This paper aims to clarify Hegel’s purpose and his transformation of mediacy in terms of the self-relation of the absolute, especially in contrast to Schelling’s concept of intellectual intuition. According to Schelling, the absolute accordswith i...
This paper aims to clarify Hegel’s purpose and his transformation of mediacy in terms of the self-relation of the absolute, especially in contrast to Schelling’s concept of intellectual intuition. According to Schelling, the absolute accordswith itself and by itself, which does not allow any kind of difference in itself. Schelling called this direct accordance “intellectual intuition.” Hence, its immediate self-relationship in which no confrontation between subject and object exists is also defined as indifference, the state of absence of difference. Because finite thinking has nothing to do with this immediacy of the absolute, which is established only by the absolute itself, it is impossible for the reflection confined to opposition to have a complete understanding of the absolute. Because thinking is only one of the opposite sides of the absolute, it cannot make the absolute its object. Hegel criticized Schelling’s understanding of immediacy, insisting that mediacy or difference is necessary in the course of the appearance of the absolute. He believed and demonstrated that the limitations of reflection can be overcome by reflection itself through his own understanding of mediacy as dialectic. To surpass the limitation of difference or to reach the pure identity, he argued that the limit does not need to be eliminated. Rather, he suggested the integration of the two opposite kinds of relation, i.e., identity (immediacy) and difference (mediacy), from which the restricted but contradictory concept of immediacy comes, thus produces mediated immediacy. The experience of consciousness in the Phänomenologie des Geistes not only shows the process and the internal logic of this concept but also expands the capacity of thinking.