Gerda Walther: Searching for the Sense of Things, Following the Traces of Lived Experiences

Abstract

Gerda Walther’s life and thought can be grasped through her various interests, including human community, the paranormal, and mysticism. These seemingly divergent topics are held together through her use of Edmund Husserl’s phenomenological method. Tracing the flow of lived experience back to its point of origin, Walther distinguishes different “spheres” constitutive of the fundamental human essence (namely, the vital-bodily, the feelings of the psyche, and the sphere of the spirit, which is marked by a spiritual, personal core). Her analysis makes evident a background or embedment that lies behind the I, from which lived experiences arise. This “background” life of the I is essential not only to describe experiences like telepathy but also to grasp communal and mystical phenomena. The I-center is always necessary for lived experience to be actualized