He is neither under academic pressure as he was when writing e1, nor under the stress of the
competition
with schleiermacher as he was when composing his first course on religion (1821).
Hegels Philosophy of the Historical Religions
hegel, Enzyklopaedie der philosophischen Wissenschaften, i, ii, iii, frankfurt: suhrkamp 1970, iii, ?
572, pp.
378-393.
? 236 gerrit steunebrink
or 'everything', it suggests that 'everything is god', so, that 'this house', 'that book' and so on 'is god'. that is utterly nonsense. no philosopher and especially spinoza ever represented that position.
however, when you take the 'pan' as the 'totality' or the one substance in all individuals, it makes sense, but then there is nothing wrong with it. it says just that god is the perfection of everything in everything, the abso- lute being the truth, the goodness itself in all finite good individual things. so it says nothing more than that the finite is the finite from the infinite and vice versa. 58 As hegel says in the encyclopaedia, this pantheism is in fact monotheism. 59 nevertheless, the difference is this that pantheism abstracts from particularity and individuality. All individual finite things are passing away for the absolute. indian pantheism expresses this iden- tity of the one and general substance, according to hegel, in the words of Krishna in the bhagavad--gita, when Krishna is saying that among all existents he is always the most excellent: "Among the stars i am the shin- ing sun (. . . ), among the letters i am the vowel A, amongst seasons of the year the blossoming spring. " etc. however, for hegel's taste this kind of litany becomes monotonous and boring. 60 nevertheless, in islamic poetry pantheism has developed in a higher a more free subjective way. hegel focuses especially on the work of the persian poets rumi (1207-1273) and hafiz (hafis) (1320-1389), indeed until now two very famous muslim mys- tics, early translated and very influential in the west. moreover, especially in this muslim pantheism is an estimation of the finite world possible that is not possible in the art of the sublime in the strict sense. for art of the sublime, Judaism, the finite world is only an ornament of god.
specifically in islamic pantheistic poetry, the presence of god in the finite world is at the service of that world. hegel's characterization of the pantheism of islamic mysticism resembles surprisingly very much what he expects from Christianity: "in pantheism, on the other hand, the immanence of the divine in objects exalts mundane, natural and human existence itself into a more independent glory of its own. "61 hegel men- tions in this respect especially the poetry of hafiz. rumi is praised for the freedom of his feeling, transcending all petty interests, in which he still retains his substantial freedom and wins his self-identification with god. hafiz is praised because he was able to ensoul objects like the rose, the
58 hegel, Aesthetics, p. 271. 59 idem, p. 385.
60 idem, p. 367.
61 idem, p. 368.
? a religion after christianity? 237
nightingale, the wine, the candle , the flame, which western poets handle in a more prosaic and ornamental way. hegel opposes this 'objectivity' of feeling of the persian poetry to western poetry as more shut in upon itself and therefore subjective. however, he praises goethe, for goethe appropri- ated this islamic attitude of feeling free in objectivity in his famous book the West-Oestlicher Diwan, in which he constructed an encounter between european and islamic poetry by writing himself oriental poetry. At the end of his lectures about Aesthetics hegel praises this attitude of 'objec- tive humour' as the true attitude for modern poetry. 62 hegel uses islamic poetry as a critique of western romantic poetry and promotes, by means of islamic poetry, goethe as the true poet of 'objective' humour, that is an attitude of being 'in 'things and at the same time being 'above' them. his own idea of 'divine' life as losing and winning yourself in finiteness he found back in goethe's famous line 'stirb und werde' that is inspired by islamic symbolism. in this way, hegel thinks that islamic poetry influ- ences and contributes to western developments.
in his comparison of islam mysticism with Christian mysticism hegel stresses the 'true' subjective character of Christian mysticism. like orien- tal pantheism, it lives from the unity of the finite and the infinite, but it develops this pantheistic unity as a feeling of gods presence in subjective consciousness. hegel's example is Angel silesius. 63 he expressed in won- derful mystical power of representation the substantial existence of god in things and the unification of the self with god and god with human subjectivity, while eastern pantheism stresses more the absorption of the self in everything that is best and most splendid and emphasizes the self sacrifice of the subject in the contemplation of the one substance. Another Christian favourite is meister eckhart. (l1 24, 347-348/248)
this 'universal' mysticism comes back at the end of the encyclopaedia in his self-defence against the attack of pantheism. hegel again quotes the bhagavad-gita and, in extenso, his favourite, the 'excellent' rumi. he refers to tholuck, who in hegel's view interpreted the pantheism of persian poetry so well, but forgot all his understanding of religion when dealing with philosophy and theology. 64 hegel has to have difficulties with tholuck, for he criticized the idea of trinity, hegel's darling idea, as an idea with foreign non-Christian origins. 65 but hegel takes tholuck's
62 idem, p. 610.
63 idem, p. 371.
64 hegel, Enzyklopaedie, pp. 384-388. 65 hodgson, o. c. (see footnote 1), p. 62.
? 238 gerrit steunebrink
positive understanding of pantheistic persian poetry as a means to defend his view on pantheism, religion and philosophy. for in hegel's positive understanding of pantheism, pantheism means at least that there is a rela- tion, an identity, not unqualified, between god and the world, the infinite and the finite, the one and the many. hegel does not accept the definition of religion as the recognition of a god just as such, without any qualifica- tion, as can be found in all religions. it is very easy to unite all religions in this definition, because it does not say anything. for hegel god is totally different from a highest being, because this is a being next and opposed to other beings and therefore not all beings encompassing god. 66 panthe- ism gives a better clue to the unity of all religions and to the endeavour of philosophy: "the point of departure of all those (pantheistic) modes of representation and systems is the one and common need of all religions and philosophies of to make a representation of god and then of the rela- tion between him and the world. "67 this relation is a differential identity relation. it is the quality of this relation, that is of identity and difference that determines the differences between the religions. in the pantheistic systems, the world seems to disappear in the infinite. so the deficiency of those systems is that they do not determine the one and common sub- stance as subject and as 'spirit'. moreover, in Christian religion this deter- mination is represented by the trinity. nevertheless, hegel still prefers this unsatisfying pantheism above 'faith' (Glaube) and the abstract reflex- ivity of the enlightenment. therefore, for hegel, that pantheistic mysti- cism, well understood, of india, islam and Christianity is the expression of a common core business of all religion and philosophy.
here we hear the heartbeat of hegel's own philosophy and religios- ity. he feels himself confirmed by mystical poetry. of course he and we 'know' already that the relation of the infinite and the finite is the deter- mining factor of religion, but now the mysticism of the world religions witnesses it.
11. evaluation: islamic Art and pantheism
how real is this admiration for and how plausible is this interpretation of islamic mysticism? hegel was in the lucky circumstance that he had good sources. tholuck and Von hammer purggstall were german and
66 hegel, Enzyklopaedie, pp. 381-382. 67 idem, p. 389.
? a religion after christianity? 239
Austrian pioneers in the field of islamic religion, culture and politics. he used translations of the famous german poet ru? ckert, who still is con- sidered to be a master translator, inside and outside germany. goethe's West-oestlicher Divan was a good source too. normally muslims do not like orientalising literature. however, for goethe they make an exception. for some muslims goethe even was a crypto-muslim. we saw already that sir mohammad iqbal loved goethe's representation of islam. he loved hegel's dynamic interpretation of rumi too. the famous expert on islamic mysticism, Annemarie schimmel, does not hesitate to quote goethe's Diwan in almost all her works as a true representation of the spirit of islamic poetry. 68 therefore, hegel was in good company. the admiration is well founded.
it manifests the romantic strand in hegel's thought. goethe himself made the transition from classicism to romanticism in his Diwan, in his admiration for non-western and non-classicistic literature.
in addition, ever since islamic poetry was discovered by german and english romantics, it belonged to the treasures of world literature and never failed to attract new readers. it was the favourite access to islam for Christians. especially the figure of rumi is almost an icon of alternative religiosity in the west. only the qualification of islamic poetry as panthe- ism is old fashioned. Already muslim reform thinkers like iqbal protested against a pantheistic conception of islam by muslims themselves, because it stimulated fatalism. According to louis massignon, islam and islamic mysticism is essentially 'testimonial monism', the 'monism' of a lover testifying of his beloved: 'you are the only one'. only with regard to the mystical thinker ibn Arabi one sometimes still speaks of pantheism or of 'existential monism', but certainly not of rumi, whose spiritual world is very testimonial, dynamic and personal as hegel knew. 69
but with the inadequate qualification of pantheism, he still could discover something typical of, for example, hafiz' poetry. when hegel stresses that his poetry is ensouling the whole world of finite things by god's presence, and gives them their own place, he reproduces in his own way a typical feature of that literature. in hafiz you never know whether the poem is about god and mystical rapture or just about wine, drunk- enness and the tavern. still modern interpreters estimate the dictum of
68 Cf. Annemarie schimmel, As Through a Veil, Mystical Poetry in Islam, new york: Columbia university press 1982, pp. 49, 216 note 17.
69 for a critical discussion see, Annemarie schimmel, The Mystical Dimensions of Islam, Chapel hill, north Carolina: the university of north Carolina press 1975, p. 267.
? 240 gerrit steunebrink
ru? ckert that hafiz always expresses by means of sensual realities a super- sensible realm of being. 70 the question is of course whether this poetical technique of hafiz has something to do with hegel's idea of the (semi) autonomy of the finite world. moreover, hegel makes things complicated by using this poetry, mediated by goethe, in a polemic with modern 'sub- jectivist' trends in german literature of his days. however, hegel's analysis of the problem of pantheism, his stressing of the relational character of finiteness and infinity as such, is still of vital importance for the under- standing of religion. moreover, hegel rightly uses mysticism as testimonial evidence.
Conclusion
what strikes us most in hegel's dealing with islam, is how modern already the religious world is his days was. the discussion about the fanatic char- acter of islam, or of all monotheism, is going on since then. the hindu philosopher and first president of india, s. radhakrishnan, writing in times of muslim separatism and Christian missions, again praised the greek and romans and reproached islam and Christianity for intolerance. At the same time, he tried to unite all religions by mysticism. 71 in modern times, the former president of iran, Khatami, tried to find access to the western world by sufism. hegel's enthusiasm for sufism and the bhagavad-gita elu- cidates the saying of the poet heinrich heine (1779-1856), that it was fash- ionable among german students of his time to learn sanskrit and to read hegel. 72 the romantic enthusiasm for mysticism, including islamic sufism, as the internationale of all religion and philosophy, present in the bud in hegel's thought, is a returning phenomenon in modern european history. it manifested itself again heavily between the two world wars and once more in the 'hippy' sixties of the twentieth century. reincarnated in the 'sixties', hegel himself could have been, for a while, a long-haired student-, striving for a better world, reading mystical texts and, god knows, smok- ing a joint. At the end, of course, hegel criticized romanticism heavily and did not want to give in to its innate tendency to take refuge to another
70 J. Ch. bu? rgel, 'einleitung', in: muhammad schams Ad-din hafis, Gedichte aus dem Diwan, ed. J. Ch. bu? rgel, stuttgart: reclam 1972, pp. 3-31.
71 s. radhakrishnan, A Hindu View of Life, london: Allan and unwinn 1964 (first edition 1927), pp. 37-40.
72 dierk mo? ller, 'nachwort' in: heinrich heine, Ideen, Das Buch Le Grand, stuttgart: reclam 1972, pp. 75-96, 82.
? a religion after christianity? 241
world, to idealized oriental cultures or to the greek and mediaeval past. therefore, he went back to Christianity as the cultural source of his own place and time, the reality he wanted to understand. this of course does not justify his neglect of the islam as a genuine religion in his lectures on the philosophy of religion. Certainly not acceptable is his interpretation of islam in function of Christian-european evolution. A good comparison of religion starts with the destruction of teleological schemes, as was done by romantics like herder and hermeneutical thinkers like dilthey. never- theless, hegel certainly was a romantic too and reaped the fruits of that movement. the positive emphatic understanding hegel has of islam, his genuine and appropriate admiration for islamic mystical poetry is due to this romantic background. hegel read all he could read about islam and other religions in his days, but sciences, like 'history of religions', 'compar- ative sciences of religions', were not really developed at that time. from that point of view, it is amazing that hegel could develop sometimes such a sympathetic understanding of islam.
Hegel and Protestantism lu de Vos
1. introduction
in the text 'Concerning an accusation of Public disparagement of the Catholic religion' (U? ber eine Anklage wegen o? ffentlicher Verunglimpfung der katholischen Religion), Hegel claims to be born, to be educated and to live as a lutheran, and to give courses at a lutheran university. 1 such a state- ment shows that Hegel remains a lutheran Protestant, while also being a philosopher who claims to present truth philosophically. this leads to the question, what could be the philosophical value and thus the true ratio- nality of lutheran Protestantism as a specific form of Christian religion. 2 is this denomination realy as prominent in Hegel's writings and courses, as it seems to be in his personal letters? 3 a simple observation, however, seems to contradict Hegel's Protestant claim: at least in his courses on the philosophy of religion (and what were a better place to show it? ), Hegel focuses only on how the lutheran confession gives the most insightful interpretation of the Christian eucharist. moreover, his interpretation of religion more generally seems eclectic and transconfessional. 4 is Hegel fundamentally a Protestant; or is he first and foremost a speculative phi- losopher? moreover, how are these two roles linked together?
Hegel was in fact born and educated in a Protestant family, followed the courses at the Stift in tu? bingen to become a preacher, and gave les- sons on religion at the Protestant Gymnasium in nurnberg, a Protestant city in Catholic Bavaria. However, these biographical details do not suf- ficiently address the questions about the rationality and philosophical
1 g. W. F. Hegel, Berliner Schriften, Werke 11, Frankfurt am main: suhrkamp Verlag 1970, pp. 68-70; this text is part of a defensive answer against an attack by a roman-Catholic priest, following Hegel's courses given at the University of Berlin.
2 let us be prudent from the beginning: the notions of Protestantism (and of other Christian denominations) discussed here are only those of the beginning of the 19th cen- tury, not those of our--hopefully more ecumenical--time.
3 see P. Jonkers, ? Hegel on Catholic religion? (in this volume).
4 P. Hodgson, Hegel and Christian Theology, oxford: oxford University Press 2005, p. 193.
? 244 lu de vos
importance of Protestantism as such. even the claim (given only in e2)5 that religion and philosophy have the same content, is too vague to be helpful on this point.
to answer the question on the relative significance of Hegel's Protes- tantism and his philosophical presentation of it, i will focus on Hegel's later period (1827-1831), the period that follows immediately after the (either personal or strategic) confession quoted above. 6 Hegel's presenta- tion of Christianity (even of its highest form--Protestantism) is too dif- ferentiated to summarize effectively in one paper. 7 the publications on which i will focus are the second and third versions of the Encyclopaedia (e2 from 1827 & e3 of 1830), some book-reviews from the Jahrbu? cher fu? r wissenschaftliche Kritik (16: 17-310) and the latin Oratio (Speech for the Celebration of the Jubilee of the Confessio Augustana, 1830; 16: 311-322). the most interesting and important texts for our purposes here will be the courses on the philosophy of religion from 1827 and 1831 (the latter of which is only extant in summaries),8 and the further courses on the Proofs of the existence of god (1829; 18: 215-218 & 228-336) and on his- tory (1830/31, with a new introduction-manuscript, 18: 119-214) from this period. 9 even as Hegel's work progresses further (it is visible in the
5 to be clear on the difference: Encyclopedia (1817) (further e1) gives no parallel claim, but stresses the beginning of philosophy (such as the Science of Logic), and only from the second Preface of the same book (1827), is there a difficult discussion with people of simple faith. the third Preface (1830), on the contrary, may be read as a full discussion with all those who cannot distinguish between religious forms 'of the catechism' and the task of philosophical thinking, a discussion, which has its origin in the criticisms of anonymous writers as well as of non-philosophers, refuted by Hegelian Recensions.
6 the basis of this restriction is that Hegel (by 1827) seems to have elaborated a good deal of his philosophical problems.
He is neither under academic pressure as he was when writing e1, nor under the stress of the competition with schleiermacher as he was when composing his first course on religion (1821). instead, he was at the pinnacle of his renown, but even then still under harsh criticism, just on the point of the Christianity of his phi- losophy (on the issue of his or schelling's pantheism).
7 even the quote from the handbook, that religion could or should be the representa- tion of absolute knowing is, as position within the framework of the PhSp, limited to that book or time. moreover, even there it should be said, that it is not religion, but religious, speculative knowledge (9: 407), which is the first content containing aspect of absolute knowing.
8 it would be very useful and interesting to find a new student notebook of the course on religion of 1831, to be certain of the changes in structure and content of the concept and of the elaboration of religion there.
9 i'm quoting here in each case Hegel's writings from the Gesammelte Werke with Volume and page number (the encyclopedia with e2 or e3 and ? , if necessary also with a (=remarks)); the Courses (Vorlesungen, Hamburg: meiner Verlag 1983 ff ) are cited by V{olume} and page; the course on world-history, g. W. F. Hegel, Die Philosophie der Geschichte, 1830/31 -Heimann, Hrsg. Kl. Vieweg, mu? nchen: Fink 2005 (quoted as Vie and page).
? hegel and protestantism 245
structure of the concept of religion as well as in the new introduction to the philosophy of history), he has reached such maturity that things are as clear as possible; and in fact there is a consistency in his philosophical view on Protestantism, that it renders Hegel's struggle with the reality of the different aspects of Protestantism coherent. 10
insofar as lutheran Protestantism is a religious, Christian phenomenon, this paper will inquire into the program of the Hegelian philosophy of religion, in four stages. 1) it will determine the place of religion and Chris- tianity within Hegel's general philosophical program. 2) it will argue that the Protestant or lutheran form of Christianity is a more complex phe- nomenon than is expressed by its denominational particularity; it also has a special significance for world-history in general. 3) thirdly, this paper will address some possible religious objections to Hegel's philosophical program or approach. 4) Finally, there will follow a short conclusion in which the main Hegelian thesis will reappear, that a philosophy (even of religion) cannot be sufficiently criticised by religious means alone.
2. Hegel's Program of a Philosophy of religion
Hegel's philosophy of religion is not (Christian) theology. it is not apolo- getic. its concern is not the metaphysical validity of a specific religion, nor is this its main topic. it is not a part (i. e. a 'handmaid') of the theological defence of a certain, Christian or Protestant form of religion. 11 it is not a philosophy that accepts the rational validity of Christian faith and reli- gion. in this sense, it is not a generally Christian, nor specifically lutheran philosophy, but rather simply philosophy. Hegel's speculative philosophy of religion is also not a simple description of what is,12 it is not a presen- tation of how believers hope (and mostly claim dogmatically) that their
10 For differences even within that view, one may refer to my Die Grenze der Politik, in: Hegel-Jahrbuch 2000, 236-245 and Religion--Staat--Geschichte bei Hegel (1827-1831), in: a. arndt u. a. (Hrsg. ) Staat und Religion in Hegels Rechtsphilosophie. Berlin: akademie Ver- lag 2009, 37-55.
11 such a form was often taken up by the obviously metaphysical (mostly neo-thomis- tic) theodicies in a catholic vein (until the sixties of the last century), where the existence of god could be proven by philosophical reason alone, and the specific religious form was that given by Christian religion.
12 if philosophy is only a description, it is a needless duplication of actuality, insofar as it is the concern of all theoretical sciences to give an (understandable and reliable) descrip- tion of actuality. a rational presentation has to give a more interesting version of actuality than simple (self-evident, phenomenal, and/or experience-based) description.
? 246 lu de vos
beliefs, as well as the objects of those beliefs, are in fact true and real. Hegel's philosophy of religion is a methodologically rational presentation of religion as such (not particularly Jewish, islamic or Christian, etc. ). in order to find and discover at least the possibility of reason in religion, reason must be present even in (Protestant) Christianity.
reason is primarily and most importantly that which we all use in think- ing and acting, but moreover, it is that which indicates that an insight is knowable for everyone, and able to be judged on just such justifiable grounds. For a critical philosopher (after Kant or Fichte), rationality in this sense must be the object of its own thematic inquiry, and such an inquiry is the central task of philosophy, called 'logic' by Kant and Hegel (or 'science of knowledge' by Fichte). this basic point already sets apart every simple argument of a normal (i. e. non-philosophical) kind, which include religious arguments, and which presuppose, and never question, the content of rationality itself. such an inquiry, the special task of phi- losophy, is thus neither Christian, nor Catholic, nor Protestant, but rather necessarily and simply rational. Hegel's philosophy is in this way critical of every normal (positivist, religious, and/or merely descriptive) understand- ing, insofar as such an understanding claims to be philosophical in an immediate sense. only if a content can be said to be rational (that is, can be addressed in and through in critical terms), can it be said to be philo- sophical. therefore, according to Hegel, even the topic 'god' is no longer available to philosophy in a strict sense, as the (traditional, metaphysical) topic of a natural theology, insofar as Hegel accepts the fundamental cri- tique of Kant against any substrate that could be considered independent of rational thinking. 13 if such a religious and purely theological topic is to have any coherence, it may appear only within a philosophy of that reality, that is, within a philosophy of religion.
Hegel's philosophy of religion, at the same time, opposes the reduction by the enlightenment, which claims that religion lacks any validity (of its own), that only positive knowledge of sensible things of the visible and measurable world is knowledge properly speaking, and that the notion of 'god' is either ideologically false (i. e. atheism) or is an empty metaphysi-
13 see my 'l'ontologie proble? matique dans la philosophie allemande classique', in: e. gaziaux (e? d. ), Philosophie et Theologie, leuven, 2007, 61-84; see also H. F. Fulda, 'die ontologie und ihr schicksal' in: Hegel, Critique de Kant, Revue Internationale de Philosophie 53, 1999, pp. 465-483. the theological description of its topics--god and revelation--, is under critique only insofar as a theology pretents to speak also for those people, who do not participate in the same religious faith.
? hegel and protestantism 247
cal claim (i. e. deism) (V3, p. 356). this latter conclusion, however, is also accepted by Hegel, albeit on other grounds, in relation to metaphysics. that such a conclusion is not destructive to religion is just Hegel's point, insofar as religion can present the name of god and the matters, which are His domain, on their own terms, as living spirit. neither was Hegel's goal a historical, exegetical one, following from the enlightenment, in which the historical sources alone where the primary objects of inquiry, as in schleiermacher (V3, pp. 356-7; V5, p. 300). that sort of inquiry, however, was not completely foreign to him, insofar as Hegel himself participated in the movement of the Leben Jesu-Forschung (in moral terms). more spe- cifically, Hegel accepts the main difference between the 'Jesus' of histori- cal biblical science on the one hand, and the communal or ecclesiastic (theological) 'Christ' on the other, which he posits after the controversy over Protestant orthodoxy with reimarus and lessing. 14
Hegel's philosophy rejects supernaturalism, which accepts faith or posi- tive revelation ('Offenbarungsglaube') as the origin of (even philosophical) knowledge. in fact, such supernaturalism is the position of faith, which regards itself (in its self-certainty) as an insight acceptable for everybody, even philosophically. 15 Furthermore, Hegel's philosophy has no confidence in the rationality of pietism, which holds that there may be no (reflected) knowledge of divine things, but only the inner awareness of the existence of god and divine events, for the pietist himself. Both of these positions are responses to the enlightenment and are (specifically) religious posi- tions, in which the notion of rational knowledge is neither justified by critical inquiry, nor open to everyone. therefore, they are purely religious positions, certain of themselves, but not philosophical ones. in fact, Hegel will consider enlightenment rationality and pietism as specifically (philo- sophically) 'problematic' positions. on the contrary, the position of faith as a religious (rather than philosophical) position is rejected or accepted as what it is in truth: simple faith. the enlightenment is very critical or sceptical of the (misuses of ) religion, but uses only the reflected criterion
14 Hegel will not apply this strict division between Jesus and Christ in his texts, but insofar as he does not accept the resurrection as an historical fact, but rather as a fact of the community of spirit, was the result of the controversy started by lessing-reimarus (Fragmenten-streit), he is indebted to that movement. see also H. gutschmidt, Vernunft- einsicht und Glaube, go? ttingen: Vandenhoeck & ruprecht 2007, p. 61.
15 For Hegel, there is no specifically Christian philosophy at all. Philosophy is the wis- dom of the world, where even an atheist must think in a valid way about the rationality of religion, at least as an important social and historical fact with its own truth-claims.
? 248 lu de vos
of reason (for Hegel, as understanding). 16 Pietism represents a simple form of religion, which is necessary, but not sufficient for religion to be grasped in its full sense. 17
the rational presentation of religion (by philosophy), on the other hand, is a conceptual presentation; and in as far as conceptuality is the mark of philosophy, this presentation is a discourse on (conceptual) knowing, and not on things. in such a presentation, a 'given' phenom- enon or domain (i. e. religion) is conceptually situated and determined within the framework of a conceptual approach to actuality: religion is neither reduced to a pre-given other domain (that of neuroscience or his- tory e. g. , as in the positivist approach), nor accepted without question, in a dogmatic or emotional way. such a rational presentation does not reject other rational (domain-specific) presentations of specific religions (i. e. historical or theological ones), which present religion either not in religious terms or, on the other hand, as religion elucidated only for the faithful. these presentations are not the affair of reason as such, nor are they philosophical. However, theological presentations, in as far as there is no one true religion, are nevertheless systematic interlocutors. Hegel's presentation shows (or proves) to what extent theological entities and events should be interpreted as concepts, and thus be considered ratio- nally valid. in this way, religion as such, and not any specific (even con- summated) religion, is taken up within a philosophical framework that can be considered rational. 18
16 For Hegel (as for Kant), there is a difference between understanding and reason; the understanding is the normal use of rationality, reason is the philosophical inquiry about the meaning of rationality in every sense (theoretical in sciences, practical, political, his- torical). applied, the rationality used within a specific sphere of inquiry is that of a fixed ontology, whereas rationality as such is to be determined by philosophical logic or phi- losophy as such.
17 supernaturalism as a theology, which only claims in vain to be philosophical, was not a serious intellectual challenge to Hegel, although it attacked his position within the public sphere and annihilated his philosophy after Hegel's death with simple positions about immortality and god's personality.
18 a philosophy of religion is a philosophical discipline of 'reality'. a philosophy of nature or history has to be based on physics in general (i. e. in the sense of 'the science of nature') or on the science of history. However, philosophy transforms the philosophical presuppositions of these constituted sciences (beings (entia) or events e. g. ). in the same way, a philosophy of religion has to take seriously theologies as sciences of religion, but such a philosophy is no longer part of any theology, but rather treats all theology as provid- ing it with conceptually insufficient data about religion for its philosophical elaboration. if this restriction were not accepted by theology, then such a theology would seem to present a positivistic version of religion (or to be supernaturalism).
? hegel and protestantism 249 3. religion and Christianity
the development of a specific philosophy of religion (as a human activ- ity) is (after Kant) a philosophical necessity, insofar as 'god' as an inde- pendent being can no longer be considered a valid topic of philosophical inquiry, as was the case in the metaphysical proofs of natural theology, in view of his status as the highest being. 19 How religion specifically fits into the framework of philosophy or how religion can deliver valid thoughts in philosophy, is subsequently the basic problem. Philosophy of religion remains a possibility. this is--evidently--not itself a theological problem, nor a problem for a philosophy that is only concerned with the potential intelligibility of dogmatically accepted faith.
Hegel's treatment of philosophy in the Encyclopaedia answers the fun- damental question of the place of religion in philosophy: the whole sphere of absolute spirit is called 'religion'. this absolute spirit, however, is not a new 'entity', independent of knowing, but is rather 'only' a new self- conception of spirit. Within this sphere, a possible definition of the treat- ment of religious topics in a philosophical manner is also given. 20 the validity of religion seems restricted, insofar as its definition is concerned, to philosophical knowing, which does not claim a transcendent (non- conceptual) validity. 21 religion itself is defined as the highest sphere of the whole philosophy of spirit, where spirit in its ultimate self-conception justifies or reflects the whole of philosophy. moreover, spirit is not some thing, but a concept, which appears in different forms. these forms (indi- viduals, states, the arts) are only forms of spirit, in as far as these forms constitute the minimal concept of spirit; through this constitution they construct a specific identity as a particular coming out of nature (e3 ? 381). in this way, there are subjective spirits, who constitute singular individu- als, since they claim in their natural individuality to be thinking and free forms. moreover, there are objective spirits, which constitute their identity
19 see W. Jaeschke, Die Vernunft in der Religion, stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: Frommann- Holzboog 1986, pp. 18-133. For an (insufficient but very interesting) attempt to refute Kantian premises in order to give new proofs, see W. Cramer, Das Absolute und das Kontin- gente, Frankfurt a. m. : Klostermann 1959, 19762 and Gottesbeweise und ihre Kritik, Frankfurt am main: Klostermann 1967.
20 see H. -F. Fulda, Hegels Begriff des absoluten Geistes, in Hegel-Studien 36, Berlin: 2001, pp. 171-198, who stresses that even an atheist should accept this proposed definition in search of a further justification.
21 in e (with exclusion of the revealed religion), the term 'god' does not appear in the main text, as it is a specifically religious term. the encyclopaedia, indeed, is a philosophical book, neither a religious or a theological treatise.
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in taking together their own nature, the many of (individual) spirits, living on their territory.
absolute spirit is, as will become clear, not an entity, but its own form (thinkable as a philosophical concept), in which, only by thinking such an absolute sphere, spirit can completely guarantee its own specificity, and show itself as the pure manifestation of freedom. in opposition to enlightenment thought, Hegel asserts: if god is spirit, his concept is not empty (as was that of the god of natural theology), but he has fulfilled the minimal definitions and claims or requirements of the notion of spirit, in as far as only his spiritual form enables him to construct an intelligible identity as spirit. 22 only within this presentation does Hegel's philosophy assume the task of natural philosophy to 'close' the system of philosophy. However, this task is not performed in the manner or method of theology, to guarantee independent beings, nor according to its content, concerned with the highest being.
this concept of religion is the elaboration of the introduction to 'abso- lute spirit' (e3 ? ? 553-555), and this encyclopaedic concept of religion (or, of absolute spirit) is proposed to be further determined by art, consummated religion, and philosophy. if this is really the case, then some problems arise, insofar as it is not immediately clear how this concept of absolute spirit can be the starting point of a philosophy of religion. 23 to begin a philosophy of religion, a sort of philosophy which seems to be presented independently, there is to be taken up out of religion a name 'god' (i. e. the term ? god? ), that must constitute the specific difference, defined by the notion of spirit itself. such a name is itself not the result of other parts of philosophy, but it has, as a new term (and thus, as representation), the mark of the real philosophy, a new and empty form (which, through phi- losophy, must be determined further).
thus: (a) With this concept of religion, the conceptual necessity of a religious form is presented. (b) in such a philosophical presentation, it is
22 this program is dependent upon the speculative doctrine of the concept, which has to spell out its own (negatively discerned or in a sceptical way attacked) determinations, so that the result is, at the same time, the completed concept and the justification of its real specificity.
23 the second problem, for those who are familiar with Hegel in a general way, is, why philosophy, and not the Christian religion, which is called the truth of religion, would be the ultimate result. a solution to this could be that the Christian religion is the truth of the concept of religion as religion. Philosophy, on the other hand, fulfils the concept of spirit adequately, insofar as it negates the form of representation, and presents the concept of spirit itself in its truth (and purity).
? hegel and protestantism 251
the rationality or--minimally--the universal recognition of the specifi- cally Christian religion--as the truth of religion as such--which will be worked out thereafter.
a. The Concept of Religion Proper
in Hegel's elaboration of his philosophy of religion, the concept of religion is its specific starting point. it has three parts, the concept of god (not given in this form in the philosophy of absolute spirit), religious knowl- edge, and cult.
this elaborated concept begins from the (at this point, empty) term 'god' as with that which is specific to religious claims. 'god' is the name for a specific religious reality fulfilling the (initially abstract) definition of absolute spirit as the correspondence of real spirit with its concept. With- out such a name, whether it is Zeus, JHWH or simply 'god', there is no recognisable religious dimension at all. on this introduction, two points can be made: 'god' is a name, so it is the initial approach of religion as such and, on the other hand, if religion is the highest form within spirit, god is also taken as the philosophical (or philosophically explainable) truth of the totality of spirit. 24
'god' as the new, specifically religious term and, up to this point, as an unknown determination, must unfold through its elaboration or devel- opment in a conceptual, scientific way. at this point, there is only the thought of the empty concept 'god' as the specificity or the claimed truth of all infinitude. only in as far as it can be elaborated within forms and institutions, which are the specifications for the use of such a concept (i. e. religions), can it be seen how and in what way it is rational. only in this way is there a new content (i. e. religions), which works in and through history to explain the specific (ideal) spirituality of spirit, or, in as far as freedom has such a spiritual form, to be recognised by all
24 With this definition, Hegel is not following the alternative that there is either a new philosophical theology (Jaeschke's position on the view of Hodgson) or a theo-anthropol- ogy (Feuerbach), given by Hodgson, (op. cit. , 13). religion is in fact not reducible to some- thing less complex or less determined (say biology, psychology (Feuerbach), ethics (Kant), politics (neo-marxism), or history. But, its main concern does remain rationally empty as long as there is not a (religiously) attributable essence of spirit (i. e. the truth of spirit). rationally, this essence could be interpreted as something other than spirit, but this is not a strange independent entity called 'god'. in fact, philosophy of religion replaces (ersetzt) the old philosophical theology, but is neither a new form of particular metaphysics, nor an aspect of speculative metaphysics proper.
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spirit. 25 However, as the starting point (of a philosophy of religion), such a truth remains abstract. it claims nothing, with the exception that god is, and that he is one truth over and against all other truths that have been asserted and sublated before (like those of nature and finite spirit, which failed to bring themselves to completion). even as absolute subsistence, 'god' is not concrete. 26 there is nothing in the name alone that the differ- ent names of god(s) can fulfil immediately, or that corresponds to the dif- ferent names of god(s) (ghost(s), re, Zeus, Jupiter, JHWH, god the Father, etc. ). With a name alone, it may be a concept or a pure representation, but there is not yet religion.
such a god becomes concrete only if he is the basis and moment of his development (as a concept), and the principle of his own (conceptual) particularisation.
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or 'everything', it suggests that 'everything is god', so, that 'this house', 'that book' and so on 'is god'. that is utterly nonsense. no philosopher and especially spinoza ever represented that position.
however, when you take the 'pan' as the 'totality' or the one substance in all individuals, it makes sense, but then there is nothing wrong with it. it says just that god is the perfection of everything in everything, the abso- lute being the truth, the goodness itself in all finite good individual things. so it says nothing more than that the finite is the finite from the infinite and vice versa. 58 As hegel says in the encyclopaedia, this pantheism is in fact monotheism. 59 nevertheless, the difference is this that pantheism abstracts from particularity and individuality. All individual finite things are passing away for the absolute. indian pantheism expresses this iden- tity of the one and general substance, according to hegel, in the words of Krishna in the bhagavad--gita, when Krishna is saying that among all existents he is always the most excellent: "Among the stars i am the shin- ing sun (. . . ), among the letters i am the vowel A, amongst seasons of the year the blossoming spring. " etc. however, for hegel's taste this kind of litany becomes monotonous and boring. 60 nevertheless, in islamic poetry pantheism has developed in a higher a more free subjective way. hegel focuses especially on the work of the persian poets rumi (1207-1273) and hafiz (hafis) (1320-1389), indeed until now two very famous muslim mys- tics, early translated and very influential in the west. moreover, especially in this muslim pantheism is an estimation of the finite world possible that is not possible in the art of the sublime in the strict sense. for art of the sublime, Judaism, the finite world is only an ornament of god.
specifically in islamic pantheistic poetry, the presence of god in the finite world is at the service of that world. hegel's characterization of the pantheism of islamic mysticism resembles surprisingly very much what he expects from Christianity: "in pantheism, on the other hand, the immanence of the divine in objects exalts mundane, natural and human existence itself into a more independent glory of its own. "61 hegel men- tions in this respect especially the poetry of hafiz. rumi is praised for the freedom of his feeling, transcending all petty interests, in which he still retains his substantial freedom and wins his self-identification with god. hafiz is praised because he was able to ensoul objects like the rose, the
58 hegel, Aesthetics, p. 271. 59 idem, p. 385.
60 idem, p. 367.
61 idem, p. 368.
? a religion after christianity? 237
nightingale, the wine, the candle , the flame, which western poets handle in a more prosaic and ornamental way. hegel opposes this 'objectivity' of feeling of the persian poetry to western poetry as more shut in upon itself and therefore subjective. however, he praises goethe, for goethe appropri- ated this islamic attitude of feeling free in objectivity in his famous book the West-Oestlicher Diwan, in which he constructed an encounter between european and islamic poetry by writing himself oriental poetry. At the end of his lectures about Aesthetics hegel praises this attitude of 'objec- tive humour' as the true attitude for modern poetry. 62 hegel uses islamic poetry as a critique of western romantic poetry and promotes, by means of islamic poetry, goethe as the true poet of 'objective' humour, that is an attitude of being 'in 'things and at the same time being 'above' them. his own idea of 'divine' life as losing and winning yourself in finiteness he found back in goethe's famous line 'stirb und werde' that is inspired by islamic symbolism. in this way, hegel thinks that islamic poetry influ- ences and contributes to western developments.
in his comparison of islam mysticism with Christian mysticism hegel stresses the 'true' subjective character of Christian mysticism. like orien- tal pantheism, it lives from the unity of the finite and the infinite, but it develops this pantheistic unity as a feeling of gods presence in subjective consciousness. hegel's example is Angel silesius. 63 he expressed in won- derful mystical power of representation the substantial existence of god in things and the unification of the self with god and god with human subjectivity, while eastern pantheism stresses more the absorption of the self in everything that is best and most splendid and emphasizes the self sacrifice of the subject in the contemplation of the one substance. Another Christian favourite is meister eckhart. (l1 24, 347-348/248)
this 'universal' mysticism comes back at the end of the encyclopaedia in his self-defence against the attack of pantheism. hegel again quotes the bhagavad-gita and, in extenso, his favourite, the 'excellent' rumi. he refers to tholuck, who in hegel's view interpreted the pantheism of persian poetry so well, but forgot all his understanding of religion when dealing with philosophy and theology. 64 hegel has to have difficulties with tholuck, for he criticized the idea of trinity, hegel's darling idea, as an idea with foreign non-Christian origins. 65 but hegel takes tholuck's
62 idem, p. 610.
63 idem, p. 371.
64 hegel, Enzyklopaedie, pp. 384-388. 65 hodgson, o. c. (see footnote 1), p. 62.
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positive understanding of pantheistic persian poetry as a means to defend his view on pantheism, religion and philosophy. for in hegel's positive understanding of pantheism, pantheism means at least that there is a rela- tion, an identity, not unqualified, between god and the world, the infinite and the finite, the one and the many. hegel does not accept the definition of religion as the recognition of a god just as such, without any qualifica- tion, as can be found in all religions. it is very easy to unite all religions in this definition, because it does not say anything. for hegel god is totally different from a highest being, because this is a being next and opposed to other beings and therefore not all beings encompassing god. 66 panthe- ism gives a better clue to the unity of all religions and to the endeavour of philosophy: "the point of departure of all those (pantheistic) modes of representation and systems is the one and common need of all religions and philosophies of to make a representation of god and then of the rela- tion between him and the world. "67 this relation is a differential identity relation. it is the quality of this relation, that is of identity and difference that determines the differences between the religions. in the pantheistic systems, the world seems to disappear in the infinite. so the deficiency of those systems is that they do not determine the one and common sub- stance as subject and as 'spirit'. moreover, in Christian religion this deter- mination is represented by the trinity. nevertheless, hegel still prefers this unsatisfying pantheism above 'faith' (Glaube) and the abstract reflex- ivity of the enlightenment. therefore, for hegel, that pantheistic mysti- cism, well understood, of india, islam and Christianity is the expression of a common core business of all religion and philosophy.
here we hear the heartbeat of hegel's own philosophy and religios- ity. he feels himself confirmed by mystical poetry. of course he and we 'know' already that the relation of the infinite and the finite is the deter- mining factor of religion, but now the mysticism of the world religions witnesses it.
11. evaluation: islamic Art and pantheism
how real is this admiration for and how plausible is this interpretation of islamic mysticism? hegel was in the lucky circumstance that he had good sources. tholuck and Von hammer purggstall were german and
66 hegel, Enzyklopaedie, pp. 381-382. 67 idem, p. 389.
? a religion after christianity? 239
Austrian pioneers in the field of islamic religion, culture and politics. he used translations of the famous german poet ru? ckert, who still is con- sidered to be a master translator, inside and outside germany. goethe's West-oestlicher Divan was a good source too. normally muslims do not like orientalising literature. however, for goethe they make an exception. for some muslims goethe even was a crypto-muslim. we saw already that sir mohammad iqbal loved goethe's representation of islam. he loved hegel's dynamic interpretation of rumi too. the famous expert on islamic mysticism, Annemarie schimmel, does not hesitate to quote goethe's Diwan in almost all her works as a true representation of the spirit of islamic poetry. 68 therefore, hegel was in good company. the admiration is well founded.
it manifests the romantic strand in hegel's thought. goethe himself made the transition from classicism to romanticism in his Diwan, in his admiration for non-western and non-classicistic literature.
in addition, ever since islamic poetry was discovered by german and english romantics, it belonged to the treasures of world literature and never failed to attract new readers. it was the favourite access to islam for Christians. especially the figure of rumi is almost an icon of alternative religiosity in the west. only the qualification of islamic poetry as panthe- ism is old fashioned. Already muslim reform thinkers like iqbal protested against a pantheistic conception of islam by muslims themselves, because it stimulated fatalism. According to louis massignon, islam and islamic mysticism is essentially 'testimonial monism', the 'monism' of a lover testifying of his beloved: 'you are the only one'. only with regard to the mystical thinker ibn Arabi one sometimes still speaks of pantheism or of 'existential monism', but certainly not of rumi, whose spiritual world is very testimonial, dynamic and personal as hegel knew. 69
but with the inadequate qualification of pantheism, he still could discover something typical of, for example, hafiz' poetry. when hegel stresses that his poetry is ensouling the whole world of finite things by god's presence, and gives them their own place, he reproduces in his own way a typical feature of that literature. in hafiz you never know whether the poem is about god and mystical rapture or just about wine, drunk- enness and the tavern. still modern interpreters estimate the dictum of
68 Cf. Annemarie schimmel, As Through a Veil, Mystical Poetry in Islam, new york: Columbia university press 1982, pp. 49, 216 note 17.
69 for a critical discussion see, Annemarie schimmel, The Mystical Dimensions of Islam, Chapel hill, north Carolina: the university of north Carolina press 1975, p. 267.
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ru? ckert that hafiz always expresses by means of sensual realities a super- sensible realm of being. 70 the question is of course whether this poetical technique of hafiz has something to do with hegel's idea of the (semi) autonomy of the finite world. moreover, hegel makes things complicated by using this poetry, mediated by goethe, in a polemic with modern 'sub- jectivist' trends in german literature of his days. however, hegel's analysis of the problem of pantheism, his stressing of the relational character of finiteness and infinity as such, is still of vital importance for the under- standing of religion. moreover, hegel rightly uses mysticism as testimonial evidence.
Conclusion
what strikes us most in hegel's dealing with islam, is how modern already the religious world is his days was. the discussion about the fanatic char- acter of islam, or of all monotheism, is going on since then. the hindu philosopher and first president of india, s. radhakrishnan, writing in times of muslim separatism and Christian missions, again praised the greek and romans and reproached islam and Christianity for intolerance. At the same time, he tried to unite all religions by mysticism. 71 in modern times, the former president of iran, Khatami, tried to find access to the western world by sufism. hegel's enthusiasm for sufism and the bhagavad-gita elu- cidates the saying of the poet heinrich heine (1779-1856), that it was fash- ionable among german students of his time to learn sanskrit and to read hegel. 72 the romantic enthusiasm for mysticism, including islamic sufism, as the internationale of all religion and philosophy, present in the bud in hegel's thought, is a returning phenomenon in modern european history. it manifested itself again heavily between the two world wars and once more in the 'hippy' sixties of the twentieth century. reincarnated in the 'sixties', hegel himself could have been, for a while, a long-haired student-, striving for a better world, reading mystical texts and, god knows, smok- ing a joint. At the end, of course, hegel criticized romanticism heavily and did not want to give in to its innate tendency to take refuge to another
70 J. Ch. bu? rgel, 'einleitung', in: muhammad schams Ad-din hafis, Gedichte aus dem Diwan, ed. J. Ch. bu? rgel, stuttgart: reclam 1972, pp. 3-31.
71 s. radhakrishnan, A Hindu View of Life, london: Allan and unwinn 1964 (first edition 1927), pp. 37-40.
72 dierk mo? ller, 'nachwort' in: heinrich heine, Ideen, Das Buch Le Grand, stuttgart: reclam 1972, pp. 75-96, 82.
? a religion after christianity? 241
world, to idealized oriental cultures or to the greek and mediaeval past. therefore, he went back to Christianity as the cultural source of his own place and time, the reality he wanted to understand. this of course does not justify his neglect of the islam as a genuine religion in his lectures on the philosophy of religion. Certainly not acceptable is his interpretation of islam in function of Christian-european evolution. A good comparison of religion starts with the destruction of teleological schemes, as was done by romantics like herder and hermeneutical thinkers like dilthey. never- theless, hegel certainly was a romantic too and reaped the fruits of that movement. the positive emphatic understanding hegel has of islam, his genuine and appropriate admiration for islamic mystical poetry is due to this romantic background. hegel read all he could read about islam and other religions in his days, but sciences, like 'history of religions', 'compar- ative sciences of religions', were not really developed at that time. from that point of view, it is amazing that hegel could develop sometimes such a sympathetic understanding of islam.
Hegel and Protestantism lu de Vos
1. introduction
in the text 'Concerning an accusation of Public disparagement of the Catholic religion' (U? ber eine Anklage wegen o? ffentlicher Verunglimpfung der katholischen Religion), Hegel claims to be born, to be educated and to live as a lutheran, and to give courses at a lutheran university. 1 such a state- ment shows that Hegel remains a lutheran Protestant, while also being a philosopher who claims to present truth philosophically. this leads to the question, what could be the philosophical value and thus the true ratio- nality of lutheran Protestantism as a specific form of Christian religion. 2 is this denomination realy as prominent in Hegel's writings and courses, as it seems to be in his personal letters? 3 a simple observation, however, seems to contradict Hegel's Protestant claim: at least in his courses on the philosophy of religion (and what were a better place to show it? ), Hegel focuses only on how the lutheran confession gives the most insightful interpretation of the Christian eucharist. moreover, his interpretation of religion more generally seems eclectic and transconfessional. 4 is Hegel fundamentally a Protestant; or is he first and foremost a speculative phi- losopher? moreover, how are these two roles linked together?
Hegel was in fact born and educated in a Protestant family, followed the courses at the Stift in tu? bingen to become a preacher, and gave les- sons on religion at the Protestant Gymnasium in nurnberg, a Protestant city in Catholic Bavaria. However, these biographical details do not suf- ficiently address the questions about the rationality and philosophical
1 g. W. F. Hegel, Berliner Schriften, Werke 11, Frankfurt am main: suhrkamp Verlag 1970, pp. 68-70; this text is part of a defensive answer against an attack by a roman-Catholic priest, following Hegel's courses given at the University of Berlin.
2 let us be prudent from the beginning: the notions of Protestantism (and of other Christian denominations) discussed here are only those of the beginning of the 19th cen- tury, not those of our--hopefully more ecumenical--time.
3 see P. Jonkers, ? Hegel on Catholic religion? (in this volume).
4 P. Hodgson, Hegel and Christian Theology, oxford: oxford University Press 2005, p. 193.
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importance of Protestantism as such. even the claim (given only in e2)5 that religion and philosophy have the same content, is too vague to be helpful on this point.
to answer the question on the relative significance of Hegel's Protes- tantism and his philosophical presentation of it, i will focus on Hegel's later period (1827-1831), the period that follows immediately after the (either personal or strategic) confession quoted above. 6 Hegel's presenta- tion of Christianity (even of its highest form--Protestantism) is too dif- ferentiated to summarize effectively in one paper. 7 the publications on which i will focus are the second and third versions of the Encyclopaedia (e2 from 1827 & e3 of 1830), some book-reviews from the Jahrbu? cher fu? r wissenschaftliche Kritik (16: 17-310) and the latin Oratio (Speech for the Celebration of the Jubilee of the Confessio Augustana, 1830; 16: 311-322). the most interesting and important texts for our purposes here will be the courses on the philosophy of religion from 1827 and 1831 (the latter of which is only extant in summaries),8 and the further courses on the Proofs of the existence of god (1829; 18: 215-218 & 228-336) and on his- tory (1830/31, with a new introduction-manuscript, 18: 119-214) from this period. 9 even as Hegel's work progresses further (it is visible in the
5 to be clear on the difference: Encyclopedia (1817) (further e1) gives no parallel claim, but stresses the beginning of philosophy (such as the Science of Logic), and only from the second Preface of the same book (1827), is there a difficult discussion with people of simple faith. the third Preface (1830), on the contrary, may be read as a full discussion with all those who cannot distinguish between religious forms 'of the catechism' and the task of philosophical thinking, a discussion, which has its origin in the criticisms of anonymous writers as well as of non-philosophers, refuted by Hegelian Recensions.
6 the basis of this restriction is that Hegel (by 1827) seems to have elaborated a good deal of his philosophical problems.
He is neither under academic pressure as he was when writing e1, nor under the stress of the competition with schleiermacher as he was when composing his first course on religion (1821). instead, he was at the pinnacle of his renown, but even then still under harsh criticism, just on the point of the Christianity of his phi- losophy (on the issue of his or schelling's pantheism).
7 even the quote from the handbook, that religion could or should be the representa- tion of absolute knowing is, as position within the framework of the PhSp, limited to that book or time. moreover, even there it should be said, that it is not religion, but religious, speculative knowledge (9: 407), which is the first content containing aspect of absolute knowing.
8 it would be very useful and interesting to find a new student notebook of the course on religion of 1831, to be certain of the changes in structure and content of the concept and of the elaboration of religion there.
9 i'm quoting here in each case Hegel's writings from the Gesammelte Werke with Volume and page number (the encyclopedia with e2 or e3 and ? , if necessary also with a (=remarks)); the Courses (Vorlesungen, Hamburg: meiner Verlag 1983 ff ) are cited by V{olume} and page; the course on world-history, g. W. F. Hegel, Die Philosophie der Geschichte, 1830/31 -Heimann, Hrsg. Kl. Vieweg, mu? nchen: Fink 2005 (quoted as Vie and page).
? hegel and protestantism 245
structure of the concept of religion as well as in the new introduction to the philosophy of history), he has reached such maturity that things are as clear as possible; and in fact there is a consistency in his philosophical view on Protestantism, that it renders Hegel's struggle with the reality of the different aspects of Protestantism coherent. 10
insofar as lutheran Protestantism is a religious, Christian phenomenon, this paper will inquire into the program of the Hegelian philosophy of religion, in four stages. 1) it will determine the place of religion and Chris- tianity within Hegel's general philosophical program. 2) it will argue that the Protestant or lutheran form of Christianity is a more complex phe- nomenon than is expressed by its denominational particularity; it also has a special significance for world-history in general. 3) thirdly, this paper will address some possible religious objections to Hegel's philosophical program or approach. 4) Finally, there will follow a short conclusion in which the main Hegelian thesis will reappear, that a philosophy (even of religion) cannot be sufficiently criticised by religious means alone.
2. Hegel's Program of a Philosophy of religion
Hegel's philosophy of religion is not (Christian) theology. it is not apolo- getic. its concern is not the metaphysical validity of a specific religion, nor is this its main topic. it is not a part (i. e. a 'handmaid') of the theological defence of a certain, Christian or Protestant form of religion. 11 it is not a philosophy that accepts the rational validity of Christian faith and reli- gion. in this sense, it is not a generally Christian, nor specifically lutheran philosophy, but rather simply philosophy. Hegel's speculative philosophy of religion is also not a simple description of what is,12 it is not a presen- tation of how believers hope (and mostly claim dogmatically) that their
10 For differences even within that view, one may refer to my Die Grenze der Politik, in: Hegel-Jahrbuch 2000, 236-245 and Religion--Staat--Geschichte bei Hegel (1827-1831), in: a. arndt u. a. (Hrsg. ) Staat und Religion in Hegels Rechtsphilosophie. Berlin: akademie Ver- lag 2009, 37-55.
11 such a form was often taken up by the obviously metaphysical (mostly neo-thomis- tic) theodicies in a catholic vein (until the sixties of the last century), where the existence of god could be proven by philosophical reason alone, and the specific religious form was that given by Christian religion.
12 if philosophy is only a description, it is a needless duplication of actuality, insofar as it is the concern of all theoretical sciences to give an (understandable and reliable) descrip- tion of actuality. a rational presentation has to give a more interesting version of actuality than simple (self-evident, phenomenal, and/or experience-based) description.
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beliefs, as well as the objects of those beliefs, are in fact true and real. Hegel's philosophy of religion is a methodologically rational presentation of religion as such (not particularly Jewish, islamic or Christian, etc. ). in order to find and discover at least the possibility of reason in religion, reason must be present even in (Protestant) Christianity.
reason is primarily and most importantly that which we all use in think- ing and acting, but moreover, it is that which indicates that an insight is knowable for everyone, and able to be judged on just such justifiable grounds. For a critical philosopher (after Kant or Fichte), rationality in this sense must be the object of its own thematic inquiry, and such an inquiry is the central task of philosophy, called 'logic' by Kant and Hegel (or 'science of knowledge' by Fichte). this basic point already sets apart every simple argument of a normal (i. e. non-philosophical) kind, which include religious arguments, and which presuppose, and never question, the content of rationality itself. such an inquiry, the special task of phi- losophy, is thus neither Christian, nor Catholic, nor Protestant, but rather necessarily and simply rational. Hegel's philosophy is in this way critical of every normal (positivist, religious, and/or merely descriptive) understand- ing, insofar as such an understanding claims to be philosophical in an immediate sense. only if a content can be said to be rational (that is, can be addressed in and through in critical terms), can it be said to be philo- sophical. therefore, according to Hegel, even the topic 'god' is no longer available to philosophy in a strict sense, as the (traditional, metaphysical) topic of a natural theology, insofar as Hegel accepts the fundamental cri- tique of Kant against any substrate that could be considered independent of rational thinking. 13 if such a religious and purely theological topic is to have any coherence, it may appear only within a philosophy of that reality, that is, within a philosophy of religion.
Hegel's philosophy of religion, at the same time, opposes the reduction by the enlightenment, which claims that religion lacks any validity (of its own), that only positive knowledge of sensible things of the visible and measurable world is knowledge properly speaking, and that the notion of 'god' is either ideologically false (i. e. atheism) or is an empty metaphysi-
13 see my 'l'ontologie proble? matique dans la philosophie allemande classique', in: e. gaziaux (e? d. ), Philosophie et Theologie, leuven, 2007, 61-84; see also H. F. Fulda, 'die ontologie und ihr schicksal' in: Hegel, Critique de Kant, Revue Internationale de Philosophie 53, 1999, pp. 465-483. the theological description of its topics--god and revelation--, is under critique only insofar as a theology pretents to speak also for those people, who do not participate in the same religious faith.
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cal claim (i. e. deism) (V3, p. 356). this latter conclusion, however, is also accepted by Hegel, albeit on other grounds, in relation to metaphysics. that such a conclusion is not destructive to religion is just Hegel's point, insofar as religion can present the name of god and the matters, which are His domain, on their own terms, as living spirit. neither was Hegel's goal a historical, exegetical one, following from the enlightenment, in which the historical sources alone where the primary objects of inquiry, as in schleiermacher (V3, pp. 356-7; V5, p. 300). that sort of inquiry, however, was not completely foreign to him, insofar as Hegel himself participated in the movement of the Leben Jesu-Forschung (in moral terms). more spe- cifically, Hegel accepts the main difference between the 'Jesus' of histori- cal biblical science on the one hand, and the communal or ecclesiastic (theological) 'Christ' on the other, which he posits after the controversy over Protestant orthodoxy with reimarus and lessing. 14
Hegel's philosophy rejects supernaturalism, which accepts faith or posi- tive revelation ('Offenbarungsglaube') as the origin of (even philosophical) knowledge. in fact, such supernaturalism is the position of faith, which regards itself (in its self-certainty) as an insight acceptable for everybody, even philosophically. 15 Furthermore, Hegel's philosophy has no confidence in the rationality of pietism, which holds that there may be no (reflected) knowledge of divine things, but only the inner awareness of the existence of god and divine events, for the pietist himself. Both of these positions are responses to the enlightenment and are (specifically) religious posi- tions, in which the notion of rational knowledge is neither justified by critical inquiry, nor open to everyone. therefore, they are purely religious positions, certain of themselves, but not philosophical ones. in fact, Hegel will consider enlightenment rationality and pietism as specifically (philo- sophically) 'problematic' positions. on the contrary, the position of faith as a religious (rather than philosophical) position is rejected or accepted as what it is in truth: simple faith. the enlightenment is very critical or sceptical of the (misuses of ) religion, but uses only the reflected criterion
14 Hegel will not apply this strict division between Jesus and Christ in his texts, but insofar as he does not accept the resurrection as an historical fact, but rather as a fact of the community of spirit, was the result of the controversy started by lessing-reimarus (Fragmenten-streit), he is indebted to that movement. see also H. gutschmidt, Vernunft- einsicht und Glaube, go? ttingen: Vandenhoeck & ruprecht 2007, p. 61.
15 For Hegel, there is no specifically Christian philosophy at all. Philosophy is the wis- dom of the world, where even an atheist must think in a valid way about the rationality of religion, at least as an important social and historical fact with its own truth-claims.
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of reason (for Hegel, as understanding). 16 Pietism represents a simple form of religion, which is necessary, but not sufficient for religion to be grasped in its full sense. 17
the rational presentation of religion (by philosophy), on the other hand, is a conceptual presentation; and in as far as conceptuality is the mark of philosophy, this presentation is a discourse on (conceptual) knowing, and not on things. in such a presentation, a 'given' phenom- enon or domain (i. e. religion) is conceptually situated and determined within the framework of a conceptual approach to actuality: religion is neither reduced to a pre-given other domain (that of neuroscience or his- tory e. g. , as in the positivist approach), nor accepted without question, in a dogmatic or emotional way. such a rational presentation does not reject other rational (domain-specific) presentations of specific religions (i. e. historical or theological ones), which present religion either not in religious terms or, on the other hand, as religion elucidated only for the faithful. these presentations are not the affair of reason as such, nor are they philosophical. However, theological presentations, in as far as there is no one true religion, are nevertheless systematic interlocutors. Hegel's presentation shows (or proves) to what extent theological entities and events should be interpreted as concepts, and thus be considered ratio- nally valid. in this way, religion as such, and not any specific (even con- summated) religion, is taken up within a philosophical framework that can be considered rational. 18
16 For Hegel (as for Kant), there is a difference between understanding and reason; the understanding is the normal use of rationality, reason is the philosophical inquiry about the meaning of rationality in every sense (theoretical in sciences, practical, political, his- torical). applied, the rationality used within a specific sphere of inquiry is that of a fixed ontology, whereas rationality as such is to be determined by philosophical logic or phi- losophy as such.
17 supernaturalism as a theology, which only claims in vain to be philosophical, was not a serious intellectual challenge to Hegel, although it attacked his position within the public sphere and annihilated his philosophy after Hegel's death with simple positions about immortality and god's personality.
18 a philosophy of religion is a philosophical discipline of 'reality'. a philosophy of nature or history has to be based on physics in general (i. e. in the sense of 'the science of nature') or on the science of history. However, philosophy transforms the philosophical presuppositions of these constituted sciences (beings (entia) or events e. g. ). in the same way, a philosophy of religion has to take seriously theologies as sciences of religion, but such a philosophy is no longer part of any theology, but rather treats all theology as provid- ing it with conceptually insufficient data about religion for its philosophical elaboration. if this restriction were not accepted by theology, then such a theology would seem to present a positivistic version of religion (or to be supernaturalism).
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the development of a specific philosophy of religion (as a human activ- ity) is (after Kant) a philosophical necessity, insofar as 'god' as an inde- pendent being can no longer be considered a valid topic of philosophical inquiry, as was the case in the metaphysical proofs of natural theology, in view of his status as the highest being. 19 How religion specifically fits into the framework of philosophy or how religion can deliver valid thoughts in philosophy, is subsequently the basic problem. Philosophy of religion remains a possibility. this is--evidently--not itself a theological problem, nor a problem for a philosophy that is only concerned with the potential intelligibility of dogmatically accepted faith.
Hegel's treatment of philosophy in the Encyclopaedia answers the fun- damental question of the place of religion in philosophy: the whole sphere of absolute spirit is called 'religion'. this absolute spirit, however, is not a new 'entity', independent of knowing, but is rather 'only' a new self- conception of spirit. Within this sphere, a possible definition of the treat- ment of religious topics in a philosophical manner is also given. 20 the validity of religion seems restricted, insofar as its definition is concerned, to philosophical knowing, which does not claim a transcendent (non- conceptual) validity. 21 religion itself is defined as the highest sphere of the whole philosophy of spirit, where spirit in its ultimate self-conception justifies or reflects the whole of philosophy. moreover, spirit is not some thing, but a concept, which appears in different forms. these forms (indi- viduals, states, the arts) are only forms of spirit, in as far as these forms constitute the minimal concept of spirit; through this constitution they construct a specific identity as a particular coming out of nature (e3 ? 381). in this way, there are subjective spirits, who constitute singular individu- als, since they claim in their natural individuality to be thinking and free forms. moreover, there are objective spirits, which constitute their identity
19 see W. Jaeschke, Die Vernunft in der Religion, stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: Frommann- Holzboog 1986, pp. 18-133. For an (insufficient but very interesting) attempt to refute Kantian premises in order to give new proofs, see W. Cramer, Das Absolute und das Kontin- gente, Frankfurt a. m. : Klostermann 1959, 19762 and Gottesbeweise und ihre Kritik, Frankfurt am main: Klostermann 1967.
20 see H. -F. Fulda, Hegels Begriff des absoluten Geistes, in Hegel-Studien 36, Berlin: 2001, pp. 171-198, who stresses that even an atheist should accept this proposed definition in search of a further justification.
21 in e (with exclusion of the revealed religion), the term 'god' does not appear in the main text, as it is a specifically religious term. the encyclopaedia, indeed, is a philosophical book, neither a religious or a theological treatise.
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in taking together their own nature, the many of (individual) spirits, living on their territory.
absolute spirit is, as will become clear, not an entity, but its own form (thinkable as a philosophical concept), in which, only by thinking such an absolute sphere, spirit can completely guarantee its own specificity, and show itself as the pure manifestation of freedom. in opposition to enlightenment thought, Hegel asserts: if god is spirit, his concept is not empty (as was that of the god of natural theology), but he has fulfilled the minimal definitions and claims or requirements of the notion of spirit, in as far as only his spiritual form enables him to construct an intelligible identity as spirit. 22 only within this presentation does Hegel's philosophy assume the task of natural philosophy to 'close' the system of philosophy. However, this task is not performed in the manner or method of theology, to guarantee independent beings, nor according to its content, concerned with the highest being.
this concept of religion is the elaboration of the introduction to 'abso- lute spirit' (e3 ? ? 553-555), and this encyclopaedic concept of religion (or, of absolute spirit) is proposed to be further determined by art, consummated religion, and philosophy. if this is really the case, then some problems arise, insofar as it is not immediately clear how this concept of absolute spirit can be the starting point of a philosophy of religion. 23 to begin a philosophy of religion, a sort of philosophy which seems to be presented independently, there is to be taken up out of religion a name 'god' (i. e. the term ? god? ), that must constitute the specific difference, defined by the notion of spirit itself. such a name is itself not the result of other parts of philosophy, but it has, as a new term (and thus, as representation), the mark of the real philosophy, a new and empty form (which, through phi- losophy, must be determined further).
thus: (a) With this concept of religion, the conceptual necessity of a religious form is presented. (b) in such a philosophical presentation, it is
22 this program is dependent upon the speculative doctrine of the concept, which has to spell out its own (negatively discerned or in a sceptical way attacked) determinations, so that the result is, at the same time, the completed concept and the justification of its real specificity.
23 the second problem, for those who are familiar with Hegel in a general way, is, why philosophy, and not the Christian religion, which is called the truth of religion, would be the ultimate result. a solution to this could be that the Christian religion is the truth of the concept of religion as religion. Philosophy, on the other hand, fulfils the concept of spirit adequately, insofar as it negates the form of representation, and presents the concept of spirit itself in its truth (and purity).
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the rationality or--minimally--the universal recognition of the specifi- cally Christian religion--as the truth of religion as such--which will be worked out thereafter.
a. The Concept of Religion Proper
in Hegel's elaboration of his philosophy of religion, the concept of religion is its specific starting point. it has three parts, the concept of god (not given in this form in the philosophy of absolute spirit), religious knowl- edge, and cult.
this elaborated concept begins from the (at this point, empty) term 'god' as with that which is specific to religious claims. 'god' is the name for a specific religious reality fulfilling the (initially abstract) definition of absolute spirit as the correspondence of real spirit with its concept. With- out such a name, whether it is Zeus, JHWH or simply 'god', there is no recognisable religious dimension at all. on this introduction, two points can be made: 'god' is a name, so it is the initial approach of religion as such and, on the other hand, if religion is the highest form within spirit, god is also taken as the philosophical (or philosophically explainable) truth of the totality of spirit. 24
'god' as the new, specifically religious term and, up to this point, as an unknown determination, must unfold through its elaboration or devel- opment in a conceptual, scientific way. at this point, there is only the thought of the empty concept 'god' as the specificity or the claimed truth of all infinitude. only in as far as it can be elaborated within forms and institutions, which are the specifications for the use of such a concept (i. e. religions), can it be seen how and in what way it is rational. only in this way is there a new content (i. e. religions), which works in and through history to explain the specific (ideal) spirituality of spirit, or, in as far as freedom has such a spiritual form, to be recognised by all
24 With this definition, Hegel is not following the alternative that there is either a new philosophical theology (Jaeschke's position on the view of Hodgson) or a theo-anthropol- ogy (Feuerbach), given by Hodgson, (op. cit. , 13). religion is in fact not reducible to some- thing less complex or less determined (say biology, psychology (Feuerbach), ethics (Kant), politics (neo-marxism), or history. But, its main concern does remain rationally empty as long as there is not a (religiously) attributable essence of spirit (i. e. the truth of spirit). rationally, this essence could be interpreted as something other than spirit, but this is not a strange independent entity called 'god'. in fact, philosophy of religion replaces (ersetzt) the old philosophical theology, but is neither a new form of particular metaphysics, nor an aspect of speculative metaphysics proper.
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spirit. 25 However, as the starting point (of a philosophy of religion), such a truth remains abstract. it claims nothing, with the exception that god is, and that he is one truth over and against all other truths that have been asserted and sublated before (like those of nature and finite spirit, which failed to bring themselves to completion). even as absolute subsistence, 'god' is not concrete. 26 there is nothing in the name alone that the differ- ent names of god(s) can fulfil immediately, or that corresponds to the dif- ferent names of god(s) (ghost(s), re, Zeus, Jupiter, JHWH, god the Father, etc. ). With a name alone, it may be a concept or a pure representation, but there is not yet religion.
such a god becomes concrete only if he is the basis and moment of his development (as a concept), and the principle of his own (conceptual) particularisation.
