Westphal – Schleiermacher & Hegel

By the end of this lesson you will have:

•Checked your understanding of Schleiermacher's and

Hegel’s ideas on philosophy and religion

• Have constructed paragraphs representing

their views• Have compared and

contrasted all the scholars which you have learnt so far

Homework Re-Cap• 1) What questions do you have from the reading over the weekend?

Ask the person next to you and see if they can answer.• 2) re-read the passages again, condense the arguments of

Schleiermacher and Hegel into a paragraph each.• 3) Use the information in your booklets to find out more about their

arguments• 4) Why does Schleiermacher reject metaphysical arguments between

the different philosophical theologies?• 5) What does Schleiermacher suggests comes to us via concrete and

finite things?• 6) How is Schleiermacher’s argument pro-religion?• 7) How might the concrete building of a Church help Schleiermacher

understand God?

Schleiermacher

• Not classified as a deist• Believed the ‘kernel’ of religion is to be found in its

feeling• Thought the God (the infinite) can be found through

concrete objects (the finite)• Therefore, whilst our understanding of God is

known as a feeling, this doesn’t mean it is based on metaphysical logic

• We find God ‘in all temporal things, in and through the eternal’

Schleiermacher

• Leans towards pantheism (the idea that God can be found in finite nature)

• Religion helps us feel at one with nature, and therefore God

• Therefore, God isn’t necessarily seen as a distinct being• The true ‘Church’ is those who appreciate this unity of the

infinite through the finite• Religion, then, is found in ‘the religions’ of the world

because these are where people gather to appreciate God and his presentation through finite things i.e. A cathedral which is an earthly construction

Schleiermacher

Schleiermacher

• The buildings on their own are not enough, however, to truly understand God. But they help a lot. (otherwise we would be saying that God is a building which obviously doesn’t sufficiently describe the God of classical theism...)

• You can’t have them without true piety and you can’t have true piety without them

• Remember: their presence alone does not garuntee that what you have is true religion

Hegel

• Hegel dislikes how Kant restricted religion to morality

• Hegel also dislikes how Schleiermacher restricted religion to ‘feeling through concrete entities’

• Hegel thinks Kant is unconvincing and Schleiermacher is confused

• Hegel demands knowledge of GOD rather than a focus on religion

• He doesn’t think we have DIRECT or IMMEDIATE experience of God as this can make way to ritualistic beliefs and practices i.e. Mysticism

Hegel

• Feeling could be compatible with anything• Who’s to say feelings are real?• Who’s to say that feelings matter?• Just saying we have an immediate romantic sense

of God is dogmatic• Schleiermacher’s ‘feelings’, for Hegel, are simply the

same as ‘concepts’ such as ‘trinity’, ‘atonement’ etc• Therefore, Schleiermacher is too grounded in

traditional religion as opposed to knowing God.

Hegel

• Hegel instead DEFENDS METAPHYSICS in a post-Kantian world

• He believes our metaphysical spirit CAN help us to gain knowledge of God

• He believes religion and philosophy are the same thing• Epistemological status of philosophy is true knowledge • Religion has to depend on accounts and images• So we have to re-interpret philosophy through the ideas

of Idea and spirit• Hegel saw God as accessible through the spirit

Hegel

• Similar to Aristotle and Plotinus’ ideas that we have ideas that are separate to our minds, Ideas exist.

• Dissimilar to Kant and Berkeley as they argue that the mind is not separate to ideas, but that it formulates ideas.

• Similar to Spinoza because he argues for a reinterpretation and demythologizing of the Church.

• Spinoza thought God is the world• Similar to Lessing in that he doesn’t see historical religious

events with utmost importance but dissimilar to Lessing in that he doesn’t reject the ideas all together – only asks us to reinterpret them.

Hegel

• For Hegel, it is only with Christianity which triggered an awareness of spiritual value, that genuine freedom became possible.

Westphal – Schleiermacher & Hegel

By the end of this lesson you will have:

•Checked your understanding of Schleiermacher's and

Hegel’s ideas on philosophy and religion

• Have constructed paragraphs representing

their views• Have compared and

contrasted all the scholars which you have learnt so far