Editorial notes: This post was found in ‘Draft’ mode in the original blog and may be incomplete. It is published here in its original state. It was last updated on 15/11/2014
I have been reading Charles Taylor’s book “Hegel” and his discussion on the Phenomenology of Spirit on “Spirit”. What follows are notes on my reading, and my reaction to Hegel’s ideas therein.
Reason is Spirit when its certainty of being all reality has been raised to truth, and it is conscious of itself as its own world, and of the world as itself. [438]
This far into the project of the Phenomenology it is virtually impossible to drop into the discussion and expect an accurate appreciation for the scope and trajectory of what’s come before, i.e. in order to situate the discussions in “Spirit”. Nonetheless, there is value in representing the stage into which the chapter opens: We (the audience) have already witnessed the manifold evolution undergone by human consciousness across history, right up to and including the shape of Reason. The odyssey of Reason ended when it found a confirmation of itself by appreciating its integral relationship with its society. Briefly: consciousness is able to exist as a particular entity expressing a universal will because it is a constituent of a culture whose values are universals which cannot exist except by being expressed in individuals.
This leaves the narrative with a few important annotations. One, the development of individual consciousness along history parallels the development of communal consciousness. Two, in order to understand the expanding scope of consciousness it will be necessary to attend to it qua vehicle for the expression of a supra-individual complex. And therefore three, in order to continue to track this development of consciousness, Hegel needs to study the experiences of whole communities and polities, which is what he in fact does in this chapter, “Spirit”; it will be necessary for the narrative of the book to fold back onto itself, beginning with primitive cultures comprised of self-conscious but non-universal citizens.
Harmonious citizenship destroyed by universalizing consciousness
The story of the spirit of communities, as Hegel tells it, is sporadically focused, describing only those chapters of history which he feels are most integral to a narrative which makes sense of contemporary society and its relation with its citizens. He begins with the Ancient Greek city states, to be soon followed by the Roman Empire, yet which itself will be followed by an enormous lacunae extending until the French Enlightenment. {This might be helpful to asserting expectations, yet it will soon be redundant, i.e. when the story is itself described and without need of synopsis}. Thus Hegel’s dialectics is actually also (here) a hermeneutics of history, with the implication that whilst interesting is not always convincing (i.e. as being necessary truth). Furthermore, whilst the details may be constructed into the final thesis for this chapter, it is possible and helpful to take each into its own perspective and focus (for best appreciation).
Ancient Greece epitomized a society that existed in harmony with its citizens, insofar as the society was the honest expression of the individual and allowed the individual to express itself honestly (meaning also rationally, whereby that reason is confirmed by the society’s forms). Note that for Hegel (and his generation), Ancient Greece served as a sort of Atlantis (viz. an ancient utopia), which was lost to the detriment of man, although also necessarily so. The justification for the demise of the Greek states was the dialectical contradiction between the laws of the city and the laws of the family (aka divine laws). These stand for, respectively, man as a particular and man as a universal. The city is a parochial entity, and believes in its own absolute nature despite the fact that it is not necessary, that there are other cities which make for an equal claim. The city however protects the family, whom within their limited scope conform also to divine laws, which considers man as a universal (e.g. the death rituals confirm and express this).
As men abandon their pure dedication to their city, the Greek way of life declines, to be replaced by the Roman empire, which has a depersonalized law which has the benefit of at least considering itself to be an expression of a universal tendency.
Individual consciousness has evolved, and what role was served by the divine law is now served by the ‘I’ of self-consciousness. However there is no more ‘ethical substance’, since the society does not reflect the individual, and rather imposes itself on the basis of power and the emperor’s capricious will. Since men no longer have rights (since even their property rights are dependent on an arbitrary will), they lack integrity, and place their integrity in an outside source to which they are alienated but towards which they might later strive.
Overcoming alienation
Men no longer identify themselves as thought, but feel they must conform to the state which gives them their identity. This can take place through economic behaviours, or religion, and occurs in parallel with the development of the unhappy consciousness. Although this behaviour is based on a false premise, it allows edification since it is at least true that the individual must find themselves in an external (viz. the absolute Geist).
Final words.
Meta and biographical notes
As already noted recently, I have stopped my reading of Hegel himself, and am now depending on Charles Taylor’s book “Hegel” for my understanding of The Phenomenology of Spirit. There are obviously some drawbacks to this choice, but I am confident that they all pale against a blank alternative, i.e. not reading anything (nb. not willing to commit to reading the entire primary text any further, at the present time).
