Hello,

 

I wish to share some thoughts on Jean Wahl (1888-1974), author of Le malheur de la conscience dans la philosophie de Hegel [The Misfortune of Consciousness in Hegel’s Philosophy] (1929). Wahl is said to have “begun the theoretical discourse of the French Hegel-renaissance in 1929” with this book (Bellantone, Hegel en France II, 142). His book, in which he argues that the “unhappy consciousness” is a key to Hegel’s philosophy as a whole, remains a point of reference for this tradition. Wahl wrote widely on philosophy and later thought he had painted too romantic a portrait of Hegel’s thought. His writings include material on Anglo-American philosophy, Kierkegaard and existentialism.

 

His contemporary, the historian of philosophy Karl Löwith, presented philosophy after Hegel as developing in rival Marxist and existentialist directions in reaction to Hegel. This is true, though not exhaustive. I have made some progress in tracing the Marxist wing through my recent reading of Lukács’s work on Hegel. I wish to take this further, but I have concluded that this will require me to engage with Marx and perhaps Lenin directly rather than through summary and paraphrase. Jean Wahl on the other hand represents the existentialist direction.

 

Wahl modified the view of Hegel as primarily a logical, systematic thinker that dated back in France to Georges Noël’s La Logique de Hegel (1897). He has been criticised for not justifying central role of the “unhappy consciousness” in his reading of Hegel. He seems to see the significance of Christ in terms of this concept as an individual mediating figure required to overcome suffering. Jarczyk and Labarrière say that: “Jean Wahl contributed more than others to give French Hegelianism its existential, if not existentialist, coloring.” (De Kojève à Hegel, 27). There are English discussions of Wahl in Michael Kelly Hegel in France (1992) and Bruce Baugh French Hegel (2003).

 

I will next give a conspectus of the opening of his book, in which one can see the influence of Wilhelm Dilthey and the rediscovery of Hegel’s early manuscripts.

 

 

Wahl begins: “Hegel’s philosophy cannot be reduced to a few logical formulae. Or rather, these formulae cover something that is not of a purely logical origin. The dialectic, before being a method, is an experience by which Hegel passes from one idea to another.” (9) [This is common ground with Haym and Lukács, but the development of the thought is likely somewhat different. Lukács explicitly assimilates Wahl to Kierkegaard and to the Lebensphilosophie he attributes to the neo-Hegelians. Let us see. – SC]

 

The mind goes beyond what it is by negation. Wahl adds: “And it is in part reflection on Christian thought, on the idea of a God made man, that led Hegel to the conception of the concrete universal. Behind the philosopher, we discover the theologian, and behind the rationalist, the romantic.” (9) Despite the final atemporal standpoint, there is a “tragic, romantic, religious” element to his thought, “a kind of mysticism and emotional warmth”. Hegel began from moral and religious problems, not intellectual questions. His Youthful Writings confirm this impression. (Wahl cites Rosenkranz, Haym, Dilthey and Nohl).

 

It is clear enough what Stoicism and Skepticism are, but this is less the case with the misfortunate consciousness. [Wahl seems to have introduced this term into French as a translation of Hegel with the assistance of Maurice Boucher, In French, malheur signifies misfortune, dissatisfaction, suffering. I am not sure how precise an equivalence this has with unglücklich. – SC] There is something cosmic, rather than fleetingly historical, in the breaks, mediations and reconciliations under discussion. This is also the case with Hegel’s ideas of separation and union: in his language, separation is pain; contradiction is evil; opposition is dissatisfaction; reason is love. The unhappy consciousness is the main concept in this mixture of emotive and conceptual fragments. Hegel’s thought seems to have passed through several stages:

Hegel lived each of these positions. When consciousness becomes his key term, there is an implicit contrast with what is not conscious. [Or the object of consciousness is not clearly conceived, I would prefer to say. – SC] As a logician, he later conceived a system in which all these elements were conserved. Wahl says: “But this system, where the concepts seem at first so wonderfully handled and applied, is the expression of a lived experience; it is the answer to a question that is not purely intellectual.” (12)

 

It is a question of bringing resolution to discord, of transforming unhappiness into happiness. The writings on:

all have a common problem. Hegel’s concepts are not just inherited, they are remade in contact with an inner flame. Admittedly, the concepts lose something of their life and harden [As Haym argued – SC]. As rich as the system was, it was not rich enough to contain all the thoughts, imaginings, hopes and despair of the young Hegel.

 

[Wahl recognises the help of French scholar Maurice Boucher in the translation of the material from the Phenomenology. He seems much like an inheritor of the Diltheyan ethos of Lebensphilosophie. I wonder what A Koyré, A Kojève and H Niel made of his work. – SC]

 

End of Preface

Stephen Cowley