The Final Name of God: Hegel on Determinate Religion

Publication: in Hegel and the Tradition. University of Toronto Press, 1997, 162-175.

Hegel’s system aims at thought encompassing self-relation. There are many ways of interpreting just what Hegel is trying to achieve in that self-relation and what kind of closure, if any, it demands. It is also difficult to be sure how Hegel intends that self-relation to include the myriad detail of the world. In this essay, I look at two models of how that self-relation might come to grips with the detail of the history of religions. I argue that Hegel prefers the stronger of the two models, but that there are serious difficulties in carrying it out.

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