Introduction

Abstract

Abstract The Introduction begins by explaining Hegel’s understanding of philosophy as a systematic enterprise. An attempt is made then to locate his analyses of religion in the context of his philosophical system. It shows how Hegel’s famous Berlin lectures constitute expansions of specific parts of the system that build on works that Hegel had previously published. An account is given of the history of the editions of Hegel’s Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion. The first edition was edited by the theologian Philipp Marheineke and appeared in the first collected works edition of Hegel’s writings which was prepared by his students after his death under the title Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel’s Werke. Vollständige Ausgabe. An account is also given of the new critical edition by Walter Jaeschke, which usefully separates the individual lecture courses and presents them individually. At the end of the chapter, the following theses are presented: much of Hegel’s agenda in the Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion comes from his reaction to the Enlightenment. Specifically, he believes that this movement has deprived religion of all its meaningful content. While the Enlightenment has undermined the key dogmas of Christianity, the content, the Romantics have made matters even worse by reducing the form of religious faith to mere feeling. Hegel’s project is to correct what he regards as the mistaken form of religious belief in his day.