Abstract

In several texts, Paul Ricœur has elaborated different concepts of horizon: the horizon of tradition that shapes our perspectives, the horizon as a careful set of determinations of the future, the horizon as a divine call that comes from the future towards us. However, the connection of these three views on the horizon, together with the explicitly Christian interpretation of the third horizon are problematic elements in Ricœur’s thoughts on this topic. In this article his views are confronted with the criticism of Jacques Derrida, who uses a quite different notion of horizon: an enclosing limit that dominates the understanding of what seems to fit in its circle. Finally, the notions of horizon and history as formulated by Jan Patočka provide valuable alternatives to Ricœur’s problematic versions of the horizons of expectation, while leaving the underlying thread of his understanding of horizon intact.