No More Learning

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a relationship of the understanding, and the religion that has this kind of foundation is the religion of the understanding. " (l2 m, 194/100)
Hegel then asks, of what kind are these finite purposes? "they are to be sought in the natural and spiritual world, not in the nature of god himself, because they are finite. and for this reason the definition of them lies outside of god, and god is seen as an understanding, operating in nature, that orders and regulates them. " (l2 m, 195/101) Roman gods are expedi- ents that oversee, regulate, and protect the full range of human activities and purposes, especially those of a political and commercial character. this is the utterly utilitarian, practical, prosaic religion; specific human needs, such as happiness, satisfaction, self-seeking, define the content of the Roman gods. in this respect, the Roman religion is fundamentally different from the greek, which exists in "the realm of free beauty, joy- ous festival, and the enjoyment of divinity. " (l2 m, 207/113) the greeks worship their gods for the sake of the gods, the Romans for the sake of humanity. the Roman attitude of consciousness is not theoretical, i. e. "it does not consist in a free intuition of objectivity, or free veneration of the divine powers, but in practical self-seeking, the quest for the fulfilment of the singularity of this life. (. . . ) Here [we find] on the contrary a preoccu- pation with finite purposes, an earthbound religion of [finite purposes]. " (l2 m, 207/113) in other words, it consists only of a practical assessment of their own subjective, contingent needs. "every human final end, no mat- ter how inwardly insignificant it may be (to feed oneself, make life more agreeable, etc. ), gives one the right to sacrifice natural things or animal life as much as one will without ado; (. . . . ). " (l2 m, 208/113-114) the objec- tive of Roman cultus lies entirely in the subjective sphere. it regards only subjective interests. "the worshippers' needs and requirements and the dependence that they create are what make them pious, and their cultus consists in positing a power to help them in their need. " (l2 m, 210/116)
Hegel then moves on to a more detailed analysis of the cultus of the religion of expediency, especially with regard to two spheres of human interests: the state and politics on the one hand, and agriculture and gen- eral welfare on the other. the purpose of the Roman cultus is, first and foremost, political: it serves the interests of the Roman empire. "in regard to the state, concrete cases, singular actual [fortunes play the same role] as a prosperous harvest in regard to nature. " (l2 m, 211-212/117) in fact, Hegel contends that this religion contains within it the more specific aspects "needed to become a political religion. " (l2 m, 211/117) a principal goal of such a religion is the state and its fortune and well-being. "(t)he worship of the gods and thanksgiving is prosaically attached to partly to singular
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determinate situations (salvation in cases of need) and actual events" the Roman deity above all others, the deity par excellence is the goddess fortuna; not necessity, nor chance, nor providence, but instead universal prosperity (Glu? ck) of the Roman empire. Hegel devotes an entire section to this goddess. (l2 m, 212-215/118-121)
Beyond this are the general human requirements and activities that make human life prosper, such as harvest, fertility, crafts, trade, travel etc. in all these domains a host of deities appear, who are worshipped in special festivals. "of this kind was the worship accorded to ops con- siva, the consort of saturn, a mysterious goddess who stores within herself the seeds from which all plants come, and ripens them. (. . . ) the bounte- ous fruitfulness of nature in all its manifold aspects [gave rise to] a large number of fertility and crafts festivals. " (l2 m, 217/122) Hegel mentions several examples, e. g. Jupiter, who had a special altar on the capitoline hill as Jupiter pistor ("the baker"), or fornax, the goddess of the oven, who presided over the parching of the corn in the ovens. in addition, there were festivals of vesta, to ensure that the fire should serve for the bak- ing of the bread, of the ambarvalia, a procession around the fields, of the suovetaurilia (festival of swine, sheep, and bulls), and so on. all these were regarded by Hegel as a matter of utility, of prosaic powers.
However, beneath all this is a fundamental fear of harm and disaster: "there are times of prosperity, but equally there are times of disaster. in this prosaic awareness of the antithesis and of finitude, the harmful just as much as the useful takes on a fixed shape (. . . ). it takes the form of something fearful (the powers of evil). " (l2 m, 218/123) this is why Hegel asserts--in a strained but unmistakable allusion to schleiermacher--that Roman religion is based on a "feeling of dependence," which, in developed form, leads to veneration of the power of evil and worship of the devil. However, "(i)t is only particular kinds of harm that one is frightened of at this stage, particular evils to which one bows the knee. inasmuch as it is a negative, this concrete outcome is a situation; it exists as a concrete negative without any inner substantive content, without inward univer- sality. " (l2 m, 219/124) allegorical, prosaic essences of this kind, however, are primarily and essentially those which are characterised by a short- coming, harm, or damage. "for example, the Romans dedicated altars to the plague, and also to fever, febris, and the goddess angerona, care and woe. they venerated hunger, fames, and Robigo, wheat rust. " moreover, he continues to wonder, "(it) is hard to grasp that things of this kind are worshipped as divine. in such images every proper aspect of divinity is lost; it is only the feeling of dependence and fear that can turn them into
hegel and the roman religion 167
something objective. " (m219/124) and finally: "(o)nly the total loss of all idea, the evaporation of all truth, can hit upon such way of representing divinity, and they can be comprehended only [through the recognition] that spirit has come to dwell entirely in [the realm of ] the finite, of what is immediately useful. " (l2 m, 219-220/124) interesting to note is that Hegel concludes the section on this negativity "that this is where the roots of superstition are to be found. generally speaking, superstition consists in treating something finite and external, some ordinary actuality just as it stands, as a power, a substance. superstition stems from the oppressed state of the spirit, from a feeling of dependence in its purposes; it cannot free itself from its purposes and as a logical consequence defines the nega- tive upon which they are dependent as something that is as temporal and finite as they are. " (l2 m, 220/125) in contrast, other religions (such as the persian, Hindu and greek religion) are free in the presence of their god, and it is only outside religion that they are dependent.
the Romans have made of their religion a thing of enslavement. enslavement to finitude and death, in fact. this becomes clear when we look at the Roman festivals and spectacles, which consisted in large-scale slaughter of beasts and men, a massacre that was purposeless and staged merely for the entertainment of the spectators. "the spilling of rivers of real blood and battles to the death were the spectacles the Romans loved best. (. . . ) they wanted this external, simple story of death, without mean- ing, the quintessence of everything external, the arid process of a natural death by violence of natural means, not death produced by an ethical power. " (l2 m, 222/127) moreover: "(f)or the Romans this prosaic pattern of spiritless butchery, cold and arid, constituted the supreme event of his- tory, the highest manifestation of the fate which for the greeks [had been] essentially an ethical transformation. to die imperturbably, through an irrational caprice having the force of necessity, (. . . ) was the ultimate and unique virtue that Roman patricians could exercise, (. . . ). " (l2 m, 223/127) the gods warded off death as long as possible, but in the end, death ulti- mately prevails. death is the one true divinity for the Romans, "the final mark of finitude for the religion that venerates 'unbounded finitude,' 'spu- riously infinite' finitude. "21
in the last section, Hegel analyses the role of the emperors in the Roman religion and how this final and ultimate determinate religion prepared the ground for christianity. Hegel notices that the Romans worshiped their
21 idem.
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emperors almost as gods, or at least as if they were gods. "inasmuch as the content of the divine purpose consisted for them in finite human pur- poses, and the power over such purposes and the directly actual external circumstances was what made up the good fortune of the Roman empire, the obvious next step was to worship the present power over such a pur- pose, the individual presence of that good fortune, as a god in whose hands it rested. " (l2 m, 223/128) especially the role of the emperor, as an exceptional individual, could be described as an "arbitrary power over the life and happiness of individuals and whole cities. " together with the imperial guard, the imperial will constituted the goddess fortuna.
for the Romans, immersed as they were in finitude, "there was nothing higher that this individual, this power over their finite purposes. " (l2 m, 224/129) in fact, the finite determinate purpose, together with its power, is concentrated and determined in the present, actual will of one individual human being. "since all are in bondage to life, one person's will is in fact the power over finite purposes, over the world; the Roman emperor is lord over the world, as long as he has guards to be the tool of this indi- viduality; but he has only to offend these guards, and he is lost. His vio- lent power is the death of individuality (. . . ). " (l2 m, 225/130) further on Hegel remarks: "power is completely determined, as singularity, but the universal moment has escaped. What is present is the world of outward happiness and the power over it--a monstrous unhappiness. What is lacking is that power should be completely determined in such a way as to make it determinately determinate, in other words that the individual should become subjectivity, actually present, should become something inward, something inwardly substantive. " (l2 m, 225/130) in this respect, the Roman world is the most important point of transition to the chris- tian religion; in fact, it is the indispensable link to it. (l2 m, 226/130)
the religion of external purposiveness closes the cycle of the finite reli- gions. the step of which the Roman religion consists of before the transi- tion to the christian religion is not a positive, but a negative step. finite religion does not evolve progressively into infinite religion, but cycles back upon it. "the 'necessity' of Roman religion is that the highest form of fini- tude is the worst, issuing in the absolute unhappiness and grief of spirit, despite the Romans' constant preoccupation with happiness, gratification, success. "22 this is what happens when the slogan of protagoras 'man is the measure of all things', the human being with his immediate wishes,
22 idem, p. 29.
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desires, purposes, interests, feelings etcetera, is elevated to a universal standard. "We behold the complete disappearance of all beautiful, ethi- cal organic life and the crumbling away into finitude of all desires, pur- poses, and interests--a crumbling away into momentary enjoyment and pleasure, a human animal kingdom from which all higher elements have been abstracted. " (l2 m, 229/134) moreover: "[i]t is a crumbling away into mere finitudes--finite existences, wishes and interests--which for that very reason are held together only by the inwardly boundless violence of the despot, the singular will whose instrument is the cold-blooded, spir- itless death of individual citizens, the negative that is as immediate as their wishes, brought to bear upon them and holding them in fear of him. He is the one, the actually present god--himself the singularity of the divine will as the power over all the other infinitely many singular wills. " (l2 m, 229/134)
it is only when finitude has played itself out to the end that god and the world can be reconciled through god in the shape of a single human being. god acquires present actuality, and the world is transfigured in its finitude. However, the religion in which this occurred could not arise in the greco-Roman world. although this world discovered the unity of thought, it did not know it in the form of a "community principle," (l2 m, 231/136) that is, while there might have been philosophical intuitions of the one, they were incapable of taking on the concrete life of a religious community and cultus. "thus christianity arose among the Jewish people when that people encountered the 'finitude of the West' and the age-old grief of the world. "23
The Lectures of 1824
compared to the lengthy treatment of the Roman religion in the Manu- script, its treatment here in the 1824 lectures is relatively short. due to the entirely different structure of the Determinate religion, the Roman religion no longer comprises in its own, separate treatment in a chap- ter, but is now treated as a mere appendage to section B, The Religions of Spiritual Individuality, as the third in a row, after the Jewish and the greek religion. the concept of purposiveness is no longer reserved exclu- sively for the Roman religion, but is attributed to the Jewish and greek as well. these two religions are now also considered under the category
23 idem, p. 30, Hegel, loc. cit.
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of purposiveness. no longer is the movement from Jewish and greek to Roman religion viewed as a transition from power to necessity to purpose (as in the Manuscript), but as a movement from exclusive (or singular) to plural to universal (though external and finite) purposiveness. that is: from exclusive purposiveness, where the Jewish god is one and almighty but confined to a particular people, to a plurality of purposes in greek religion where the gods express a multitude of purposes (and where in fact necessity is purposeless), to a universal purpose--a purpose that is as universal as necessity itself but at the same time empirical, external, and political in character, namely: world dominion of the Roman empire. and because of its finitude and externality, it becomes necessity itself, or better: fate (Fatum). the holiness and transcendence of Jewish faith is lost, as well as the beauty and freedom of the greek religion. Roman reli- gion is the religion of "unfreedom" because human beings have become dependent on a host of finite deities that control every facet of human life, these deities being abstractions, and in fact not spiritual individualities. 24 Hence, Roman religion actually does not fit properly under the category of the title of this second section of the Determinate Religion, namely The Religions of Spiritual Individuality, but because Hegel envisaged only two moments before dealing with the christian religion, the Roman religion had to be treated there as the last station, providing a transition to chris- tianity by depicting the collapse of finite religion in and upon itself.
after a short introduction, Hegel discusses in section a) the concept of necessity and external purpose. stress is laid on the externality of the purpose, even on its empirical content: "What makes it empirical is its content; and this next mode of universality--incomplete, abstract universality--is where the empirical purpose is extended to embrace [the whole of] external reality. this purpose thus becomes a universal condi- tion of the world, world dominion, universal monarchy. (. . . ) the inherent purpose is one that is external to the individual, and it becomes ever more so the more that it is realized and externalized, so that the individual is merely subordinated to the purpose, merely serves it. " (l2 24, 500/399)25 this implies a unification of universal power and singularity, but a raw one, devoid of all spirit. "it is not in the realm of thought that this fulfil- ment is posited; it is worldly power, mere lordship, worldliness merely
24 idem, p. 55 and l2 24, 498/397, footnote 701.
25 islamic religion, Hegel tells here, also has world dominion as its purpose, but of a predominantly spiritual rather than a political one, as is the case in the Roman empire.
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as lordship. (the particular) lies outside the posited unity, it is a content that lacks divinity--it is the egoism of the individual, seeking satisfac- tion apart from god, in particular interests. it lies outside reason; lordship stands cold and egoistic on one side, and the individual equally on the other. " (l2 24, 50-501/399-400)
the discussion of the configuration of this god (imperial authority) and the gods in the second subsection (b) and the cultus in the third (c) in these 1824 lectures is taken from the Manuscript but condensed. emphasis is laid on the seriousness and functionality of the Roman reli- gion, in contrast to the cheerfulness and serenity of the greek religion, which was essentially free. the two necessities it serves are world domin- ion and the exigencies of everyday life. "thus everyday requirements, the arts of understanding, were viewed as something essential, as gods, even though they are concerned with wholly subordinate matters, relating to everyday life, in which the only religious aspect is the formal one that these purposes have now achieved the empty shape of essentialities. " (l2 24, 504/403) again, Hegel mentions many of these gods in the texts, and wonders: "(i)t is hard for us to grasp how such things can be vener- ated as gods. the content can be anything, provided it appears essential for the common needs; it can be any situation, which is then compre- hended without phantasy and on its own, all idealization and all living phantasy being excluded. it is consistent with this prosaic situation in regard to power that the Romans later came to worship their emperors too as gods. " new gods are introduced whenever particular needs arise, be it relief from the plague, be it public sanitation, victory in battle, etc. in a word: Roman worship is a "theogony in progress. " (l2 24, 509/407) moreover, "(w)e see the Romans conquering magna graecia, sicily, plun- dering and destroying the temples and carrying off whole shiploads of gods to Rome. in Rome there is toleration: the syrian, egyptian, Jewish, christian, greek, persian religions, mithraism--the Romans seize on all of them, and precisely in this fusion what gives each religion its shape, the particularity that pertains to art and phantasy, is lost. " (l2 24, 507/405) in fact, "Rome becomes the pantheon in which all the gods of all the peoples are set up side by side, so that they extinguish one another; and they are all subject to the one Jupiter capitolinus, the one necessity, or to the one Rome and her fortuna. " (l2 24, 506/404)
in discussing the cultus, Hegel first mentions the religious disposition of the believer, which amounts according to him to a political disposition: "the religious disposition as such means in Rome that lordship or the universal in general is owed to the gods; it belongs to fortuna, to Juno or
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Jupiter, to a power that is in and for itself, and which is recognized and venerated in Rome's dominion. " (l2 24, 507-508/405) on the subjective side the religious pathos here is what is called Roman virtue. subjective consciousness has only value, insofar as it concentrates itself on the sal- vation of the state. the second aspect of this disposition is that human beings, as concrete, have many other purposes, interests, wishes. imagi- nation equates real worldly purposes with the infinite. therefore, "(t)his religion is consequently one of dependence; the prevailing feeling is one of dependence, of unfreedom. " (l2 24, 508/406) according to Hegel, this dependence leads to superstition, but he does not go that far as to con- tend, as he did in the Manuscript, that this feeling of dependence ulti- mately leads to the veneration of evil and the worship of the devil. this indirect charge to schleiermacher he made then, obviously could not be sustained. (l2 24, 508/406, footnote 723) the second moment of the cul- tus proper is characterized by the fact that the gods are recognized and reverenced in regard to the purposes that the believers want to achieve. "the Romans worship the gods because they need them, in other words primarily at times of stress and anxiety, i. e. , because they wish to have their own narrow interests maintained as essential. " (l2 24, 509/407) lordship of power exists only as the successful accomplishment of par- ticular purposes. Hegel closes this description, again, with an analysis of the Roman spectacles, games and festivals. in fact, nothing more than a process of death devoid of spirit, a murder game, willed by irrational caprice, serving only to give the spectators something to feast their eyes on. "this is a necessity that is mere caprice, murder without content, or having only itself for content. this and the envisagement of fate are the acme of experience, to die imperturbably through an empty caprice, not from natural causes, nor through the external force of circumstances, nor in consequence of offending against something ethical. thus dying is the only virtue a Roman patrician could exercise, and it is one he has in com- mon with slaves and with condemned criminals. " (l2 24, 510/408)
after having briefly mentioned, again, the role of the emperor ("an individual, whose wilful caprice is inevitably devoid of right and of ethi- cal life"), (l2 24, 511/408) Hegel concludes his treatment of the Roman religion, as a transition to the next stage, rather differently from the Manuscript. What we find in the Roman religion is an infinitization and universalization of the finite; the finite subject as a matter of fact. "this infinitude of subjectivity as such can be expressed more precisely as per- sonality, the category into which a human being enters as a person in the realm of right. as a person a human being owns property, has the right
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of possession. it is the person who enjoys recognition as such, but only the abstract person, the abstractly juridical person capable of ownership. it goes no further than that, and i count as infinite in this sphere only; as the infinite reference of myself to myself, i am the absolute, self-sustaining atom. " (l2 24, 511-512/409)26 in Roman religion there appears thus for the first time an infinitude of subjectivity, but only as empirical, immediate, untrue, which cannot be maintained. in this sense, there is still after all place for the Roman religion in this section B. The Religions of Spiritual Individuality, albeit a very abstract and limited one. in the next stage, infi- nite subjectivity will be taken in a much higher sense, as pertaining to the idea, to absolute spirit as it mediates itself with itself. this is the true infinite as opposed to the spurious deification of the finite ego, the most blatant form of which is worship of the Roman emperors. "the stage has been set for the confrontation between christ and caesar. "27
The Lectures of 1827
Hegel's treatment of the Roman religion in the 1827 lectures differed not much from that of 1824, both in content and length. the only remark- able differences are the transitions. now that the religion of expediency has regained an independent status again (as section c. ), just behind B. The Elevation of the Spiritual above the Natural, as the religion in which purposiveness is not yet spiritual. as a matter of fact, what is still lack- ing here, is a divine purposiveness that is holy, universal, and concrete at once. By contrasting it with the greek and Jewish religion, Hegel once again attempts to find a proper place for the Roman religion in his phe- nomenology (or typology) of determinate religions. in greek religion, con- creteness in ethical content of their gods was achieved, but what was still lacking was holiness. moreover, universality was sacrificed to multiplicity. on the other hand, the god of israel was one and holy, but was asserted as the god of a particular people, whose laws were abstract. Roman reli- gion, according to Hegel, was a relative totality, in which the greek and Jewish religions "indeed loose their one-sidedness, but both of the prin- ciples perish conjointly, each by means of assimilation into its opposite; still, it is this very homogeneity that interests us in them. the religion of
26 note that this concept of the person, as bearer of rights such as property, is treated extensively by Hegel in his Philosophy of Right (1821).
the entire first section of it, Abstract Right, deals with it. the Roman origin of this concept is convincingly accounted for.
27 Hodgson, 'editorial introduction', l2, 56.
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beauty loses the concrete individuality of its gods and hence also their ethical, independent content; the gods are reduced to means. the religion of sublimity loses the orientation toward the one, the eternal, the tran- scendent. " (l2 27, 688/580) due to its external, empirical, finite, utilitarian character, the universal purposiveness of the Romans is flawed. "Religion, when reduced to a means to extrinsic, worldly ends, is finally destroyed. Roman religion is the religion to end all religion--a fact symbolized by collecting the gods of all the religions into a single pantheon, where they are subjected to Jupiter capitolinus and destroy one another, a veritable Go? tterda? mmerung. "28
the conclusion of this section is very elliptical, and therefore the tran- sition to the next and final stage of religion, christian religion, is very difficult to reconstruct. it reads that when the moments which subsist in contradiction and in a spiritless way are unified in Roman religion, then we shall have advanced to the "next and final stage of religion. " (l2 27, 699/591) presumably these very moments are the authentic moments of the religions of beauty and sublimity, as well as the heritage of the reli- gions of nature--moments that have been "homogenized" in Roman reli- gion, but not truly unified. 29 it is not for determinate religion to truly unify preceding moments.
The Lectures of 1831
the text of 1831 on the Roman religion is very short and fragmented, and consists mainly of excerpts made by david friedrich strauss. it need not be summarized again, because the content is virtually identical with that of the preceding lectures, apart from some transitional nuances that will be discussed here.
Hegel makes the transition from greek to Roman religion as follows. 30 free spirit must come to recognize that "its value no longer consists in its being merely the free spirit of the greeks, of the citizens of this or that state, but humanity must be known freely as humanity, and god is the god of all humanity, the comprehensive, universal spirit. "31 in fact, this happens when one of the limited folk-spirits "raises itself to become the fate of all the others. " it does so through pretensions of universality,
28 idem, p. 72. 29 idem, p. 72. 30 idem, p. 86. 31 idem.
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through the politics of world mastery and of oppression, so that other peoples would become conscious of the weakness of their gods. "the fate that overthrew the world of the greeks was the world of Rome. "
However, this fate was an advance, as a matter of fact. the way by which spirit was cleansed of its finitude was by way of the absolutization of finitude, with the ensuing result that the whole world of finite gods finally collapsed itself. "the Romans orchestrated this Go? tterda? mmerung, and this was their service to the history of religion. "32 much that was good perished as well in this collapse--the happiness, serenity, and beauty of greek religion, and the transcendence, sublimity, and holiness of the god of israel, the vitality and diversity of the religions of other peoples as well. in sum: "(t)his brought to naught the serene happiness of the previous religion. this abstract power [of the emperor] brought into the world the monstrous unhappiness and anguish that were to be the birthpangs for the religion of truth. it was by renouncing satisfaction in this world that the soil for the true religion was prepared. and in the fullness of time, i. e. , when this state of despair had been brought about in the spirit of the world, god sent his son. " (l2 31, 760/642)
conclusion
it is clear from our investigation of Hegel's view on the Roman religion that this religion plays a pivotal role in the transition from the determi- nate religions to the consummate, revelatory religion: christianity. Hegel's idea that all religions preceding christianity in one way or another paved the way to it, more or less culminates in his treatment of the Roman reli- gion. Hegel's contribution to the subsequent scholarly image of Roman religion is remarkably substantial, especially his characterization of it as a religion in which fulfilment of an aim plays a decisive role. 33 His decon- struction of the commonly held view, embodied in the work of moritz,34 according to which greek and Roman religion are more or less alike, is of special significance. it enabled him to take a fresh and unprejudiced look at this religion, which resulted in a relatively new view on it, with definitively lasting importance. now in this conclusion, we shall draw a few modest inferences from Hegel's analysis, also for our present age.
32 idem.
33 see the authors mentioned in footnote 2: especially mensching and latte. 34 see footnote 21 and the corresponding text, above ? 3, introduction.
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as we have seen, the religion of the Romans is all about everyday human affairs: personal and political success, well-being, prosperity etc. gods are worshipped (and sometimes even invented) for very concrete, subjective purposes. moreover, these purposes are of a personal, maybe even selfish nature. not only is private egoism served, but public, collective egoism as well. no wonder the Roman emperor could in due course attain god-like characteristics. the ensuing tendency to superstition and finally fear and anguish gives much food for thought.
Hegel shows himself here as a master in the social psychology of reli- gion. He shows what happens in the mind of the believer when the idea of homo mensura (man is the measure of all things, attributed to protagoras) is in fact elevated to a universal, divine standard. this happens when per- sonal aims and wishes become divinised as objects of worship. as we have read in the Ms. , the result is "a crumbling away into momentary enjoy- ment and pleasure, a human animal kingdom from which all higher ele- ments have been abstracted. "35 in a way, Hegel can be read here as a critic of modern Western culture, in which--due to mass secularization-- 'all higher elements have been abstracted' in large areas of the population. categories that can be attained already in this world are nowadays gener- ally regarded as sacrosanct, like individual happiness, well-being, welfare, security, etcetera. 36 and when these are somehow threatened or jeopar- dized, either because of immigration, globalization or due to economic crisis, it can come as no surprise that fear becomes an important factor in people's minds and souls. With Hegel in mind, when he speaks on the Roman religion, we can only hope that this monstrous unhappiness and anguish will in the end prove to be the birthpangs of the religion of truth. What religion that is, remains to be seen.
? 35 Hegel, op. cit. p. 229.
36 charles taylor, A Secular Age, cambridge mass. , the Belknap press of Harvard uni- versity press: 2007, passim.
Hegel on CatHoliC Religion Peter Jonkers
1. introduction
among the vast number of books and articles about Hegel's philosophy of religion the overall majority of them focuses on his interpretation of Christianity in general, while relatively few discuss his view of Protestant- ism and even less his ideas about Catholic religion. given the importance Hegel attributes to Christianity in comparison to all other religions, and his relative lack of interest for the confessional differences within Christi- anity, this is no wonder. in Hegel's view Christianity is 'the consummate religion', that is the religion in which the abstract concept of religion has fully developed all its implications, not only as such, but also for human consciousness. 1 Since Hegel determines the essence of religion as the self- consciousness of the absolute spirit, it is only in Christianity, especially in its spiritual nature, that this spirit has become fully conscious of itself. Because of this, Christianity is also the revelatory religion: after having passed through its successive shapes, which form the history of religions, the absolute idea has revealed its essence in the spiritual nature of the Christian god, thus reaching a shape that is perfectly identical with its essence. 'Relevatoriness' and self-communication are essentially what god is, viz. spirit: the spirit moves away from immediacy toward the knowledge of what spirit is in and for itself, toward a self-consciousness that is both divine and human. the Christian doctrine of god's incarnation exempli- fies the double movement of the spirit: the divine becoming human (the substance empties itself of itself and becomes self-consciousness), and the human becomes divine (the self-consciousness empties itself of itself and makes itself into a universal self ). the essence of this doctrine is formu- lated in the creed, in particular in the articles on the humiliation and exaltation of Christ. Finally, Christianity is a religion of truth and freedom, since truth, being identical with the spirit, is its content, and since it is the
1 See the contribution of lu De Vos to this volume. Furthermore, i want to thank him for some valuable comments on an earlier version of this paper.
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religion in which all human beings are recognised to be free, not just one (as in the ancient oriental monarchies) or some (as in greek and Roman societies). 2
Because of its consummate, revelatory, true, and free character Chris- tian religion is, in Hegel's view, clearly superior to all other historical reli- gions. While many of them continue to be practised throughout the world, the spirit seems to have left them behind, implying that they only exist in a fossilized form. only Christianity lives, because it is the only religion in which the absolute spirit has become fully manifest, and is conscious of its own revelatory essence. However, (Christian) religion is not the final shape of the absolute idea. its representational form (including all kinds of sensuous elements, such as stories, tradition, rituals, images etc. ) is ill- adapted to its content, the absolute idea. therefore, it is philosophy's task to give a conceptual justification and criticism of the representational character of (Christian) religion. this will lead to a "flight of religion into philosophy", which means that philosophy is to realize the spiritual con- tent of the religious community in its proper, i. e. conceptual form. 3
Within Christian religion, Hegel distinguishes between Roman Catho- lic, lutheran, and Calvinist (or, as he calls it, reformed) confessions. in his times, these three were the dominant religions in Western europe, and also the ones that were privileged in the german federation. 4 as said above, he does not seem to be particularly interested in doctrinal aspects of these inner-Christian distinctions,5 as he considered them of minor importance in comparison to the difference between Christianity as such and the other historical religions. He was profoundly influenced by the spirit of the enlightenment, in particular by lessing's Nathan the Wise, whose ideas about the inherent unity of all religions and about religious tolerance made a strong impression on him ever since his youth. never- theless, Hegel has all his life paid considerable attention to Catholic reli- gion in his writings and lectures, starting as early as his Diary (1775) till his last lectures on Philosophy of History (1830/31) and Philosophy of Religion (1831). His main points of interest relate to Catholicism's sensuous and
2 For an overview of the essential characteristics of Christianity: P. Hodgson, Hegel and Christian Theology. A Reading of the lectures on the Philosophy of Religion, oxford: oxford University Press 2005, pp. 85 ff, and W. Jaeschke, Hegel-Handbuch. Leben-Werk-Schule, Stuttgart / Weimar: Metzler Verlag 2003, pp. 467 ff.
3 W. Jaeschke, Hegel-Handbuch, pp. 474 ff.
4 W. Jaeschke, Hegel-Handbuch, p. 396.
5 Hodgson, Hegel and Christian Theology, pp. 193; 260.
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authoritarian character, its place in the history of the world spirit, and its attitude towards the modern state.
generally speaking, Hegel considered himself as an orthodox lutheran professor of philosophy, although he only rarely made a stand for this in public. this explains to some extent his unfavourable personal attitude against Catholicism, to which he gave vent especially in his letters and personal contacts. as his friend, the Frenchman Cousin, remembered in 1866: "as soon as it was question of Catholicism mr. Hegel forgot our com- mon principles [about the indispensability of religion and the possibil- ity of a conciliation between religion and philosophy, PJ] and abandoned himself to flights rather unworthy of a philosopher," overtly showing his contempt for some typically Catholic rituals and practises, which he con- sidered as superstitious. 6
in sum, against the background of Hegel's appreciation of Christian- ity as such, regardless of its internal confessional differences, it is strik- ing that he expresses himself from time to time in a clearly depreciative way about Catholicism. as i will show below more in detail his position with regard to Roman Catholicism was fuelled by a mix of personal and political elements. therefore, i shall start with analyzing two important biographical and political facts that influenced Hegel's view of this matter. as will become apparent below, they are important to understand Hegel's philosophy of religion.
2. Personal and Political elements
the duchy of Wu? rttemberg, in which both Stuttgart, where Hegel was born, and tu? bingen, where he studied theology, lie, was a Protestant enclave in the dominantly Catholic south of germany. Hegel grew up in a family that was well aware of its strong Protestant roots, with a keen awareness of the existence of religious differences and with the convic- tion of their momentous consequences: according to a story, which was told in his family, his ancestors had emigrated from Catholic austria in the 16th Century, where the Protestants had been required to convert to Catholicism, and gone to Protestant Wu? rttemberg. 7
6 g. nicolin (ed. ), Hegel in Berichten seiner Zeitgenossen, Hamburg: Meiner Verlag 1970, p. 528 [Hegel, The Letters. Translated by C. Butler and Chr. Seiler; with commentary by C. Butler, Bloomington (ind. ): indiana University Press 1984, p. 664].
7 t. Pinkard, Hegel. A Biography, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2000, pp. 2 f; l. S. Stepelvich, 'Hegel and Roman Catholicism', in: Journal of the American Academy of
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in the course of his life, several incidents, personal as well as politi- cal, reinforced Hegel's negative predisposition towards Catholicism. He vented his feelings about these incidents in his private correspondence, but it is difficult to determine the context of these utterances adequately. therefore i will limit myself here to discussing one incident, which hap- pened at the end of his life. Because of its official character and its possible consequences for his career this incident probably caused the most seri- ous deterioration in Hegel's attitude towards Catholicism, and is probably one of the causes of the sudden change in his philosophical position with regard to Catholic religion. in the winter semester of 1825/26 a chaplain of the St. Hedwig's cathedral in Berlin had complained to minister alten- stein that Hegel had publicly slandered Catholic religion. 8 in his Lectures on the History of Philosophy he had repeated a longstanding Protestant leg- end about the Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation. according to this legend, Catholics were required to worship a mouse, as well as its excre- ments, if it were to eat the consecrated host, since the transubstantiated body of Christ would be in the mouse's stomach. 9 altenstein deftly passed the problem over to Schulze, who asked Hegel to respond in writing to the complaint. in a confidential letter of april 3, 1826 he gave a quite defiant answer in six points. First, "as professor of philosophy at a Royal Prussian University in Berlin, and as a lutheran Christian, it is only to be expected that [he] should express [him]self in such terms on the teachings and spirit of Catholicism. " Secondly, he has "not sought the opportunity to speak out on the Catholic Church," but has "had to speak of it" in his lec- tures on the history of philosophy, especially in the part about scholastic philosophy. thirdly, he did "not leave the matter [of Catholicism] at the level of generalities of either a mild or timid nature, or of a purely con- demnatory, deprecatory nature. " He has, "on the contrary, had to interpret the Catholic doctrine at its very centre--i. e. the Host, to speak of it, and to speak of it with scientific determinateness. " He has "therefore explained and expressed luther's teachings as true, and as recognised by philoso- phy as true. " Moreover, he is certainly not the only lutheran Christian,
Religion, 60, 4 (1992), p. 674. See also: J. Hoffmeister (ed. ), Briefe von und an Hegel IV/1, Hamburg: Meiner Verlag pp. 1952 ff, 8 [Henceforth: Hegel, Briefe].
8 See Pinkard, Hegel, p. 529, and Jaeschke, Hegel-Handbuch, p. 54.
9 g. W. F. Hegel, Vorlesungen. Ausgewa? hlte Nachschriften und Manuskripte, Bd. 9: Vorlesungen u? ber die geschichte der Philosophie, Hamburg: Meiner Verlag 1986, p. 27 [Henceforth: Hegel, Vorlesungen 9] [Hegel, Lectures on the History of Philosophy. Edited and translated by Robert F. Brown, Berkeley (Calif. ): University of California Press 2000, p. 47].
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who "declare[s] the Catholic doctrine on the Host to be mere papistic idolatry and superstition. " Fourthly, his remarks were made during his lec- tures, so that he "could invoke the right of oral delivery, the meaning of which, at least with regard to casual remarks, is often based on nuances even in the tone of voice, and therefore can be altered if not completely turned around through slight inconspicuous deviations, eliminations, or additions. " Fifthly, he considers it beneath his dignity to defend himself against those, who, because of the absurd and malicious conclusions they draw from his lectures, took offence at what he said. He declares a portion of the charges against him to be "errors and misunderstandings born of feeblemindedness;" another portion as "falsehoods, and yet another por- tion to be [. . . ] cases of malicious disparagement. " Hegel's conclusion (his last point) is that, if the Catholics did complain about his lectures,
they would have to blame only themselves for attending philosophical lectures at a Protestant university, under a professor, who prides himself on having been baptised and raised a lutheran, which he still is and shall remain. or else they would have to blame their superiors for failing to warn them or--as has happened elsewhere to Catholic theology students--for failing to prohibit their attendance.