Hegel's Trinitarian Claim: A Critical Reflection

Notes

Notes Preface to the Paperback Edition 1. See discussion at http://www/listproc.bucknell.edu/archives/hegel-1/ 199905/msg00315.html, accessed on August 30, 2001. 2. William Desmond, Hegel’s God. A Counterfeit Double (Aldershot, Hants, England: Ashgate, 2003) 10–11. 3. In Revue théologique de Louvain 17 (1986) 368–369. 4. See further on Hegel’s critique of Kant in Dale M. Schlitt, Experience and Spirit. A Post-Hegelian Philosophical Theology (New York: Peter Lang, 2007) 32–36, 54. Also see the helpful remarks on Hegel’s “immanent critique” of Kant made by Stephen Houlgate, The Opening of Hegel’s “Logic.” From Being to Infinity (West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press, 2006) 27–28. 5. Brito writes, “Cette solution [with reference to Schlitt’s interpretation of §§ 569–570 of Hegel’s 1830 Encyclopedia] . . . nous semble difficile à admettre: Hegel n’emploie jamais le terme de syllogisme à propos de la Trinité; et pour cause: le concept trinitaire n’est que virtuellement syllogisme; l’explicitation en syllogisme de la vie trinitaire déborde, à ses yeux, l’abstraction idéale de 1’Éternel.” Review of Hegel’s Trinitarian Claim, by Dale M. Schlitt, in Revue théologique de Louvain 17 (1986) 369. 6. See Chapter Three, notes 70 and 71 below, with the quotation found in note 71. 7. Westphal writes, “One cannot fail to mention (since Schlitt does not) the curiously Kierkegaardian character of the critique of Hegel developed here. The three claims that 1) Hegel’s system of pure thought is not available to human thinkers, 2) that the incarnation is an historical contingency that cannot be transformed into conceptual necessity, and 3) that the unity of the divine and human is not something that can be immediately perceived are precisely the three charges that Johannes Climacus levels against Hegelian philosophical theology in the Philosophical Fragments and Concluding Unscientific Postscript.” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 58 (1990) 312–314, with the quotation taken from 314. 193 194 Notes to Introduction 8. In Archives de Philosophie 50 (1987) 318–319. 9. Labarrière writes, “La ‘thèse de base’ de cette étude [Hegel’s Trinitarian Claim] est que le mouvement de l’Esprit, chez Hegel, va toujours, primairement, de l’infini au fini. . . . C’est négliger le fait, capital, que la ‘réflexion’ par autant de l’extérieur que de l’intérieur.” Introduction: Hegel’s Trinitarian Claim 1. See Hegel’s footnote in the Preface to the second (1827) edition of the Encyclopedia in E pp. 13–14. See also BR 46.13–47.33. Generally no translation is indicated for BR, NR and GI. See further in Ch. 5 n. 1 below. The philosophy of religion text cited here, BR 46.13–47.33, is probably from the 1831 or possibly from the 1827 lectures. Identification of the lecture years 1821, 1824, 1827 and 1831 will follow Hodgson in CR for the lectures on the absolute religion (found in AR) and, for the lectures found in BR, NR and GI, will follow the indications by Walter Jaeschke in “Der Aufbau und bisherigen Editionen von Hegels Vorlesungen über Philosophie der Religion” (M.A. thesis, Die Freie Universität Berlin, 1971). Unless otherwise indicated, “1821” at the end of the reference refers to the manuscript text. The 1824 lectures are cited from the Griesheim transcript as available in Lasson unless otherwise indicated. The 1827 and 1831 lectures are from the compiled student transcripts in the Lasson edition unless otherwise indicated. The 1821 manuscript will be cited according to ILT, followed by the Lasson pagination (BR, NR, GI, AR) and the English translation in CR as possible. Occasionally reference is made to WS 16 and 17 as well. On Hegel’s reaction to the philosophy and theology of his day, see further briefly in Jörg Splett, Die Trinitätslehre G. W. F. Hegels (Munich: Alber, 1965) 138. 2. See by way of entry into this question Wolfhart Pannenberg, “Die Subjektivität Gottes und die Trinitätslehre. Ein Beitrag zur Beziehung zwischen Karl Barth und der Philosophie Hegels,” Kerygma und Dogma 23 (1977) 25–40. Note also two theologians in the general Barthian tradition, Ebehard Jüngel and Jürgen Moltmann. It would be important at another time to examine in detail whether they have freed themselves of uncriticized Hegelian and Barthian presuppositions. See Ebehard Jüngel, Gott als Geheimnis der Welt, second edition (Tübingen: Mohr, 1977) and Jürgen Moltmann, Trinität...