Abstract

This article discusses the concepts of dwelling elaborated by Eugen Fink and Emmanuel Levinas. Both think human dwelling as both occuring inside infinity and taking its measure from it. However, both differ in the way infinity and thus ethical dwelling is conceived. Concerning Levinas, the article focuses on the concept of dwelling developed in Totality and Infinity. It presents it via the stations of the birth and individualization of an individual, subjectivity’s expansion via the house and economy as well as the culmination of dwelling in receiving the guest. Subsequently, it presents Fink’s conception of dwelling. Via his notion of physis, the article discusses his cosmological notion of world, the locus of human dwelling. Dwelling, in turn, is presented through Fink’s notion of the ideal, his concept of basic phenomena and the co-existentiality of custom (Sitte). The article concludes with an extensive comparison of Levinas’s and Fink’s approaches.