stone to flesh. We will maintain that this interior conversion opens up a space between the man of the world and the Son of Life, as a passage from one state to the other that endures in life as a lived concrete experience which transforms the entire person. This analysis will serve to reappraise Henry's non-intentional phenomenology of subjectivity, which he bases on a transcendental auto-affectivity that is prior to any intentional knowledge. Our intent is to inquire as to what extend is the latter mode of knowledge «too late» in order to elucidate its significant role within such a personal transformation.

Michel Henry radicalises phenomenology by putting forward the idea of a double manifestation: the "Truth of Life" and "truth of the world. " For Henry, the world turns out to be empty of Life. To find its essence, the self must dive completely inward, away from the exterior movements of intentionality. Hence, Life, or God, for Henry, lies in non-intentional, immanent self-experience, which is felt and yet remains invisible, in an absolutist sense, as an a priori condition of all conscious experience. In Christian theology, the doctrine of the Trinity illuminates the distinction between the immanent Trinity (God's self-relation) and the economic workings of the Trinity (God-world relation). However, the mystery of God's inmost being and the economy of salvation are here understood as inseparable. In light of this, the paper aims to: 1) elucidate the significance of Henry's engagement with the phenomenological tradition and his proposal of a phenomenology of Life which advocates an immanent auto-affection, radically separate from the ek-static nature of intentionality, and 2) confront the division between Life and world in Henry's Christian phenomenology and its discordancy with the doctrine of the Trinity, as the latter attests to the harmonious unity that subsists between inner life and the world.

This essay centres upon Hannah Arendt's concept of 'natality', which she expounds in her book The Human Condition, to argue against the distinction which Peter Singer makes between a human person and human non-person; with reference to his book Practical Ethics (1993) as being representative of preference-utilitarianism and consequentialism.

From its onset, phenomenology has been highly concerned with new beginnings. Its insistent demand to relearn how to see things in a new light is evident not only in its method but also in the phenomenologists' relentless dedication to reintroduce and describe anew this project in myriad ways, time and time again, through their works and lectures to a variety of audiences. One of the main driving forces is that the notion of 'beginning', in phenomenology, takes on a wider and fuller meaning: to go back, again and again. This is precisely because phenomenology takes the starting position very seriously.

Chad Engelland's book, Phenomenology, is both for beginners and about new beginnings; an invitation to reexamine and renew what it means to be a philosopher by analysing how we experience our very own experiences. In his own words, "philosophy is a rigorous intensification of ordinary reflection, and phenomenology is a renewal of philosophy" (151). Engelland's book is not just a highly accessible introduction to this 20th century movement but, moreover, it is a way (the phenomenological how) of presenting the subject itself. The content list Engelland presents is itself not conventional for academic books introducing phenomenology. Instead of the typical chapters titled 'intentionality' or 'consciousness' we find chapter titles such as 'love' and 'wonder'. Nevertheless, all the key concepts and main thinkers are mentioned within these chapters throughout the book, in Engelland's own way of offering them. When one starts reading his book, it becomes immediately clear that the author intends the reader to read this work not as a mere theoretical exercise but, rather, as a means of shifting from the conceptual to the experiential. In many ways, this book is a guide on how to do phenomenology on a daily basis.