Throughout my education I have been in search of the perfect model by which to relate the world around me to myself. At various points throughout this process I have found answers and subsequently been faced by their impossibility. This movement between answer and negation followed the shape of postmodern deconstruction or Pyrrhonean skepticism until I found myself without any intellectual commitments and completely within myself. Yet, this was not and is not a viable stopping point for anyone, as the self in itself is just as unknowable as the objects outside the self. Little did I know that the shape of my intellectual development as a student followed not only a typical postmodern system, but also the shape of Western philosophy in general. Hegel, being a student of history, grasps the problem presented by Western philosophy and offers an interpretation and solution which has been largely misunderstood since his time.
This paper is an attempt to reverse engineer Hegel through his continuity with Western philosophy all the way from the pre-Socratics and present the relevance of his thought for humanity today. Unfortunately, the scope of this project necessitates that the analysis be inadequate in terms of its thoroughness. The goal is to present a wide, but merely cursory look through the history of philosophy towards Hegel. Along with this, the entire scope of Hegel’s work has not been considered, only those parts of Phenomenology of Spirit that seem essential to the project are treated. The limit of this project is also present in my treatment of Hegel’s ongoing relevance, in that our present is in constant development and is impossible to treat thoroughly.
Despite these limitations, I will show how Hegel solves the problem of philosophy as he understands it and why his understanding offers a viable solution to the problem as it has developed into the present. To begin, I will show what the problem or primary question of philosophy is and has been. Then I will trace the solutions to this problem through the Christian tradition, followed by a presentation of Hegel’s system with relevant ties back to philosophy and Christian tradition made explicit. Lastly I will present some contemporary Hegelians and show their reliance on Hegelian thought.
Presentation of the Problem: A Brief Overview of Western Philosophy
Western philosophy arguably begins with Thales, the earliest of the Ionians and the first to articulate the problem. Thales rather strangely thought that the universal substance was water and that the world had a soul which caused motion. The genius of Thales is not these assertions in particular but his being the first to articulate the problem. This problem is how the universal relates to the particular. For Thales, the universal waters are animated by soul, which is the essence of movement and thus particularity. By setting up the problem in this way, Thales set the course for the rest of Western philosophy.[1] Anaximander, Thales’ student extended this problem by arguing that the universal substance must be infinite since it must not be generated. Rather, the universal is that out of which all particulars are generated. It must be infinite because if it were limited it would have a beginning and thus would have been generated of something outside of itself and not be universal. He also thought that the universal was a principle or a law, not one of the fundamental elements.[2] Pythagoras carries this logic further by stating that nature is a harmony of those things which are limited and the universals which are unlimited. These harmonies are characterized by numbers, which are analogous to the universe. This division of nature into limited and unlimited in harmony led to his view of the human as a soul endlessly transported from body to body in death. Thus, the person or self is really the soul.[3]
Moving to the last of the Ionians, Heraclitus offers the first definite precursor to Hegel’s thought; Hegel wrote his thesis on Heraclitus.[4] The most famous of Heraclitus’ sayings is that “one cannot step twice into the same river, nor can one grasp any mortal substance in a stable condition, but it scatters and again gathers; it forms and dissolves, and approaches and departs.”[5] What is meant is this: particular substances, i.e. any individual thing, contains within their being their own constant changing. Thus, a river is only a river as it ceases to be the river it was and becomes the river it will be. Everything is in flux. This extends to our experience of life and death. Heraclitus points out the dialectic nature of life and death when he says, “for souls it is death to become water, for water it is death to become earth; out of earth water arises, out of water soul.” Death here functions as the instrument of change and regeneration in the universal, thus accounting for the particular while simultaneously denying the self-identity of the particular.[6]
While it might seem like Heraclitus has solved the problem prematurely, it is important to note that his account only works if you already hold certain ideas about the universal, such as its infinitude. Zeno, an Eleatic philosopher, critiques these assumptions and shows their logical impossibility. His primary insight is that infinitude cannot exist and be coherent with our experience of particulars; one could use Zeno to argue that reality is a simulation. The problem of infinity is most clearly critiqued in Zeno’s midway problem. This paradox states that for anything to move, i.e. for anything to be particular, it must complete an infinite number of tasks; because an infinite number of tasks is impossible to complete, movement must be impossible. This paradox operates on the assumption that between any two points are an infinite number of divisible points like a number line. Between 1 and 2 is 1.5, between 1 and 1.5 is 1.25, etc. ad infinitum.[7]
In reply to Zeno’s conclusion that nothing can move or change, Anaxagoras introduces the idea of a universal mind. This mind is infinite, immaterial, and all controlling. Functionally, the mind is no different than the idea of a simulated universe, for all particulars are merely ideas in the mind, or to put it in my words, the simulation. The programming of any given simulation never changes and encompasses all that is in the simulation, including the momentary activities of the subject being simulated. Thus, mind satisfies the relation of universal to particular by substantially destroying the particular and transforming it into the essence of the mind, however in order to accomplish this it must relinquish the idea that nature is real or actual.[8]
Protagoras takes this notion and develops it in a different direction. He says that “man is the measure of all things – of the things that are, that they are, and of the things that are not, that they are not.”[9] Instead of the mind being universal and particulars existing within it, here the mind is individual and the objects of its perception exist outside of it. This epistemological foundation is sufficient to establish the existence of the object in the mind of the observer, but it does nothing to establish the essence(s) of the object. Hence, all we have in Protagoras is the ability to know that things are, not what they are.[10]
The Three Shapes of Philosophy
Out of this groundwork, the three most important philosophers for understanding Western thought build their systems. These philosophers are Plato, Aristotle, and Sextus Empiricus. Plato develops the track established by Anaxagoras, Aristotle develops the track of Protagoras, and Empiricus acts as the negation of the entire project each of them attempt. Each of these tracks will from here on be referred to by their method of knowing: Plato is deductive, Aristotle is inductive, and Empiricus is skeptical.
The key of Plato’s philosophy is the theory of Forms, which are similar to Anaxagoras’ mind. Where Anaxagoras assumed the universal mind, Plato assumes a multitude of Forms, each self-contained and perfect, but relating to the sensuous world. The task of philosophy is to apprehend the Forms and apply them to particulars accurately. Each of the Forms is a predicate which can be applied to objects, e.g. the Form of Goodness can be applied to someone who is good.[11] In Hegelian terms, this type of reasoning can only be applied to things as they are in themselves, which is admitted by Plato himself in the dialogue Parmenides. In this dialogue, Parmenides critiques Socrates’ by arguing that Forms must be self-predicated, meaning that the Form of Good is also Good. These self-predicated Forms can be related to specific beings but fall into infinite regression since Forms are simply syllogisms. However, if Form is not self-predicated, then said Form cannot be related to specific beings because without the predicate, which is the substance of the Form, we have no means by which to apprehend the Forms.[12]
The key concept of Aristotle’s philosophy is the idea of substance, which is similar to Protagoras’ individual being the measure of all things. Instead of assuming some universal principle or being, Aristotle seats knowledge firmly in the sensuous experience of individual objects, which are called primary substances. Secondary substances are those categories that we apply to primary substances, like species or genus. Substance is not in a subject, only in an object, and these objects exist in flux or ‘receive contraries’.[13] In Hegelian terms, this type of epistemology is only able to apprehend things as they exist for themselves.
This brings us to Sextus Empiricus, who gives us the three categories of philosophy as we have divided them above. Platonic philosophy is called Academic, Aristotelian is called Dogmatic, and lastly there is the Skeptic. The Skeptic system forfeits the problem and refuses knowledge altogether, choosing instead to remain agnostic.[14] This system is best summed up in Empiricus’ own words:
It is also plain that all sensible are relative; for they are relative to those who have the sensations. Therefore it is apparent that whatever sensible object is presented can easily be referred to one of the Five Modes. And concerning the intelligible object we argue similarly. For if it should be said that it is a matter of unsettled controversy, the necessity of our suspending judgment will be granted. And if, on the other hand, the controversy admits of decision, then if the decision rests on an intelligible object we shall be driven to the regress ad infinitum, and to circular reasoning if it rests on a sensible; for since the sensible again is controverted and cannot be decided by means of itself because of the regress ad infinitum, it will require the intelligible object, just as also the intelligible will require the sensible. For these reasons, again, he who assumes anything by hypothesis will be acting illogically. Moreover, objects of thought, or intelligibles, are relative; for they are so named on account of their relation to the person thinking, and if they had really possessed the nature they are said to possess, there would have been no controversy about them.[15]
Thus, the pursuit of knowledge by any of these avenues has been thwarted by Empiricus’ logic and we are left at the start, unable to relate ourselves to the sensuous world except by pragmatism and without certainty. This problem would continue to be worked on, but after the advent of Christ, the question becomes altered. We will now trace its development through the Christian tradition.
The Problem in the Christian Tradition
Origen, the first Christian thinker I will examine, was committed to the deductive model of philosophy. According to him, all things began in divine unity (universality) and descended through sin into multiplicity (particularity). God ordered these things to work in their multiplicity for the service of the unity. Essentially, God has stepped into multiplicity so that the multiplicity can return upwards into unity.[16] Christ serves as the exemplary model of unity and division combined. His unity is as the Son of God, his multiplicity is as a rational human soul.[17] Origen also recognized the duality of consciousness, a primary interest of Hegel, in the division between flesh and spirit. However, Origen opposes them to each other so that the spirit is the superior of the two and the body is ultimately done away with.[18] The unique addition which Christian thought in Origen makes to the problem of Western philosophy is the unity of the division between God and Man, in that Christ exemplifies how division can be held in dialectic tension with unity.
Augustine, the primary figure in Western Christianity until Aquinas, continues this deductive track. Like Descartes, Augustine takes the individual consciousness as the foundation of knowledge. In remarkably Cartesian fashion, he says, “…if I am deceived, I am. For he who is not, cannot be deceived; and if I am deceived, by this same token I am.”[19] Yet, Augustine goes further and speaks of the soul “finding itself” as its own object.[20] Within this self, Augustine identifies three aspects, memory, understanding, and will, and relates each to the other such that they remain distinct, yet unified in the self. “For I remember that I have memory and understanding, and will; and I understand that I understand, and will, and remember; and I will that I will, and remember, and understand….”[21] Thus for the first time we have the triune nature of not God, but humanity, represented philosophically. This will become a model for Hegel.
Turning now to an earlier work called Soliloquies, we find Augustine’s dialogue with reason for the pursuit of knowledge regarding God. The first important revelation that Augustine articulates is that God is known in the same manner by which mathematics is known. Mathematics is known by the transformation of information taken in by the senses into intelligible truths which do not depend on reality.[22] Hegel will critique this model, but not outright reject its viability. The other key takeaway from Soliloquies is the dependence of predicates upon their subjects. For a predicate to exist, the subject upon which it is predicated must also exist, but the subject does not depend on the predicate unless that predicate contains the essence of the substance of the subject.[23] Here, without explicitly drawing from Aristotle, Augustine has managed to incorporate some of Aristotle’s key insights into his Platonism. These insights will be carried forward into Hegel.
Next we will look into Pseudo-Dionysius, an eclectic, mystic theologian. In his work The Divine Names, he offers an explanation of each of the names which we predicate upon God to explain his character. What sets Pseudo-Dionysius apart from other theologians of his time is his awareness of the depth of the division between God as God is in itself, and God as God acts for others. God in itself is entirely contentless, meaning that he is beyond any assertion or denial, simultaneously affirming and denying anything said by God’s very universality, similar to the problem of Plato’s Forms in Parmenides. Since nothing can correctly be predicated upon God as God is in itself, we can only know God as he exists for others.[24] Despite this, it is out of the very being of God in itself that everything comes to be and thus God in itself exists interdependently with Creation.[25]
Where Pseudo-Dionysius established the mystical understanding of God in itself, John Scotus Erigena develops the mystical understanding of humanity in itself. Just as God is beyond all assertion in denial, humanity is also beyond assertion and denial, “for that alone is a substantial definition, which affirms only that it is but negates that it is anything in particular.”[26] As a result of humanity in itself being beyond knowledge, it has itself as its object for contemplation. It is the task the human consciousness that knows that it is via Augustine’s logic to consider itself as outside itself because “…it knows that it is, but does not know what it is.”[27] This process is then extended to other humans in that, since the self exists in itself, that which exists in the understanding of both individuals unites them by their shared content. If one idea is understood in the same way by multiple people, then those people are identical where there understanding overlaps.[28] Thus, the other is brought into the self as one with the self.
We have here established the basic tools by which Hegel will construct his philosophy and attempt to solve the problem of Western philosophy. The problem is the inability of the universal to relate to the particular and our loss of certainty in that process. Since the foundation of any certainty is in the self, consciousness and the dialectic of unity and division become the ways in which this consciousness might be able to step outside of its subjectivity and become real. This is coming into actuality as self-consciousness, which requires an other, but in this we have still not solved the problem. We will now turn to Hegel, analyze his interpretation of the problem as stated above, and show his solution in what he calls Spirit.
Hegel Addresses the Problem
Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit is his most widely read work and establishes the foundations for his answer to the problem. He states as his goal, “that [philosophy] might be able to relinquish the name of love of knowledge and be actual knowledge.”[29] For Hegel, actual knowledge must exist in actuality, i.e. particularity. Thus, truth finds the form of its existence or actuality in science. This actuality of truth in science he calls the Concept. This science is against the type of knowing exemplified by deductive reasoning, which is intuition. Intuition knows the truth only as it is in itself, not as it pertains to the Concept. In a surprising twist, Hegel makes explicit that substance is the object of intuition, which is in agreement with what Sextus Empiricus thought was the downfall of deductive or Academic philosophy. As substance is the object of intuition, so is Concept the object of science.[30]
Formalism, which is taking any law as universal (think physics), is mere repetition of one simple Concept in several scenarios. Formalism cannot apprehend the absolute because it is not present in actuality via the same logical problems present in deductive philosophy. Any scenario which does not conform to the formula is written out of consideration as an anomaly, thus revealing that Formalism is mere repetition of a Form as a universal law. This cannot be knowledge because it does not pertain to the universal as it is in distinctness, which we will explore further later.[31] In this one swift motion, Hegel has done away with the dogmatic shape of philosophy by showing its reliance on the academic shape of philosophy, just as Empiricus did. What is revealed is that formulas as absolutes to explain all phenomena are Platonic, not Aristotelian. Thus, Physics is Platonic. Science as Formalism strips the universe of its life and leaves it as bare determinateness, subject to the universal system of the formula. Thus, substance is gotten rid of and the life of consciousness is robbed of its content. Science as Formalism provides merely the table of contents, not the contents themselves.[32]
The terms with which Hegel frames the problem is the inability of the subject to relate to the object, where the subject is the universal and the object is the particular. Thus, the absolute is subject, meaning God as a consciousness is the absolute. This absolute only becomes actual when it unites itself with substance or actuality. In Hegel’s words, “the living substance is… in truth actual only insofar as it is the movement of positing itself, or the mediation between a self and its development into something different.”[33] Here we clearly see the influence of Heraclitus, who said that everything is in flux. Thus, since God is defined as the absolute which becomes actual through self-mediation, we can divide the life of God into three moments: 1) it is in itself as the “circle that presupposes its end as its aim and thus has it for its beginning….”[34]This being in itself is only perceived by intuition, it is sameness and unity and abstract. This is the life of God as deductive yet unknowable, as it is in Pseudo-Dionysius and mystic theology. 2) It is for itself as Formalism, becoming, self-moving, mediating, and actual. This is the life of God as God acts. It is the realm of inductive philosophy and theology, as seen in Aristotle and the Scholastics. 3) Lastly, it is in and for itself, which is the sublimation of both forms of being in which both disappear.[35]
For now, Hegel deals with the first two alone, for the third cannot be understood without the first two. First, he addresses God as being in itself by writing on the names of God, much like Pseudo-Dionysius. God as a name is mere noise according to Hegel because it carries no content about God with it, and thus has no actuality. What the word signifies then is not a being or general principle, but God’s existence as that which is reflected back into itself, i.e. a subject. There is a problem with this idea of God though, and it is the same problem that Plato recognized in his theory of the Forms in Parmenides. “…that the absolute is subject is therefore not only not actuality of this Concept, but even makes this actuality impossible; for it posits a point at rest while the actuality is self-movement.”[36] It is important to remember here that Hegel is not pursuing knowledge of God, but rather he is attempting to establish a logic by which we may have knowledge of Truth. The goal is logical, not ontological.[37] It is because of this goal that God as being in itself will not satisfy the pursuit for truth.
Here Hegel surprisingly turns to his final goal: the idea of being in and for itself, which is Spirit, but we will have to return to this later, as it is the end in mind. Instead, we will demonstrate Hegel’s unique treatment of another kind of knowledge which is in itself: Math. His treatment of Math is important because it shows how he manages not to simply abandon being in itself. Math, according to Hegel, is insufficient for supplying knowledge in that it is merely internally consistent but not apprehended; this is the same problem Hegel has with God as a being in itself. Because Math concerns nothing but magnitude, and magnitude is not essential, it is devoid of Concept. It has no relation to matter, and thus has no actuality. Math cannot be comprehended in substances, and thus cannot be true except within itself. This is contrary to Augustine’s understanding of math/geometry, which serve him as analogous to our knowledge of God, but Augustine is committed to deductive philosophy which ends with being in itself.[38]
Hegel does not reject the truth of Math outright, he merely recognizes its place in the dialectic, which is to say that Math is a subject with no object apart from how it relates to objects for itself. In this turn, we will now consider Hegel’s understanding of being for itself. The best place to begin this consideration is in Hegel’s transition from being in itself to being for itself in the predicate of the being, a Pseudo-Dionysian move. The example Hegel provides is the proposition “God is being”. In this construction, subject and predicate become entangled, so that the subject disappears and the predicate becomes the subject, because the predicate “being” contains the subject within itself as far as the subject’s content goes. This is true of all subject-predicate constructions in which the predicate is the essence of the subject. Thus, the subject becomes an object unto (for) itself. With this we have stepped firmly into inductive, Aristotelian philosophy.[39]
Hegel critiques the inductive method along similar lines to what we would call the observer effect, although he takes it a step further into what would more rightly be called the knower effect. Because truth is absolute, knowing cannot be an instrument or medium by which we apprehend truth, because as an instrument or medium, knowing changes truth into something which it was not before, thus destroying the universality and content of the truth. In Aristotelian terms, the essence of the substance is lost in the knowing by way of the knowing not being an inherent part of the absolute. This treatment of knowledge as a philosophical subject to be understood transforms knowledge into an object for us. Knowledge itself is the object of our understanding. In this, knowledge and our understanding of it become a part of us in the same logic that Erigena used to say that where two people’s understandings overlapped they become one. In our perception of knowledge as an object for us, we have become unable to perceive knowledge in itself. Yet, in recognizing the object as an other, we acknowledge its existence and can compare the object as it is in itself with our understanding of it as it is for us.[40]
This acknowledgement is the foundation of Hegel’s treatment of consciousness, which will move us toward his solution in Spirit. Consciousness knows something as the object in itself, but this object is consciousness itself (this is often veiled from our consciousness). Thus, there are two objects in the self: the object in itself, and the being for consciousness of the in itself. The object in itself is the consciousness’ knowing of the object reflected back at the consciousness as in a mirror, but this reflection back changes the object into the being for consciousness of the in itself.[41] This is similar to Erigena’s construction of humanity in that the self knows that it is, but not what it is.[42] Restated in Hegel’s terms, Erigena says that humanity knows itself in itself but not for itself. Since this first object is knowledge, it is acknowledgement that gives rise to consciousness and also to the change of consciousness into something new, or mediation of the consciousness. This experience of the movement of consciousness is an attempt at science which is the science of the experience of consciousness.
Thus, knowledge has been established, but only knowledge of our own being. However, since consciousness has been established inductively, we can start to establish its relation to universals and have true Concept. This is counterintuitively established through sensuous experience. Because all sense experience refers to particulars like here and now through the ego or the I, sense experience becomes an internally limited universal. This is due to the terms themselves syllogistically being universal. Each of the terms, here, now, and I refer to particulars but it is impossible to refer to the terms themselves as particulars. The immediate relation of subject to object in these terms brings the object into the subject, transforming the inductive method into the deductive and placing our philosophy back into the deductive mode, or pure intuition. It is Formalism again.[43]
To explain more clearly, this is due to the internal infinitude of our terms. This infinitude arises out of the self-negation of the terms, much like Heraclitus’ river. Take the term now: a particular now has the essence of its predicates, for instance, day, but the essence of now is to change into a been. The now has become a been: it has been day, but it is not now. So, we can define now as that which is the be no more. There is no particular now, only an infinite multiplicities of particular nows. Thus, now is universal in that it negates itself. The same can be said of here and I. All three contain their own negation, for there is no “I”, only that “I” which has been, but the “I” is that very change from being to nonbeing, thus the “I” is reinstated as an absolute.[44] What Zeno said was true, anything with an infinite nature destroys its particularity, but Zeno failed to realize that if the essence of the thing is its own negation, the thing becomes universal. It is what is in itself. This gets us closer because it defines the nature of consciousness as that which is a series of moments, always becoming, but it is still stuck in itself. It is a limited infinity.
Because things which are unified are negative by way of their infinitude, they are also divided into particularities which assert themselves in order for the infinite to exist. So, unity and division are interrelated dialectically. The entirety of this process is Life; unity alone is not life, division alone is not life. They must be taken together as a whole, despite being diametrically opposed. Here enters the last step on our way to Spirit: self-consciousness. Consciousness desires certainty of itself, the subject, by the destruction of the object. In this construction, the subject is the infinite nature of “I” and the object is the particular “I”. The desire for certainty of the subject requires the object to destroy. This certainty is what constitutes self-consciousness. The desire is generated by the object, destroys the object, and regenerates the object through its desire. The object, containing its negation within itself, fulfills the desire of the subject in itself, and yet maintains itself by its independence from the subject. Self-consciousness is the immediate “I” as object, the mediation of the “I” by its immediacy (like here and now), and the desire to be truth which is reflected back into self-consciousness. Thus, self-consciousness is being for itself.[45]
Finally, we can see Hegel’s solution in Spirit, being in and for itself coming together. To recap briefly, being in itself is analogous with deductive philosophy and falls to the problems of Academic philosophy as articulated in Parmenides and by Sextus Empiricus, being for itself is analogous with inductive philosophy and falls to the problems of Dogmatic philosophy as articulated by Empiricus. Neither can reach true actuality or universality.
Hegel’s Solution: Spirit
The spiritual alone is the actual; it is [i] the essence or being-in-itself; [ii] that which relates itself and is determinate, that which is other and for itself; and [iii] that which in this determinateness and being outside itself remains in itself – or in other words, it is in and for itself…. The spirit that, so developed, knows itself as spirit is science. Science is the actuality of the spirit and the realm that the spirit builds for itself in its own element.[46]
The statement above is, in my assessment, the pinnacle of Idealist logic, and it is primarily this logic that I have been exploring thus far. I have made the claim that Hegel exists in continuity with the Christian tradition, but here I will take a bolder stance; Hegel’s logic here is orthodox Christian logic. At the council of Chalcedon, Christ’s nature as both divine and human held in tension was made explicit against the heresies of Arianism and Apollinarianism. Arianism took the stance that Christ was created and not truly divine, whereas Apollinarianism took the stance that Christ had a human body and a divine mind. Both arise out of a logic of false oppositions and Chalcedon, taken as a logical argument, refutes the logic of false oppositions. The Chalcedonian formula states that Christ had both natures, human and divine, and that both are preserved in their unity in Christ. This is identical with Hegel’s formulation of Spirit above as far as their governing logics go.[47]
Thus, the solution to the problem of knowledge, that which, in Hegel’s words can get us to Absolute Knowing, is the recognition and dissolution of false oppositions. This is precisely what the dialectic is. I have heard the dialectic explained as a thesis and antithesis diametrically opposed producing a synthesis by their conflict, but this explanation does not do justice to the revolutionary nature of this logic. It can be better stated that the dialectic, out of which we get Spirit, is the unity of the thesis and antithesis by their interdependent relationship. This does not do away with oppositional logic in all cases, but it does limit truth to those claims which are perceived via Spirit. Oppositional logic is not done away with in cases where two things have no relation to each other, rather, oppositional logic is done away with in cases in which two things are in inseparable relation, e.g. race, sex, religion, etc.[48]
The genius of Hegel is that he seats Spirit firmly in the experience of self-consciousness and humanity. Is it applied to God? Yes, but it is not limited to God, for that would be to exploit oppositional logic. Spirit is required to bridge the gap not only between humanity and God, but also between individuals and their world
Contemporary Significance
To conclude this project I will show how Hegel is still present in contemporary Christian thought through two vastly different authors. Terence Fretheim, who is a Biblical scholar of the Old Testament and is fairly conservative, and Peter Rollins who is a liberal, radical theologian. My choice of these two is intentional to reflect the false opposition between conservative biblical theology and liberal radical theology. They are not opposed, rather, they are distinct but in interdependent relationship.
Fretheim’s focus is on creation theology, and his interpretation of the creation accounts in Genesis 1-2 exhibits Hegelian logic perfectly. Whereas the traditional interpretation of God’s creative act is that God is the sole actor on Creation, one could interpret God’s creative act as in dialog with creation. “…the divine creating often entails a speaking with that which is already created…. God’s creative act is mediated in and through these creatures…. Hence, the divine speaking in this chapter is of such a nature that the receptor of the word is important in the shaping of the created order.”[49] For Fretheim, this means that God by his very nature, exists in dialectic with Creation.
This is made permanent in his covenant with Noah, in which God permanently limits his ability to intervene in the natural outcomes of evil, which is defined as the undoing of the creative work. “For God to promise not to do something again entails an eternal self-limitation regarding the exercise of divine freedom and power. God thereby limits the divine options in dealing with evil in the life of the world…. Genesis 6:5-7 makes the bold claim that this kind of divine response means that God will take the route of suffering. For God to decide to endure a wicked world, while continuing to open up the divine heart to that world, means that God’s grief is ongoing.”[50] Initially it was by God’s nature that Creation was allowed to exist in union with the divine creative act, now it is by God’s promise that Creation is allowed to exist as an opposing force against God. Thus, Creation is in an interdependent relationship with God; God by his nature must create the world, while the world by its existence relies on God. Yet, by its freedom, the world has become opposed to God. Jesus becomes the embodiment of Spirit, or the synthesis of this dialectic. This synthesis is explored by Peter Rollins in The Divine Magician.
The problem, which is identified as sin by Rollins, is the false opposition of the divinity and humanity. We look to the divine as that which can fulfill us but fail to recognize that the divine is the very lack which we seek to fill. This is solved by Christ, in that Christ makes the gap or lack within God explicit.[51] This presentation of the object which we think will bring us fulfillment and the subsequent disappearance of that object is what Rollins calls the divine magic trick. “This change in perspective means that heaven and earth are no longer seen as separate, but the sacred and profane are fused, and the pursuit of a single fruit-bearing tree is replaced with the vision of an abundant world ready for harvest.”[52] The reappearance of the object which was made to disappear is the loss of the sacred object which we thought could fulfill us and the embracing of the lack within us as that which unites us with God.[53]
Conclusion
Like a magic trick, that dogmatic certainty with which I began my education was made to disappear in the various perspectives and criticisms which I came in contact with, most of which have been touched on in this paper. Whether or not Hegelian logic can adequately serve as the foundation for the reappearance of faith is not the question which I am attempting to answer, but it is the one I want to leave with those on a similar path. Knowledge in either of its two typical forms must be done away with to make space for Spirit, yet the forms of knowledge in Plato and Aristotle are nothing anyway. They are not vehicles for truth, and thus are not true knowledge. Two terms which Hegel takes as a pair are thinking and being. I have been told that the purpose of education is to teach one how to think, but when operating as a Hegelian, it could also be stated as “the purpose of education is to teach one how to be.”
Works Cited
Adams, Nicholas. The Eclipse of Grace: Divine and Human Action in Hegel. New Jersey: Wiley-Blackwell, 2013.
Augustine. Soliloquies. Translated by Kim Paffenroth. New York: New City Press, 2014.
Fretheim, Terence E. God and World in the Old Testament: A Relational Theology of Creation. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2005.
Inwood, M. J., ed. Hegel: Selections. New York: Macmillan, 1989.
Kolak, Daniel, and Garrett Thomson. The Longman Standard History of Ancient Philosophy. New York: Pearson Longman, 2006.
Kolak, Daniel, and Garrett Thomson. The Longman Standard History of Medieval Philosophy. New York: Pearson Longman, 2006.
Origen. On First Principles. Translated by G. W. Butterworth. New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1966.
Pseudo-Dionysius. Pseudo-Dionysius: The Complete Works. Translated by Colm Luibheid. New York: Paulist Press, 1987.
Rollins, Peter. The Divine Magician: The Disappearance of Religion and the Discovery of Faith. New York: Howard, 2015.
[1] Daniel Kolak, & Garrett Thomson, The Longman Standard History of Ancient Philosophy (New York: Pearson Longman, 2006), 8-9.
[2] Ibid, 10-11.
[3] Kolak & Thomson, Ancient Philosophy, 16-19.
[4] Ibid, 29.
[5] Ibid, 24.
[6] Ibid, 24-30.
[7] Kolak & Thomson, Ancient Philosophy, 37-38.
[8] Ibid, 50-53.
[9] Ibid, 64.
[10] Ibid, 64-65.
[11] Kolak & Thomson, Ancient Philosophy, 74.
[12] Ibid, 254-255.
[13] Kolak & Thomson, Ancient Philosophy, 278-280.
[14] Ibid, 495.
[15] Ibid, 500.
[16] Origen, On First Principles, trans. G. W. Butterworth (New York: Harper and Row, 1966), 77.
[17] Ibid, 111-112.
[18] Ibid, 234-235.
[19] Daniel Kolak, & Garrett Thomson, The Longman Standard History of Medieval Philosophy (New York: Pearson Longman, 2006), 29.
[20] Kolak & Thomson, Medieval Philosophy, 30-31.
[21] Ibid, 33.
[22] Augustine, Soliloquies, trans. Kim Paffenroth (New York: New City Press, 2000), 29-32.
[23] Ibid, 78-79.
[24] Pseudo-Dionysius, Pseudo-Dionysius: The Complete Works, trans. Colm Lubheid (New York: Paulist Press, 1987), 50.
[25] Ibid, 54.
[26] Kolak & Thomson, Medieval Philosophy, 103.
[27] Ibid, 105.
[28] Ibid, 112.
[29] M. J. Inwood, ed., Hegel: Selections (New York: Macmillan, 1989), 117.
[30] Ibid, 117-119.
[31] Inwood, Hegel, 121-122.
[32] Ibid, 139-140.
[33] Ibid, 123.
[34] Ibid, 123.
[35] Inwood, Hegel, 123.
[36] Ibid, 125.
[37] Nicholas Adams, Eclipse of Grace: Divine and Human Action in Hegel (New Jersey: Wiley-Blackwell, 2013), 9.
[38] Inwood, Hegel, 135.
[39] Ibid, 145.
[40] Inwood, Hegel, 153-158.
[41] Ibid, 159.
[42] Kolak & Thomson, Medieval Philosophy, 103.
[43] Inwood, Hegel, 164.
[44] Inwood, Hegel, 165-166.
[45] Ibid, 171-175.
[46] Inwood, Hegel, 126.
[47] Adams, Eclipse of Grace, 5-7.
[48] Adams, Eclipse of Grace, 23-24.
[49] Terence E. Fretheim, God and World in the Old Testament: A Relational Theology of Creation (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2005), 38.
[50] Ibid, 83.
[51] Peter Rollins, The Divine Magician: The Disappearance of Religion and the Discovery of Faith (New York: Howard, 2015), 69-70.
[52] Ibid, 157.
[53] Ibid, 120.