Dans ce travail, nous avons pris le parti d'interroger l'uvre de Michel Henry à partir de problèmes qui ne sont pas explicitement formulés par elle : l'égalité et la démocratie. L'intérêt d'une telle lecture est qu'elle permet d'aborder ces problèmes sous un angle neuf : il ne s'agit plus seulement d'interroger l'égalité et la démocratie à partir des structures sociales, mais à partir de ce que le phénoménologue appelle la subjectivité monadique ou encore l'individualité. Comment le concept d'individualité de Michel Henry permet-il de penser à nouveaux frais l'égalité et la démocratie ? L'ambition de la première partie de ce travail est d'aller chercher dans la phénoménologie matérielle de Michel Henry des éléments qui permettent un ré-examen du partage établi entre l'illusion, l'idéologie et la vérité. En effet, ce partage nous permet de pouvoir interroger les conditions de possibilité d'une relation égalitaire entre les individus. Nos questions sont les suivantes : qu'est-ce que l'égalité ? En quoi une société égalitaire implique-t-elle, non pas la suppression des rôles et de leur spécificité, mais une certaine façon de les faire jouer en collectivité ? Dans la seconde partie de notre travail, nous interrogeons la relation entre la vie et les formes sociales. L'objectif fondamental poursuivi dans cette seconde partie est de mettre au jour, dans la phénoménologie de Michel Henry, des éléments qui nous permettent de revisiter le rapport entre la vie et le commun ; ce rapport permet d'interroger les conditions de possibilité d'une société égalitaire ou de la démocratie. Nous posons alors les questions suivantes : l'égalité entre les individus s'inscrit-elle uniquement dans l'expérience singulière du commun en tant que tel ou est-elle liée aux modalités sociales qui définissent, pour une part, ce commun ? Quelles sont les modalités qui rendent possible une société égalitaire ou ce que nous appelons, avec Michel Henry, une démocratie radicale ? Contre quelles tendances cette société égalitaire doit-elle lutter pour se maintenir ?

Comme l’indique le titre de cette étude, notre travail se situe dans le prolongement de celui de Franck, et plus précisément de sa thèse déployée dans son livre, Chair et Corps : sur la phénoménologie de Husserl. Dans ce livre, Franck a démontré clairement le fondement dernier de la phénoménologie de Husserl, en disant que dans la mesure où la chair est définie par Husserl comme « auto-affection pure », cette chair ne peut pas se constituer comme un corps. Notre travail est un essai pour éprouver la phénoménologie de Henry, à partir de cette objection adressée à Husserl par Franck : l’impossibilité de l’incorporation de la chair. Notre question est donc la suivante : comment l’incorporation est-elle possible pour Henry, dans la mesure où, pour lui, l’auto-affection de la chair est pure. Notre travail sera conduit par cette seule question. Cependant, ce dont il s’agit ici ne peut pas être une simple interprétation de la philosophie de Henry. S’il est vrai que la phénoménologie de Husserl est un essai qui, en désirant « la phénoménologie comme science rigoureuse », cherche le fondement indiscutable de la philosophie, notre question touche ce fondement même, c’est-à-dire, le commencement de la philosophie. Lorsque nous interrogeons Henry sur le problème auquel est conduit inévitablement Husserl, cela nous conduit à poser la question du fondement dernier de la philosophie, à savoir, la question de son commencement qui, à vrai dire, est un commencement qui a toujours et déjà commencé. / As like the title of this study, our work is a continuation of the Franck’s work, specifically, which he deployed in his book Flesh and body : on the phenomenology of Husserl. In his analysis on the phenomenology of Husserl, Franck demonstrates that the flesh cannot be embodied, if it is defined as “pure auto-affection.” Our work expands on this thesis : the impossibility of emboyding the flesh, and attempts to examine the phenomenology of Michel Henry. The most important question is : how can Michel Henry explain an embodiment of flesh to the extent that he defines the flesh as pure auto-affection. However, what is involved here cannot be a simple interpretation of the Henry’s philosophy. While it is true that Husserl’s phenomenology is a test that, desiring "phenomenology as rigorous science", seeks the indisputable foundation of philosophy, we are asking for this foundation of philosophy that means the beginning of philosophy, when we ask Henry about the problem which inevitably leads Husserl. So, our question is the ultimate foundation of philosophy, the question of its beginning which, indeed, is a beginning that has always already begun.

L’œuvre de Michel Henry introduit l’idée d’une phénoménologie non-intentionnelle, fondée sur le concept d’auto-affection comme mode de la phénoménalité plus fondamental que l’intentionalité qui révèle le monde, le visible. La vie est l’être qui se révèle à soi dans l’immanence de l’auto-affection, dans l’invisible. C’est sur ce dualisme onto-phénoménologique que repose l’esthétique que Henry développe dans Voir l’invisible. Il y définit l’art comme accomplissement de la vie, c’est-à-dire comme Rappel pathétique de la vie. L’art est donc conçu, selon le paradoxe qu’énonce le titre de l’ouvrage, comme une manifestation de l’invisible dans le monde visible. L’art, pour Michel Henry ne vaut donc pas en tant qu’il révèle le « phénomène phénoménologique », mais en tant que, ce faisant, il accomplit la vie : il n’est pas contemplation, mais action. Il constitue l’accomplissement pratique d’une éthique de la vie. Cependant, la définition de la vie comme auto-affection, et l’affirmation fondamentale selon laquelle l’art constitue l’accomplissement de celle-ci, expose l’entreprise de Henry à un certain nombre de difficultés : sous-détermination de l’art, impossibilité de rendre compte d’une réalité objective de l’œuvre d’art, exclusion de la littérature hors du champ de l’esthétique. La décision d’édifier une esthétique fidèle à l’affirmation fondamentale de Henry, qui soit aussi un discours capable de rendre compte au plus près des pratiques artistiques dans leur diversité, et leur réalité concrète, conduit ici à interroger les fondements théoriques de l’esthétique henrienne : ses conceptions de la transcendance et de la subjectivité. La réinterprétation de l’impression comme intentionnalité fondamentale, et du sens de l’auto-affection comme plurivoque vise ainsi à préciser la définition de l’art comme Rappel, d’une manière assez concrète pour en édifier une théorie générale, qui permette de le concevoir dans ses déterminations concrètes, et comme moment de la culture.Mots-clés : Michel Henry, Art, Esthétique, Phénoménologie, Intentionnalité, Affectivité, Auto-affection, Subjectivité, Invisible. / Michel Henry’s work has brought about the idea of a non-intentional phenomenology, based on the analysis of self-affection, as a phenomenological process allegedly more fundamental than intentionality. Whereas the latter reveals the visibility of the world, self-affection reveals, for its part, the invisibility of affective life. The theory of aesthetics that Henry develops in Voir l’invisible is based on this onto-phenomenological dualism. In this book, Henry defines art as the accomplishment of life, as its pathetical « emotional Recall ». Consequently, art is conceived accordingly to the paradoxical statement implied in the title of his book, since “voir l’invisible” means seeing what is invisible. So, to Henry’s opinion, art doesn’t bring forth the ‘phenomenological phenomenon’, but is the practical fulfilment of the ethics of life. Nevertheless, determining life as the invisibility of self-affection, and art as the accomplishment of life, urges him to face a certain number of difficulties : what about the risk of underestimating the complex structure of the work of art ? What about its actual reality ? And how is one supposed to understand, in such an aesthetical context, the possibility and structure of literature ? The purpose of settling a new theoretical basis for aesthetics, grounded on Michel Henry’s fundamental concept of the “Recall”, but at the same time able to solve these problems, and to actually take into account the wide variety of art practices, leads to investigate here the ontological foundations of Henry’s aesthetics : the way he conceives transcendence and subjectivity. Reinterpreting ‘impression’ as the fundamental intentionality, and showing self-affection as equivocal, enables to shape a more accurate and balanced characterization of art, viewed as ‘Recall’, in a much more realistic and concrete way, which brings about the conditions for a general theory of art and its relation to culture.Key words : Michel Henry, Art, Aesthetics, Phenomenology, Intentionality, Affectivity, Self-affection, Subjectivity, Invisible.

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / This work has as purpose, from the thought of Michel Henry, contemporary French philosopher, afford a study on the phenomenology of affectivity, more specifically on henrianas investigations regarding affectivity, considering the essential notes investigated and formulated in relation life, phenomenology, in the case the Phenomenology of Life or Material Phenomenology, and passivity. The intended reflection aims to consider possibilities that arise for the contemporary phenomenological field. The main thesis to be defended and grounded is that the essence of phenomenology of life manifests itself in immanent way by means of the affectivity. It is investigating the foundations for a Phenomenology of Affectivity, thus presenting a conceptualization from the radical immanence of life. Affectivity, privileged subject in Henry's works, is reached or reaches a very special way the experience of radical subjectivity, which, according to our philosopher, the life essentializes up itself, affecting itself in the experience of self same, the radical immanence of his affectivity. Because the concrete truth of this movement is the life that proves herself. Which is realized in his pathos, in the subjectivity that is known, independent of any conceptual or sensitive approach, or of a intentional look, but life in the absolute probation of their intrinsic certainty, in a material meaning, in the materiality of his pure appear that gives us access to itself, made in the modalities of suffering and enjoy, in the revelation itself, in its pathos of passivity that is affected. In order to sustain the structure of his thought, which culminates in the formulation of the phenomenology of life, Henry's concern aims to open up new fields of inquiry about the effective fenomenalização the phenomenality as such and in the reversal of phenomenology, a rethinking on this, another direction, a material bias. Therefore, this work is based in the works of this philosopher, in particular L'Essence de la manifestation. / A presente dissertação tem por intuito, a partir do pensamento de Michel Henry filosófo contemporâneo francês, proporcionar um estudo acerca da fenomenologia da afetividade, mais especificamente sobre as investigações henrianas a respeito da afetividade, levando em consideração os apontamentos essenciais averiguados e formulados em relação à vida, fenomenologia, no caso a Fenomenologia da Vida ou Fenomenologia Material e passividade. A reflexão pretendida objetiva considerar possibilidades que surgem para o campo fenomenológico contemporâneo, a tese principal a ser defendida e fundamentada é: que a essência da fenomenologia da vida se manifesta de forma imanente por meio da afetividade. Trata-se de investigar os fundamentos para uma Fenomenologia da Afetividade, apresentando assim, uma conceituação a partir da imanência radical da vida. A afetividade, assunto privilegiado nas obras de Henry, é atingida ou atinge de modo muito especial à experiência da subjetividade radical, a qual conforme o nosso filósofo a vida essencifica em si mesma, se autoafetando, na experiência de si mesma, na imanência radical de sua afetividade. Pois a verdade concreta desse movimento é a vida que se prova a si mesma. A qual se realiza em seu pathos, na subjetividade que se conhece independente de qualquer abordagem conceptual ou sensível, ou de um olhar intencional, mas a vida na provação absoluta de sua certeza intrínseca, em uma significação material, na materialidade de seu puro aparecer que nos dá acesso a si mesma, que se constitui nas modalidades do sofrer e do fruir, na revelação de si, no seu pathos da passividade que é afetada. A fim de sustentar a estrutura de seu pensamento, que culmina na formulação da fenomenologia da vida, a preocupação de Henry mira-se a abrir novos campos de investigação acerca da fenomenalização efetiva da fenomenalidade enquanto tal e na reversão da fenomenologia, um repensar esta, um outro direcionamento, um viés material. Para tanto este trabalho tem como base as obras deste filósofo, em especial, a L Essence de la manifestation.

A realidade das igrejas cristãs protestantes é atualmente marcada pela noção de crescimento numérico e pela ascensão subjetiva perpassada pela grande ênfase no sucesso pessoal do indivíduo. A Missão da Igreja como comissionamento evangélico tem se transformado em projetos que relegando as práticas (fundamentais) de cuidado ao próximo à mera prática administrativa de crescimento institucional adaptam-se à lógica do mundo. Não tendo o cuidado e a terapia a objetividade requerida, os quais testemunhados amplamente nos Evangelhos, tanto por meio das práticas de Jesus quanto por meio da própria pedagogia divina ao ensinar o esvaziamento de si em favor de muitos, cumpre refletir o atual estado das comunidades de fé agregadas sob a confissão de Jesus como o Cristo. Para tanto, o presente trabalho quer analisar as possibilidades de uma Igreja Terapêutica, considerando o que a Palavra de Deus tem a ensinar a respeito do cuidado e da terapia, exemplificados nas ações de Deus através da história de seu povo, estendendo-se aos evangelhos. Daí retirar aportes a uma prática do cuidado e da terapia em diálogo com a contribuição da Fenomenologia da Vida, de Michel Henry. / In recent days, Protestant Christian churches have been marked by a desire for numerical growth as well as for subjective growth in importance, imbued with a great emphasis on personal success of the individual. The Mission of the Church as an evangelical commission has been transformed into projects which relegate the (basic) practices of caring for ones neighbor to the category of mere administrative practices which can contribute to the growth of the institution, in this way adapting to the logic of the world. When care and therapy do not have the level of objectivity required and amply witnessed to in the Gospels, both through what Jesus did and what in his divine pedagogy he taught about emptying oneself in benefit of many, it is important that we reflect on the present state of the faith communities which join in confessing Jesus as the Christ. To help in this reflection, the present dissertation seeks to analyze the possibility of developing a Therapeutic Church, through considering what the Word of God has to teach about care and therapy, as exemplified in the actions of God throughout the history of his people and continuing through the Gospels. On this basis, the dissertation seeks to contribute to the practice of care and therapy, in dialogue with Michel Henrys concept of Phenomenology of Life.

Dans la pensée contemporaine (tous domaines confondus), le traditionnel problème du fondement a disparu. Et cela à juste titre : les plus importants résultats aujourd’hui ont été obtenus, en effet, sans passer par une hypostase méthodologique que le concept de « fondement » impose à la pensée. La phénoménologie, plus que toute autre approche, semble avoir accompli ce processus ; pour ce faire, cependant, elle a gardé un vocabulaire souvent ambigu ; voire, elle s’est réclamée expressément comme étant au fondement des sciences. Notre travail trouve son point de départ, dans la philosophie d’inspiration phénoménologique de Michel Henry. Elle permet de penser un fondement sans passer par la violence d’un maître-mot, et simultanément sans passer par le dogme d’une théorie où le fondement porterait à une réaffirmation des dualismes, lui-même hypostasié (comme « être » par exemple). Pour Henry, le fondement, comme ce qui est sans condition, est l’apparaître de quelque chose. À son tour, il se dit comme une condition absolue de tout ce qui se manifeste, comme une force de manifestation de l’être. Mais le chemin vers un fondement s’avère difficile, puisqu’il n’existe pas de thématisation de ce concept chez Henry, ni de possibilité de « concept » de fondement dans le « dire le phénomène », dans un langage qui doit, pour se dire fondamental, exprimer l’immédiateté de la manifestation en tant que telle, une manifestation qui se dise elle-même sans avoir recours à une référence externe. Peu importe la manière, le fondement doit lui-même bâtir sa propre problématique. Le phénomène du fondement représente, à travers un parcours aux limites de la philosophie, à la fois théorétique, empirico-transcendantale et expérimental, la tentative de penser le fondement comme ce qui se manifeste et, sans médiation, manifeste une altérité finalement comprise à partir d’une immanence irréductible. / In contemporary thinking (all fields included), the traditional problem of the foundation has disappeared. Rightfully: the most important results today have been obtained, in fact, without going through a methodological hypo-stasis that the concept of “foundation” imposes to the thought. Phenomenology, more than any other approach, seems to have been through this process ; for doing so, however, it kept a vocabulary often ambiguous ; it even claimed it specifically as the foundation of science. Our work finds its starting point, in the phenomenological philosophy of Michel Henry. It suggests a basis without going through the violence of a master word, and simultaneously bypassing the dogma of a theory in which the foundation would be a reaffirmation of dualism, itself an hypo-stasis (as the "being", for example). For Henry, the foundation, understood as what is unconditional, is the appearing of something. Thus he says as an absolute condition that manifests itself as a force of manifestation of being. But the path to one foundation is difficult, since there is no theming of this concept in Henry, and no possibility of “concept” basis in the “to say the The phenomenon of foundation. Essay on the philosophy of Michel Henry.In contemporary thinking (all fields included), the traditional problem of the foundation has disappeared. Rightfully: the most important results today have been obtained, in fact, without going through a methodological hypo-stasis that the concept of “foundation” imposes to the thought. Phenomenology, more than any other approach, seems to have been through this process ; for doing so, however, it kept a vocabulary often ambiguous ; it even claimed it specifically as the foundation of science. Our work finds its starting point, in the phenomenological philosophy of Michel Henry. It suggests a basis without going through the violence of a master word, and simultaneously bypassing the dogma of a theory in which the foundation would be a reaffirmation of dualism, itself an hypo-stasis (as the "being", for example). For Henry, the foundation, understood as what is unconditional, is the appearing of something. Thus he says as an absolute condition that manifests itself as a force of manifestation of being. But the path to one foundation is difficult, since there is no theming of this concept in Henry, and no possibility of “concept” basis in the “to say the phenomenon”, in a language that has, to say fundamental, to express the immediacy of the event as such, an event which tells itself without using an external reference. Anyway, the foundation itself must build its own problems. The phenomenon is the basis, through a journey to the limits of philosophy, theoretical, empirico-transcendental and experimental, trying to understand of the foundation as what is manifest and without mediation, manifest otherness finally understood from an irreducible immanence.

La duplicité de l’apparaître consiste à distinguer tout ce qui apparaît conformément à son mode d’apparaître : immanence et transcendance. Notre travail a pour objectif d’élucider par l’analyse des lectures henryennes de l’histoire de la philosophie une présupposition fondamentale qui conditionne cette doctrine de la duplicité de l’apparaître, présupposition qui joue un rôle fondamental dans la phénoménologie de Michel Henry. Notre problématique consiste donc à nous demander comment comprendre l’essence d’une telle duplicité qui ne peut que rendre difficile à penser ce qu’il y a de commun entre la transcendance, comme déploiement de l’horizon phénoménologique, et l’immanence, comme épreuve immédiate de soi dans l’affectivité. Afin de donner une réponse à cette question fondamentale, nous avons centré notre étude sur les deux ouvrages majeurs de M. Henry : Philosophie et Phénoménologie du corps et L’essence de la manifestation. Conformément à nos analyses qui suivent les lectures henryennes de Maine de Biran, Kant, Fichte, et Heidegger, nous nous sommes demandé si une distinction kantienne entre la logique formelle et la logique transcendantale ne fonctionnait pas comme une présupposition qui, d’une part détermine la duplicité de l’apparaître et, d’autre part entraîne une purification radicale de l’immanence en dehors de la transcendance, au point d’anéantir la possibilité qu’elles auraient de se rapporter l’une à l’autre. Une telle analyse nous a conduit à saisir l’enjeu de l’attachement exclusif de la doctrine henryenne de l’immanence au principe des jugements analytiques ; attachement qui conférera un caractère paradoxal à la duplicité de l’apparaître / The duplicity of appearing phenomenologically classifies appearances according to their modes of appearance: immanence and transcendence. By analyzing Michel Henry’s analysis of the history of philosophy, this study examines the fundamental presupposition that conditions this doctrine of duplicity of appearing and plays an important role in Henry’s material philosophy. The following question arises: how can we understand the essence of duplicity, which makes it difficult to comprehend the relationship between transcendence and immanence? To answer this question, we focus on Henry’s two major works: Philosophy and Phenomenology of Body and The Essence of Manifestation. By analyzing Henry’s interpretation of the works of Maine de Biran, Kant, Fichte, and Heidegger, we inquire whether the Kantian distinction between formal and transcendental logic serves as the condition that determines the duplicity of appearing and leads to the distinction of immanence from transcendence to eliminate the possibility of a relationship between them. This analysis leads to an understanding of a fundamental issue regarding the exclusive commitment of immanence to the principle of analytic judgments, with the commitment lending a paradoxical character to the duplicity of appearing.

This thesis examines two French Catholic phenomenologists whose work engages in a serious manner with embodiment and theological phenomena. Michel Henry (1922-2002) and Emmanuel Falque (b. 1963) are both connected with the “theological turn” in French phenomenology. By using the tools of phenomenology, these thinkers take aim at the general phenomena of flesh and body and the religious phenomena of incarnation and resurrection. In this thesis I seek to uncover how their philosophical foundations inform their theological work, how they articulate a phenomenology of the body and the flesh in relation to incarnation and resurrection, and which thinker might provide a better account of these. I begin by providing a succinct overview of phenomenology—as articulated by Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger—paying attention to the phenomenological distinction between flesh (Leib) and body (Körper) that is vital to Henry’s and Falque’s analysis of incarnation and resurrection. I then lay out Dominique Janicaud’s critical labelling of the “theological turn” in French phenomenology in 1991, as well as responses by those who continue to knowingly operate under that label. I then critically examine the work of Henry and Falque, first by laying out their philosophical approach and method, and then by working through each of their theological trilogies, showing how the former influences the latter. My analysis reveals that both Henry and Falque have a similar understanding of a phenomenology of resurrection, in that it is a move from body to flesh. What my analysis also shows is that although Falque is critical of Henry’s position on the incarnation for neglecting materiality and completely understanding the human being as flesh, Falque’s critical response to it ironically mirrors it: by turning to material forces and drives to better describe the body in his recent work, Falque recapitulates Henry’s understanding of flesh. / Dissertation / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

This investigation attempts to consider the identity of the contemporary Bergsonian philosophy of immanence by reflection on key conceptualisations from the work of Henri Bergson. From the view that thinking Bergsonian is an attitude of philosophy that anticipates the metaphysics of a philosophy of process, the demands of the emergence of thinking in art plays a role the directions of philosophical development. It is by this concern that key Bergsonian concepts serve as grounding of philosophical reflections of the related themes of time, images, and movement, and the change of thinking, towards an encounter of the practice of philosophy through the process of painting. Under the rubric of contemporary process metaphysics in art, we will attempt to establish a conceptual framework from principle Bergsonian conceptualizations, to acknowledge the process of painting as a different methodology of philosophy. This study of philosophy through painting then becomes a corresponding philosophy of the difference of thinking and the challenges to go beyond its identity. Proceeding by Bergsonian conceptualisations, to frame the context for a philosophy of painting, the question of the identity of painting is situated according to the didactic philosophies of Wassily Kandinsky. The comparisons and philosophical engagement between Bergsonian thinking and Kandinskian painting will be mediated by the counter interpretations of the philosophy of Michel Henry. The motivation to return to Bergsonian, exercised by a synthesis of Bergson’s concepts and Kandinsky’s theoretical practice, is situated according to an understanding of the identity of painting according to the terms of an ontology of images. In terms of a Bergsonian account of image, supported by a Kandinskian perspective, the focus will be towards the possibilities of philosophy and the metaphysics of becoming through the process of painting.

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