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OVERCOMING THE FEAR OF DEATH: A CLUE FROM AN 

ONTOLOGICAL ENGAGEMENT BETWEEN HEIDEGGER AND SARTRE 

Isaac Chidi IGWE Ph.D. 

Abstract 

There is hardly any concept in any human language that is as terrifying and frightening 

as the term death, perhaps due to its enigmatic status. In fact, no normal human being, 

except a suicide which itself has been established to be a mental disorder, wants to die. 

Even serial killers, when apprehended, are often seen pleading to be allowed to live. To 

many human beings, the word death is anathema which extinguishes all enthusiasms. 

The only time, it seems, the mention of death is trivialized is when referring to the death 

of a distant person not attached to us. In effect, human beings do not want to die but to 

live endless time and timeless end, to the extent that even those promised a heavenly 

place of bliss and sage-hood after death are equally caught in the web of the fear of 

dying. What an existential paradox! Thus, it therefore elicits the question; do human 

beings really fear death or they fear something else concealed by the phenomenon of 

death? The position of this paper is in the latter. It posits that concealed by the 

phenomenon of death, which are more fundamental than the simple act of dying 

includes; the unknown, the unaccomplished projections, the unceremonious parting of 

ways with loved ones, sweet memories of human sojourn and the attendant existential 

goodies. These are the actual undisclosed fears. On the strength of this new 

understanding, the essay attempts to examine the asymmetrical conversation between 

Heidegger and Sartre on the value of death, with the goal of teasing out how humans 

can surmount its fear and actualize earthly possibilities. As an inquiry in existential 

ontology, it adopts a phenomenological approach. With this method, the paper presents 

death as not just that event which happens to human beings which leads to cessation of 

life. Rather, as a being that is and has always been present in the very being of man right 

from birth. Building on this new dimension, the paper alleys the fear of death among the 

living.  

Keywords: Authenticity, Being-towards, Dasein, Death, Existentialism, Fear  

Introduction 

Death is arguably the most terrifying and uncannily striking theme in human discourse. 

It is viewed as the cessation of the connection between our mind and our body. Death is 

real and marks the final end of an individual's biological and corporeal existence. The 



Igwe               Overcoming the Fear of Death: A Clue from an Ontological  

2 

adjectives 'biological and corporeal' are meant to distinguish the nature of death under 

consideration as against what I call the consolatory view that those who died, still live 

in a way; or as against the notion of life as a prison of the soul. Therefore, biological 

and corporeal death is the inevitable fate of all men and all families without exception. 

It is the law of nature that whatever is composed must eventually be decomposed. Death 

is so enigmatic that Jean Paul Sartre sees nothing good in its being. For him, death makes 

the human life absurd and meaningless. In his Being and Nothingness, he contends that 

if all the aspirations and achievements of life will be extinguished in death, then death 

is meaningless and undignifying to human existence. 

However, Martin Heidegger presents a radically different interpretation of death. In 

Being and Time, death does not simply spell the end of one's existence. All death is the 

ending of that which lives, “man's death is not an event that happens to man; it is rather, 

a phenomenon to be understood existentially” (Omoregbe, 1981, p.31). In opening up 

this new vista of understanding death, Heidegger aims to formulate a more authentic 

mode of relating to death; one which goes beyond the notion of death as the coming to 

an end of life or the final annihilation of all possibilities. This more authentic relation to 

death is a being-toward-death which he calls a “running ahead [Vorlaufen].”  Because 

the certainty of my death is futural, because death will surely come to me out of the 

future, my anticipation of death in the present makes me, so to speak, ahead of myself. 

I am thrown to the certainty of my own death.  Insofar as I exist, I am running ahead of 

myself, because I am related to a futural possibility that is essentially always a “not yet,” 

namely, my death. This kind of existential attitude towards death, Heidegger says, is a 

blessing to humanity because it propels us to actualize all our existential possibilities.  

For the African, death is a transition to begin another life. It is not the end of life and 
does not cut off family relationship as it extends to the world of the ancestors. The 
Christians also hold the same view apart from the idea of ancestral connection. For 
Bolaji Idowu and J.S. Mbiti as captured in Offiong Asuquo; Olodumare (God) is the 
creator of death as a means of recalling man to the world of the spirit after his life on 
earth. Mbiti sees death as the process of removing the living from the physical world 
and this process is one which every living must partake in (Asuquo, 2011, pp. 171-
173). Asuquo was critical of both views, especially, the creationist views of Idowu. To 
say that God is the creator of death comes with metaphysical, epistemic and moral 
challenges. Thus, Asuquo contends:  The problem with this view is that it does not 
explain whether it is God who causes premature and undesirable deaths such as those 
caused by suicide, violence, accidents and drowning. Moreover, will God  

deliberately inflict such pains and sorrows that 

death often brings when He is seen as a loving 

father? (Asuquo, 2011, p.173). 

In earnest, the creationist account of death is burdensome, which is why the existentialist 

intervention with the view that the fact of death lies in the ontological structure of human 

reality appears more satisfying to the question; from where comes the phenomenon of 



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3 

death?. Irrespective of this little challenge, the African believes that dying is a 

homecoming which confers on life its meaning. The African views death as a coming 

home because human life on earth is a sojourn which began from the world of the spirits 

to the world of the material, full of troubles and imperfections (Ogungbemi, 1997, pp.1-

6). Man is born into struggle. Struggle for food, struggle for shelter, struggle for a better 

life, struggle against evil and in the end, everything becomes elusive. Thus, the 

phenomenon of death becomes a transition to a blissful realm of existence where human 

life finds rest, although it depends on how one lives one's life on earth. This African 

view is however reinterpreted existentially in Heidegger and Sartre, but stripped off 

afterlife and creationist contents, in a way that charges humans to take ownership of its 

ever-present and its possibility. In view of the forgoing, the task in this paper is to 

provide these authors' views and how such understanding can be channeled into making 

human earthly sojourn a triumphant existence.  

The Phenomenon of Death 

While there are those who see death as a cessation of life which reality does not come 

into being the very day it occurs but had always being present since the day life assumes 

its being; there are others who believe it is a closing of human earthly account and a 

mere passage to another form of life. Irrespective of which party wins the debate, the 

undeniable substance of the argument remains the fact that the subject death, has been 

a mystery throughout the history of human reality on earth. It is so puzzling that the 

history of it can be said to be a history of self-reflection. Self-reflection in the sense that 

death itself is about the cessation of being. As such, when human reflects on death, he 

or she can be said to be engaged in self-reflection because death is his/her fate and 

destiny. While engaging in this self-reflection, questions which occupy the mind 

include: who am I? Where do I come from and where will I go after here on earth?  Is 

there an afterlife? If there is an afterlife, what is it like and how can I prepare for it? “But 

if this life is the fullness of our time, how best might we live it, knowing we are going 

to die”? (Davis, 2006, p.1) 

Humans feel so challenged by this phenomenon of death that we always seek to know 

what is the meaning of life in itself- if its ultimate destiny is dying. This perennial and 

ever-present puzzle was reiterated in St Augustine's expression when he averred that: 

“Our entire life is nothing but a racing towards death, in the course of which no one is 

permitted to stop for a little while: all are forced to keep instep, all are driven on the 

same speed” (Reinchardt, 1960, p.137). 

By this, Augustine further lends credence to the view that death is an inevitable necessity 

of which everything that has life must go through. As stated earlier, it is a mystery. 

Further reinforced by Igboaja, “it is a mysterious mystery that man is alive today and 

tomorrow he is no more” (Nyong, 1996, p. 57). For Davies, at the event of death lies not 



Igwe               Overcoming the Fear of Death: A Clue from an Ontological  

4 

only the emotion of grief and the breaking of bonds between each other and our place 

in the world, but also the hope of answering the queries and resolving the injustices of 

a life time (Davis, 2006). In the light of this reality, humans are consistently involved in 

search of how to perfect the absurdity of existence, hence, the hope of afterlife existence.  

In honest, the first encounter one has of death is always the death of others. In other 

words, no human being can experience his or her own death. That is why one often hears 

phrases like; that man, that woman, that person has died. Thus, meaning that he or she 

is no more. To some scholars, death, since it is a negation of life, is nothing. In other 

words, anything that has no being, and that brings sorrow and chaos, is valueless. Along 

this line of thinking, Ira Byock writes: 

Phenomenologically, death is nothing. The essential nature 

of life entails activity, purpose, and making order from 

disorder. Death is the antithesis of life. Nonlife is inactive, 

and despite its stillness, death is chaos. Life generates its own 

meaning. In contrast, on its face death appears devoid of 

meaning and value (Byock, 2002, p.27). 

From the foregoing quote by Byock, death is not a good phenomenon. It is not so 

because it seems to bring an end to life, full of activities. In his thinking, why should 

there be death when life is so enjoyable and meaningful. It is only in the act of living 

that possibilities can become actualities. It is only in life that purpose and dreams can 

come to fruition. All of these are extinguished with the arrival of death. Thus, Byock 

concludes that anything that removes meaning is devoid of value and therefore a bad 

omen. This view brings us to the theme proper, most especially, as discussed by the 

existentialists of which Heidegger and Sartre represent.  

The Issues in the Existentialist Conception of Death 

 Before we delve into the existentialist view of death, it is compelling that we make 

some clarifications on the concept of existentialism. Existentialism, designates the series 

of thinkers in the Post-Hegelian tradition of European philosophy. It became the most 

influential philosophical  movement for several years. Existentialism is better classified 

as a movement rather than a school. The reason for this is because it is not a coherent 

system of philosophy like Rationalism, Thomism, Platonism, and the like. The 

movement is not a homogeneous school of philosophy, but, rather, it should be seen as 

a style of philosophizing. They generally treat the same themes, although differ in their 

interpretations, based on their theistic biases. With reference to the two great 

existentialists under our consideration; Heidegger and Sartre, their strongest point of 

intersection is that they do not believe in abstract speculation, instead they are interested 

in concrete human existence and its attendant predicament. As such, their mode of 

philosophizing begins from man rather than from nature (Unah & Osegenwune, 2010, 



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5 

p.129). “What they have in common is simply their belief that existence precedes 

essence; or, if you prefer, that subjectivity must be our point of departure” (Sartre, 2007, 

p.20). Properly conceptualized, to exist means to be set forth or dynamically set in 

motion, to be constitutive of action, to live precariously and sometimes dangerously, 

and to work out a consistent course of action in order to introduce meaning and value 

into an apparently meaningless world. That is why existentialists say that only human 

beings exist; other things merely are. 

This kind of thinking, was the binding cord of philosophers like Soren Kierkegaard (who 

is often referred to as the father of this movement), Martin Heidegger (although would 

not like to be called an existentialist), Fredrick Nietzsche, Dostoevsky, Albert  Camus, 

Karl Jaspers, Gabriel Marcel, Simon de Beauvoir , Jean-Paul Sartre and host of others. 

The condition and quality of the existing human individual remains the kernel of their 

philosophies, hence they are classified as existentialist thinkers. The biggest among 

them in contemporary scholarship are Heidegger and Sartre (Omoregbe, 1981, p. 31). 

Properly understood, the term existentialism is a derivative of Kierkegaard's frequent 

use of the word 'existence'. It was the need to understand and find solution to the seeming 

futility of human existence in an organized society that inspired these thinkers. In 

addition to this, were the frequent wars and human carnages of the 18th and 19th centuries 

in a supposedly civilized and rational human society, which disregarded human feelings 

and aspirations of man. In the aftermath of the first and second world wars, it became 

clearer that, humanity, left at the mercies of science and technology, was doomed to 

collective suicide. In response, the existentialist movement emerged as an effort to give 

the world a human face and save human civilization from total decimation arising from 

human activities aided by over bloated emphasis on the rational and the calculative. 

In the existentialists' determination to make humans live an affirmative, authentic and 

responsible form of existence, most of the members of the movement denied all forms 

of abstractions and esoteric values in respect to existence. “Against all objectives and 

abstractions, existence, for these philosophers, takes precedence over essence” (Nyomg, 

1996, 37). They believe that against all odds, man must make every effort to live his life 

to the optimum on earth. However, they realized that there are some human “givens”, 

otherwise known as facticity of existence, which might not allow man to affirm himself 

and achieve all his earthly possibilities. One of these facticities is the phenomenon of 

death, that is, the fact of human temporality. 

Accordingly, in response to the aforementioned fundamental questions of existence, that 

is, what will be the fate of man after his sojourn on earth, the existentialists argued that 

man is a dying being. Irrespective of their nonconcordant and inharmonious views on 

other issues such as; afterlife, human freedom and the existence of God, they 

unanimously agree that death is a phenomenon which every man must experience 

individually. By individual death, they mean that no one can die for another. You will 



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die your own death, while I die my own death. Secondly, it equally means that there is 

no collective death except by accident. Even if two people were born together as twins, 

in the same day and hour, by the same mother, their dying day may not follow the same 

pattern. Like we observed earlier, although death is a destiny which all living will 

experience, another fact in it is that no one can experience his own death. People will 

have to talk about other people's death. It is this fact that brings home the essence of 

man as a beingwith-others. It is in this sense also that “death is said to be a loss, for it is 

a loss that is experienced not by the deceased himself but by those around him since he 

is a being-withothers” (Omoregbe, 1981, p.32). 

Again, in the existentialist belief, contrary to some religious beliefs, death is not 

transferable. This argument follows from the earlier statement that no one can die for 

another. This is because, to say one died for another, will mean that the benefactor will 

not have to die anymore. Furthermore, there is existential belief that our existence 

implies at the same time, our imminent non-existence and our impending death.  For 

Percy Walker, this is also called “nothingness, nothingness of our life now and then. 

According to him, we are aware of either a conscious or subconscious level (or a mixture 

of the two)” (Walker, 2017). Here, a new dimension to the discourse is introduced, that 

is, death consciousness. 

Speaking about death consciousness, Unah, on his part, tries to separate it from public 

death which according to him is a social fact, and an ordinary way of looking at death. 

Thus, he writes: 

“In this kind of dying and understanding death,  epitaphs are written, dirges (sorrowful 

songs) are presented, condolences and sympathies are expressed by way of 

commiseration with the living members of the dead person's family” (Unah, 2002, p. 

119).   

On the contrary, he (Unah) conceives the consciousness of death to mean 

existentialontological death which according to him is something rooted in the very 

being of human existence. But again, one needs to ask at this juncture: how does this 

consciousness of death affect our feelings, our actions, why we act, how we should act? 

The answer to all these questions can be summarized into two: the consciousness of 

death makes us to either existentially confront its inevitability and push forth to attain 

our possibility or we inauthentically resign to fate and give in to fear and passivity. 

When we resort to fear, we debase our existence to merely what happens at the point of 

the last breadth. Put differently, death consciousness and the event or act of dying are 

quite distinguishable. The latter is a loss while the former is a gain only if we do not 

give in to its dominance over the human existential resilience of meaning making. 

According to Kierkegaard, death consciousness simply brings an underlying sense of 

anxiety or dread in all that we do. Again, we shall return to this later, but first, let us 

proceed to engage the views of Sartre on the question of death proper. 



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Sartre's View on Death as Mortal Blow to Man  

At the introductory part of this paper, we briefly captured the views of Heidegger on 

death as  ontologically ingrained in the very fact of human reality. However, Sartre 

thinks otherwise, “he rejects the view that death is the final cord of a melody giving 

meaning to what has gone before” (Warbarton, 1998, p. 201). In other words, he refuses 

to see death as an essential nature of man; neither does he see any essential role which 

it plays in the affairs of man's existence. In fact, according to him, “death is a 

meaningless absurdity which removes all meaning from human existence”(Nyong, 

1996, p.56). In Being and Nothingness, he asserts thus: “What must be noted first is the 

absurd character of death. In this sense every attempt to consider it as a resolved chord 

at the end of a melody must be sternly rejected”(Sartre, 1969, p. 533). 

For Sartre, death has no meaning whatsoever, it is absurd. He reasons; how can a life 

full of glorious activities, surrounded by family bonds and loved ones, with all the 

achievements, with all the pains human go through in the process of raising children, 

with a view that these children will in turn bring smile on the faces of their parents but 

behold, this same life is crowned with death on either ways? This pattern of rewarding 

life, to him, is definitely meaningless and valueless. More so, equally rejected by Sartre, 

is the view that death is part of individual's life. “Death is not a part of the individual's 

life of his situation except in very special circumstance, such as death sentence that he 

knows will be carried out” (Ndubuisi, 2006, p.70). In other words, man is not a being 

awaiting death as Heidegger opined. Sartre speaks: 

“If only deaths from old age existed (or deaths by explicit  condemnation), then I could 

wait for my death. But the unique quality of death is the fact that it can always before 

the end surprise those who wait for it at such and such a date” (Sartre, 1969, p. 536). 

What Sartre tries to debunk in the above quotation is the view that death is a fate which 

every human being waits for. It is only a convicted person that awaits the day of his 

death by way of execution. This is a case of a determined situation. But even with that, 

as observed by Friday Ndubuisi, there are possibilities that there could be a change of 

government or authority or jail break which will alter the awaited fate. Equally debunked 

by Sartre, is the notion that death is something which no one can do for another. On the 

contrary, he contends: 

If my acts in the world are considered from the point of view 

of their functions, their efficacy and their result, it is certain 

that the other can always do what I can do. For instance, if 

loving a woman means giving her security, making her 

happy, raising a home with her, then somebody can love for 

me. My death can fall in this category. If to die is something 

meant to inspire, to bear witness to one's country, then 



Igwe               Overcoming the Fear of Death: A Clue from an Ontological  

8 

anybody can die in my place. In fact, there is no personalizing 

virtue that is peculiar to my death. A death becomes mine 

only if I place myself already in the perspective of 

subjectivity (Sartre, 1969, pp. 539-540). 

The illustration from the above citation simply implies that even death is transferable. 

As such, to argue that no one can die for another becomes untenable in the views of 

Sartre. I think he definitely mistakes the point Heidegger makes by individualization of 

death as we shall later see. But our preliminary response is that, to die for another as 

understood in Heideggerian conception, simply means that one who is died for would 

not have to die anymore. This is definitely an impossibility. Every mortal owes 

individual death as debt.  Again, Sartre equally contends that we cannot determine when 

we will die; hence, the position that death is the end of human life is not true. To say 

that man is condemned to die, according to Sartre, is to equate him with a condemned 

criminal who awaits his death. It is certain that mortal being will die some day, Sartre 

agrees, but the particular day and time it will happen, no one knows. It can be at one's 

prime or old age. No one can await death as though it is an event, it is an unforeseeable 

enigma, and it is equally wrong to believe that I move closer to my death with every 

passing moment. Again, it is equally fallacious to posit that death confers meaning on 

life. It is only a subjective being that gives meaning to his life, not from the outside. As 

much as death does not appear on the foundation of man's freedom, it can only remove 

meaning from man's life and not add. According to him, death does not give life its 

meaning. Its principles only remove all meaning from life. If man lives to die, then his 

life has no more meaning. This is because the problem of life has ended up receiving no 

solution whatsoever. Explicit and compelling as these views seem to appear, this is the 

pessimistic picture which Sartre paints of death. However, he agree just like we shall 

later see in Heidegger, that death ought not be faced with fear, rather, it should be 

confronted with an existential equanimity of mind through which we push further to 

affirm our individual freedom.  

To Sartre, therefore, even sudden death is always a possibility but not my own 

possibility. Instead, it is rather a remover of all my possibilities because it brings an end 

to all that makes me human. Thus, for him; “death, in so far as it can be revealed to me, 

is not only the always  possible nihilation of my possibles, a nihilation outside my 

possibilities. It is not only the project which destroys all projects and which destroys 

itself, the impossible destruction of my expectations” (Sartre, 1969).  

Against the Sartrean thought-provoking understanding of death, Taylor becomes 

disturbed and gets soaked in his own thoughts as he interrogates the enigma called death; 

“dying and then being dead, being no more, being nothing-why this fatal calamity? Why 

this to crown the most beautiful of lives: lucky the beasts who fear, but know not what 

they fear. We know; it is concealed from us. We know with the same stark realization 

as the prisoner being led to the gallows” (Sartre, 1969). 



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Arising from these gloom and doom dictions which are characteristics of Sartre's 

conception, Heidegger's approach resonates a succour aimed at freeing humanity from 

the grips of the fear of death.  

Heidegger on the Authentic Mode of Understanding Death as a Being-towards 
Heidegger insists that death is one of the fundamental structures of Dasein, that is, it is 
in the very nature of Dasein. For the purpose of clarity, he uses the term Dasein to 
designate human being. So, when we talk of Dasein here, we mean human being or 
man as present in the world. Death for Heidegger does not simply mean an end per se. 
In his view, the death of Dasein does not simply mean end. Rather, Dasein in itself is a 
being towards the end. It is a way to be, which Dasein acquires as soon as it is. I relate 
to the possibility of my death with resolute certainty, because what I am most certain 
of in the world is that I will some day die. I am always a being-toward-death.  
According to him, this being-toward-death is precisely what makes my being possible, 
for death is the most extreme possibility of my existence, my “ownmost potentiality of 
being [das eigenste Seinkönnen]” (Heidegger, 1962, pp. 232-233). Consequently, as 
soon as man comes to life, he is old enough to die. To that end, in his book, Being and 
Time, he writes: “Death is a way to be, which Dasein takes over as soon as it is. As 
soon as man comes to life, he is at once old enough to die”(p.289). In this sense, for 
the Heideggerian understanding, expressions such as: gone so soon, sudden, untimely 
and premature deaths mean nothing other than exercises in existential and linguistic 
absurditity. 

In an ordinary or layman sense, man prepares, hopes, and looks forward to his death as 

though it is an event such as a wedding day or a day for birth celebration. As such, quite 

often, we are reminded of the need to prepare for the last day, the day of death, we are 

sometimes presented with a case study of someone who had just died as a way of 

reminding us that such would be our fate someday. But the existential understanding is 

that the one who has just died did not just die that very day per se. The death began 

many years ago. He/she only lived to actualize it. For Heidegger, death is not an event 

which happens after man's years on earth. It is present in the very nature of man right 

from the first day one comes into this world. Expressing this view differently, Unah 

writes that the phenomenon of death is the most individualistic charade of man. He 

however notes that it is not just the ending of life per se. According to him; “death is 

not an unfortunate incident which befalls man but a vitalizing structural component of 

the human being. Man is essentially a being-onto-death. He begins to die the very day 

he is born. In fact, man is born to die” (Unah & Osegenwunem 2010, p.205). 

The phenomenon of death permeates the totality of man's life. It is a possibility of 

Dasein. In other words, more than just an end, the ending which existential death speaks 

of is a special kind of ending which end begins from the very beginning. Thus, it 

becomes safe to assert that man is a dying being whose death begins from the beginning. 

Reiterating this view further, Omoregbe observes;  



Igwe               Overcoming the Fear of Death: A Clue from an Ontological  

10 

Death, in the wildest sense, says Heidegger, is ending of that 

which lives, but man's death is not an event that happens to 

man. It is, rather a phenomenon to be understood 

existentially. An existential interpretation of death shows that 

it is a phenomenon that involves the whole being of man right 

from his birth. Dying is not just an event that occurs to man 

at the close of his life, but man's  mode of being. For man is 

a being-towards death, a being who begins to die the very day 

he is born and lives all his life towards death (Omoregbe, 

1981, p. 36). 

For Heidegger therefore, the best way to understand death is to understand it 

existentially. Such existential understanding of death reveals its absoluteness over all 

mortal. Hence, for him, it is the “possibility of the absolute impossibility of Dasein” 

(Heidegger, 1962, p.294). The absolute possibility in this sense refers to the fact that in 

death, all human possibilities are grounded to a halt. In other words, everything about 

Dasein as a being-in and being-with the world loses meaning in death since he cannot 

experience his own death. Dasein gains experience of death from the death of others 

(p.281). Again, this brings about the individualizing fact of death. In essence, Being-

towards-death presents death as an anticipated possibility of Dasein. It avails man his 

individuality and temporality and launches him into achieving all his potentialities.   

The Individualizing and Salutary Dimensions of Death  

The individualizing phenomenon of death uproots man from the inauthentic and crowd 

form of being and makes him take ownership of death as his distinct possibility. A being 

towards death which Dasein acquires right from being, urges him to comport himself 

existentially without losing guard to “everydayness” demand. This individual character 

of death, this “ownmost possibility is non-relational” (p.308), meaning that death is not 

transferrable. Thus, in anticipation, Dasein is unveiled with the understanding “that 

portentiality-for-being in which its ownmost being is an issue must be taken over by 

Dasein alone. Death does not just 'belong'to one's own Dasein in an undifferentiated 

way; death lays claim to it as an individual Dasein. The non-relational character of death, 

as understood in anticipation individualizes Dasein down to itself”(p.308).  Further 

captured in Omoregbe, “this individualizing effect of the anticipation of death leads man 

to a sense of self-awareness; becoming aware of his individuality and possibilities, he 

becomes aware of his freedom and personal responsibility. He becomes aware of his 

freedom to die” (Omoregbe, 1981, p.33). The awareness of death propels us to live a 

more responsible, authentic and purposeful life. That is exactly what Heidegger means 

by the individualization character of death, and that is part of the characters of death 

which confers meaning on existence.  “Thus, the realization is absolutely certain, that 

no one can die my death for me, that I can die at any moment… that I might as well not 

have existed, and that I may at any moment dissolve into nothingness” (Unah & 



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Osegenwune, 2010, p.205), throws up the radical contingency of my being and instigates 

me to have a meaningful and purposive engagement with my existential givens. 

However, unlike the gloomy picture which the layman's understanding of death conveys, 

the Heideggerian conception tells us that death is a meaningful part of human life. To 

the everyday conception of death, death is sorrow, it is grief, it is an ending of a sweet 

melody and it casts condemnation on the purpose of existence if human life is rewarded 

with death. But for Heidegger, there is a positive value of death in relation to human 

earthly engagements. As reemphasized by Nyong, death “confers on human existence 

its uniqueness and meaning” (1996, p.57). What this means is that when one takes the 

phenomenon of death as a personal possibility, as something that can happen any 

moment, one ceases to live a life of crowd, the impersonal form of existence. In this 

way, according to Unah & Osegenwune, “I free myself from the servitude to the 

anonymous “they” and thereby open myself up to my own most potentiality for being, 

actively using time to realize my projects before death supervenes to extinguish all my 

possibilities. Thus does death becomes the most vitalizing fact of life – the cardinal 

indicator of authentic selfhood” (2010, p.206). 

This way of understanding death distinguishes Dasein (man) from other mode of Being. 

This is because man alone regards death as the universal and inevitable phenomenon, 

hence, the  consciousness of which equips us to separate ourselves from the crowd's 

form of life. In other words, it propels man to existentially confront his day to day life 

challenges, by striving harder to achieve his aspirations – knowing full well that he does 

not have the whole of eternity to live. Therefore, death is that which ushers life into 

nothingness state. The awareness of this human temporality “gives vitality to life for it 

prompts one to urgency of action”(Omoregbe, 1981, p.38).  

To be sure, Heidegger, in his treatment of death as the mode of being of Dasein, did not 

state the cause of fear of death neither did he discuss fear in relation to death per se. For 

him, fear is a state of mind and it is towards something which we encounter within the 

world. In other words, it is a disposition of the mind toward something threatening to 

self. It has an object, that is, that which threatens the self. Thus, for Heidegger, the 

phenomenon of fear lies in its threatening character. When that which is threatening is 

removed, the fear ceases. Fear is an existential possibility of the essential state of mind 

of human beings (1962, pp.140-143). Fear is the fear of something in particular while 

anxiety is anxious about nothing in particular, but being-in-the-world as such. Sartre on 

his part attributes fear to existential freedom, that is, being aware of the enormity of 

freedom and the attendant burden of responsibility causes a sense of anguish (Ndubuisi, 

2006, pp.26-27). Thus, fear for him is an unreflective escape and an attempt to negate a 

threat in the face of helplessness (Sartre, 2004, pp.42-60). Therefore, this clarification 

makes the effort to relate fear to death and a way to overcoming it ingenuously 

autochthonous to this research. It is the import of the analysis made on the phenomenon 



Igwe               Overcoming the Fear of Death: A Clue from an Ontological  

12 

of death by Heidegger and Sartre that is of particular interest to this study as relevant in 

addressing the ever-present fear of death. 

Overcoming the Fear of Death 

Often times, human beings are daily lurked and wrapped in the fear of death, and this 

ushers us into the state of anxiety and in some cases this perpetual life of anxiety ends 

up hastening the occurrence of that which we fear. My position is that, ontologically, 

the origin of this fear is not farfetched. It is fundamentally derived from man's innate 

disposition for pleasure/happiness and the avoidance of pains/sadness. It is also linked 

with man's ontological desire to perpetually remain young, healthy without aging. To 

remain connected with family members, loved ones and the goodies which life confers 

on existence. In other words, impressions of the things, people and aspirations make on 

our consciousness in our daily experience of the world, the nothingness and uncertainty 

which permeate our imagination of death insidiously incite the desire to live and the 

disdain for death. Therefore, the expression of fear of death is an expression driven by 

non-willingness to part ways with those impressions on our consciousness for the world 

of uncertainty. Ironically, even those who believe in an afterlife of blissful realm of 

reward, still express this fear. This informs the position of this paper on the fact that 

what people fear about is not the act of dying itself but the unwillingness to let go of the 

'known' world for the unknown world.  

On the other hand, the existential instruction for the cause of the fear of death is the 

understanding of death as an event which ushers in the last day on earth. Hence, to 

overcome this fear, it is necessary to underscore fundamental characteristics of death. 

These are: the fact that human beings are contingent beings and we probably could not 

have existed; that death is not an event but ontological structured in our being alive; that 

we begin to die the very day we take in our first breath on earth; that daily as we take in 

further breath and count our years, we are gradually bidding goodbye to life and finally, 

that the fear of death is misplaced because the individualizing factor of death implies 

that nobody experiences own death. For this reason, why do I need fear that which I 

cannot experience? Often times, we get so afraid of the event of death to the extent that 

it throws us into that realm where we become afraid of everything and at the same time, 

afraid of nothing. Being that this state has no object, according to Unah, “it is both 

disturbing and easy to smoother; both creative and destructive” (Unah, 1996, p.83).  On 

one hand, it is creative because the mere awareness of our finitude and temporality, 

should spur us to assert our individuality and actualize our possibilities. It ought to 

propel us to make hey while the sun shines. On the other hand, it is destructive in the 

sense that man can decide to resign to fate, throw-in all motivations, become pessimistic 

and consequently live inauthentically.  According to Unah, “it is thus that anxiety 

snatches a man out of the distracting cares of the world, encloses him in a cubicle of 

thought where he is urged to either own its self or disown it and take solace in the 

comforting delusion of the anonymous 'they'” (1996, p.94). 



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Therefore, for Heidegger, the authentic mode to relate to death is to confront its fear 

headon and understand it as part of the existential structure of human being as a being-

ontodeath, which journey we begin the very day we took the first breath. And because 

it is the absolute possibility of all impossibilities, the only thing we can do of it is to 

view it in the light that “I am to die”. By this mindset, the significance of death is brought 

home to me. In so doing, death becomes no longer an external and public fact, but an 

internal possibility of my own being. It becomes no longer the sad end of a sweet story, 

but something that enters into the story and invests it with a dramatic character (Unah, 

1996). It is in the light of this awareness can man achieve his authentic personal 

existence.  

Again, for Heidegger, death is linked to the notion of authenticity. Our most authentic 

mode of being is being-towards-death. Death is our own-most possibility. Unlike Sartre, 

it can not be passed off to another person, and its importance to us cannot be diminished 

by heroic rhetoric. We know that people die all the time, and we know that one day we 

too will die but the death that will come upon us will not be an event. It is right within 

us here and now. We known people who have died. But death is non-relational: death is 

the extinguishing of all relations, and our knowledge of the death of others has no 

parallel to our own death. To know about the death of another does nothing to prepare 

us for our own death because ours is right here with us. As an intellectual conversation, 

the existential logic does demand that the most plausible position on any issue, 

whatsoever, is one which upholds the flourishing of the concrete human being and which 

equips man to surmount his thrown facticities towards self-affirmation. It is for this 

reason that this essay considers the Heideggerian position more comforting owing that 

it charges man not to give in to the fear of death, instead, cease the fact of its inevitability 

and its ever-present status to chart a good earthly course for himself and the world at 

large, always bearing the phenomenon of time in mind. 

Conclusion 

The authentic way is to face death not as an event, but as always a “not yet” which 

constitutes every moment and second of my existence. This means that I anticipate death 

not as an actuality that I expect, but as an omnipresent, immanent possibility to which I 

am always already thrown. In other words, one countenances death as constitutive 

possibility, that is, as constituting life. Put differently, it means that the notion of life 

implies the absolute possibility of death. So, if one asks the question why death, the 

answer would simply be; because there is life.  For Heidegger, death is a possibility of 

being which Da-sein had to take upon itself at birth and must be confronted with an 

existential doggedness, not with a defeatist or surrendering mentality but with authentic 

selfhood. The being-possible of death is not a possibility of something that may become 

actual, for death is an existential possibility that is at the same time an impossibility to 

the extent that it cannot, strictly speaking, be actualized. In other words, that death is not 

an actuality means that death can never be present as such because it is beyond the reach 

of cognition and therefore not available to phenomenal experience. Heidegger insists 

that, as a futural possibility (i.e., as a certain end that cannot be bypassed), being-toward-



Igwe               Overcoming the Fear of Death: A Clue from an Ontological  

14 

death is what makes the present possible. Being-toward-death is what possibilizes the 

present.  Heidegger views death as that which throws Dasein back upon its “ownmost 

potentialityof-being and discloses his ontological structure as possibility. In the final 

analysis, it is worthy to note that what is most significant in Heidegger's view on death 

is not that it has any meaning in the true sense of the word but that the awareness of the 

temporality of human earthly sojourn has the propensity to reawaken our sense of 

urgency for active participation towards the actualization of self-affirmation, radical 

finitude and autochthonous footprints on the sands of time, against the risk of resigning 

to the irresponsible world of 'they” often occasioned by the consciousness of human 

finitude. Again, more instructive from the existentialists' account of human finitude 

includes the point that even death as an event ought not be feared since no man 

experiences his own death. According to Lucretius as made available by Anthony 

Kenny: “for thou shall sleep, and never wake again, And quitting life, shall quit thy 

living pain. But we, thy friends shall all those sorrows find which in forgetful death thou 

leaves behind. No time shall dry our tears, nor drive thee from our mind. The worst that 

can befall thee, measure right, is a sound slumber, and a long goodnight” (Kenny, 2004, 

p.102).  

From his view, once we understand the material nature of the soul, we realize that death 

ought not be feared. This is because a dead body cannot feel and death leaves no self 

behind to suffer. It is those who survive who are left with grief and speak about the 

event. But again, this is not to say that we should live our lives in such a soulless manner 

that our death becomes a hell to the living. Instead, it instructs us that while we are alive, 

we should strive to live a life worthy of blissful memories when we might have gone. 

This is because, in most cases, it is the living that bears the grief, brunt and consequences 

of our irresponsible and wayward earthly existence. This stirs up the new realm for 

future scholarship, that is, the 'otherness' of human actions. 

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