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In philosophy (often specifically metaphysics), the absolute, [lower-alpha 1] in most common usage, is a perfect, self-sufficient reality that depends upon nothing external to itself. [2] In theology, the term is also used to designate the supreme being. [3]
Contrary to some popular accounts, [lower-alpha 2] the term is not specific to Hegel. It first occurs in the work of Nicholas of Cusa, and Hegel's own usage was developed in response to that of his contemporary Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling. [4]
Hegel's use of "absolute" is easily misunderstood. Michael Inwood, however, clarifies: derived from the Latin absolutus, it means "not dependent on, conditional on, relative to or restricted by anything else; self-contained, perfect, complete." [4] In the words of scholar Allegra de Laurentiis, this means that absolute knowing can only denote "an 'absolute relation' in which the ground of experience and the experiencing agent are one and the same: the object known is explicitly the subject who knows." [5] That is, the only "thing" (which is really an activity) that is truly absolute is that which is entirely self-conditioned, and according to Hegel, this only occurs when spirit takes itself up as its own object. In some respects, this view of Hegel was anticipated by Johann Gottlieb Fichte's theory of the absolute self. [6] The final section of Hegel's Philosophy of Spirit presents the three modes of such absolute knowing: art, religion, and philosophy. [lower-alpha 3]
For Hegel, as understood by Martin Heidegger, the absolute is "spirit, that which is present to itself in the certainty of unconditional self-knowing". [8] As Hegel is understood by Frederick Copleston, "[l]ogic studies the absolute 'in itself'; the philosophy of nature studies the absolute 'for itself'; and the philosophy of spirit studies the absolute 'in and for itself'." [9]
In British philosophy, self-identified neo-Hegelian F. H. Bradley distinguishes the concept of absolute from God, whereas Josiah Royce, another neo-Hegelian and founder of the American idealism school of philosophy, has equated them. [6]
The concept of the Absolute has been used to interpret the early texts of the Indian religions such as those attributed to Yajnavalkya, Nagarjuna and Adi Shankara. [10]
According to Takeshi Umehara, some ancient texts of Buddhism state that the "truly Absolute and the truly Free must be nothingness", [11] the "void". [12] Yet, the early Buddhist scholar Nagarjuna, states Paul Williams, does not present "emptiness" as some kind of Absolute; rather, it is "the very absence (a pure non-existence) of inherent existence" in Mādhyamaka school of the Buddhist philosophy. [13]
According to Glyn Richards, the early texts of Hinduism state that the Brahman or the nondual Brahman–Atman is the Absolute. [14] [15] [16]
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel was a German philosopher and one of the most influential figures of German idealism and 19th-century philosophy. His influence extends across the entire range of contemporary philosophical topics, from metaphysical issues in epistemology and ontology, to political philosophy, the philosophy of history, philosophy of art, philosophy of religion, and the history of philosophy.
Idealism in philosophy, also known as philosophical idealism or metaphysical idealism, is the set of metaphysical perspectives asserting that, most fundamentally, reality is equivalent to mind, spirit, or consciousness; that reality is entirely a mental construct; or that there is some higher "ideal form" of reality. Because there are numerous forms of idealism, it is difficult to define the term.
Nirvāṇa is a concept in Indian religions that represents the ultimate state of soteriological release, the liberation from duḥkha, suffering, and saṃsāra, the cycle of birth and rebirth.
German philosophy, meaning philosophy in the German language or philosophy by German people, in its diversity, is fundamental for both the analytic and continental traditions. It covers figures such as Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Immanuel Kant, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Karl Marx, Friedrich Nietzsche, Martin Heidegger, Ludwig Wittgenstein, the Vienna Circle, and the Frankfurt School, who now count among the most famous and studied philosophers of all time. They are central to major philosophical movements such as rationalism, German idealism, Romanticism, dialectical materialism, existentialism, phenomenology, hermeneutics, logical positivism, and critical theory. The Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard is often also included in surveys of German philosophy due to his extensive engagement with German thinkers.
Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling, later von Schelling, was a German philosopher. Standard histories of philosophy make him the midpoint in the development of German idealism, situating him between Johann Gottlieb Fichte, his mentor in his early years, and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, his one-time university roommate, early friend, and later rival. Interpreting Schelling's philosophy is regarded as difficult because of its evolving nature.
German idealism is a philosophical movement that emerged in Germany in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. It developed out of the work of Immanuel Kant in the 1780s and 1790s, and was closely linked both with Romanticism and the revolutionary politics of the Enlightenment. The period of German idealism after Kant is also known as post-Kantian idealism or simply post-Kantianism. One scheme divides German idealists into transcendental idealists, associated with Kant and Fichte, and absolute idealists, associated with Schelling and Hegel.
Advaita Vedanta is a school of Hindu philosophy and a Hindu sādhanā, a path of spiritual discipline and experience. In a narrow sense it refers to the oldest extant scholarly tradition of the orthodox Hindu school Vedānta, written in Sanskrit; in a broader sense it refers to a popular, syncretic tradition, blending Vedānta with other traditions and producing works in vernacular.
The Kyoto School is the name given to the Japanese philosophical movement centered at Kyoto University that assimilated Western philosophy and religious ideas and used them to reformulate religious and moral insights unique to the East Asian philosophical tradition. However, it is also used to describe postwar scholars who have taught at the same university, been influenced by the foundational thinkers of Kyoto school philosophy, and who have developed distinctive theories of Japanese uniqueness. To disambiguate the term, therefore, thinkers and writers covered by this second sense appear under The Kyoto University Research Centre for the Cultural Sciences.
Nondualism includes a number of philosophical and spiritual traditions that emphasize the absence of fundamental duality or separation in existence. This viewpoint questions the boundaries conventionally imposed between self and other, mind and body, observer and observed, and other dichotomies that shape our perception of reality. As a field of study, nondualism delves into the concept of nonduality and the state of nondual awareness, encompassing a diverse array of interpretations across traditions, not limited to a particular cultural or religious context; instead, nondualism emerges as a central teaching across various traditions, inviting individuals to examine reality beyond the confines of dualistic thinking.
The Phenomenology of Spirit is the most widely-discussed philosophical work of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel; its German title can be translated as either The Phenomenology of Spirit or The Phenomenology of Mind. Hegel described the work, published in 1807, as an "exposition of the coming to be of knowledge". This is explicated through a necessary self-origination and dissolution of "the various shapes of spirit as stations on the way through which spirit becomes pure knowledge".
Absolute idealism is chiefly associated with Friedrich Schelling and G. W. F. Hegel, both of whom were German idealist philosophers in the 19th century. The label has also been attached to others such as Josiah Royce, an American philosopher who was greatly influenced by Hegel's work, and the British idealists.
The Right Hegelians, Old Hegelians (Althegelianer), or the Hegelian Right were those followers of German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel in the early 19th century who took his philosophy in a politically and religiously conservative direction. They are typically contrasted with the Young Hegelians, who interpreted Hegel's political philosophy as supportive of left-wing and progressive politics or views on religion.
Acosmism, held in contrast or equivalent to pantheism, denies the reality of the universe, seeing it as ultimately illusory, and only the infinite unmanifest Absolute as real. Conceptual versions of Acosmism are found in eastern and western philosophies.
Ajātivāda (अजातिवाद) is the fundamental philosophical doctrine of the Advaita Vedanta philosopher Gaudapada. According to Gaudapada, the Absolute is not subject to birth, change and death. The Absolute is aja, the unborn eternal. The empirical world of appearances is considered unreal, and not absolutely existent.
Brahmā is a leading God (deva) and heavenly king in Buddhism. He is considered as a protector of teachings (dharmapala), and he is never depicted in early Buddhist texts as a creator god. In Buddhist tradition, it was the deity Brahma Sahampati who appeared before the Buddha and invited him to teach, once the Buddha attained enlightenment.
The lord–bondsman dialectic is a famous passage in Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel's The Phenomenology of Spirit. It is widely considered a key element in Hegel's philosophical system, and it has heavily influenced many subsequent philosophers.
In Hinduism, Brahman connotes the highest universal principle, the Ultimate Reality in the universe. In major schools of Hindu philosophy, it is the immaterial, efficient, formal and final cause of all that exists. It is the pervasive, infinite, eternal truth, consciousness and bliss which does not change, yet is the cause of all changes. Brahman as a metaphysical concept refers to the single binding unity behind diversity in all that exists.
Self-realization is a term used in Western psychology, philosophy, and spirituality; and in Indian religions. In the Western understanding, it is the "fulfillment by oneself of the possibilities of one's character or personality". In the Indian understanding, self-realization is liberating knowledge of the true self, either as the permanent undying Purusha or witness-consciousness, which is atman (essence), or as the absence (sunyata) of such a permanent self.
The following is a list of the major events in the history of German idealism, along with related historical events.
The Young Hegelians, or Left Hegelians (Linkshegelianer), or the Hegelian Left, were a group of German intellectuals who, in the decade or so after the death of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel in 1831, reacted to and wrote about his ambiguous legacy. The Young Hegelians drew on his idea that the purpose and promise of history was the total negation of everything conducive to restricting freedom and reason; and they proceeded to mount radical critiques, first of religion and then of the Prussian political system. They rejected anti-utopian aspects of his thought that "Old Hegelians" have interpreted to mean that the world has already essentially reached perfection.
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