Study Questions
How would an origin myth (like the Christian Genesis) fit into Hegel's
system of recorded history? Why?
It wouldn't, since Hegel bars "legends, folksongs, [and] traditions" from
counting as true history. The reason is that Hegel considers such folk forms to
be the products of a people still unaware of themselves as a people,
rather than a record of "observable" events by a people "who knew what they were
and what they wanted." For Hegel, collective self-awareness in the form of a
State must precede any truly historical record. Genesis, although it may
set forth a general story about human nature, is not Hegelian history.
What significance does Anaxagoras have for Hegel?
Anaxagoras was the first to perceive nature as operating on a set of
rational laws, and Hegel compares and contrasts this idea with his own assertion
that Reason "rules the world." The crucial difference (which, Hegel reminds us,
was first recognized by Socrates) is that Anaxagoras' philosophy failed to
address the nature of the fundamental Reason that lay behind natural laws, and
failed to show how one relates to the other. Hegel, on the other hand, will be
concerned with precisely this relationship, and specifically with the way
concrete human history unfolds from abstract Reason or Spirit.
Anaxagoras, in Hegel's view, saw Reason in the concrete but not in the
abstract.
How does Hegel defend subjective morality against being trampled by the
goals of history?
He does so by arguing that humans, with their arbitrary personal moralities,
are not only the means of Spirit in achieving its goal but also share in
that goal themselves. This is because the nature and goal of Spirit are
fundamentally rational--thus, each human contains that goal (the end) to the
extent that they are rational. The subjective morality that values human life
and freedom is generally arbitrary and particular, but it gains unshakable
strength because it stems in part from the universal ethics demanded by Spirit
and Reason. Thus, human freedom is to be valued because true human freedom
has its context only in Reason, and Reason is the end-goal of history. Although
human deaths in the past have served Spirit's higher purpose, we cannot claim to
justify a single one of them on that account.
What are the main characteristics of Hegel's three major types of written
history?
List the three major characteristics of Reason according to Hegel, and give
a brief account of their relationship to each other.
List the three major abstract characteristics of Spirit, and give a brief
account of their relationship.
How is Spirit like a seed?
What are the "means" of Spirit?
What is a "world-historical individual"? Give an example and explain why
that example counts in Hegelian terms.
What is the difference between the social contract (or "negative freedom")
model of the State and Hegel's own model of it?
What is the importance of religion for the State, in Hegel's view?
How does Hegel account for "development" and progress in history, in
contrast to the
stable state of "nature"?
What does Hegel mean by "dialectic" with regard to Spirit?
Why is Hegel so wary of "mere formalism"?