Being (Sein) qua being (Seiende) determines Dasein‘s encounter and understanding of beings in the world (with Dasein itself as a being-in-the-world in its fundamental mode of being, inalienably and absolutely) and defines its circumspect (umsichtig) way of going about things in its everyday existence as its pre-philosophical, if not vague, interpretation of what is right (was zu Recht kommt) about reality. This unreflective, if not innate or “natural”, hermeneutic relation between being and beings qua Dasein‘s making of it covers over an essential ontological difference between the two and places Dasein in a position of incompleteness in its understanding, hence limiting the interpretative power of its circumspection (Umsicht). God, as an observer of Dasein, may well ask, “Whereto goes this Dasein?”

Phenomenology rejects the metaphysical dichotomy of essence and appearance: phenomenon, by its very definition, is what it appears to be. The same phenomenon may have this or that appearance to Dasein at different times – the temporality of perception, hence of circumspection, is none other than the time of the existential projection of Dasein as a future-oriented (zukünftig) being in its being-toward-death (Sein zum Tode).