within the European economic community was a European event of world-historic significance. Now, if the word "event" is heard in the context of a discussion of Being, and if we take the word only in its current meaning, it becomes almost inevitable to speak of the event of Being. For without Being, no being is capable of being as such. Accordingly, Being can be proffered as the highest, most significant event of all.
However, the sole purpose of this lecture was to bring before our eyes Being itself as the event of Appropriation. But what the word "Appropriation" denotes says something altogether different. The inconspicuous word "as," always treacherous because of its several meanings, must also be thought accordingly. Even assuming that in our discussion of Being and time we abandon the common meaning of the word "event" and instead adopt the sense that suggests itself in the sending of presence {Anwesenheit} and the extending of time-space which opens out—even then our talk about "Being as Appropriation" remains indeterminate.
"Being as the event of Appropriation": Formerly, philosophy thought Being in terms of beings as ἰδέα, ἐνέργεια, actualitas, will—and now, one might think, as Appropriation. Understood in this way, "Appropriation" means a transformed interpretation of Being which, if it is correct, represents a continuation of metaphysics. In this case, the "as" signifies: Appropriation as a species of Being, subordinated to Being which represents the leading concept that is retained. But if we do what was attempted, and think Being in the sense of the presencing and allowing-to-presence that are there in destiny—which in turn lies in the extending of true time which opens and conceals—then Being belongs into Appropriating. Giving and its gift receive their determination from Appropriating. In that case, Being would be a species of Appropriation, and not the other way around.
{GA 14: 27} To take refuge in such an inversion would be too cheap. Such thinking misses the matter at stake. Appropriation is not the encompassing general concept under which Being and time could be subsumed. Logical classifications mean nothing here. For as we think