Ontologija kao ciklično mišljenje. Levinas i Platon
Ontology as the Cyclical Thinking. Levinas and Plato

Summary/Abstract: In opposition to the founder of phenomenology Edmund Husserl, who claimed that Plato’s thinking should be recognized as paradigmatic for the all-encompassing rationality and genuine social ethics, Levinas identifies in Plato’s ontology the fatal suspension of authentic humanity. Interpretation of the antic ontologist by Levinas culminated in insight that Husserl, similar to the majority of interpretative approaches to Plato after Hegel, overlooked a pagan origin of the constitution of ontology. If we accept that the concept of being was deeply platonized, as Levinas’ teacher in philosophy Rosenzweig claimed, does it mean that the true ontology could be made possible only after we break with the pagan heritage? The core of Levinas’ critique is built on indications that rationality of ontology consists in the transcendence of the self for the sake of identity with the eternal forms, which stabilizes both the thoughts and the thinkers. From this perspective, Plato appears as the thinker whose ontology is nothing else but the constitution of the cyclical thinking. The second part of the article discusses the limits of Levinas’ critique, keeping in mind his idea regarding the possibilities of the reconciliation of »Athens« with »Jerusalem«.

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