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published on February 24, 2022
Karl Wilhelm Ferdinand Solger, Alexander Crist
On the Unity of Revelation and True Philosophy
In this text, Karl Wilhelm Ferdinand Solger (1780–1819), an influential but often overlooked figure in German Idealism and German Romanticism, offers an account on the relationship between revelation and philosophical thought. For Solger, the being of the eternal reveals itself in and to existence as a “creation out of nothing.” Similarly, existence seen from the position of the being of the eternal is the “nothing of being.” For the being of the eternal to enter into existence requires the sacrifice of existence, that is, the annihilation of the nothing of being. For Solger, the task of philosophy is to think these oppositions of the eternal and existence as a complete “passing over” movement, one which is comprised of creation and annihilation. Ultimately, “true philosophy” should attempt to think the “absolute fact” of revelation, namely, revelation as both thought in consciousness and experienced in its actuality in existence.