Greatest Explanation of "The Phenomenology of Spirit" ever

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Dimebag
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Re: Greatest Explanation of "The Phenomenology of Spirit" ever

Post by Dimebag »

Well after a failed attempt at reading Hegel’s phenomenology, I stumbled across your thread and have dived into the sheer immensity that is Dr Gregory B Sadler’s in depth exploration of Hegel’s work.

And what an amazing explanation and exploration it is. Even the preface takes you on such a journey which is to mirror the main body of work, it was daunting to work through it but it was nice to have Sadlers interpretation of the ideas.

I agree somewhat with both of you two, who are arguing over the correct translation of ‘Geistes’.

To the uninitiated, mind is a more apt description of the term, but, unfortunately using the term mind doesn’t fully capture the true nature of what Hegel is describing. The limitation of the term mind is that, mind has a very bland connotation, usually used by the secular world, which hasn’t truly appreciated the possibilities of the way the mind can transcend itself. For that reason, spirit does seem to me to be an appropriate term, with the caveat that, what spirit is describing is not some separate entity from the body, but, the very essence which is not separate from the body, and yet, can transcend the physical and mental limitations which entails being a body.

For anyone who has really looked into the phenomenology of spirit, it is pretty clear that transcendence, or maybe expansion and inclusion is what the work entails. The book isn’t just a description of what is, but a transformation of mind, an evolution towards something better, something self justifying.

For someone who in the last two years underwent a kind of awakening, a change in identity, a change in the understanding of this self, and an expansion into the feeling of something greater, yet completely normal, this work really resonates with me.

These are my initial thoughts.

Sadler lays out some pretty useful models to interpret the text through, which place the work in context. It would be nice to go through these models progressively here, but the problem is the text is so interlaced with a kind of self effacing underline that almost defeats the purpose of attempting to even explain this to others. It adds to the seemingly impenetrable nature of the work.

It is truly an internal alchemical masterpiece.
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