Parmenides: The Principle of Western Thought: The Heidegger Lectures of 1932

This article aims to analyse the lectures that Heidegger dedicated to Parmenides in the Summer Semester of 1932. In them Heidegger offers a different interpretation to the traditional one set by Plato and followed by Aristotle and Simplicius. For Heidegger, Western metaphysics did not manage
to explicitly show the ontological necessity of the link between alétheia
and dóxa. The Parmenides being is not “zeitlos”, but presence. Being can only be interpreted when referred to temporality and to the present. It is our contention that feeling dissatisfied with the way tradition has transmitted Parmenides’ original thought, Heidegger suggests a new reading of the foundational poem of the Greek philosopher that intentionally breaks with Western metaphysics, the Roman culture, Christianity and Judaism.