The Function of Introduction?

          The title, Introduction to the History of Philosophy or Lectures on the History of Philosophy, necessarily brings up the question of the function of an introductory lecture. The idea of introduction implies a sort of skeleton; that the body lies in a “History of Philosophy” that is not presented here. The idea of “introduction” seems to describe a support system of how the history of philosophy functions (as opposed to the actual history of philosophy). Hegel's primary aim of introducing the philosophical history of the world depends on first drawing distinctions between the different methodologies of conceptualizing and presenting history (primarily written history). He defines three categories of history, Original, Reflective, and his own method, Philosophical. The original he defines as limited to presumably eyewitness or current events encountered by the historians. They transform external occurrences into internal conceptions. Hegel notes the limitations of this kind of writing. The historians figure in their works, and both share the same spirit resulting in an inability to transcend the written present. The aim of such a work is to present an image of events as the historian has observed without reflection. Reflective history is then divided into four subcategories that are united under the condition of an ability to transcend its present. The first category aims to compile a complete volume of the history of a country. The second category, the pragmatic reflective history converts the past into the present with a didactic function. The third, termed the critical history is the history of histories or a criticism of historical narratives through investigations into their validity. The last category of reflective history is a perspectivized history, the history of certain subjects such as art, law, or religion. Hegel states that these first two categories of history need no further explanation but that the philosophical history demands justification. He states that “the Philosophy of History means nothing but the thoughtful consideration of it”. Hegel bases his subsequent justification on the idea of thought which is most perfectly realized in the conception of reason. Reason governs and constitutes the world in the form of the Divine Being which then suggests the realization of an ultimate design. Hegel then moves to the concept of spirit which encompasses the realm of the Universal History. The essence or substance of spirit is deemed to be freedom. The history of the world is then defined as the progression of the consciousness of freedom. Human passions and subjectivity is the material out of which reason manifests yet individual subjectivity is obviously limited in scope. However, the subjectivity of the individual when joined with rational will becomes a the State, termed as a moral Whole. The state becomes the actual existence and realization of freedom and of a moral life. The worth and spiritual reality the human being possesses is possessed only through the State. Crucially, the formation of the State, the “Divine Idea” on earth, becomes history itself.

           Hegel's Introduction is structured with an introduction within the larger idea of “introduction”. This meta-introduction defines the terms and structures that is at work within the text, namely the previously outlined separation of the different methodologies of history writing and the ideas of Thought, Reason, Spirit, and the transition from individual to State within the philosophical history. Section IV then moves to the second part (my cutoff) of the Introduction which then also serves as a kind of “body” to the meta-introduction of roughly the first half of the text. Starting from this section, Hegel discusses the progression of world history as that which continually advances to a more perfect state through the progression of Spirit. The beginnings of History arise from the manifestation of rationality in the World's affairs (as opposed to only within the individual consciousness). In fact, Hegel specifies that the “state of nature” is decidedly not History or objective history and reiterates that History can only begin with the formation of a State. History progresses when the Spirit (the general spirit of the Nation) progresses in time. It progresses through its embodiment of its own negation which leads to a “natural death” that can be more accurately characterized as a self-consciousness of its own work. Through its self-consciousness, the Spirit becomes objectivized in its own thought and destroys the form of its own being to move to a high form of being. Furthermore, the spirit is immortal without past or future. The present spirit contains all the past and the progression of history is not linear but cyclic.

        In a sense, the Introduction itself is also cyclic if we do think of the text as a two part introduction, body structure. By the end, we are brought back to the idea of introduction when we think of the series of lectures again as a whole entity (again as suggested by the title, Introduction or Lectures, with lectures also implying a kind of introductory context), in the sense that the text is not complete but a skeleton of a more fully fleshed work. However, simultaneously we can also read the text as the History of Philosophy. If the first half lays the groundwork for explaining the History of Philosophy, the second half then becomes the History of Philosophy. Hegel's first definition of the History of Philosophy was “the thoughtful consideration of it”, which is exactly the function of the Introduction. So in this sense, this introduction is both skeleton and flesh.