Edith Stein in her activity as Edmund Husserl's assistant in Freiburg

Abstract

The present article aims to present the incidences that Edith Stein had to overcome during her personal and professional dealings with Edmund Husserl in the revision, selection, arrangement and publication of her notes on the work of the philosopher. In particular, we focus our study on Edith Stein's most substantive contribution to Husserl's work: the constitution of soul reality in empathy that consummates the consideration of psychic nature and serves as a bridge from the psychological to the spiritual. This contribution brings together Edith Stein’s inquiries into the body and empathy as prerequisites for the constitution, the «exchange of places» and for settling the dilemma regarding the idealism of which Husserl was accused by his critics. The Steinian solution can be synthesized as follows: between material and spiritual nature the mediating factor is now not rational logic but an aspect of nature itself: the psychic, that is, the sensibility of the living body. Husserl, on the other hand, wanted to make the constitution a prerequisite for individual embodiment. We trust that our work shows the spirit of fraternal collaboration that existed between the Carmelite saint and her dear Master.