Introduction in Hans Georg Gadamer’s hermeneutic. The meanings of the “tradition” concept

The present research introduces us to the hermeneutics of the German philosopher Hans Georg Gadamer. This research highlights the concept of tradition and the elements that define its meaning. Gadamer creates a humanist synthesis by combining the elements from the Christian tradition and those from the Greek philosophical tradition to which Heidegger’s strong influence is added through the concept of Dasein and the idea of temporal continuity. Gadamer’s approach starts from the historical moment of the Enlightenment that represented “a separation of the continuity of meaning from tradition”. What the German thinker will argue is the fact that the human being is deeply rooted in history, in the Being-in-the-world, a reason for which there can be no break in temporality. The time axis is marked by continuity.  The past represents the first pre-understanding of the present and creates the horizon lines for the future. Gadamer talks about a series of concepts such as historicity, history of effects, fusion of horizons, presuppositions that point to us the fact that history is not made up of disparate events. In reality, we deal with an effect of continuity like that in the development of a language.