The past remains unthematizable yet inescapable for the for-itself

Evidence

We are dealing here with an unconditional necessity: whatever the For-itself under consideration may be, it is in one certain sense; it is since it can be named, since certain characteristics may be affirmed or denied concerning it. But in so far as it is For-itself, it is never what it is. What it is is behind it as the perpetual surpassed. It is precisely this surpassed facticity which we call the Past. The Past then is a necessary structure of the For-itself; for the For-itself can exist only as a nihilating surpassing, and this surpassing implies something surpassed. — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 476 (#expands, via linked claim)

There is a past only for a present which cannot exist without being its past—back there, behind itself; that is, only those beings have a past which are such that in their being, their past being is in question, those beings who have to be their past. … It is through the for-itself that the past arrives in the world because its “I am” is in the form of an I am me. — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 422 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: The past is a for-itself that has hardened into an in-itself — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on…, 434; The past is an in-itself whose content can neither be changed nor added to — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on…, 427; The for-itself is its past yet cannot posit or thematize it (+5 more)

Broader Connections

• The for-itself is its past yet cannot posit or thematize it #corroborates (0.97)
• The past is not an accretion but a necessary structural feature of the For-itself. #expands (0.85) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 476
• Only the for-itself has a past, the in-itself does not. #expands (0.82) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 422
• The past is the only essence a for-itself ever possesses #expands (0.80) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 1505