Loading ...
Sorry, an error occurred while loading the content.

Welcome to Yahoo Groups.

An extension to your real life group of friends, interests and communities.
What's new : see video
Attention: Starting December 14, 2019 Yahoo Groups will no longer host user created content on its sites. New content can no longer be uploaded after October 28, 2019. Sending/Receiving email functionality is not going away, you can continue to communicate via any email client with your group members. Learn More

44741Re: [hegel] Notes on the skeptical self-consciousness

Expand Messages
  • Mary Malo
    Jul 18
      Paul, 

      Correction: I meant the conjugal meaning, not connotation, of consummation. Etymology for consume is different of course but may apply whenever Hegel means abolish, which I doubt he intends for the unfolding idea of incarnation and reconciliation. Although I suppose devouring something to make it part of yourself is not the same as destroying or wasting. Consummation is appropriate whenever he means completion or perfection. Taken together they may relate to the activity of aufheben/aufhebung. Hegel's use of revealed/revelatory, from the root unveil, along with consummate imply a speculative unity in difference. Ancient religions' sacred marriage and Christianity's bridal chamber, marriage feast of the Lamb, etc. represent/resemble this unity. The unveiling and completion of difference is what spirit does, making its subjectivity objective. 

      Mary


      On Wednesday, July 17, 2019, 11:20:33 AM CDT, Mary Malo reading_for_meaning@... [hegel] <hegel@yahoogroups.com> wrote:


       

      Thank you Paul. 

      I also notice a connotation relating to antiquity's sacred marriage in the Christian church as bride with eucharist being part of the celebration. In any event, I've begun Hegel's LPR 3 Manuscript and find much about why the consummation of spirit is fulfilled by a single individual rather than several. My corresponding interest concerns the reconciliaton of the diremption. I'm not even sure I've put this properly and need to read more, post less. However when you wish to begin a thread for a close reading of LPR 3 I'm amenable.

      Mary

      On Tuesday, July 16, 2019, 12:13:34 AM CDT, Paul Trejo petrejo@... [hegel] <hegel@yahoogroups.com> wrote:


       

      Hi Mary,

      Thanks for your conversation.  I find that Hegel's LPR 2 makes his LPR 3 more interesting.   Hegel shows that Christianity doesn't arise in a vacuum, but is the spectacular version of the many World Religions that came before.

      I recognize the common tendency to dismiss all previous Religion as "pagan," or "heathen," or "primitive" and all the violent medieval imagery that goes with it.  Yet Hegel makes a Historical Point with his LPR 2.  

      LPR 1 is about Concept of Religion.   Here is the Thesis.   LPR 2 is about the History of Religion.  Here is the Antithesis.   LPR 3 is about the Consummate Religion.   Here is the Synthesis.

      Consider the word, Consummate and its etymological root, namely, "to consume."    Christianity has also been called "catholic" (small c) meaning that it strives to be Universal -- as inclusive as possible.   For some, Christianity has absorbed all the Religions that went before it.   Clearly, Christianity absorbed Judaism.   Clearly, Christianity absorbed Neo-Platonism.

      As Hegel shows, other religions had their Dying-and-Resurrecting Deities; their Incarnations and their Miracles.  One might say that Christianity absorbed them all.

      Frazier wrote of the sacrifice of a mock-king in the Babylonian feast of Sacaca.  Human sacrifices were common in Rome before Hadrian, he wrote, and in Arabia before Muhammad.  This reminds us of the bizarre story of Abraham ready to sacrifice Isaac.

      The ritual of the Eucharist, in its very details, has much in common with models even more ancient models, said Frazier.   Some might be surprised that in LPR 2 Hegel says:

      "This earliest form of Religion -- although
      one may well refuse to call it Religion -- 
      is called 'Magick.'  To be precise, it is the
      claim that the spiritual aspect is the power
      over Nature...The spiritual is at first just 
      the singular and contingent human Self-
      consciousness which, in spite of being 
      only sheer Desire, Self-consciously knows
      itself to be nobler than Nature!  It knows
      that Self-consciousness is a power 
      transcending Nature." (Hegel, LPR 2, p. 538)

      What!?  Magick is the "earliest form of Religion!?"   These words by Hegel would surely be seized upon by Glenn Magee, along with a warning about Hegel and the Hermetic sphere (2001).  

      Yet Frazier suggested this too, as did many, e.g. Freud, J.M. Robertson and Morton Smith..  Smith finds the "bread of life" saying of Jesus to be particularly magical -- ritually eating the magician and drinking his blood -- this is not only more ancient than Christianity, it is probably prehistoric.

      Therefore, in these limited senses, Christianity is far from unique.  From this limited perspective, it seems that Christianity is a copy-cat religion that has merely copied the salient features of every older religion.  Christianity copies the Mosaic Law.  Christianity copies ancient rites of sacrifice and atonement.  Christianity copies the Incarnation doctrine.  Christianity copies the Dying-and-Resurrecting Deity. 

      Christianity copies ancient legends of Miracles, perhaps from stories of Elijah, but perhaps also from the older stories of Krishna.

      Now we begin to see what Hegel meant when he boldly cited Volney, who had proposed that the Indo-European word, "Christ," is a variant of the more ancient word, "Krishna."   By the way, depending on the province, the name is sometimes pronounced, "Krishta," while in other provinces it is pronounced, "Karishma."

      Hegel mentions this because it serves his theory.   The Consummate Religion has "consumed" all previous Religions.   Here is the synthesis of the whole World History of Religion.

      So, what truly makes Christianity different and special enough for the deep-thinking Hegel to call it the Consummate Religion?   Yes, that will be revealed in his LPR 3, which, wonderfully, takes us all the way back to the LPR 1, to the Concept of Religion. 

      All best,
      --Paul


      ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
      On Monday, July 15, 2019, 09:15:45 AM CDT, Mary Malo reading_for_meaning@... [hegel] <hegel@yahoogroups.com> wrote:

       

      Hi Paul, 

      This is all new to me and will make the LPR 3 even more interesting!

      Mary

      -------------------------------------------------------
      On Sunday, July 14, 2019, 11:45:31 PM CDT, Paul Trejo petrejo@... [hegel] <hegel@yahoogroups.com> wrote: 

      In response to the Sun14Jul2019 post by Mary Malo:

      > ...As for the unhappiness and anguish of both Jewish and 
      > Roman self-consciousness, an appropriate intersection for 
      > the appearance, pages 307-310 probably relate well to your 
      > discussion with John and others about the skeptical 
      > self-consciousness.

      Well, Mary, I interpret this as your agreement with John Bardis in the context of our disagreement about the Stoic, Skeptical and Unhappy Consciousness in the early part of Hegel's Phenomenology (1807).

      I have pages 307-310 in front of me now.   Yes, I'm now confident that you've received your copy of LPR 3.   It is indeed a wonderful text.

      In my reading, these pages compare and contrast the Stoic consciousness and the Jewish consciousness.  This is surely one legitimate comparison among many.  Yet my point is that Hegel says nothing about Judaism in his section about the Unhappy Consciousness, just as he says nothing about Christianity there. 

      John Bardis is quick to jump to the ending of Hegel's PhG to interpret that early section -- and I say that changes the topic.  John Bardis also jumps to the LPR 3 to interpret the UC.  It is roughly the same as the ending of the PhG.  

      Yet if John is allowed to jump to the LPR3, then I must be allowed to jump to the LPR2.

      It is a mistake in interpreting Hegel, I say, to insist that when Hegel speaks of a stern demand for rock-hard discipline, that he must be speaking of the Greco-Roman culture -- as if earlier, Far East culture knew nothing about rock-hard discipline.

      It is a mistake in interpreting Hegel to insist that when he speaks of anguish, self-denial, purity, atonement, contrition or forgiveness -- that he must be speaking of Greco-Roman culture -- as if earlier, Far East culture knew nothing of these.

      > The antithesis within the universal -- two sides of 
      > unhappiness (attempts to bridge the cleavage of human 
      > and divine), Jewish and Roman abstractions -- requires 
      > a transition/reconciliation through a particular individual. 

      Yes, Mary, but that was just as true in the earlier religions of Buddhism and Hinduism, according to Hegel in his LPR 2.   In that case, the Individual was also known as the Incarnation, and also provided Forgiveness.   Hegel said this explicitly in his LPR 2,
      as I have shown.

      > Paul's Epistle to the Romans demonstrates this as well, 
      > vis-à-vis his explanation of Christ's fulfilling the Law/law 
      > for both Jews and Gentiles. The LPR 3 is a great 
      > complementary text to Paul's epistle...
      > 
      > Mary

      Yes, Mary, I agree with you that the LPR 3 is a wonderful text, and that it sings of the Incarnation of Christ in marvelous dimensions.

      Yet Hegel's LPR 2 is also a wonderful text.  I continue to maintain that LPR 2, with its narratives on Buddhism and Hinduism, sheds more light on Hegel's section on the Unhappy Consciousness than the majority opinion that Hegel specifically refers to Christianity there.   

      Hegel never mentions Christ there explicitly.  That should be cause for pause.

      In that section Hegel speaks of alienation, internal division, a double-consciousness, a quest for liberation, and most urgently, the "embodiment of the Unchangeable."  Readers widely presume that Hegel must mean the Incarnation in Christ.  Yet let's ask Hegel.  Hegel says:

      “The death of God is a historical feature 
      of many religions.  In the Syrian religion
      there is the death of Adonis, and similarly
      in Egyptian religion the death of Osiris..”
      (Hegel, LPR 2, p. 369)

      There Hegel mentions the "death of God" without speaking of Christianity.  The key is that, for God to die, God must first assume the form of a human being; "embodiment."   Hegel says: 

      “…We have already gone…to the concrete
      representation of God.  Hence, the moment
      of negation, in the shape in which it means
      ‘death,’ insofar as God is intuited in human 
      shape.  Thus, death is seen as highly 
      estimable, not as a determination of the
      finite as such, but as a Content of God as 
      God, immanent in God’s essence itself.”
      (Hegel, LPR 2, p. 369)
       
      Hegel does not speak of Christ's Cross here -- where death becomes a temporary attribute of God.  Hegel is speaking of Osiris and Egyptian Religion here!  Further, Hegel will emphasize this with a familiar theme.  Hegel says:

      "That God has become man occurs  
      in the Hindu religion, too; and all the 
      moments or aspects that are present 
      in the ultimate, truthful religion, also
      occur in Hinduism.”  (Hegel, LPR 2, 
      p. 374)

      There Hegel uses the phrase, "all the moments or aspects."  Thus, Hegel speaks of "embodiment" of the Unchangeable in the context of religions before Christianity.   

      If Hegel says so much about Hinduism, I feel justified in my universal interpretation for Far East models of Stoicism, Skepticism and the Unhappy Consciousness.

      So, Mary, I'm willing to discuss LPR 3 here..  Yet I'd first like an acknowledgement of my quotations from LPR 2.  I believe they're relevant to contemporary interpretation of Hegel's Unhappy Consciousness.

      All best,
      --Paul 

    • Show all 74 messages in this topic

    See more posts from Mary Malo