PRESIDENT'S ESSAY
Hamann contra Hegel
POSTED
September 21, 2009

Hegel arranges art, religion, and philosophy on a scale.  Art, bound to sensuous external stuff, is the lowest self-expression of Geist , religion’s representation ( Vorstellung ) climbs a bit higher, but the peak comes with the pure, transparent, total conceptual clarity achieved in philosophy.

Only: Even philosophy has to use language; and language, as Hamann insisted, is a perfect hypostatic union of sensible and intelligible.  From Hamann’s perspective, Hegel is just as much a gnostic and an enthusiast as Kant.

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