UNDERSTANDING HEGEL 7
OR: NO MORE THESIS — ANTITHESIS — SYNTHESIS
Win Corduan
Le lundi 13 octobre 1806, Napoléon entré à Iéna. Le professeur Hegel ne savait pas si son livre était arrivé chez l' éditeur et il était trés inquiet.
So, Hegel had to get the last part of the Phenomenology of Spirit mailed no later than October 13, 1806. If not, Göphardt, the publisher, could have, and probably would have, not have printed it, and all of Niethammer's deposit money would be gone forever--or more precisely into Göphardt's bottomless pocket. Hopefully nothing would stand in his way.
Unfortunately, there was something that did stand in his way, something huge and formidable, namely a battle of world-historical cnsequence, "The Battle of Jena," which ended the "thousand-year" Holy Roman Empire.
The empire had been founded by Charlemagne in AD 800, though it fragmented rather quickly under his heirs and other ambitious princes. Then it was revived by Otto I in AD 962, and officially ended when Franz II abdicated his office as "Holy Roman Emperor," in August, 1806. Simultaneously, in order to retain his title he also declared himself to be "Franz I, Emperor of Austria." Thereby he sought to retain his throne (in which he was successful), but he also abandoned his German dominions and let them be overrun by French forces until this fateful, decisive battle of Jena, truly a significant event that left its mark on subsequent history.
Hegel saw Napoleon ride through Jena in person, and he couldn't help but be amazed at having a direct view of this individual, around whom the whole Western world revolved at the time. Here was the conqueror, right before his eyes, appearing as normal flesh-and-blood, and yet what power was concentrated in this one human being! In a letter to Niethammer on that same fateful day of October 13, Hegel referred to the emperor as a "world-soul" (K, 318-19), an expression that certainly conveys awe and respect, given the power contained in that one single person. It did not have any philosophical significance other than the fact that he played a leading roll in the development of history.
| Let me explain that feeling a little more. As a boy in Bonn, Germany, visiting politicians from other countries usually travelled around the city in motorcades: a flying wedge of white-clad motorcycle officers, followed by several large black American vehicles, with more motorcyclists bringing up the rear. Schools would take the time out for us as classes to line the streets and wave the paper flags we had been given. The men who were wielding unsurpassed political power rode high up in the backs of black convertibles with their tops down, a practice that was ended everywhere thanks to a certain Lee Harvey Oswald in Dallas in 1963, the year I came to this country. Among other high-standing people I got to see were world changers such as Dwight D. Eisenhower and Charles DeGaulle. I was aware of the fact that these were men at whose command the map of the world had been changed and could be reconfigured again. This amount of power brings with it an aura that goes beyond what fame, social standing per se, financial status, or anything else could produce. Undoubtedly, this is what Hegel was experiencing. I don't think my feelings were as strong if, say, Hannibal or Alexander the Great—two of my favorite people to study at the time—had been travelling in the motorcade, but I was very much aware of the obvious similarities.
If I may add to my reminiscences, one sunny afternoon around 1960, when we (i.e. my mother and us three boys) were going down to the Rhine river to play, we just happened to cross paths with Konrad Adenauer (1876–1967), as he was apparently taking a stroll outside of his official mansion, Palais Schaumburg, perhaps trading the nice afternoon sun for his usual post-Mittagessen nap. He and Mutti exchanged cordial greetings without the usual German shaking-hands-all-around, as we passed another on the sidewalk and continued on our way. As I recall, there were no signs of any SG agents around, though I might possibly not have noticed them since I was still a child. Adenauer became the first chancellor of West Germany, taking office in 1949 and remaining politically active until 1967. (I'll leave it to you to calculate his age at those times).
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In subsequent generations, as the innovative and creative process of misconstruing Hegel began to climb along its long and winding road, some nincompoop turned the word "soul" (Seele) into "spirit" (Geist), a horrendous mix-up! Gordon Clark, for one, used "world soul" as synonymous with Absolute Spirit (Thales to Dewey, 449), but I doubt that he originated it. "World Soul" is sometimes used for Brahman, the single spiritual entity in Advaita Hindu pantheism, and it may have fit Schelling's protean philosophy at some time, but it has nothing whatsoever to do with Hegel's Absolute Spirit. This goof then, quite naturally, led some folks (though not Clark) to make up the ridiculous idea that Hegel claimed to have seen Absolute Spirit riding on a horse.
No, Hegel did not see the Absolute on horseback. He admired Napoleon for restoring order in France after the post-revolutionary reign of terror; thus, he considered him to be a hero (ein Held) in the development of Absolute Spirit. Other than that, the Corsican certainly caused him a lot of anxiety. Still, that's par for Hegel's life; uncertainty and suspense were never far away, not even once he was settled in Berlin.
That last point reminds me of the observation made by Henry D. Aiken in the once-popular volume of the Mentor anthology: The Age of Ideology (New York: Mentor, 1956), p. 73:
What an absurd, untrue, and demeaning statement! Unfortunately, Aiken does not give us a definition of an "interesting," person. What he really demonstrated was that he did not consult any sources on Hegel's life, which were available then and now, and tried to make up for it with a witty line.
Sorry, at this rate we're not making much progress, but I'm having fun venting my spleen and pointing out the plenitude of unclothed emperors (and I'm not talking about Napoleon).
Encore plus tard.
