Hegel_absolute as the Beginning of Logic

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Philosophical FormVol. 6 1974-5

THE ABSOLUTE AS THE BEGINNING OF HEGBL'S LOGICROLF AHLERS

I . TH E RELATION OF THE LOGIC TO ABSOLUTE KNOWLEDGE IN THEPHENOMENOLOGY

In the section which prepares for the investigation of the Logic, entitled"Wherewith must the Beginning of Science be made?," Hegel characterisesthe relation of the Phenomenology to the Logic by saying that the formerwork is the "science of the appearing spirit," which must be understoodas the "presupposition " of "pure science." The "unmediated consciousness" is in the Phenomenology the object of its "unmediated science."*By distinction, the Logic is "pure science," i.e., "pure science in the totalimplication of its development."2 The Logic as pure science has thPhenomenologythe. unmediated science of unmediated consciousnessas its own presupposition. The latter work is therefore the presuppositionof the former insofar as the result of the analysis of the appearing spiritis the absolute knowledge. In this absolute knowledge, the result of thePhenomenology, "spirit has gained the concept" and develops its essenceand movement "in this ether of its life, and is science." 8 In this science"the moments of its movement present themselves no longer as determinedforms of consciousness," but rather as definite concepts and as their own"organically self-founding movement" which is possible through theirdifference retreating into "their self."4

We could therefore expect the Logic to spell out with precision thedeterminants of pure science. But in this we are mistaken. If the momentsof appearing spirit lead to the necessity to determine precisely the innermovement of that science itself, we are surprised to find that the Logicdoes not begin here, but rather with "undetermined immediacy." In looking at the relation of Book I of the Logic, the logic of being, Sein, toBook II, the logic of essence or reflection, we are surprised to find thatthe relation of being to essence is circular insofar as only the results of288


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THE ABSOLUTE AS THE BEGINNING OF HEGEL'S LOGICthe process of thought can spell out the legitimacy and therefore rationalityof the presuppositions. The point of the logic of being is that the verypresuppositions of logical thought lie beyond the realm of reflection, andonly after these presuppositions have been dealt with in all their "undetermined immediacy," can legitimate reasons be arrived at in the logic ofreflection (Book II).y It is Hegel's point that a beginning in logical thought cannot be madeby reflecting on that beginning. That procedure would imply placing difference into the beginning even before its identity has been permitted tobe the origin of that difference. And precisely a beginning is to be made.Hegel's use of the words "absolute" and "absolute knowledge" arise fromthe attempt not to describe how a beginning can be made, but rather tomake a beginning. The deliberations on essence in the second book differfrom the deliberations of being in Book I insofar as the former is thereflexive aspect of pure being. The first sentence of Book II states thatthe "truth of being is essence." Only in this new development within self-sufficient being the determination of being takes place, and being is determined in its specificity.Therefore we read in thefirstbook, in the opening sentences on being,that "being is the undetermined imm ediacy."5 The concept "undetermined"is a reflex of the determination which takes place in the logic of essence inBook II, Here is the place where the term "undetermined immediacy" hasits material origin, and not at the beginning of the logic of being, where itappears first.0 The spelling-out of being itself in the logic of essence is therefore the reflex of being, and only in this mirrored image can ont seeprecisely what being is in itself. But since all reflection is to be kept awayfrom a determination of being, since being is to remain altogether free fromthe reflexive structures of determinating reason, being is spoken of inBook I only in the negative form of "undetermined immediacy." Beingas it is in itself can be talked of only in terms of the negated forms ofreflection (which have themselves negating quality).

The reason for this protection of pure being from the forms of reflection must be sought in Hegel's attempt to preserve being from misunderstanding. Hegel observes that the beginning of all science cannot befound in reflecting on the way in which thought proceeds. That was ratherthe method employed in the Phenomenology. The Logic is now to be thebeginning of all science by reflecting in the second part of the Logic onthe beginning of thought which has actually taken place in the first part.But such a determination cannot take place by repeating what the Phenomenology has done. The Logic has often, indeed, almost universally, beenmisunderstood as a determination of the dynamic of thought standing over

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ROLF A1ILKKSagainst that which is thought. But the positing of being over against nothingand insisting on their identity cannot have that meaning, if Hegel's professions are to have any meaning that those critics are on the wrong path,who assault the dynamic of being and nothing with their reflexive forms.7

II. TH E PROBLEMATIC OF THE BEGINNING IN THE LOGICHow is then this dynamic to be understood? We will attempt to clarifythis interrelation by trying to give an argument for a beginning of allthought to be able to be accomplished at all.Hegel mentions in the Anmerkungen to the first chapter of the logicof being the names Parmenides, Hcraclitus and Spinoza.8 The "Spinozisticsubstance" appears then again at the end of the logic of being, just priorto the "transition to essence" at the end of thefirstbook.9 In the first threeterse formulations concerning being, nothing and becomingwhich incidentally were kept unchanged in the second editionthe identity of beingand nothing is maintained. But simultaneously Ilegel insists that both beingand nothing are "undetermined" and "immediate." The undetermined andimmediate nature of being and nothing must be maintained, because theopposition of nothing to being is in the form of negation usually the determining and specifying factor. But here, where Hegel confronts the secretof being and nothing itself, such reflective aspects must not yet be applied.Hegel knows that the dynamic process of being itself cannot be maintained,if reflexive forms, which appear only in the second book of the Logic, arealready introduced here, and that thereby a beginning can in fact not bemade. Rather, reflection is to be an action of that dynamic itself. So thesimple and unreflected presentation of this dynamic of the relation of beingand nothing must be accomplished first, if a beginning is to be made inthis process at all. The secret of being able to present that beginning of allthought is at the same time the key to understanding Hegel's Wissenschaftdes Absoluten.In the presentation of the secret of being in view of its potential to bethe beginning of thought, it is appropriate for Hegel to refer to the firstform of Kant's Antinomy of Pure Reason.10 Whereas Kant's intention was,however, to show that theoretical reason has certain limitations beyondwhich reason may not proceed, in order to make room for the engagementof moral reason,11 Hegel probes the secret of that logical dilemma itself.For Kant the inescapable contradictions of theoretical reason, presentedconvincingly in the first Widerspruch of the Antinomy of Reason concerning the beginning of the world, becomes the motor driving practical reason290


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THE ABSOLUTE AS THE BEGINNING 01' HEGEL'S LOGICto its goals. (Because the question whether the world was created and thushad a beginning or has existed eternally ends in a theoretical aporia, I amcalled upon practically to realize that reasonableness which is theoreticallyunasccrtainablc.) That means that for Kant the logically unresolved contradiction becomes the beginning of moral reason.But Hegel picks up that Widerstreit and asks himself, how it can bethe beginning of logic. To answer that question, a different approach thanKant's was necessary. And this approach is to begin with the "indefiniteimmediacy," "which is no something nor a thing (at all) nor any indifferentbeing which is outside of its determinateness and relation to the subject,"as Hegel says in the first chapter of the logic of essence.12 The transitionfrom Kant's scepticism to Hegel's idealism 13 is not possible by assumingknowledge to be recognition of a thing in itself, as Kant did, a thing whichis outside of the knowing subject. Rather, the path to a more logicalidealism is to resolve that logically unresolved dualism (pointed out firstby Jacobi) and to let being and the negating reflection on being evolveout of one indefinite immediacy. But that becoming cannot take place byreflecting on it. By doing that one falls back into Kant's problem. Beingand reflection on it must rather arise out of the undifferentiated origin ofthe two. That is also the reason why the logic of reflection follows upon thelogic of being. Reflection can only follow out of being if being is to becapable of specification and determination. The simple, unreflected14 presentation of that secret in the Logic becomes the driving motor of Hegel'sscience of the absolute itself.Hegel, influenced by the Kant-critique of Jacobi and Fichte and Schel-ling, therefore immerses himself anew into the secrets of being. Spinoza andParmenides are important figures in this task. He realizes that neitheiParmenides' nor Spinoza's being could be as an absolute principle at thesame time a beginning. A becoming, a development is possible only if beingand nothing are understood as identical. Hegel made this problematicallyclear in the four notes16 to thefirstsection of the logic of being, particularlyin note four. There can be no beginning, either if one thinks beingherethere is no becoming, because being is alreadyor if one thinks non-beinghere there is nothing and therefore there can be no becoming. Therefore,Hegel argues, nothing of substance is brought against becoming or cessation,nor against the unity of being and nothing. And because no argument ofsubstance is produced, the thesis of the unity of being and nothing and becoming remains intact for Hegel as the basis and absolute principle ofthe Logic.

It is significant to observe how Hegel strives to protect this thesisin spite of its indisputability from the destructive assaults of reflection.291


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ROLF AHLERSBeing is from the start the "undetermined immediacy; it is free fromdetermination over against the essence,"10 and that means over againstreflection. For that reason the naive thought is "more consequent" in itsassertion tha t the unity of being and nothing cannot be; it is more consequentthan the reflected notion that being and nothing can be conceived only asbeing separate, which reflection asserts while at the same time insisting th atbecoming and cessation can be as well. This thought lacks internal consistency. Therefore it remains for Hegel, who starts from within the contextof the problem, a secret, that the absolute principle from w|iicb all thoughtmust start, is that being and nothing are in their identity at the same timethe basis for becoming. Only as that secret develops and unfolds its internalworkings through the logic of being, essence and concept, will it specifyits internal workings. At the end of the Logic will the secret therefore beexplicated. Only at the end of the Logic will that enigmatic identity therefore have a beginning in the sense of being well-grounded. But the beginning of that development cannot start with that explication. This beginningof the dialectic remains rather something which is "inconceivable."17 "Thatwhich makes the beginning, the beginning itself, is therefore to be takpn assomething which is not analysable, in its simple, unfulfilled immediacy,, andtherefore (it is to be taken) as being, as the complete emptyness."10This emptyness becomes consequently the "ground," that is, the adequateground for all further arguments, while these further arguments explicatethat ground and fill it with content. Anything short of this unfulfilled,indetermined, pre-reflected immediacy of the absolute, which is the .principle of the unity of being and nothing, will be incapable of providingany reasonable progress in logical thought. It will be incapable of progressively determining itself into the specificity which makes out reality.It is important to note how unconstructed this notion of the absoluteis. The very call to keep distant the categories of reflection and to simplylook at the dynamic of thought itself by immersion into this dynamicprohibits a forced interpretation, such as that of Kojve, indicating that"Hegel becomes God in thinking or writing the Logic"19 The problematicof Hegel's absolute is so easily misinterpreted because the result of thePhenomenology, the "idea as pure knowledge"20 is not to become the centerof attention. Reason does not stand over against that pure knowledge. Muchless does reason create or produce it. To the contrary. How reasonableprogress of reflection is possible is to be shown in the first place. Whereasthe Phenomenology was concerned with the structure of the "appearingspirit" which, in its description becomes the "unmediated knowledge,?' theLogic is to be the unfolding of pure knowledge itself. It might seem reasonable therefore to assume that a description of this pure knowledge is;a292


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THE ABSOLUTE AS THE BEGINNING OF HEGEL'S LOGICproduct of mediation and therefore a construct of reflection. But the Logicdoes not describe. Rather, a beginning of reflection is made with the Logic.The interpretation of this fcook as a construct of reason is, as Henrich hasshown,

21a misinterpretation. Hegel's theory of the absolute is guided altogether by the intention to m ake evident a thought which does not lend itselfin any way to such a tour de force of thought. When Hegel insists that theLogic is to be "pure science"22 it is the exact opposite of that wilful determination which attempts to make manageable and which hopes to controlthat which is objectified by scientific thought. Hans-Georg Gadamerproperly questions that "method" of scientific thought.23 But it is a questionable interpretation of Hegel's absolute when Gadamer identifies thisrightfully criticised method of scientific thought with Hegel's "infinite

knowledge."24

The entry into this "infinite science" must be sought in itsunavailability over against the will to methdicate. It appears that Hegelwas himself not capable of formulating the method of his thought. Hegelrarely reflected from the outside of his system as to the method in which histhought proceeds. Such a description is foreign to him.25 The enigma ofHegel's absolute as the inner dynamic of his "pure science" can apparentlybe approached only by freely, with Gelassenheit,2Q i.e., iinconstructivelyfollowing27 the inner consequence of the issue which formulates itself atthe beginning of the Logic in the thesis of the identity of being andnothing.28

III . THE ORIGIN OF THE SCIENCE OF THE ABSOLUTE IN THE SYSTEM-FRAGMENT OF 1800

How consistently Hegel followed the inner necessity of the issue, oncegrasped at Frankfurt in the circle of his friends, is evident in the "definitionof the absolute" with the help of a formula which he stated in theDierenzschrijt of 18 01 , bu t which has a history even longer than thatfirst publication.In the logic of being, where Hegel deals with the question how sciencecan make a beginning, he says "The analysis of the beginning gives ustherewith the concept of the unity of being and nothingor, in reflectedform, the unity of being differentiated and being not differentiatedor theidentity of identity and non-identity. This concept could be taken as thefirst, purest, i.e. most abstract definition of the absolute."20 Hegel picks uphere the formula which he had stated in his first publication on the Difference Between Fichte's and Schelling's System of 1801: "But the absoluteitself is therefore the identity of the identity and the non-identity; juxtaposi-

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ROLF AIILERStion and unity arc simultaneously in it."30 But this formula of 1801, almostidentical with the one in the Logic of 1812, stems from the germinalphilosophical insights wliicli Hegel had had at Frankfurt in 1800, wherehe wrote the famous Systemfragment, llcre Hegel uses the term "Leben"instead of "Seyn" in the Logic, and states of life that it is the "unificationof the unification and non-unification."31 It is in the context of this earliestof Hegel's conception of the system quite clear that a beginning and theimpetus of the whole thought can be guaranteed only if that "which wascalled the relation between the synthesis and antithesis is not somethingposited, nothing rational (nichts Verstndiges), nothing reflected, but thatrather its character for reflection can alone be that it |ias its being outsideof reflection."32 Reflection must be kept apart from this "living whole,"which here is still called "life." Only by keeping reflection apart from thewhole of life, is it possible to have a genuine beginning of thought out of,this whole. For, to continue quoting this fragment of asysteni, 6t 1800,"death, juxtaposition, reason is posited simultaneously in the living whole;it is posited as a living multiplicity which is vital and is capable as something living to posit itself as a whole."38But a beginning of thought in the sense of a systematic and scientificprogress of reason implies the quality of being "guided" and having a"Ruhepunkt," u a point of rest. Thought "being eternally driven along"between the contradictions of reason is a dynamic which one of the friendsat Frankfurt, Zvvilling, envisioned. That is, Zwilling did conceiye the contradictions of {hought to arise out of the whole, but he was incapable ofgetting out of the eternal progress of these contradictions; therefore hisconception was lacking internal "guidance." The other friend, Isaak vonSinclair, who was so important a mediator between Hlderlin and Hegel,35had been capable of achieving the unity of difference and non-differenceonly by means of comparisons. Therefore also he was incapable of achieving the needed guiding stability in the system.30From this insightflowsright from the start the demand that philosophymust end with religion.37 The reason why Hegel claims this termination ofphilosophy in religion, which still maintains itself in the Phenomenologyin chapter VII on Religion, is identical with the thesis in the Logic thatbeing and nothing are identical, that their identity alone can make abeginning which guarantees the scientific progress of the system, and thatthis progress is possible only on condition of keeping reflection distantfrom this identity, i.e., understanding both being and nothing in all theirindefinite immediacy. Reflection, the activity of philosophical reason, hasthe task to "point out finality in all that is final," but especially "to recog-294


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THE ABSOLUTE AS THE BEGINNING Ol lU 'G E l/ s LOGICnizc the errors through its own infinity," which it can accomplish only by"positing the truly infinite outside of its own circumference,"118The thesis'of the logic of being, to start reflection in the absolute, istherefore identical with the claim of the fragment of the systematic conception of 1800. For the absolute is this prereflected "unity of being andnon-being," which has its reflected counterpait in the unity of the "identityof the identity and difference."39 But the Logic as a whole, composed ofthe logic of being in Book I, progressing to the logic of essence in Book IIto the logic of the concept in Book III has the task to conceptualizeprecisely at the end of the process the science of logical discourse. For thesake of that precise determination, a beginning has to be made in theunconceptualized and undefined absolute. The progress of that precisedetermination in the Logic, ending in the logic of the concept with theabsolute idea,40 is conceived already in the systematic fragment of 1800.This progress is to be definite and precise. It is not to be a "progress intothe infinite"41 but rather "guided." The eternal progress of Zwilling andSinclair which comes to no definite conclusion is avoided by beginning inthe Logic with the absolute as the prereflected unity of being and nothing.In the fragment of 1800 this "elevation" appears as the elevation to religion:"The elevation of the finite to the infinite characterizes itself thereby as theelevation of the finite life to the infinite as religion, tha t it does not posit thebeing of the infinite through reflection, as an objective or subjective (bein g) ,adding thereby to the limited the limiting, recognizing this again as aposited, itself as a limited, progressing from here to the renewed search forthe limiting, and making the demand to con tinue this process into infinity."42Such a progress from the limited to the limiting and so forth is incapableof determining the precision of logically proceeding thought. It is, as Hegelindicated in the fragment of 1800 "driven along without a point of lest,"and therefore without "guidance," For the sake of that guidance the systemhas to start with a "being outside of reflection," 43 which circumstancetakes form in the Logic's beginning with "being," characterized as "withoutall further determination." Being is the start of the Logic in its "undetermined immediacy."44 Being as undetermined and therefore empty is identical with nothing, which is therefore also "this identical determination orrather indtermination and therefore the same which the pure being is."4r 'It has often been remarked that both in the early manuscripts and inthe Phenomenology religion is the end-point of the process developed.40The fragment of 1800 makes the demand that "philosophy must end withreligion."47 But if the elevation of the fragmented life to the whole life isthe elevation out of which a scientifically proceeding reflection can alone

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ROLF AHLERSarise, the systematic conception of the fragment of 1800 appears not to becontradictory to the procedure of the Logic which begins with that pre-reflected absolute, The unresolved problem with which Kant had left thephilosophical scene was the task to provide adequate grounds for theguided progress of reason. To see a contradiction in the claim of thefragment of a system of 1800 to have philosophy end with pierefiectedunity of all being which is religion, whereas the Logic beging wSfrltttfTprereflected absolute unity of being and nothing indicates a lack of understanding that even though the system was conceivecf ' in one instance,"im Nu" as Henrich expressed himself once,48 that does not mlian that thespelling out of that systematic conception was also done in that^smeinstant. Hegel did have at one instant around 1800 the brilliant insightwhich guided all his further thought. But the development of the various"moments" of appearing consciousness in the Phenomenology served toarrive at that absolute ground ou t of which the ability to differentiate:andunify arises. Once that ground has been reached, it can serve as the basisfrom which the process of logic can itself proceed. Because Hegel 4qesnot artificially construct a system but rather follows diligently the,;innerlogic and necessity of his original insight of 1800 he must fi^st \yr& Jusway through the phenomenological appearance of the various forms piconsciousness/up to the high ground of absolute knowledge, from wljichthe inner dynamic of logical thought can be traced.Only if the logic of reflection in Book II is understood to originateout of the prereflected and undetermined being in Book I, for .which theground was prepared in the Phenomenology, can the manifold and preisedeterminations of the concept in Book III come to expression. Hegel voicesthis circumstance with the first words of the logic of essence: "Essencecomes out of bein g; insofar it is not imm ediate and in and for itslfi,: botrather a result of that movement."40 But the Hegelian dialectic understandsbeing to be also a result of essence.50 Being as immediacy is the immediacyover against essence which is the "definite negation" of being : "Essence hasthe immediacy (of being) over against itself as one ou t of which it .hasbecome and which preserves itself in this elevation (Aufheben) S'*1\Onlybecause being is posited in its immediacy by essence as the groundout of which it comes, does essence have its definity and defining potential.Positing (Setzen) implies mediation and negation. If being is posited byessence, it is mediated by its own ground, essence. But being is mediatedin its immediacy. Being is therefore the result of essence insofar asJt -is thenegation of negating essence.52 Essence, in positing being, mediates^ ;b^tJnpositing being, it posits the absolutely immediate. Essence as the relation-creation determination is the determination of being itself. Th reflection296
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T H E A B S O L U T E AS THE B E G IN N IN G OF HEGEL'S LOGICof the logic of essence is a reflection not from the outside of being on being,but rather the reflection of being upo n itself. The merely external reflection,as it appeared in Spinoza,53 is the end of the logic of being, not yet having"reached" essence. Substance had in Spinoza been understood as beingthat pure negativity which "absorbs" everything into itself. In Spinoza,difference is introduced altogether from the outside. The attributes inSpinoza's understanding of substance have no more significance than thatthey express this substance altogether. But the difference is external andtherefore merely quantitative, not qualitative. But if being is to be understood as the posited immediacy of essence, which itself is the "definite negation" of being, then this difference must not be merely external. It must be adifference which appears within being itself. In Spinoza's understandingof substance, "difference is not immanent to her (substance); as quantitative it is rather the opposite of immanence, and the quantitative indifferenceis the externality of unity. Herewith also difference is not understood qualitatively, and substance is not determined as that which differentiates itself,not as subject."54In this last formulation the famous sentence of the Preface of thePhenomenology is repeated, that truth is to be grasped and expressed notas substance, but rather just as much as subject.55 The Logic is now theprocess by means of which truth comes to its own self-understanding. Andthe secret of the relation of being to essence must be sought in the lackof any presupposition setting this process in motion. Truth comes to self-understanding altogether out of itself.Only if in this manner the logic of reflection and finally the determinations of the concept arise as internal reflections out of indeterminateand immediate being will the well guided science of the absolute, whichis Hegel's Logic, and in a broader sense Hegel's whole thought, be able tounfold. We hope to have made with these remarks a small ccmtribution toa better understanding of Hegel's logic of the absolute.

Russell Sage College

N O T E S1 Logik I, p. 53, ed. Lasson, Felix Meiner Verlag, Hamburg, Phil. Bibl. number 56,1969. The second volume is Phil. Bibl. number 57.2 Logik I, p. 53.3 Phnomenologie des Geistes, ed. Hoffmeister, Hamburg, 1952, 6th ed., Phil. Bibl.number 114, p. 562.* Ibid., p. 562.

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ROLF AHLERS5 Logik I, p. 66.* See Hen rich, Hegel im Kontext, Suhrkum p Verlag, Frank furt, 1971, p. 85.7 Logik I, p. 80.a Ibid., pp, 69, 68.0

lbid.r p. 396.1 0 Kant, Kritik der Reinen Vernunft, ed. Raymund Schmidt, Phil. Bibl. number 37a,Felix Meiner Verlag, Hamburg, 1956, pp. 454ff.1 1 See Peter Cornchl, Die Zukunft der Vershnung, Vandenhock & Ruprecht, Gttingen, 1971, see esp. p. 64 : "D ie Restriktion der theoretischen steht bei Kan t im Dienstedes Primats der praktischen Vernunft. Der 'letzte Zweck,' die 'Endabsicht' cierVern unft liegt nicht im H orizo nt des W issens, sonde rn des Willens."* See also p. 75 :"Ka nt kom mt alles darauf an nachzuweisen, dass die Einschrnkung' un se ^r theoretischen Vernunft gerade unserer praktisch-sittlichen Bestimmung angemessen ist unddass also die 'unerforschlichen Weisheit, durch die wir existieren, nicht minderverehrungswrdig ist in dem, was sie uns versagte, als in dem, was sie uns zuteilwerden Hess.' (K.d.Pr.Vernunft, p. 266. 9th ed., Hamburg, 1959, Phil. Bibl. number38, ed. by Vorlnder, Felix Meiner Verlag.) Denn die Mglichkeit theoretischerEinsicht in die letzten Dinge hiitlc in praktischer Hinsicht fatale Folgen."12 Logik II, 9. Ibid., 9f." See Hen rich, Hegel im Kontext ( = H i K ) , p . 85ff.1 5 Problematically, because the footnotes reflect on that secret of the beginning ofthe logic, rather than being that beginning. Because Hegel realized this problem,he relegated these rejections to mere "notes."i Logik I , 66.17 ibid., p . 91 . Ibid., p. 60.1 9 Kojve, Hegel, Versuch einer Vergegenwrtigung seines Denkens, KohlhammcrVerlag, Stuttgart, 1958, p. 86. See also p. 109: "Wenn man wie Hegel behauptet, dassalles Verstehen dialektisch und die natrliche Welt verstehbar ist, dann behauptet mandamit . . . dass diese Welt das Werk eines Demiurgen, eines nach dem Bilde dearbeitenden Menschen aufgefassten Schpfergottes ist. Und das sagt Hegel tatschlichin der Logik, wenn er ausfhrt, dass seine Logik (d.h. seine Ontologie) 'das DenkenGottes vor der Schpfung der Welt1 ist. Daraus wrde folgen, dass Hegel die Weltvers teht , weil die W elt auf Gr un d des Begriffes erschaffen ist, den H egel hat.' Unddamit sind wir mitten im Paradox: Der Hegeische Anthropo-theismus hrt auf, einBild zu sein; Hegel ist tatschlich Gott der Schpfer und ewiger Gott. Nun kann aberkein Mensch von sich behaupten (es sei denn im Wahnsinn), er habe die Weltgeschaffen. Wenn also das sich in der Logik offenbarende Denken, das die Welterschaffende ist, so ist es sicherlich nicht das Hegels, sondern das eines Schpfers, derweder Hegel noch der Mensch im allgemeinen ist: das Denken Gottes. Die Logik istdaher, auch trotz ihres Titels, nicht einfach Logik, sondernwie Spinozas Ethik~Theo-logie, also Logik, Denken oder Rede Gottes." Theunissen is closer to a moreappropriate interpretation. The remark about Hegel becoming God when thinking theLogic is a "silly remark," Hegels Lehre vom Absoluten Geist als Theologisch-PolitischerTraktat, DeGruytcr, Berlin, 1970, p, 6.20 Logik I , p. 53.2i Henrich, HiK, 89.22 Logik I, 53.2 9 8


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THE ABSOLUTE AS THE BEGINNING OF HEGEL'S LOGIC23 Gadamer, Wahrheit und Methode, Tubingen, 2nd ed. , 1965, p. 426.24 ibid,, p. 4 6 1 .25 See Henrich, HiK, p. 104f .26 I am using this Heideggcrian term provocat ively to indicate that the HeideggerSch ool's rejection


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ROLF AHLERS44 Logik I, p. 66.45 Ibid., p. 67.46 See, for example, Theunissen, HL, 75.47 FS, Su I, 422f.48 HiK, in the essay Hegel und Hlderlin, pp. 9ff.49 Logik H, p. 7.60 See preliminary remarks concerning this situation above, pp. 289 and 291.l Logik II, p. 8.52 See also Henrich to this point in HiK, 107: "Sein kann als Resultat des Wesens;als durch es gesetzt, also als 'Gesetztsein' gelten, das garz ohne Umstand aus deitfGedanken der doppelten Negation gewonnen ist. Gesetztsein heisst abefr aufgehobenes'Sein,Sein, welches das Wesen zu seinem Grund hat, und zwar so, das| Wsn 'seinerseits im Setzen von Unmittelbarkeit besteht." ! - 'x * ?3 Logik I, pp. 3?6, 397.54 Logik I, p. 396.55 Phnomenologie, ed. Hoffmeister, ibid., p. 19.

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Hegel_absolute as the Beginning of Logic