Martin Heidegger and the return of God through poetry

Abstract

Poetic art has had multiple interpretations in the history of philosophy, from pre-Socratics to the present day. Philosopher Martin Heidegger claimed poets and poetry represent a way of thinking that, although different from philosophy, share the same essence: the 'meaning of being' question. All topics that run through his work are based on this question. One of them is the concept of divinity, which is related to poetry. I would like to expose this relationship, in order to ask ourselves, from the Heideggerian perspective, if a new god for contemporary man is possible, and what would the role of the poet be, in that case. To do this, I will begin by asking about the essence of poetry and the mission of poets. Then, I will try to make a brief analysis of the Heideggerian concept of divinity, and also show why it is intrinsically related to the habitat of man. Then, from Heidegger's view, I will analyse our contemporary world and, from this, we will be able to think about the possibility of this new god to come: the last god. Finally, I am going to expose the function of ‘future’ poets, regarding the arrival of this god.