63	THE TREASURE CHEST OF BEING

If we think of Being as that which illuminates things from the perspective of mankind, mankind located in time, mankind that inherits a language and modifies it, that projects itself, then Being and Time could be retitled Being Is Time. Being is temporality.

Heidegger goes so far as to write that death is the treasure chest of Being. Death as the treasure chest of Being? Is that possible? Yes. Look, how many times can I alter my thinking over the course of a lifetime? Four, five, that’s about all. If I didn’t die, I’d always be clinging to the last interpretation I had come up with. It’s only by dying that we make room for other events of Being.

I don’t know if we die for that reason. It’s certain that Being can irrupt only because we die.

Historicity means mortality. Without mortality we would all be around forever, and Being would be unable to occur in new illuminations.