Hello Bill,

I am glad that you read what I wrote here, as it was particularly addressed to your remarks recently about the syllogism in the Phenomenology.

I read what I wrote--and I didn't mention the word "God" once.

I backed off from my assertion about Neo-Platonism because Neo-Platonism is somewhat late. But this third to Stoicism and Skepticism is, then, without question, a precursor to Neo-Platonism.

But it all does really have to do with God. In the first form of unhappy consciousness God is simply the universal. In the second form, which is, basically, true infinity, it is the holiness of the particular. And the third form is ultimately the 'I' of reason where the priest is the mediator between God and man.

Hegel then moves to the third moment which is Reason--a moment truly without God. But, to a large extent, Hegel makes fun of reason. It is only its transition to spirit where it begins to really make sense.

But the final three moments of the Phenomenology as a whole are, first, Revealed Religion, which corresponds to the Inverted World or the first form of the unhappy consciousness, then Absolute Knowing (which is simply Hegelian philosophy) which corresponds to true infinity, and finally the Preface (otherwise titled Scientific Cognition) which corresponds to the 'I' of reason. Truly a grand syllogism.

John