The present study is dedicated to the Hegel reception in Denmark, but this is particularly difficult to circumscribe during the period covered by this third tome. The problem concerns the reception of some of Hegel’s most important students, especially Strauss and Feuerbach, who came into prominence during the period. How Hegel was understood in the 1830s and 1840s was strongly shaped by these thinkers from the left side of the Hegel school. It has therefore been necessary to include accounts of the reception of these figures in Denmark since a key element in the contemporary discussion was whether their views were in harmony with that of their teacher, Hegel, or if they were setting out in new directions that contradicted Hegel’s philosophy. During this period the reception of Hegel cannot be separated from the reception of his schools. It was difficult for scholars to talk about Hegel on his own during this time since his name was so closely associated with those of his students. For these reasons the scope of the Hegel reception in Denmark becomes considerably broader during this third period.
Hegel’s Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion played a particularly important role in the reception of his thought at this time. Some scholars might question my decision to make use primarily of the older English translation of these lectures by E.B. Speirs and J. Burdon Sanderson,1 in contrast to the newer one by Robert F. Brown, Peter C. Hodgson and J.M. Stewart.2 The latter is an outstanding new translation, based on the German edition by Walter Jaeschke,3 which is more widely used today and offers the advantage of providing the texts to Hegel’s lectures from the different years in which they were given. The reason for my decision is that the old translation is based on the second revised edition of Hegel’s lectures produced by Philipp Marheineke, which was the work that all the Danish figures discussed here were using at the time.4 It is therefore essential to use this edition in a study that aims to trace the quotations and references back
All efforts have been made to make the formalia in the three tomes of the present study consistent. As was the case in the first two volumes, almost all the sources are in Danish, and few have been previously translated into English. The translations that appear in the text are my own unless otherwise indicated.
Bratislava, 2024
G.W.F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion, vols. 1–3, trans. by E.B. Speirs and J. Burdon Sanderson, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul; New York: The Humanities Press 1962. (Abbreviated here as Phil. of Religion.)
G.W.F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion, vols. 1–3, ed. by Peter C. Hodgson, trans. by Robert F. Brown, P.C. Hodgson, and J.M. Stewart with the assistance of H.S. Harris, Berkeley: University of California Press 1984–87. (Abbreviated here as LPR.)
G.W.F. Hegel, Vorlesungen über die Philosophie der Religion, Parts 1–3, ed. by Walter Jaeschke, Hamburg: Felix Meiner 1983–85. (Abbreviated here as VPR.)
Hegel, Vorlesungen über die Philosophie der Religion, vols. I-II, ed. by Philipp Marheineke, 2nd revised ed. (1840), vols. 11–12 in Hegel’s Werke.
For a discussion of this issue, see Peter C. Hodgson, “Hegel’s Interpretation of Determinate Religion: Analysis of the Scholarship Issues,” The Owl of Minerva, vol. 52, nos. 1–2, 2021, pp. 5–9. Jon Stewart, “The Significance of the Determinate Religions,” The Owl of Minerva, vol. 52, nos. 1–2, 2021, pp. 159–192; pp. 160–164.