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- Nov 4, 2018Dear Stephen T.,I'm glad to finally get back to your post. Yes, I agree fully that there is a sense in which "Hegel inverts Anselm."You note that Anselm "crowns" the Idea of God with "Existence." Hegel moves beyond this moment, you note, by showing how the concept of "Existence" is sublated (absorbed) by the concept of the Absolute Idea.That is, True Infinity includes the idea of Existence and much more. I think we agree on this interpretation. Thus, it is absurd to say that God merely "exists" when actually God is the very Ground of Being.Yes -- Hegel defends Anselm from the attacks leveled by Kant in his First Critique (1780), however, Hegel also criticizes Anselm from his own dialectical viewpoint. Hegel says:"When we now compare Anselm's pattern, his thought,and the thought of the present day [e.g. Kant], whatthey have in common is the fact that they both makepresuppositions. Anselm presupposes perfection,which is in itself still indeterminate, while the modernview presupposes concrete humanity as such in ageneral sense." (Hegel, LPR 3, tr. Hodgson, p. 183)So, Hegel rejects Kant's $100 riddle, but Hegel also rejects Anselm's hasty manner of articulating the Ontological Proof. Hegel chooses to update the Ontological Proof, and to give it the foundation of Dialectical Logic.This will become an elaborate procedure. In any case, Hegel does recognize the flaw of trying to prove the mere "Existence" of God. Hegel says:"There is talk of God and God's 'existence' [Dasein];'existence' is determinate, finite being -- and 'Existenz,'too, is used in a determinate sense. But God's beingis in no way a *limited* being. It would be better to say,'God and God's being,' or 'God's actuality or objectivity'."(Hegel, LPR 1, ed. Hodgson, p. 417)The flaw -- as you noted Stephen -- is in attempting to conceive of God as "Dasein," a "being-there" in some finite position in space. So, Hegel identifies the German term, "Dasein," as the wrong vocabulary for discussing the Ontology of God. Hegel also identifies the Latin term, "Existence," as the wrong vocabulary for discussing Ontology of Absolute Being.In this sense, then, I would agree with you that Hegel "inverts Anselm without dismissing his insight." God is Real; God is the very Ground of Being; and this is something greater than mere "Existence," and greater than a mere "Dasein."All best,--Paul--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
On Monday, October 29, 2018, 6:23:04 AM CDT, stephen theron stephentheron@... [hegel] <hegel@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
Dear Paul,... I am involved in editing, going over, my, Contemplating Hegel's Logic: Mind as Form of Forms...A new thought struck me today, leading to an inserted extra paragraph in the editing...It seems to me there is a sense in which Hegel inverts Anselm...Thus Anselm shows that existence must attach to the Idea, since it is infinite, as, surely, crowning it (as realist as Aquinas in this).Hegel, however, while his thought maybe includes this moment, goes beyond it in that he finds Existence, a finite category, absorbed in and by the Idea.That is, it is not just that he finds that the Idea exists. The Idea has no substance outside itself, and is the true being (end of GL), not of existence precisely (pace McTaggart and others).So it (God) does not exist as other things, which is what people often start off by trying to prove, i.e. that God exists.Thus Hegel fasten at one place on the ex- as suggesting/implying a proceeding out of something more basic (here his use of "subsist" seems worth more precise investigation..Hence I say he inverts Anselm without dismissing his insight.You could say, the Idea does not need to exist, since it "has" everything. This, it seems to me, is profoundly connected with the nature of spirit as freedom, as when Hegel says quite simply, as one knowing it, "Death is the entry into spirit", i.e. into Mind, in absolute self-consciousness, "the standpoint of science" in fact, to cite another of his phrases.Of course the idea of the infinite as contained in and therefore identical with the Absolute Idea and, secondly, the infinitude of this idea (of the infinite) can seem to be two different notions.It is even difficult to see how an "idea", inasmuch as this is a determinate concept, or anything else or other than infinite (as Hegel repeatedly points out), can be infinite, but here I maybe blur my original point by going further.So, just to draft/test some notions.Stephen Theron. - << Previous post in topic Next post in topic >>