Abstract

Lévinas never clarified his method himself. This article is an attempt to account for such an omission and also for the non-classical notion of method as it was constructed. By observing the originality of the means by which this philosophy operates, we come to understand that phenomenology is a necessary beginning to perceive the essential ambiguity of phenomenon and the “trace” of alterity. But since this can only be an indicative process, Lévinas must find alternative means of justification, as new forms of reduction. This contingency implies a notion of truth as testimony. The last stage in the method of alterity consists of an “ethical vigilance” in order to distinguish what in Same is Other.