The Obvious Unsaid: An Inquiry into Heidegger’s Doctrine via Derrida

In his essay „Plato’s Doctrine of Truth,“ Heidegger posits that a thinker’s doctrine resides not in their explicit articulations but in what remains unsaid within the said, in the gaps and interstices of their thought. This paper examines the question of Heidegger’s own doctrine through a Derridean lens, with particular attention to “Sending: On Representation.” It argues that Heidegger’s philosophy, through its various turns, remains underpinned by the conception of Being as transcending signification, which cannot be but a representational mode of thinking even if truth (ἀλήθεια) is thought of as unhiddeness. As a result, Heidegger’s doctrine emerges, paradoxically, as the very concept of doctrine – a recursive matrix mirroring his critique of metaphysics.