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The Role of Religion in Hegel's Epistemology

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 June 2015

Ardis B. Collins
Ardis B. Collins*
Affiliation:
Loyola University, Chicago
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Abstract

“Is there a way the world is regardless of how we think about it? If so, can we know the way the world is? Is knowledge a socio-historical phenomenon?” With these questions, Kenneth Westphal begins a study that explicitly aims at connecting Hegel's theory of knowledge to main stream epistemology. The project I am proposing here examines the connection between epistemological and religious issues. It will show how Hegel's strategy for an examination of knowledge changes the fundamental orientation of the epistemological project, transforms the questions we usually associate with it, and demonstrates an inseparable connection between epistemology and religion. Throughout the discussion, Westphal's questions will represent the concerns of contemporary epistemology. The project begins with an account of Hegel's strategy for a critical examination of knowledge.

Hegel defines his relation to epistemology in the Introduction to the Phenomenology of Spirit. It seems natural to assume, Hegel says, that we must first come to an understanding about cognition — its different forms, their nature and limits — before we use cognition to know what truly is. Hegel describes this assumption as “a certain uneasiness,” “a mistrust,” a “fear of error,” which “seems justified.” If we do not determine precisely what cognition can and cannot know, if we do not identify which form of cognition is appropriate for knowing reality as it truly is, we might accept as true of reality itself what is only cognition's way of knowing it.

Type
Hegel and Religion
Information
Bulletin of the Hegel Society of Great Britain , Volume 23 , Issue 1-2: number 45/46 , January 2002 , pp. 36 - 55
Copyright
Copyright © The Hegel Society of Great Britain 2002

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References

1 Westphal, Kenneth R., Hegel's Epistemological Realism (Dordrecht/Boston/London: Kluwer, 1989), p. 1 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also p. ix.

2 Phänomenologie des Geistes, eds. Wessels, Hans-Friedrich & Clairmont, Heinrich, according to the text of Gesammelte Werke Band 9, eds. Wolfgang Bonsiepen & Reinhard Heede (1980), 53–54/57–59 Google Scholar. Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit, trans. Miller, A. V. (Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press, 1977), §§73–74 Google Scholar. Subsequent citations of Hegel's Phenomenology refer first to the numerical ordering carried over from Gesammelte Werke Band 9, followed by the page numbers of the Wessels & Clairmont edition, followed by the section numbers of the Miller translation, thus: PhG 53.54/57-59 (M §§73-74).

3 PhG 54-56/59-60 (M §76).

4 PhG 59-60/66 (M §85).

5 PhG 55-60/60-67 (M §§76-86).

6 Hegel first introduces this dynamic in his account of perception's self-identical thing. See PhG 77-79/87-89 (M §§123-128); 82-86/94-98 (M §§134-139).

7 Hegel first introduces this dynamic in his account of understanding. See PhG 94102/108-119 (§§154-165).

8 PhG 63-64/70 (M §§92-93).

9 PhG 78-80/88-90 (M §§126-130).

10 PhG 82-93/94-107 (M §§134-152).

11 PhG 93-102/106-119 (M §§152-165).

12 I have developed a more complete defense of this interpretation in another essay. See “Justification and Time in Hegel's Phenomenology ,” Bulletin of the Hegel Society of Great Britain, 43/44 (2001):15–43 Google Scholar.

13 Hegel, G. W. F., Wissenschaft der Logik: Die Lehre vom Sein (1832), edited by Gawoll, Hans-Jürgen (Hamburg: Felix Meiner, 1990)Google Scholar according to the text of Gesammelte Werke Band 21, edited by Hogemann, F. & Jaeschke, W. (1985), 37–38/38–39 Google Scholar; Miller, A. V., trans., Hegel 's Science of Logic, (London: Allen & Unwin/New York: Humanities Press, 1969), pp. 53–54 Google Scholar.

14 PhG 103-105/120-122 (M §§167-168).

15 PhG 104-107/122-126 (M §§169-174).

16 PhG 104-105/122-123 (M §169).

17 PhG 103-105/120-122 (M §§167-168); 107-109/125-127 (M §§174-177); 110-111/130-131 (M §187).

18 Hegel does mention here the ‘I’ that is ‘We’ and the ‘We’ that is ‘I’ which belongs to the concept of spirit. But he also admits that in this, its first form, self-consciousness does not yet know what spirit is. We must learn how self-consciousness at this point knows itself in another self by deriving its experience from what the preceding demonstration calls for, and by examining the structure Hegel gives to this new version of self-consciousness. (PhG 108-109/127 [M §177])

19 PhG 63/69-70 (M §91); 65-66/72 (M §100); 74-75/83-84 (M §117); 109-110/127-129 (M §§178-184).

20 PhG 109-110/127-129 (M §§178-184).

21 PhG 112-119/132-140 (M §§189-201).

22 PhG 118-121/140-143 (M §§202-205).

23 PhG 120-121/142-143 (M §205); 121-122/144 (M §207).

24 I Kant, mmanuel, Kritik der reinen Vernunft, Akademie edition, Vol. 3, vol. 4 (Critique of Pure Reason), B3–4 Google Scholar; A20/B34; A51-52/B75-76; A70/B95.

25 PhG 118-119/140 (M §201). Hegel introduces the form-content issue in his account of understanding. (PhG 86-87/98-99 [M §140]; 93-95/108-109 [M §154])

26 PhG 121/143-144 (M §206).

27 PhG 121-125/143-147 (M §§206-213); 125/148 (M §216).

28 PhG 128-131/153-156 (M §§224-230). See also 125-127/149-150 (M §§217-218).

29 PhG 123-124/146 (M §211).

30 PhG 132/157 (M §231).

31 PhG 132-133/157-159 (M §§232-233).

32 PhG 136-137/162-163 (M §238).

33 PhG 131/156 (M §130).

34 “It is only the one-sided, spurious idealism that lets this unity again come on the scene as consciousness, on one side, confronted by an in-itself, on the other. But now this category or simple unity of self-consciousness and being possesses difference in itself; for its essence is just this, to be immediately one and selfsame in otherness, or in absolute difference.” (PhG [M §235] 134-135/160-161) See also PhG 132-133/157-158 (M §§231-232); 136-138/162-165 (M §§238-242).

35 PhG 130-131/155-156 (M §230). See also 363/443 (M §673).

36 PhG 238-240/288-291 (M §§438-442); 286-289/348-352 (M §§527-529); 316-320/386-391 (M §§584-591); 323-324/394 (M §595); 423-424/518 (M §791).

37 PhG 323-329/394-400 (M §§596-604); 334-337/408-410 (M §§621-623).

38 PhG 328-332/400-405 (M §§605-615); 336-342/410-417 (M §§623-633).

39 PhG 342-353/417-430 (M §§634-655).

40 PhG 352-355/430-433 (M §§655-658).

41 PhG 354-360/433-439 (M §§659-667).

42 PhG 360-362/439-442 (M §§668-671).

43 In his account of the Kantian moral world, Hegel gives us an important clue to later developments of the thought-nature issue. He says that moral consciousness thinks “only in abstractions, and does not comprehend,” and he contrasts this to “the absolute <concept>, which alone grasps otherness as such, or its absolute opposite, as its own self […].” PhG 330-331/403 (M §611).

44 PhG 362/442 (M §671); 363-364/444-445 (M §§676-677); 423-425/518-519 (M §§792-793).

45 PhG 364-365/445 (M §678); 367/448 (M §681).

46 PhG 367-368/449-450 (M §683); 404-407/494-497 (M §§758-761); 409-410/500-501 (M §§769-770); 411-412/502-504 (M §§772-775); 413-414/505-506 (M §777); 414-417/507-509 (M §780); 417-418/510-511 (M §783).

47 PhG 418-420/511-513 (M §§784-786). See also 414-417/506-509 (M §§778-780).

48 PhG 103-105/120-122 (M §§166-168); 330-331/403 (M §§611); 411-412/502-503 (M §§772-774); 431/527-528 (M §804).

49 PhG 364-366/445-446 (M §§678-679); 367/447-448 (M §681); 419-422/513-517 (M §§787-788); 425-428/519-523 (M §§794-799); 428-434/524-531 (M §§801-808).

50 PhG 363-364/444 (M §676); 414-417/ 507-509 (M §780); 422/516 (M §788); 425-426/520-521 (M §795); 427-428/523 (M §§798-799); 428-429/524-525 (M §801); 430-432/ 26-528 (M §§803-804); 432-434/529-531 (M §§806-808). See also 150/180 (M §265); 154/185 (M §§274-275).

51 Compare to Harris, , Hegel's Ladder, Vol. II., pp. 690, 719 Google Scholar.

52 “The reconciling Yea, in which the two ‘I’s let go their antithetical existence, is the existence of the ‘I’ which has expanded into a duality, and therein remains identical with itself, and, in its complete externalization and opposite, possesses the certainty of itself […].” (PhG 362/442 [M §671]).

53 PhG 242/293 (M §448); 245-246/297-298 (M §455); 262-263/318-319 (M §481); 275-276/334-335 (M §§507-508); 319-320/ 390-391 (M §591).

54 For another Hegel-inspired alternative to Hegel's position, see Schlitt, Dale M., “Trinity and Spirit,” The American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly LXIV:4 (Autumn 1990), 457–489 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.