As Heidegger himself tells us, what is most fundamentally at issue in "The Origin of the Work of Art" is the question of Being. Challenging the understanding of Being that has presided over the progress of metaphysics, an understanding that would make our ability to comprehend reality the measure of being, Heidegger wants to recall us to the wonder that seizes us whenever we suddenly experience some quite ordinary thing, say a pebble on some beach, as a finally incomprehensible gift.