Supposedly, one could understand all of the above and most possibly discover or rather re-discover the whole of Hegel's philosophy and maybe even more, if one could understand the "Phenomenology of Spirit", which makes this book the starting point of the investigation into the matter. — Pussycat

So, what are your thoughts on the preface to the Phenomenology as it has been discussed so far in this topic?

But Hegel's philosophy is about the whole, so how could it leave these things behind?? After all, Hegel provides the scientific foundations, and physics and evolutionary biology are sciences. — Pussycat

The question is not whether he leaves these things behind but whether the process of nature is the same as the process of the development of spirit, specifically, whether the development is a process of aufheben. For example, in the link to Hegel's philosophy of nature he says:

§ 210. Gravitation is the true and determinate concept of material corporeality ...

This would indicate that the processes are not the same, but I have not read the text, although one leads to the other.

Anyway, why did you stop your reading? — Pussycat

It was taking too much time and energy. I was spending many hours working through a single paragraph in some cases.

Yes, sublation, if this is how all things are evolving ... — Pussycat

Hegel is talking about the movement of thought or spirit. I don't think this extends to physics or evolution, but I could be wrong.

In the process, he would have to explain why Aristotle didn't think of what he himself did. — Pussycat

The explanation has to do with the development of thought in time through history, the dialectical movement from the objective to the subjective.

And elsewhere, where for example he examines Plato's Ideas, Hegel does so within his philosophical system, he doesn't just say that Plato was wrong and disposes of his thoughts, but tries to give an account of what Plato thought in hegelian terms. — Pussycat

I do not know the details of this but in general this is how Hegel regards all prior philosophers. There is something correct in their view but it is aufheben, sublated. Each proposition followed to its logical end contains its own contradiction.

Yes, so his philosophy, method or theory has the explanatory power to give an account for all philosophical thoughts throughout history. Meaning for example when Aristotle thought something, Hegel can come up and say why he thought so and what he meant by it, the same for everyone else. Also, it explains itself. — Pussycat

I don't think it is a matter of Hegel being able to explain why Aristotle thought as he did but that since Hegel denies that there can be partial knowledge, Aristotle's philosophy, as well as the philosophy of all others before Hegel, is deficient, incomplete.

I don't think this means that Hegel was able to definitively explain everything that Aristotle said.

Nevertheless, the idea is a bit grandiose, don't you think? — Pussycat

Yes, I do. I think Hegel is important because he makes time and change essential to thinking.

So I am saying that Hegel believed, mystic or not, purported himself to be the one to see the whole, "see the whole of the moon", would you agree? — Pussycat

Yes, he does claim to know the whole. He also claims that it is now possible for others to do so as well.

Has Hegel lost his mind, or does he know what is he talking about? — Pussycat

Knowledge of the whole for Hegel does not mean knowledge of every particular. It is not a claim of omniscience. The Phenomenology describes the movement of thought from consciousness to self-consciousness - knower and known.

So, to make things clear, you say that a mystic is like the one being portrayed in the following music video, one that "saw the whole of the moon"? — Pussycat

I am not saying what the mystic is. What I am saying is that there is no single definition of the mystic. I am not sure if the label is important or helpful. So, when someone asks whether Hegel was a mystic I must ask what he or she means by that.

And that Plato was not one, but Hegel was? — Pussycat

I don't think either of them were. I do see some similarities between Hegel and Lurianic Kabbalah, but I am not prepared to make more of it. I simply do not know his work well enough to speak with more confidence on the matter.

Good and evil (bad) are one of the many dualities of Genesis. They are fundamental, not to be resolved. The truth lies neither with this or with that, but with both in the tension of their opposition.

The tree of knowledge cannot be understood without knowing what was meant by knowledge. It seems to have had something to do with producing or making, whether it was protective girdles out of fig leaves or Cain and Abel. Knowledge bring both benefits and new problems, it produces both what is good and evil.

When I first read Plato I thought he was a mystic. I no longer read him this way.

I think he was a Socratic or zetetic skeptic, knowing that he does not know. What he says about the Forms seems to be a direct contradiction of this point, but a careful reading of the Republic makes clear that Socrates is telling stories. He admits he cannot confirm that things are as he says. In other words, he has not had the transcendent experience of direct apprehension of the Forms. The Forms, of which the visible world is said to be an image, are actually themselves images of the truth, a truth he does not know.

I think what Plato presents is a public teachings that takes on the guise of mystical revelation. It is a salutary teaching about the Good. It is Plato's response to the poets who shaped the minds and souls of man. It is poetry (poeisis, to make), intended to inspire and lead to the desire to aspire, to seek the truth itself.

Did you read the background to that observation? — Serving Zion

Yes, I did.

It shows that a rhetorical question is only effective if the answer to the question supports the speaker's point. — Serving Zion

It shows that this is your contention. Nothing more.

In order for a rhetorical question to be effective, any valid answer given to the question must be consistent with the single conclusion that the speaker is drawing by putting the question in the given context. — Serving Zion

The questioner may intend for it to lead to a particular conclusion but a questioner does not stand as the sole or final arbiter of what a valid answer to the question is. You may want to lead your interlocutor to a particular conclusion but it does not follow that a valid answer is the one that matches your own conclusion. Perhaps the given context is more problematic or complex than you think.

I think that my answer to it has a potential to challenge the "single robust conclusion" that you were expecting to find, that is "it doesn't" (which is yet possible, if you can lead me to see it). — Serving Zion

If your answer is a potential challenge to what you imagine my expectations to be then your answer could not, by your standards, be valid. As it turns out, however, your inability to answer was exactly the answer I expected my question to lead to, which, of course, is not the same as saying it is the answer I expected you are any other particular person to draw. One way in which rhetorical questions are asked is to point to the problem of answers to it.

Hmmm, it looks to me that you have answered the question. If a hearer doesn't agree that the speaker's conclusion is necessarily true for the question, then the speaker's point has become discredited. — Serving Zion

The speaker could be wrong or the interlocutor could be wrong or both could be wrong. If the speaker asks the question it does not follow that the speaker thereby provides a conclusion.

Therefore it fails to be a robust statement ... — Serving Zion

It simply fails to meet the questioner's expectation. The problem may be with the question rather than the answer.

... and is a failure in communication so far as a speaker's objective is to effectively convey knowledge. — Serving Zion

It may be that the failure is that the questioner does not know what she assumes she does. Socratic irony is instructive here in that his interlocutors often fail to recognize it. It is not a failure to communicate since others may recognize it, but a failure on the part of the interlocutor to understand not only his but our lack of knowledge of such things.

I have already conceded that rhetorical questions are not slang ... — Serving Zion

Good.

... a rhetorical question is not a misuse of language at all — Serving Zion

So, you concede this as well.

I am looking for an argument though, that says I am wrong to say invalid rhetoric questions (whereby the conclusion is not necessarily true) are invalid language. — Serving Zion

You seem to have not thought any of this through since you keep changing position. Let's look at Adam's response to God's first question:

God asks: “Where are you?” to which he responds “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.”

Adam's answer is not a "conclusion". It does not even answer the question. What he says is nevertheless true.

How a question is answered does not determine the validity of the question or the language of the question. In addition, how a question is answered may far outstrip the intent of the questioner. How the question has been answered may lead to more questions. It is not simply a matter of correct or valid conclusions based on the initial question. The questioner may not see the implications of her question.

Your assumption seems to be that what is at issue is the determination of correct answers, but perhaps priority should be given to philosophy as the art of questioning, of examination, of inquiry, of investigation.

No, and the purpose appears to be bringing conviction to them for their ignorance of those things. — Serving Zion

Well, God intended for them to remain ignorant. They hid because they knew that they had done something wrong. Would they have known this if they had eaten of some other tree if God had decided that tree instead would be the one forbidden? God's questions challenge them in a way that would not have been possible before they gained knowledge.

... it produces the intended statement — Serving Zion

Did it? God had already made his statement and their responses are evasive and intended to shift the blame to the serpent, to Eve, and to God himself.

I would advise to not take such a calculated approach, rather in humble service, allow the truth to manifest by purely honest discussion. — Serving Zion

Humble service to who are what? God? The truth? It may be that "purely honest discussion" has led you to your conclusions but the truth is it has led others to very different conclusions. What I offer as honest discussion you dismiss as "calculated". It seems to me that you do not have any interest in open-ended philosophical inquiry but rather in attempting to lead others to believe as you do, and calling what you believe "the truth".

I have introduced a new principle though: a truly rhetorical question must lead to a single robust conclusion, and that must agree with the speaker's expectation. — Serving Zion

Why must a truly rhetorical question must lead to a single robust conclusion? Is this a rhetorical question? What is the apodictic connection between a truly rhetorical question and the questioner's expectation? It may be that the "single robust conclusion" one who is asked the question might reach is that the questioner is misguided, and it is likely that this will not agree with the questioner's expectation.

But I still need to be sure that what I think is right, in fact is right. So far I do not see that there is a case where a rhetorical question is not, in truth, strictly a misuse of language for dramatic effect (iow, "slang"). — Serving Zion

In Genesis 3 God asks Adam and Eve a series of questions: “Where are you?”, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?”, “What is this you have done?” (3:9-13)

Are these rhetorical questions, iow, "slang"? Was God misusing language? Was God ignorant of where they are and what they did? Note their responses do not lead to a single robust conclusion.

I am a person who, when I discover that others are wrong, I seek out what is right and then I cling to it and I share that knowledge with others. So that is what I am here to do, with regards to a finding I have, that people seem to assume a rhetorical question is not allowed to be challenged. — Serving Zion

Seeking out what is right and knowing what is right are not the same. What you cling to may not be right even though such doubt may compel you to cling to it even more. Is it possible a well phrased rhetorical question will help loosen your grip? Or is that the thing you want most to guard against?

Socrates said that he possessed human wisdom, knowing that he does not know. He contrasts this with divine wisdom, knowledge of the things Socrates desires to know.

Hegel's claim is that the pursuit has successfully come to its end. Philosophy as the pursuit of wisdom finds its realization in obtaining what it loves,desires, and pursues. It has become science.

Nietzsche's Dionysus is the god who philosophizes, that is, one who seeks but does not possess wisdom. It is not only human beings who are not wise, the gods are not wise either. Dionysus is a skeptic, knowing that he does not know.

Can Hegel be a lover of wisdom if he believes he possesses wisdom, or is he unwise like those Socrates criticizes for not knowing their own ignorance? But surely Hegel is not the first philosopher to claim to know. Perhaps it would be better to distinguish between philosophers who claim to know and those who know they do not know. I will leave open the question of whether anyone does have knowledge of the whole or if it is even possible.


Regarding the question of secondary sources: they have their uses and abuses. Commentary is a time honored tradition. I have learned far more from secondary sources than I ever could have learned if I only read primary sources. The problem arises when instead of using secondary sources as an aid to reading a philosopher they are relied upon to the exclusion of the primary material.

Perhaps men have themselves bereft Hegel of his wits, or maybe he too is a man of worth. In that case he would be like Plato in that both have a lot to say but both leave the things of the most worth unsaid. I am certain that this is the case for Plato but do not know if it is for Hegel.

By your description Hegel would not be a mystic, but those who, like Wallace, claim that Hegel was a mystic hold to some other idea of what mysticism means.

Given the importance of the development of spirit in time, it seems clear that Hegel's thinking goes further than that of the mystics. But, one might argue that the mystic is able to transcend time. For Hegel, however, science is discursive. It is necessary to articulate or give a rational account of what one claims to know. I think he would say that the mystic fails to do this, but not because the mystic chooses to remain silent.

The Hermeneutic Circle. What is it ? — Amity

The hermeneutic circle originally referred to the problem of interpretation of texts. The whole cannot be understood without an understanding of the parts and the parts cannot be understood without an understanding of the whole. Each informs the understanding of the other.

The image of a circle is latched upon in a certain way. Is it a real engagement with the core text or is it a dance around the periphery ? — Amity

It is not a circling around the periphery but a circling within the text.

I would appreciate your thoughts on the PN article. — Amity

The problem I have with Wallace's article is the lack of reference. How much of what he claims can be found in the texts? I am reminded of Nietzsche's inversion of a famous saying: "Seek and you will find". Is Wallace finding all this in Hegel because it is there to be found or does he find it because that is what he wants to find?

As to the question of whether Hegel was a mystic, we must first ask what a mystic is. Is it someone who has experiences or someone who has been initiated formally or informally into secret teachings or someone who yearns for immediacy or someone who attempts to attain altered states of consciousness via particular practices or ...?

Another thing might be that each thing must be other than all other things. Is the whole other than itself? In one sense since there is nothing other than the whole of what is then there would be nothing other than the whole. But self-knowing requires the self to treat itself as is object of knowledge.

If we were to draw the circles of wholes where would absolute otherness be? If it is complete otherness it would be a circle that is not encompassed in some larger whole, otherwise it would not be absolute otherness.

Perhaps what Hegel is getting at is the movement from absolute otherness to its sublation, its negation.

↪Fooloso4 What do you think? — Wayfarer

Aristotle's use of common words always maintain that usage even when he extends the meaning. The term 'eidos' means the look or kind or essence or species of a thing. Form is also the term used to translate 'morphe'.

I do not think that Aristotle's aim is to provide a consistent definition of the term but to examine what is said and observed. That is why he typically begins by discussing earlier philosophers. He is not building arguments that lead to clear unambiguous conclusions and knowledge. He is leading the reader to think about these matters, to recognize that they are problematic, aporetic.

You are right to point to the problems with what Aristotle says about matter. But I think he was smart enough to recognize that it is problematic. In fact, I think that is exactly where he leads the thoughtful reader. He, like Plato and Socrates, is a zetetic skeptic (not to be confused with modern versions of skepticism). We simply do not know and so cannot say what 'is' at the most fundamental level.

Of course, this does not stop people from making such claims. So, it is better he tell his own stories, reasonable stories, beneficial stories.

The distinction I was referring to is this one:

From what I understand there’s a distinction to be drawn between philosophical scholarship (what so-and-so actually said and thought) and interpretation ... — AJJ

Philosophical scholarship is interpretation and research that supports an interpretation.

There is, however, a clear distinction between reading Aristotle and reading what other people say about Aristotle.

Or perhaps their interpretation lends the clearest insight. — AJJ

That is possible but how do you know it is the clearest insight without reading Aristotle?

I guess they thought so, and it sounds good to me. — AJJ

Okay.

From what I understand there’s a distinction to be drawn between philosophical scholarship (what so-and-so actually said and thought) and interpretation ... — AJJ

There is no clear distinction between them. What so and so said and thought is an interpretation of what so and so said and thought, unless one simply points to the work of so and so in her own words. But even here there is interpretation involved.

The objection being made was that the concept of prime matter is hard to grasp, when on the scholastic interpretation is isn’t, really. — AJJ

What the article says is:

In fact there is considerable controversy concerning how to conceive the bottom rung of Aristotle’s hierarchy of matter.

It is not that the concept is hard to grasp but rather that the concept shows itself to be problematic. If the school men interpreted it in such a way that there is no problem then perhaps they miss something or add something.

In any case you are not discussing Aristotle but the scholastic interpretation of Aristotle.

This was discussed in Dfpolis’s thread on realism, and Feser talks of it in his book (matter per se is termed “prime matter”): — AJJ

The problem is, once again, that you are not talking about Aristotle, but the Scholastic interpretation of Aristotle. There is no consensus as to whether Aristotle actually accepts the notion of prime matter.

See, for example the section of prime matter: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/form-matter/

Why is it that the ancient commentators recognized Aristotle's concealment but many modern scholars are silent on this? They do not appreciate the art of esoteric writing and reading.

A review of Melzer's Philosophy Between the Lines:
https://ndpr.nd.edu/news/philosophy-between-the-lines-the-lost-history-of-esoteric-writing/

A real eye opener for anyone interested in the interpretation of texts.

Aristotle says many different things about matter, not all of it in agreement with other things he says about matter and form.


From one of the most influential commentators on Plato and Aristotle in the ancient world, Alfarabi. He had a strong influence on Aquinas.

Whoever inquires into Aristotle’s sciences, peruses his books, and takes pains with them will not miss the many modes of concealment, blinding and complicating in his approach, despite his apparent intention to explain and clarify.

– Alfarabi, Harmonization (unpublished translation by Miriam Galston,
quoted by Bolotin in Approach to Aristotle’s Physics, 6

This was the accepted view in the ancient world. For more see the section on Aristotle: https://www.press.uchicago.edu/sites/melzer/melzer_appendix.pdf

Edward Feser’s book on Aquinas — AJJ

This is the problem: Feser's take on Aquinas' take on Plato and Aristotle.

I think you are right about the importance of others for self-consciousness, but what I am still struggling with the concept of absolute otherness. It seems to be a contradiction in terms. What is other is so relative to something, but if relative then it is not absolute.

[Added: I might put this question aside for now.]

In that the claim is that it is philosophy alone which is supposed to lead to increased understanding of self via others. — Amity

Standard disclaimer: in trying to work out what Hegel says I am forced to frequently revise what I think he is saying. What follows is no exception.

I think that absolute otherness as discussed here does not refer to others but to pure self-knowing, that is, knowing that has itself as its object, which is to say, that treats itself as other. What is absolute is not relative to or conditioned by anything else. The otherness of objects in the world as well as other people are other relative to me, and so, cannot be absolute otherness. The otherness of myself is not relative to anything other than myself. But absolute otherness cannot be the otherness of myself to myself either, because that would make it dependent on me. Knowing in its universality means what is common to all knowing, the unification of subject and object, identity in difference. All knowledge is self-knowledge. Absolute otherness must be the otherness of the whole within itself as the condition for the whole's self-knowledge. The circle of self-knowledge plays out on the levels of the individual, the culture, and the whole. The first two are limited wholes, the last the whole of wholes.

If this is the case, then it should provide the means, the ladder - the structure of reason - to facilitate this process. The path to knowledge or science. — Amity

Others do come into play but here we are led to the same question as in the ascent from Plato's cave. If one is led up and out, then who led out those who can lead us out? Is there first one individual who did not require others? In line with the metaphor of the ladder, the rungs may have been put in place by the work of those who came before, but each new step requires going further than what culture and education provided. There must still be someone whose step goes beyond what was already provided. But now with Hegel all the rungs are in place.

Hegel goes on to claim that the individual has immediate self-certainty, an unconditioned being. I think that what he is getting at here is the certainly of our being. Descartes' self-certainty was his Archimedean point, from which he could move the Earth. Perhaps Hegel is suggesting that Descartes science was incomplete because he failed to otherness into account.

... curious to know more ... — Amity

I think it is more than curiosity. It is desire, eros, love. And here again we are reminded of Hegel's claim that the title of love of knowing can be set aside and replaced by actual knowing (5).

The image of the ladder reminds me of the Wittgenstein thread you participated in.
In that case, wasn't the ladder kicked away ? Do you think that it might be a different kind of ladder ?
I can't remember the details. — Amity

There are some similarities but the image of the ladder is an old one. There is, for example, Jacob's ladder (Genesis 28:10-17). Hegel's ladder is to reach the standpoint of absolute otherness, the ground and soil of science. Wittgenstein's ladder is leads to what is beyond the limits of science.

26:

Pure self-knowing in absolute otherness, this ether as such, is the very ground and soil of science, or, knowing in its universality.

All knowing takes place in unconditioned otherness, that is, in what is other than self. As its ground and soil, the otherness to self cannot be separate from self-knowing. Pure self-knowing is purity from otherness.

The beginning of philosophy presupposes or demands that consciousness is situated in this element.

Both Plato and Aristotle say that philosophy begins in wonder (‘thaumazein’) (Theaetetus 155c-d; Metaphysics 982b). There can be no wonder without a sense of the otherness of what engenders wonder. It is what lies beyond or outside of what can be understood or taken within consciousness, what remains a mystery.

However, this element itself has its culmination and its transparency only through the movement of its coming-to-be. It is pure spirituality, or, the universal in the mode of simple immediacy. It is pure spirituality, or, the universal in the mode of simple immediacy.

The coming to be of otherness is not the coming to be of the object in and for itself but of its coming to be for us, that is, as an object of consciousness. It is pure spirituality in that it is for us in its immediacy, in its otherness, its mystery, understood universally rather than as a particular object of consciousness.

Because it is the immediacy of spirit, because it is the substance of spirit, it is transfigured essentiality, reflection that is itself simple, or, is immediacy; it is being that is a reflective turn into itself.

The substance of spirit is the union of consciousness and what is for consciousness. Otherness is transfigured from what is other than or independent of consciousness to what is for consciousness in its immediacy. Being becomes conscious of itself.

For its part, science requires that self-consciousness shall have elevated itself into this ether in order to be able to live with science and to live in science, and, for that matter, to be able to live at all.

Science requires that self-consciousness be situated in the ether of absolute otherness. It must become other in and for itself, its own object.

Conversely, the individual has the right to demand that science provide him at least with the ladder to reach this standpoint. The individual’s right is based on his absolute self-sufficiency, which he knows he possesses in every shape of his knowing, for in every shape, whether recognized by science or not, and no matter what the content might be, the individual is at the same time the absolute form, or, he has immediate self-certainty; and, if one were to prefer this expression, he thereby has an unconditioned being.

The individual in his conscious awareness is not aware of his awareness but of what is given immediately in awareness. His absolute self-sufficiency, his being unconditioned, his immediate self-certainty of being, requires for its self-sufficiency self-knowledge. He must be both knower and known.

However much the standpoint of consciousness, which is to say, the standpoint of knowing objective things to be opposed to itself and knowing itself to be opposed to them, counts as the other to science – the other, in which consciousness is at one with itself, counts instead as the loss of spirit – still, in comparison, the element of science possesses for consciousness an other-worldly remoteness in which consciousness is no longer in possession of itself.

The standpoint of consciousness is its awareness of things as other than itself. This standpoint, the opposition of subject and object, is the other of science. Science is self-consciousness, the unity of consciousness with itself, is the loss of spirit because it is the loss of consciousness of the world.

Each of these two parts seems to the other to be an inversion of the truth.

The one part is consciousness as knowing objective things, the other consciousness knowing itself. Each taken by itself is an inversion of the truth because each by itself leads away from the truth, that is, away from the concept of the whole in which both parts are united, identity in difference.

For the natural consciousness to entrust itself immediately to science would be to make an attempt, induced by it knows not what, to walk upside down all of a sudden. The compulsion to accept this unaccustomed attitude and to transport oneself in that way would be, so it would seem, a violence imposed on it with neither any advance preparation nor with any necessity.

The natural consciousness is consciousness of objects and is thus not sufficient to move immediately to science. It is one sided, undeveloped, not yet prepared to be knowledge of the whole, that is, of the identity in difference between subject and substance, knower and known.

Science may be in its own self what it will, but in its relationship to immediate self-consciousness, it presents itself as an inversion of the latter, or, because immediate self-consciousness is the principle of actuality, by immediate self-consciousness existing for itself outside of science, science takes the form of non-actuality.

Self-consciousness is immediacy. Science is mediated, the conception of or thinking about rather than the immediacy of self-consciousness.

Accordingly, science has to unite that element with itself or instead to show both that such an element belongs to itself and how it belongs to it. Lacking actuality, science is the in-itself, the purpose, which at the start is still something inner, at first not as spirit but only as spiritual substance. It has to express itself and become for itself, and this means nothing else than that it has to posit self-consciousness as being at one with itself.

Science is the in-itself but must become for itself, that is, it must move from self-consciousness as being something inner, by which substance is other or object to self-consciousness, to self-consciousness being for itself, the whole as the union of substance and subject. Here spirit is no longer substance, that is, object of consciousness but the actualization of spirit, as in itself and for itself; not something that is mine or particular, or even as universal, but as absolute, the identity of difference, one with itself.

I guess there was more to it.
Anti-religion ? What comes first...not words. Nor a Bible. — Amity

I cannot say what more there is for Goethe but for Hegel it is the sublation of both the Greek logos and John's logos. Some read Hegel as anti-religious and others as religious. At this point perhaps it is prudent to just suggest that Hegel sublates religion.

I think Hegel's response might be that Goethe represents it but does not raise it to the level of science
— Fooloso4
Goethe does that elsewhere. — Amity

Is it science in Hegel's sense of the term, that is, knowledge of the whole?

Yeah, I got that. I just don't get it. What is there at the beginning... — Amity

If I remember correctly and understood it correctly (it has been a very long time since I last read Hegel) it begins with the eternal negating itself and giving rise to time. In its embryonic stage it contains all that it will come to be, but must work itself out over time, eventually there is the development of consciousness and finally self-consciousness and knowledge of itself as the whole.

The picture of Trump, Sharpton, and Don King speaks volumes. All self-promoters desperate to have their face in front of the camera and willing to say or do whatever is necessary to make it happen.

Those who live in the New York area know that making Sharpton out to be the good guy is ridiculous, but it may play well elsewhere. I think that Trump's Archie Bunker move that a black guy can be a racist too is intended to put a gap between white and racist.

No, I don't think that's it. Goethe was a poet and thinker. Faust was the character trying to translate the New Testament into German. From what I remember, he was seeking inspiration having dried up in more ways than one. Then came the Spirit... — Amity

I am not sure I follow. I am at a disadvantage not having read Goethe (and have been scolded by you for this omission). Isn't it the translation of logos that Goethe's Faust is grappling with, the term translated as wort in German and word in English, as in: "In the beginning was the ..."?

Inspiration is, literally, the indwelling of spirit. If I understand you, Faust is moved the the spirit. If that is the case then doesn't this point to the insufficiency of words, that words alone are not what provides the movement both for him and in the beginning? I take it as being for this reason that he translates logos as deed or act, something done rather than something said.

This may be off though, since what God does to begin is to speak, to say: "Let there be ...". [Added: Perhaps Goethe shares Hegel's view of continuous development. It is not simply what was said or done at the beginning, but the continued active doing. From what you presented it also seems that Goethe shares Hegel's rejection of a transcendent God who acts upon the world.

It was Goethe's way of being - the poet; not here offering conscious opinions, intellectual convictions and philosophical beliefs. The latter don't always express the self, they may even disguise.
At the level of his deepest thought, the subjective and objective modes are quite evidently harmonised.' — Wilkinson and Willoughby

There is much in what you quote that is consonant with Hegel. I think Hegel's response might be that Goethe represents it but does not raise it to the level of science, he does not:

... [posit] that the true shape of truth lies in its scientific rigor – or, what is the same thing, in asserting that truth has the element of its existence solely in concepts –

Of course one might claim that this reflects the superiority of poetry. With Hegel we are still within what Socrates calls the ancient battle between philosophy and poetry.

If Man does not engender the concept, then who ? — Amity

Self-engendering spirit. Man's role is in the articulation and working out of the absolute. As a teleological movement, what comes to be, what develops is the potentiality that is realized or actualized in what is there from the beginning.

I would caution against assuming Plato is wrong without first understanding him. The term translated as beautiful is kalos, which also means good or noble. It is the good or noble that is to be desired or loved, but what is worthy of love cannot be determined simply by its being desired. The beauty of the body leads Socrates to reflect on beauty itself, the power of beauty to lead us to desire what we find beautiful. It has the power both to lead us toward and away from what is good and noble.

When I think of spirit, beginnings and qualitative leaps, Goethe comes to mind. With his:
In the beginning was the act. Im Anfung war die Tat - Faust.
As opposed to the Word of the Bible. — Amity

The Greek word used by John in the New Testament is logos. It seems likely Hegel in using the term is mindful of both the Greek and Christian tradition, and since both are historically important his use reflects the full range of meaning.

As used by John it connotes the tradition of revelation, what God speaks to man. It is primarily what man is told by and about God. For the Greeks logos is an ordering of words intended to give an account or explanation, literally to gather together and lay out. One who is wise is able to give a logos that reflects the intelligible order of the cosmos, why and how all things are as they are. But the logos is not simply ordered speech, it is the ordering of what speech is

Perhaps what Goethe was getting at is the impotence of mere words. Actions not words are primary. Hegel's use of terms such as 'logos', 'reason', and 'concept' are self-generative, that is, not passive descriptions of something separate and other.

25:

That the true is only actual as a system, or, that substance is essentially subject, is expressed in the representation that expresses the absolute as spirit – the most sublime concept and the one which belongs to modernity and its religion.

What is the religion of modernity? Without venturing an answer it can be noted that “the most sublime concept” belongs to it, the expression of the absolute as spirit.

The spiritual alone is the actual; it is the essence, or, what exists-in-itself. – It is what is self-comporting, or, the determinate itself, or, otherness and being-for-itself – and, in this determinateness, to be the self-enduring in its being-external-to-itself – or, it is in and for
Itself.

The spiritual is what exists-in-itself and comports itself to itself. But this means it must be to itself other than itself for itself.

However, it is first of all this being-in-and-for-itself for us, or, in itself, which is to say, it is spiritual substance. It has to become this for itself – it must be knowing of the spiritual, and it must be knowing of itself as spirit. This means that it must be, to itself, an object, but it must likewise immediately be a mediated object, which is to say, it must be a sublated object reflected into itself.

Spirit comes to know itself through us, by becoming an object to itself, an other whose otherness is immediately negated so that it is taken back into itself

It is for itself solely for us insofar as its spiritual content is engendered by itself.

It is not us who engender the spiritual content, it is engendered for us. It is as it is for us.

Insofar as the object for itself is also for itself, this self-engendering, the pure concept, is, to itself, the objective element in which it has its existence, and in this manner, it is, for itself in its existence, an object reflected into itself.

I take this to mean that the object, that is, spirit becoming an object to itself, is self-engendering, it conceives itself. It is pure concept, reason, logos.

Spirit knowing itself in that way as spirit is science. Science is its actuality, and science is the realm it builds for itself in its own proper element.

Man does not engender the concept but thinks it, develops it dialectically, actualizes it.

24:

It is only as a science or as a system that knowing is actual and can be given an exposition; and that any further so-called fundamental proposition or first principle of philosophy, if it is true, is for this reason alone also false just because it is a fundamental
proposition or a principle.

There is no first principle of philosophy upon which everything else rests and is supported. Both the truth of a proposition and its negation are moments within the movement of the system of knowledge.

Conversely, the genuinely positive working out of the beginning is at the same time just as much a negative posture towards its beginning; namely, a negative posture towards its one-sided form, which is to be at first only immediately, or, to be purpose. It may thereby be taken to be the refutation of what constitutes the ground of the system, but it is better taken as showing that the ground, or the principle, of the system is in fact only its beginning.

Contrary to the assumption that the ground or principles of reason must be firm and unchanging, the movement of reason has no fixed ground. A principle is a starting point. The positive movement is via the negative, the negation of what is taken as true. It is not the truth but in the movement, the development, the working out of truth.

How do we understand him ? — Amity

I think for him the game is over, unity has been realized.

I'll stick with the scholarly view. — frank

The information I provided is from scholarly sources. Even if the dates are accurate this does not resolve the issue in question. When the stories were compiled does not tell us when, where, and by whom the stories were first told.

The notion that the priests who wrote down the stories knowingly recorded conflicting conceptions of their own divinity is absurd. — frank

Not at all. You seem to have missed the point. "Their own divinity" was the result of the joining of beliefs and practices of different groups. The twelve tribes of Israel, the families of the 12 sons of Jacob/Israel, did not settle together in one place as one united group. The theme of the reuniting of the tribes is a familiar one in the Hebrew Bible. The uniting of the peoples of the kingdoms of Judah and Israel required the stories of each group be represented. This is why we see the two stories of the Flood with their different details woven together. This is laid out clearly by Richard Friedman (a well regarded Biblical scholar) in "Who Wrote the Bible".

You can, of course, believe whatever you want. I am going to leave it there.