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[German Version] (Oct 26, 1757, Vienna – Apr 10, 1823, Kiel), trained by the Jesuits to teach philosophy, Reinhold joined the Illuminati in 1783; in 1784 he and C.M. Wieland began publishing Der Teutsche Merkur. In the same year, he converted to Protestantism. With his eight Briefe über die Kantische Philosophie (1786; Letters on the Kantian Philosophy, 2006), he succeeded in becoming the pioneer of post-Kantian systematic philosophy in Germany. A…

[German Version] This doctrine rests on the idea of the dynamic unity of a fundamental constellation, remaining qualitatively self-identical, which through quantitatively increasing self- differentiations constantly repeats itself afresh in everything that has being, albeit in varying measure. Drawing on the Aristotelian distinction between enérgeia and dýnamis (Capacity), Thomas Aquinas set a precedent for Scholasticism by turning potencies into ontological principles, making it possible to establish a hierarchy of all that has finite being while also ground-¶ in…

[German Version] (Feb 22, 1788, Danzig [Gdańsk] – Sep 21, 1860, Frankfurt am Main). Schopenhauer’s philosophy is a metaphysics of the will grounded in pessimism (Optimism and pessimism: II). Historically and systematically, it was a transitional philosophy: its understanding of the totality of our lived reality on the basis of the monistic principle of the will kept it linked to the great systematic designs…

[German Version] The atheism dispute was one of several religio-philosophical controversies in the early phase of German Idealism – a dispute significant …

[German Version] …

[German Version] I. Philosophy – II. Philosophy of Religion I. Philosophy Ever since Aristotle, immediacy has been placed on a par with the highest concept of judgment (syllogism) and of evaluation (self-evidence), the principle of a first cause and that of a presuppositionless beginning. The theoretical enhancement of the subject's immediate self-awareness proposed by R. Descartes as the secure foundation of philosophical knowledge was further emphasized by early Idealism. For J.G. Fichte and F.W.J. Schelling, immedia…

[German Version] I. As Epoch 1. Literature. The term “romantic” (from Old Fr. romanz, roman; cf. Ger. romantisch) appeared as early as the 17th century with the meaning “unbridled,” “fantastic,” “wild”; while Romanticism in Europe denotes a period in culture and art. As a movement in literary studies it runs from 1790 to 1825, with offshoots to c. 1850. ¶ Literary Romanticism in Germany is divided into early, high, and late Romanticism. Around 1798, the so-called Jena or early Romantic group (until c. 1806) formed around the journal Athenäum…

[German Version] I. History of the Term The development and spread of the term will go hand in hand with the history of Christian theology. Classical Greek had no single, distinct term like will denoting an independent mental faculty. The voluntative dimension was contained in the terms used for rational deliberation, decision-making, willingness, and non-rational desire. For Aristotleβουλή/ boul…