«L’enigma dell’esistenza dell’altro». Empatia e intersoggettività in Edith Stein

Abstract

In this paper we will try to reconstruct, starting from Husserl’s path, the genesis of Edith Stein’s philosophical itinerary and to show that, just in her detachment from Husserl’s orthodoxy, Stein will end up opening new paths to phenomenology and to reckon with questions left open by the father of phenomenology. Therefore, we will try to show that one of the most interesting aspects of the husserlian legacy revolves around the concepts of empathy and intersubjectivity developed in Edith Stein’s reflection. Moreover, we will try to refute Paul Ricoeur’s remark that speaks of an illusion arising from all attempts of phenomenology to account for the existence of the other and, in doing so, we will see that the solution proposed by Stein is not only not disappointing at all but contributes to open the way to a phenomenology of otherness that does not merely flatten and confine the other to one’s self.