Vers une ontologie indirecte

Author: Emmanuel de Saint Aubert Year: 2006 Type: book Subtitle: Sources et enjeux critiques de l'appel à l'ontologie chez Merleau-Ponty Publisher: Vrin, Bibliothèque d'histoire de la philosophie ISBN: 978-2-7116-1852-1

The third volume of Saint Aubert's five-volume project on Merleau-Ponty. Volumes 1–2 (2004 Du lien des êtres aux éléments de l'être; 2005 Le scénario cartésien) constructed the Sartrean and Cartesian "scenarios"; this 2006 volume constructs the Heidegger scenario — but the book's load-bearing thesis is that there is no genuine Heideggerian turn in late MP. The book is the wiki's principal archival anchor for *ontologie indirecte* as a distinct named framework, and supplies the Blondel-derived genealogy that the structural reading of intra-ontology had left implicit.

Core Arguments

  1. Claim: MP's late "ontology" is fundamentally reactive: the systematic qualification "ontology" appears in 1957, but MP defended the ontological status of his thought from 1946 in answer to four critics — Jean Hyppolite, Jean Beaufret, Pierre Lachièze-Rey, Ferdinand Alquié. Because: Hyppolite at the 23 Nov 1946 SFP discussion (Le primat de la perception) refused the "solidarité" between MP's perception- description and ontological conclusions; Beaufret accused MP of insufficient radicalism (still Husserlian-idealist); Lachièze-Rey reads MP as Aristotelian-finalist-pantheist; Alquié reads MP as crypto- idealist (the Fontaine "philosophie de l'ambiguïté"). MP "ruminates" these objections through 1953 (Le monde sensible et le monde de l'expression), 1955 (Le problème de la passivité), and into the V&I working notes ("résultats de Ph.P. — nécessité de les amener à explicitation ontologique"). Against: the reading that MP's ontology emerges only in 1958–59 under Heideggerian influence. (Ch. I §1)

  2. Claim: 1955 is the cardinal terminological year, producing three coordinated mutations: (i) "primat de la perception" → "priorité ontologique" (PbPassiv); (ii) first declared name "ontologie du monde perçu" (RC55); (iii) the protest "ce que je fais n'est pas une anthropologie mais une ontologie" enters MP's litany (notes from late 1958 through March 1961). Because: PbPassiv (1955) explicitly answers Lachièze-Rey ("priorité ontologique du monde perçu, et du corps phénoménal, i.e. tout l'être qui a sens pour nous est à concevoir d'après monde perçu") and Alquié; Le philosophe et son ombre (achieved end-1958) and the V&I working notes carry the new vocabulary forward. Against: dating MP's late ontology to the 1957 Nature course alone. (Ch. I §1c)

  3. Claim: The "anti-anthropological turn" reading of late MP is a category error: anthropologisme (negative humanism) ≠ anthropologie (the discipline MP praises). Because: in October 1959 MP publishes De Mauss à Claude Lévi-Strauss celebrating anthropology as "ce qu'il y a de plus concret dans sa méthode" for "approfondir notre insertion dans l'être." The negative anthropologisme is defined in PbPassiv (1955) and the 1957 Nature course as "humanisme radical où tout est construit et tout est donné" — i.e. Brunschvicg's "humanisme criticiste" extended to Sartre. Against: Heideggerianizing readings of late MP that equate the "anti-anthropological" formula with a reduction of the human to the question of Being. (Ch. I §2)

  4. Claim: MP's ontology is essentially an ontology of facticity in relation with non-philosophy — and "non-philosophy" is not primarily disciplinary (sciences, art, literature, sociology) but ontological: it indexes the "monde des causes perdues" (Marcellian existence: perception, body, imaginary, desire, religious acts, art) that Brunschvicg's immanence philosophique refused. Because: the term non-philosophie first appears in MP's 1947–48 ENS lectures defending Maine de Biran against Brunschvicg's accusation that Biran "quitte la philosophie pour une non-philosophie" by attending to the body. From 1947 through May 1961 (the Philosophie et non-philosophie depuis Hegel course given the day before MP's death), the polemic remains continuous. Against: reading "non-philosophie" interdisciplinary-structurally (à la Lévi-Strauss / Lacan / Benveniste). MP's non-philosophy is not the search for common structures across disciplines but the philosophical work on the non-philosophical fields. (Ch. II §1)

  5. Claim: Maine de Biran's [[fait-primitif|fait primitif]] (Essai sur les fondements de la psychologie) is a load- bearing concept that MP retains throughout the late period despite the disappearance of explicit references to Biran after 1948. Because: the fait primitif provides MP's third way between empiricism and intellectualism — a fact that conjugates body-evidence and faith, motor-evidence and perception, supplying a "primitive duality of inside and outside." It reappears in 1955–56 dialectique courses and in the November 1960 V&I drafts ("le fait primitif, c'est ce double mouvement, c'est le point où ils se croisent — et non intériorité ni extériorité"). MP's "structure" (1942 SC), "facticité" (1955+), and "élément" (V&I 4) all carry the load of the fait primitif. Against: histories of MP that treat facticité as Heideggerian without genealogical-archival anchoring in Biran. (Ch. II §2)

  6. Claim (THE BOOK'S CARDINAL GENEALOGICAL THESIS): The cardinal source of MP's *ontologie indirecte* is not Heidegger but Maurice Blondel's L'Être et les êtres (1935, Essai d'ontologie concrète et intégrale), worked by MP in 1955–56. Because: the formula [[ontological-diplopia|diplopie ontologique]] comes verbatim from Blondel's chapter title. MP works Blondel into the November–December 1957 Le complexe ontologique cartésien feuillets and into the 1958 Nature course preparation. The vocabulary of L'Être et les êtres — "promiscuité," "parturition," "connexions mutuelles," "interdépendance de tout ce qui est," "accès du dedans par le dedans" — diffuses into MP's "endo-ontologie." The 1956 cours sur la dialectique (PhiDial, 17 May 1956) inaugurates the appeal to indirect ontology in this Blondelian context, well before MP reads Identität und Differenz (1957) and well before any sustained Heidegger work. The famous V&I working note — "On ne peut pas faire de l'ontologie directe. Ma méthode 'indirecte' (l'être dans les étants) est seule conforme à l'être — 'philosophie négative' comme 'théologie négative'" (Feb 1959) — must therefore be read in a Blondelian-not- Heideggerian context. Against: the standard reading that "ontologie indirecte" derives from a 1958–59 Heideggerian reception. (Ch. III §2b)

  7. Claim: MP's reading of Heidegger was archivally thin. The corpus shows four stereotyped attitudes (a-favorable-vague, b-brutal-critical, c-neutral-account, d-lateral-silence) corresponding to four periods (PhP / 1945–58 / 1959 course / 1959–61). 80% of MP's Heidegger references are in 1958–61 documents. MP's personal copy of Sein und Zeit shows underlining of only §§1–14 and §§25–27, no annotations; the Identität und Differenz notes are bare paraphrases without commentary; the 1959 Heidegger course is "transparent," presenting Heidegger without combat. Because: a careful audit of the bibliothèque personnelle, the published references, and the unpublished feuillets shows that MP began serious Heidegger work only summer–autumn 1958, by which time MP's ontology was already mature; MP's habits with other authors (Arnheim, Schilder, Klein, Freud, Gueroult, Belaval, Laporte) show abundant marginal commentary that is strikingly absent in the Heidegger materials. Against: the assumption that late MP's ontology is substantially shaped by Heidegger's. (Ch. III §1)

  8. Claim: The direct vs. indirect ontology opposition derives from MP's earlier Le langage indirect et les voix du silence (1952) — applied to language — and is extended to ontology only in 1956. The "ontologie directe" charge against Heidegger is ambiguous: it functions as MP's name for Heidegger's "domanial" attitude (refusing the empiétement of non-philosophy) more than as engagement with the actual Heideggerian differentiations. Because: the V&I working note (Feb 1959) extends the perceptual logic of vision in depth to ontology: the "direct" gaze is monocular, the "indirect" gaze is binocular and articulates incompossibles. The ontologie indirecte is "moins une route détournée que d'un autre type — aux antipodes du différé, cet indirect s'apparente plutôt au se faisant bergsonien." Against: reading MP's "indirect" as a deferral of ontology. (Ch. III §2a)

  9. Claim: MP's appropriation of the ontological difference is a transposition: ontique becomes the projective/objective being (Cartesian extension, Laplacian science, projective-Euclidean of Piaget's adult-schema, Whitehead's spatio-temporal individual at fixed location); ontologique becomes the carnal/préobjective/sauvage being. Because: the November 1960 working note is decisive: "Pas de différence absolue, donc, entre la philosophie ou le transcendantal et l'empirique (il vaut mieux dire: l'ontologique et l'ontique) — Pas de parole philosophique absolument pure." MP's Identität und Differenz notes (probably December 1960 – January 1961, just before MP's death) record without commentary the closest convergence (Zusammengehören, co-appartenance, Ereignis as vibration) and the irreducible distance (Heidegger's "saut" into language vs. MP's Verflechtung of the chair). At the start of OntoCart (1961), MP writes "Pas de meilleur commentaire de Heidegger Identität und Differenz" — meaning that MP's own depth-phenomenology of the perceived counts as the best commentary; Heidegger is not commented, only paralleled. Against: readings that equate MP's "ontique/ontologique" with Heidegger's. (Ch. III §3)

  10. Claim: Late MP's critique of occultisme, ésotérisme, gnose — running from 1951 (L'homme et l'adversité) through 1956 (cours sur la dialectique) and 1958–59 (Introduction à l'ontologie) — has Heidegger as named target after 1953. Because: the 1953 first Collège course frontally critiques "les fausses étymologies de Heidegger" as "linguistique imaginaire"; the 1956 dialectique course explicitly stigmatizes "ésotérisme autour de Heidegger," the "âge d'or" myth, the "involution silencieuse" toward Parmenides; the 1957 Nature course names "les fausses étymologies de Heidegger, sa Gnose"; the term gnose enters MP's vocabulary in 1957 via Jaspers's Schelling and stays through to 1960. But: MP's actual target is often Beaufret's Introduction à une lecture du Poème de Parménide (1955) rather than Heidegger himself — a "faux dialogue" in which MP "ferraille moins avec Heidegger lui-même qu'avec un courant de pensée qui l'agace." (Ch. IV §1)

  11. Claim: The fundamental MP diagnosis of his time is the endurance du chaos — the requirement to live in the ruines de pensées (Eugen Fink) rather than escape them via the two pre-dialectical solutions: (1) tabula rasa (logical positivism / analytic philosophy); (2) restoration (Heideggerian return-to-origins, *supralapsaire pensée*). Both are "deux positivismes du langage" — language without flesh. Because: the Introduction à l'ontologie (autumn 1958) makes this the labyrinthe problem: every philosophy that "starts from" a being (Nature, Man, God, Being, Language) abandons philosophy. MP's response: "circularité vraie" — a circularity that does not exempt itself; hyperdialectique. MP's May 1958 Royaumont colloquium with Gilbert Ryle is the live confrontation. Against: any reading of late MP that subscribes to the two solutions or fails to see that MP is positioning between them. (Ch. IV §2)

  12. Claim: MP renounces the title Origine de la vérité (held 1947–58) because origine itself is supralapsaire fantasme — projecting the lacuna of the present onto a fully-present past. The replacement registers are imminence, naissance continuée, co-naissance, parturition, enfantement. Because: the V&I final passages (Ch 4, November 1960) state: "L'originaire n'est pas d'un seul type, il n'est pas tout derrière nous; ... l'appel à l'originaire va dans plusieurs directions: l'originaire éclate, et la philosophie doit accompagner cet éclatement." MP's philosophy is "ni lapsaire ni supralapsaire": there is no "chute" depuis une "origine" but only a felt non-coïncidence of man with himself. Against: reading late MP as still searching for an origin of truth in the classical sense. (Ch. IV §3)

  13. Claim: Heidegger's exclusion of the chair from the existentials (Sein und Zeit; Zollikoner Seminare) and his answer to Sartre — "le charnel est la chose la plus difficile et justement à cette époque je ne savais pas encore en dire davantage" — defers the chair indefinitely. Because: in the Zollikoner Seminare Heidegger explicitly says the Leiben "appartient à l'être-au-monde" but "l'être-au-monde ne s'épuise pas dans le vivre-comme-corps... Hierbei geschieht kein Leiben." MP responds: "la chair est par principe ce que je ne peux pas mimer sans que ce je soit la chair même: seule la chair mime la chair." Hence the categorical: "la chair est pensable et n'est pensable que par elle-même." Against: any phenomenology that treats the chair as a regional structure subordinate to a "neutral, disincarnate" Dasein. (Ch. V §1–2)

  14. Claim: MP's Ineinander ontology refuses the Heideggerian être- pour-la-mort and the angoisse-revealed Dasein. The "principe des principes": "the possibility of rupture (freedom, death, body accidents) does not prove anything about the possibility of Ineinander and connection." Because: from the existentialist period on (1945–49 manuscripts on empiétement, Mexico Conferences 1949), MP frames la chair as constituted by the vie du lien, by intercorporéité, accouplement and prégnance — figures absent from Heidegger's analytic. The angoisse Heideggerienne, in MP's reading, is itself a flight from intolerable carnal facticité. Against: existentialist readings that read MP as Heideggerian-existentialist on death-and-anxiety. (Ch. V §3)

  15. Claim: The cardinal source of MP's topologie de la chair / topologie de l'être (~80 attestations Oct 1959 – Sep 1960) is Jean Piaget's La représentation de l'espace chez l'enfant (1948), not Heidegger's "topology of being" (Zur Seinsfrage), not Lacan. Because: the most important early note (October 1959) speaks not of "topology of being" but of "espace topologique" as a "milieu où se circonscrivent des rapports de voisinage, d'enveloppement," contrasted with "espace euclidien" as the model of projective being. The April–May 1960 Être et Monde feuillets cite Piaget over 100 times. L'Œil et l'Esprit (Jul–Aug 1960) was prepared in the topology context. The Signes preface (Sep 1960) — MP's only published "topologie de l'être" reference — caveats it: "ce qu'on pourrait appeler la topologie de l'être." Piaget's five topological relations (voisinage, séparation/ségrégation, ordre, enveloppement, continuité) are MP's grammar for the chair-spatiality. Against: Heideggerianizing readings of MP's topology, and Lacan's posthumous self-portrait of MP-as-lacanian. Lacan in 1959–61 has not yet built his topology (the nœud borroméen enters Lacan only February 1972 — eleven years after MP's death). (Ch. VI §1–2)

  16. Claim: MP's insufficiencies of Piaget critique is structurally the same as MP's critique of Descartes: Piaget treats topological infant-spatiality as "prélogique," a mutilated thought to be replaced by adult Euclidean intelligence — failing to see what is positive in topology as the structure of desire, of the body open to being. Because: MP's signature formula on Piaget — "Cela n'est, pour Piaget, que confusion. Pour nous, c'est promiscuité de l'Être" — repeats verbatim MP's anti-Cartesian formula. The promiscuité names the dimension Piaget could not see: the active-ignorance / "ignorance naturelle du topologique et de la chair" that organizes our adult flight from the topological-carnal. (Ch. VI §3a)

  17. Claim: There are two ontological psychoanalyses: MP's (perception-and-desire) and Lacan's (langage-structuré). They diverge at the topology / language fork. MP's "topologie de la chair" places desire as the animating principle of the body-schema and reads the unconscious as "être de promiscuité" extended to the entire body- schema's Ineinander with the world and with autrui — coextensive with le sentir, with the chair as "massive adhésion à l'Être." Lacan's topology is combinatorial-formal, an algorithmics of the unconscious- as-langage. MP inverts Lacan's "inconscient structuré comme un langage": for MP "le langage est structuré comme le schéma corporel" — language as a "second corps," as "corporéité." Against: lacanian readings of late MP and post-Lacan readings that cast MP as proto- lacanian. (Ch. VI §3c)

Argumentative Movement

The book moves through six chapters under a clear architecture:

  1. Ch. I — UNE ONTOLOGIE EN QUESTION: the four-critic reactive context (Hyppolite, Beaufret, Lachièze-Rey, Alquié); the three terminological mutations of 1955; the false "anti-anthropological turn" reading; the closing "ontologie naïve?" that introduces MP's refusal of the supralapsaire pensée.
  2. Ch. II — VERS UNE ONTOLOGIE DE LA FACTICITÉ: the non-philosophie genealogy (1947–48 ENS first occurrence through May 1961 last attestation); the Maine de Biran fait primitif as MP's third way; psychology entrelaced with philosophy from 1933 onwards; contemporary science as carrier of the new ontology against Heidegger.
  3. Ch. III — L'ÊTRE ET LES ÊTRES: the archival demonstration of MP's thin Heidegger reading; the "ontologie directe" charge as ambiguous; the Blondel L'Être et les êtres genealogy (1955–56 reading, diplopie ontologique formula, hyperdialectique birth in 1958); MP and the ontological difference (a transposition, not a Heideggerian adoption).
  4. Ch. IV — LA CHAIR EST LA DEMEURE DE L'ÊTRE: the endurance du chaos; MP's denunciation of occultisme/ésotérisme/gnose (1951–60); the labyrinthe de l'ontologie and the two pre-dialectical solutions (positivisme logique + Heideggerian restoration as deux positivismes du langage); the abandonment of Origine de la vérité under the supralapsaire critique; the replacement registers (imminence, naissance continuée, co-naissance, parturition).
  5. Ch. V — LA CHAIR SI LOIN, SI PROCHE: Heidegger's deferral of the chair in Sein und Zeit and Zollikoner Seminare; MP's counter-reading (chair-as-generality-of-the-body, accouplement-and- prégnance, refusal of être-pour-la-mort, principe des principes).
  6. Ch. VI — TOPOLOGIE DE LA CHAIR ET TOPOLOGIE DE L'ÊTRE: the three apparent sources (Heidegger, Lacan, Bourbaki) and the actual source (Piaget Représentation de l'espace 1948, mediated by Schilder); the 1959–60 transposition into a topology-of-the-flesh; the insufficiencies of Piaget critique; deux topologies de l'être (MP vs Heidegger); deux psychanalyses ontologiques (MP vs Lacan).
  7. Conclusion — La permanence de l'idolâtrie / L'imminence de la vérité / L'être de la chair et la chair de l'être: idolâtrie as construction of substitute-bodies for escape from the empiétement of the chair; imminence-of-the-truth as MP's late attitude; the program of the next two volumes (the symmetric "être de la chair" and "chair de l'être" — which became Être et chair I 2013 and *Être et chair II* 2021).

Movement is philological-and-archival (genealogical demonstrations across volumes), polemical-corrective (against Heideggerianizing readings of late MP), and synthetic (the triptyque of scenarios in the conclusion).

Key Findings

  • There is no genuine Heideggerian turn in late MP. The "Heidegger scenario" is attenuated: not a real philosophical confrontation but a conjunctural disputatio franco-française (against Beaufret), a stylistic emulation, and a deferred face-to-face that MP did not have time to complete. The Identität und Differenz notes are bare paraphrases; the 1959 Heidegger course is "transparent."
  • The cardinal source of *ontologie indirecte* is Blondel's L'Être et les êtres (1935), not Heidegger. The 1956 cours sur la dialectique inaugurates the appeal to indirect ontology in this Blondelian context, well before any sustained Heidegger work.
  • The cardinal source of MP's topology is Piaget's La représentation de l'espace chez l'enfant (1948), mediated by Schilder's body-image, not Heidegger's Topologie des Seins and not Lacan (whose topology proper begins only February 1972).
  • The "anti-anthropological turn" reading is a category error: anthropologisme (Brunschvicg-Sartre humanisme criticiste) ≠ anthropologie (the empirical discipline MP praises in "De Mauss à Lévi-Strauss"). Late MP's anti-anthropological formulae presuppose the positive anthropology and target only the negative anthropologisme.
  • 1955 is the cardinal terminological year: priorité ontologique replaces primat de la perception; "ontologie du monde perçu" first appears as positive name; "ce que je fais n'est pas une anthropologie mais une ontologie" enters the litany.
  • Maine de Biran's *fait primitif* persists through the November 1960 V&I drafts as the load-bearing concept of MP's third way between empiricism and intellectualism, even after explicit Biran references vanish after 1948.
  • MP renounces Origine de la vérité under the *supralapsaire* critique — replaced by imminence, naissance continuée, co-naissance, parturition. The "originaire éclate."
  • The chair is pensable et n'est pensable que par elle-même — Heidegger's deferral of the chair (Zollikoner) is structurally symmetric to Sartre's reduction of the chair (L'Être et le Néant). Both flee the empiétement of the carnal-anthropological.

Methodology

Saint Aubert's method here is the same archival philology-of-concepts that animates the entire five-volume project (cf. the entity page § Method): systematic survey of all known occurrences of a term across the MP corpus, published and unpublished, in chronological order of writing (not publication); respect for the BNF cataloguing; re-transcription of unpublished feuillets where published editions are "parfois fautives"; tracking of subsequently-separated folios (NP = non publié) within ensembles otherwise known through published transcriptions.

What is distinctive about this volume's method:

  • Genealogical demonstration through absence. The argument that MP's Heidegger reading is thin proceeds via positive evidence of absence (no annotations in MP's bibliothèque, no marginal commentary on Identität und Differenz) cross-checked against positive evidence of abundance in MP's other reading (Arnheim, Schilder, Klein, Freud, Gueroult, Belaval, Laporte). The asymmetry is the gravity of the argument.
  • The "scenario" framework. Saint Aubert structures MP's late ontology as a triptyque of critical scenarios — Cartesian, Sartrean, Heideggerian — the third of which (this volume) is shown to be attenuated. The framework lets him argue that what looks like Heideggerian influence is structurally a projection of the Cartesian and Sartrean scenarios onto a stylistic surface.
  • The "ontology indirecte" framework as historical-philological thesis. Saint Aubert demonstrates that the formula ontologie indirecte is not a Heideggerian inheritance but a 1956 extension of the 1952 langage indirect, anchored in the Blondel-derived diplopie ontologique. This is a substantive historical-philological claim, not a structural one — and it is the book.

Concepts Developed

Concepts for which this source does original or substantial work (i.e., where the 2006 volume is the wiki's primary anchor):

  • indirect-ontology — the volume's title-concept; this 2006 monograph is the principal scholarly framework for indirect ontology as a distinct named position (per the 2026-04-25 audit gap report, formerly the wiki's "most consequential raw/ absence"). Anchors the Blondel genealogy.
  • ontological-diplopia — anchors the Blondel L'Être et les êtres (1935) source for the diplopie ontologique formula (resolves the page's prior open question on Blondel-source identification).
  • fait-primitif — Maine de Biran's Essai sur les fondements de la psychologie via the 1947–48 ENS lectures; persistence through November 1960 V&I drafts.
  • non-philosophie — the 1947–48 first attestation, the May 1961 last attestation, the empiétement framing.
  • anthropologisme — the corrective distinction from positive anthropology; the "humanisme criticiste de Brunschvicg" extension.
  • empietement — already heavily Saint-Aubert-anchored; this volume supplies the anti-Heideggerian scenario dimension (already noted on the empietement page).

Concepts Referenced

  • co-naissance — invoked in MP's Introduction à l'ontologie and the V&I drafts as the replacement register for origine.
  • ineinander — recurrent figure for the carnal-ontological structure Heidegger refuses (Verflechtung in Heidegger's Identität und Differenz vocabulary).
  • hyper-dialectic — first launched in 1958 cours preparation, taken up in V&I 1959.
  • surrection — invoked in the conclusion's "naissance et co- naissance" register.
  • propaedeutic-dialectic — the methodological correlate of indirect ontology in V&I Ch I (cf. the linked Kee 2025 reading).
  • chiasm — invoked as the structural figure of empiétement.
  • prégnance — Blondel-derived figure that diffuses into MP's "endo-ontologie."
  • wild-being — invoked in the Ch IV §1b "racines mêmes de l'être" register.
  • body-schema — Schilder is MP's principal source; 1953 and 1959–60 re-readings drive the topology framing.
  • primacy-of-perception — the 1955 "priorité ontologique" reformulation.
  • science-secrete — not directly invoked but implicit in the painter- side of the conclusion.

Terminology (bilingual)

French (original) English Attestation locations Translation notes
ontologie indirecte indirect ontology passim the volume's title-concept
ontologie de la facticité ontology of facticity Ch II not standardized in English secondary literature
non-philosophie non-philosophy Ch II §1; Ch IV passim translates as "non-philosophy" but loses the empiétement connotation
empiétement encroachment / overlap passim gestural French, hard to translate without losing the moral-political resonance
promiscuité promiscuity Ch III §2b; Ch VI §3a retained in technical English; semantically coordinate with empiétement
diplopie ontologique ontological diplopia Ch III §2b from Blondel; the binocular-vision metaphor for the dual perspective on Being
fait primitif primitive fact Ch II §2 from Maine de Biran; conjugates fact and faith
anthropologisme anthropologism Ch I §2 translates as "anthropologism"; not "anthropology"
supralapsaire (pensée) supralapsarian (thinking) Ch IV §3 theological term redeployed by MP for the fantasy of pre-fall integrity
hyperdialectique hyperdialectic Ch III §3; Ch IV §2 first launched in 1958 cours preparation
labyrinthe (de l'ontologie) labyrinth (of ontology) Ch IV §2 Leibniz-derived figure for the philosophical confusion of starting from one being
ruines de pensées ruins of thoughts Ch IV passim from Eugen Fink
naissance continuée continued birth Ch IV §3 replaces origine under supralapsaire critique
imminence (de la vérité) imminence (of truth) Conclusion §2 the truth as on-the-verge-of-birth, neither lost nor possessed
co-naissance co-birth / co-knowing passim Claudelian portmanteau
topologie de la chair topology of the flesh Ch VI distinct from Heidegger's Topologie des Seins
espace topologique topological space Ch VI §1c Piaget-derived; pre-projective and pre-metric
direct vs. indirect ontology direct vs. indirect ontology Ch III §2a extends the 1952 langage indirect framework to ontology
deux positivismes du langage two positivisms of language Ch IV §2b analytic philosophy + Heideggerian ésotérisme
ésotérisme / occultisme / gnose esotericism / occultism / gnosis Ch IV §1a MP's late critique of Heidegger and Beaufret-Parménide
effondrement collapse Ch IV §1b the 1958–59 figure for the contemporary epistemic-existential crisis

Key Passages

"Si deux mots suffisaient à situer le dernier Merleau-Ponty, d'après son texte même, on retiendrait sans doute ontologie et chair. Un tel couple peut paraître étrange, sinon contre nature." (Introduction) — the book's opening thesis.

"La qualification du projet merleau-pontien comme 'ontologie' ne devient systématique qu'à partir de 1957, avec les premiers cours au Collège de France sur le concept de Nature et l'annonce d'une 'ontologie de la Nature'. Une étude attentive, incluant les inédits, montre toutefois que Merleau-Ponty revendique régulièrement le statut ontologique de sa réflexion depuis 1946..." (Introduction) — anchors argument 1.

"Ce que je proposais, différent de Ruyer, et que Lachièze-Rey ne voit pas c'est: priorité ontologique du monde perçu (et du corps phénoménal) i.e. tout l'être qui a sens pour nous est à concevoir d'après monde perçu." (PbPassiv 1955, cited Ch I §1c) — the cardinal terminological mutation.

"Tous nos concepts sont anthropocentriques" (note inédite 1958–59) and: "Le sujet percevant, l'univers de la perception, quand il est vraiment pris pour premier, n'est pas un univers 'anthropologique' à la surface de l'en soi inconnaissable" (note inédite 1958) — both anchor argument 3 (the anthropologisme/anthropology distinction).

"Une herméneutique de la facticité ne peut être sans faits." (1953 first Collège course, Ch I) — anchors arguments 4 and 5.

"Ramenant le regard du philosophe vers le corps, il quitte la tradition philosophique et lui oppose une non-philosophie" (Brunschvicg on Maine de Biran, in MP's 1947-48 ENS lecture, Ch II §1) — the first occurrence of non-philosophie in MP's corpus.

"Le 'fait primitif', question principielle de l'Essai sur les fondements de la psychologie, est dès lors la notion essentielle que Merleau-Ponty gardera de Biran après ses cours de 1947-1948, et après l'effacement de toute référence explicite à ce philosophe. On la retrouve jusque dans les feuillets de préparation du dernier chapitre du Visible (novembre 1960)." (Ch II §2) — anchors argument 5.

"Notre diplopie ontologique pourra-t-elle se ramener à l'unité d'une vision binoculaire? Et comment la phénoménologie ne suffit pas à fonder l'ontologie. En quel sens l'ontologie après être allée des êtres à l'Être revient de l'Être aux êtres." (Blondel, L'Être et les êtres, 1935 — chapter title cited Ch III §2b) — the philological keystone of argument 6: this Blondel chapter title is the documented source of MP's diplopie ontologique.

"On ne peut pas faire de l'ontologie directe. Ma méthode 'indirecte' (l'être dans les étants) est seule conforme à l'être — 'philosophie négative' comme 'théologie négative'." (V&I working note Feb 1959, cited Ch III §2a) — the cardinal MP formula. Saint Aubert reads it in Blondelian context.

"Pas de différence absolue, donc, entre la philosophie ou le transcendantal et l'empirique (il vaut mieux dire: l'ontologique et l'ontique) — Pas de parole philosophique absolument pure." (V&I working note November 1960, cited Ch III §3) — anchors argument 9; the November 1960 anti-Heideggerian formula.

"Heidegger et l'archaïsme, le trésor enfoui, l'ontologie directe, la découverte d'un savoir philosophique transcendant, p. ex. d'un Λόγος transcendant toute langue comme Parménide surplombe toute notre histoire" (Introduction à l'ontologie, autumn 1958, cited Ch III §2a) — anchors argument 10.

"Si l'on appelle philosophie la recherche de l'Être ou celle de l'Ineinander, la philosophie n'est-elle pas vite conduite au silence — ce silence justement que rompent de temps en temps les petits écrits de Heidegger? Mais ne tient-il pas plutôt à ce que Heidegger a toujours cherché une expression directe du fondamental..." (RC59, cited Ch III §2a) — anchors argument 8.

"Pas de meilleur commentaire de Heidegger Identität und Differenz" (OntoCart 1961, cited Ch III §3) — anchors argument 9. MP's own depth-phenomenology counts as the commentary; Heidegger is paralleled, not commented.

"Cela n'est, pour Piaget, que confusion. Pour nous, c'est promiscuité de l'Être." (Être et Monde April-May 1960, cited Ch VI §3a) — the cardinal formula on argument 16. The structural identity of MP's Piaget critique with MP's Cartesian critique.

"[En marge: Piaget, Représentation de l'espace.] Description (parce que la topologie en donne l'idée à Piaget) d'une organisation spatiale pré-projective. Le sensori-moteur comme origine commune de l'espace topologique et de l'espace projectif-métrique." (Être et Monde April 1960, cited Ch VI §1c) — anchors argument 15.

"L'analyse du sens merleau-pontien de la topologie qui a achevé le présent ouvrage constituait ainsi un élément de transition... à savoir le trésor des figures de la chair, qui sont aussi, et aussi bien, les figures de ce qui anime la chair — le désir — que celles de ce qu'elle exprime — l'être." (Conclusion §3) — the closing programmatic statement; the bridge to the next two volumes (Être et chair I 2013 and Être et chair II 2021).

"Tout ce qu'on croyait pensé et bien pensé... tout cela est en ruine... Mais attention. Ce que nous appelons désordre et ruine, d'autres, plus jeunes, le vivent comme naturel et peut-être vont-ils avec ingénuité le dominer justement parce qu'ils ne cherchent plus leurs références où nous les prenions... Pourquoi ne serait-ce pas un espoir?" (Signes preface, cited Conclusion §2) — anchors the imminence register.

What's Not Obvious

Three things that would not appear in a conventional summary or review:

  1. The book argues for the absence of a Heideggerian turn in late MP, but is structured as if to construct one. Saint Aubert builds the "Heidegger scenario" methodically, chapter by chapter — the reactive-context (Ch I), the non-philosophy quarrel (Ch II), the ontological difference and direct/indirect (Ch III), the chair (Ch IV–V), the topology (Ch VI). The cumulative effect of this scenario-construction is to demonstrate that the scenario itself is attenuated: MP's actual Heidegger-engagement is too thin to sustain the architecture the surface vocabulary suggests. The form of the book is the negative of its argument: a Heideggerian-shaped structure that turns out to be empty at the philosophical center (Brunschvicg + Biran + Blondel + Schilder + Piaget supply what Heidegger appears to). This is structurally the same move as Le scénario cartésien (2005) made for Descartes — Saint Aubert's signature method.

  2. The cardinal genealogical thesis (Blondel-not-Heidegger) is archival-philological, not interpretive. Saint Aubert does not argue that Blondel is philosophically more important than Heidegger for MP — he argues that the formula "ontologie indirecte" and the diplopie ontologique come from Blondel, that the 1956 cours sur la dialectique inaugurates the appeal to indirect ontology in this Blondelian context, and that this happens before MP's sustained Heidegger work. The thesis is dating + provenance, not value- ranking. This matters because the wiki's existing indirect-ontology page houses Saint Aubert's framework as "Position 2" alongside Chouraqui's structural reading — the 2006 monograph supplies the historical-philological foundation that Chouraqui's structural reading does not engage. The two readings are coordinate complements, not rivals: Chouraqui describes the form, Saint Aubert establishes the provenance.

  3. The book's silent-key term is promiscuité. It is used 6–7 times across 200 dense pages, never given an explicit definition. Yet it names the structure of the chair-and-being relation — the proximity-and-active-ignorance that organizes adult-flight-from-the- carnal. Promiscuité is semantically coordinate with empiétement but adds the active-ignorance dimension that empiétement does not name. The book's most cited formula — "Cela n'est, pour Piaget, que confusion. Pour nous, c'est promiscuité de l'Être" (Ch VI §3a) — makes promiscuité the bridge concept between the Piaget critique and the non-philosophie / fait-primitif / empiétement register. Promiscuité is the lexical hinge at which the volume's archival-philological argument becomes a philosophical thesis about the structure of carnal-ontological access.

Critique / Limitations

  • The book's central thesis (no genuine Heideggerian turn) hinges on positive evidence of absence (under-annotation, sparse reading-notes) cross-checked against positive evidence of abundance for MP's other reading. This is a strong methodological move but is defeasible: MP could in principle have engaged Heidegger philosophically without leaving the marginal-annotation-trail he leaves with other authors. Saint Aubert's strongest move is not the under-annotation but the positive demonstration that the Blondel + Biran + Schilder + Piaget genealogy supplies the structural concepts MP uses — Heidegger is then not needed. But this leaves the question: why does MP use Heideggerian language at all? Saint Aubert answers "stylistic / figural emulation," but this answer is partly defensive — the figures are sometimes load-bearing (e.g., Ineinander with explicit Heideggerian provenance from Sartre's reading; Verbergung from the late MP).

  • The "scenario" framework presupposes structural unity that is not argued. Saint Aubert presents the Cartesian / Sartrean / Heideggerian scenarios as components of one MP project, but does not interrogate the structural unity of these scenarios — could they be three different projects loosely held together by their common target (l'ontologie de l'objet)? The Conclusion §3 names "l'être de la chair" and "la chair de l'être" as the program of the next two volumes, but does not justify that this is one program and not two.

  • The book does not engage Maldiney, Marc Richir, Henri Maldiney's later work, or Didier Franck on Heidegger-and-the-flesh in sustained fashion. Cited briefly but not engaged philosophically. Consequence: the "Heideggerian alternative" reading the book refuses is the Beaufret-Parmenides one, not the contemporary debates about the body in Heidegger.

  • The Bourbaki-mathematical source for MP's topology is acknowledged but quickly subordinated to Piaget. The 1959–60 attention to actual mathematical topology (the Royaumont colloquium with Ryle in May 1958; the early references to non-Euclidean spaces in 1957–58) is treated as inflowing into the Piaget-mediated framework. A reader interested in MP and contemporary mathematics would want more than this volume provides.

  • The treatment of MP's relation to Lacan is reductive. The closing argument (Ch VI §3c) — "two ontological psychoanalyses" — is suggestive but compressed. MP's Sorbonne-period reception of Lacan (1949–52, the mirror stage etc.) is mentioned in passing but not engaged in the depth that the conclusion's polemic would warrant.

  • The Conclusion's program for the next two volumes is structured as "l'être de la chair" + "la chair de l'être" — symmetric pair. The actual next volumes (Être et chair I 2013 / Être et chair II 2021) do not preserve this exact symmetry. Reading 2006 retroactively with the actual later trajectory in view shows that the 2006 programmatic gesture is itself an artifact of the volume's place in the trilogy's transition.

Connections

  • is volume 3 of Saint Aubert's five- volume project. Builds directly on Du lien des êtres (2004) and Le scénario cartésien (2005); is succeeded by Être et chair I (2013) and *Être et chair II* (2021).
  • anchors indirect-ontology — closes the wiki's most consequential raw/ absence per the 2026-04-25 audit gap report. The Blondel genealogy and the 1952-langage-indirect derivation must now anchor the page.
  • anchors ontological-diplopia — supplies the documented Blondel L'Être et les êtres (1935) source, resolving the page's prior open question on Blondel-source identification (the page was open between L'Action 1893 and an unspecified Blondel text; the answer is L'Être et les êtres 1935).
  • anchors fait-primitif (new) — Maine de Biran's Essai sur les fondements de la psychologie via MP's 1947-48 ENS lectures.
  • anchors non-philosophie (new) — the 1947-48 first attestation through May 1961 last attestation.
  • anchors anthropologisme (new) — the corrective distinction from positive anthropology.
  • complements empietement — already heavily Saint-Aubert- anchored; this volume supplies the anti-Heideggerian scenario dimension.
  • contrasts with [[chouraqui-2014-ambiguity-and-absolute|Chouraqui's Ambiguity and the Absolute]] (2014) — coordinate complement on indirect-ontology: Saint Aubert supplies historical-philological provenance (Blondel genealogy); Chouraqui supplies structural form (circulus vitiosus deus as architectonic motif). The two readings are not rivals.
  • contrasts with Heideggerianizing readings of late MP — Saint Aubert's archival demonstration that MP's Heidegger reading was thin and late.
  • applies primacy-of-perception to the ontological level via the 1955 priorité ontologique reformulation.
  • converges with the 2023 paper on the anti-monism of the chair (the 2023 paper's "three-term dramaturgy" is the public-facing condensation of the 2006 architecture).
  • converges with Institution and Passivity (1954–55) and [[merleau-ponty-2020-sensible-world-expression|the 1953 Sensible World course]] — the primary-text correspondents of the volume's archival reconstruction.
  • converges with [[merleau-ponty-1968-visible-and-invisible|V&I working notes]] (Feb 1959 circulus vitiosus deus note; Nov 1960 Heidegger-distancing note).

Sources

This is a secondary source on Merleau-Ponty. The primary corpus cited includes (with sigles per Saint Aubert's apparatus):

  • MP published works: PhP, SC, V&I, OE, S, La Nature, L'Œil et l'Esprit, Sens et non-sens, Signes, Éloge de la philosophie, Aventures de la dialectique, Humanisme et terreur, Causeries 1948, Notes de cours 1959-1961, Résumés de cours 1952-1960, Parcours 1935-1951, Parcours deux 1951-1961, Le primat de la perception.
  • MP unpublished BNF manuscripts (don 92-21 of Suzanne Merleau-Ponty; don 93-03 of Claude Lefort): Être et Monde (vols VI), V&I working notes (vol VII–VIII), Notes sur le corps (vol XVII), Notes sur la vie (vol XVI), DESC, OntoCart, Husserl (vol XVIII), Mexico (1949), L'Œil et l'Esprit preparation (vol V), Le monde sensible et le monde de l'expression preparation (vol X), Le problème de la parole preparation (vol XII), Le problème de la passivité preparation (vol XIII), La philosophie aujourd'hui preparation (vol XVIII), Philosophie et non-philosophie depuis Hegel preparation (vol XX), La prose du monde preparation (vol III), MSME, Notes de lecture sur Identität und Differenz (vol XIX).
  • Heidegger primary: Sein und Zeit; Identität und Differenz; Zur Seinsfrage; Lettre sur l'humanisme; Sein und Zeit §§1-14, 25-27 (the only paragraphs MP underlined); Zollikoner Seminare.
  • Maine de Biran: Essai sur les fondements de la psychologie (cited via MP's 1947-48 ENS lectures and Brunschvicg's L'expérience humaine et la causalité physique).
  • Maurice Blondel: L'Être et les êtres. Essai d'ontologie concrète et intégrale (Vrin, 1935) — the cardinal genealogical anchor.
  • Brunschvicg: L'expérience humaine et la causalité physique (cited in MP's Biran defense).
  • Piaget: La représentation de l'espace chez l'enfant (1948); La naissance de l'intelligence chez l'enfant (1936).
  • Schilder: L'Image du corps (cited extensively in the topology argument).
  • Husserl: Krisis (third part); various passages from Ideen II and Umsturz (the "earth-doesn't-move" inédit).
  • Sartre: L'Être et le Néant; Merleau-Ponty vivant (1961).
  • Eugen Fink: cited as source of "Nous vivons dans des ruines de pensées" formula and as source of the Sprache das Haus des Seins motif (which MP encounters via Fink's reading of Heidegger, not directly).
  • Beaufret: Introduction à une lecture du Poème de Parménide (1955) — MP's actual target of the "ésotérisme" critique.
  • Lévinas: cited briefly for a passage MP transcribed.
  • Whitehead: cited via MP's 1957 Nature course reading.
  • Jaspers: Schelling — source of the term gnose in MP's 1957 vocabulary.
  • Lacan: cited in passing via the topology discussion (Ch VI §1b).
  • Secondary scholars on MP: Marc Richir, Mikel Dufrenne, Henri Maldiney, Didier Franck, Jean Greisch, Michel Haar, Jocelyn Benoist, Bernard Baas — cited to corroborate or contrast the volume's argument.