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Johann Georg Hamann's Relational Metacriticism
- GenresPhilosophy
Hardcover
First published January 1, 1995
77 people want to read
About the author
Johann Georg Hamann
118 books42 followersJohann Georg Hamann (August 27, 1730, Königsberg – June 21, 1788, Münster) was an important German philosopher, a main proponent of the Sturm und Drang movement, and associated by historian of ideas Isaiah Berlin with the Counter-Enlightenment. He was Pietist Lutheran, and a friend (while being an intellectual opponent) of the philosopher Immanuel Kant. He was also a lutenist, having studied this instrument with Timofey Belogradsky (a student of Sylvius Leopold Weiss), a Ukrainian virtuoso then living in Königsberg. He was known by the epithet Magus im Norden ("Magus of the North").
His distrust of reason and the Enlightenment ("I look upon logical proofs the way a well-bred girl looks upon a love letter" was one of his many witicisms) led him to conclude that faith in God was the only solution to the vexing problems of philosophy.
His distrust of reason and the Enlightenment ("I look upon logical proofs the way a well-bred girl looks upon a love letter" was one of his many witicisms) led him to conclude that faith in God was the only solution to the vexing problems of philosophy.
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June 26, 2023
Along with John Betz's "After Enlightenment," this is the only book on Hamann in English that could be described as "magisterial." Now nearly 30 years old, Gwen Griffith Dickson's work is essentially a description of Hamann's method through a careful analysis of five of Hamann's works: the Socratic Memorabilia, Aesthetica in Nuce, the Herderschriften (including Philological Ideas and Doubts), Essay of a Sybil on Marriage, and the Metacritique on the Purism of Reason. English translations of these texts are included as appendices. The bulk of the monograph is devoted to careful assessments of each writing.
The book's major argument is that Hamann's style of authorship, his 'metacriticism' (i.e., his criticism of criticism itself; his "pre- systematic" attack of untenable presuppositions; his corrective and curative urges) is 'relational' (22). By this Gwen Griffith Dickson means that Hamann's purpose is to bring the reader into a new relation with something or someone. Hamann's writings are not meant to impart information but assist the reader in getting over his or her own presumptions and prejudices and connect him or her to the well-spring of truth: ultimately, God Himself. By using authors' own words against themselves by ironic combinations to achieve new meaning while embedding them within a patchwork of allusions and quotations from biblical, classical, and contemporary authors, Hamann's own writings force the reader to question his or her standpoint (and so many cherished idols) again and again.
The key to all of Hamann's "authorship" is not his rejection of systems or anything approaching an 'irrationality' or 'existentialism.' It is, rather, the condescension of God to His creation, so that all that is physical is simultaneously divine—not in a pantheistic sense, but in a relational sense. All things participate in God, but via this participation, they do not lose their physicality or worldliness. Learned from Luther but also picked up through Nicholas of Cusa and Giordano Bruno, this recognition of the coincidentia oppositorum—the coincidence of opposites—is at the heart of Hamann's work. That Someone infinite and omnipotent decides to humble Himself in such absurd ways (and even creation itself is a mark of God's condescension), that what He creates is neither destroyed nor absorbed but loved and distinct, is a sign of this coincidence: what is Divine enjoys what is human, what is infinite stoops down to the finite; what is everlasting embeds His Word in time.
The relational experience of this coincidence of opposites is understood by Hamann in the classic Lutheran doctrine of the cummicatio idiomatum, the "communication of attributes" or properties in the God-Man, Christ. In Christ the humanity is not overcome by dignity, but neither does the humanity reduce the divinity. What is human participates in what is divine and vice versa, so that in Christ all of creation is both fully material and fully spiritual. Every tree is a communicated word from God and every man is the image of God on a small-scale. All things, therefore, bear God and proclaim God.
This work is most helpful in showing how Hamann's relational metacritical project is three-pronged: Hamann will unsettle and overturn any philosophy that destroys the unity of humanity and God which is achieved through language, sexuality, and history/creation.
In these areas God joins humans to Himself. In regards to language, God neither puts the capacity magically within each brain nor does He let humans figure it out on their own; rather, as a Parent, He teaches humanity how to speak. Their speech is, therefore, fully their own (i.e., fully human) and yet learned from God (i.e. fully divine). Hamann writes, "[Language is] the sign, symbol and pledge of a new, mysterious, inexpressible but all the more intimate union, participation and community of divine energies and ideas" (N III, 32:21-24).
Human sexuality also demonstrates our relation to God; through procreation, mankind obeys the first commandment given by God to "be fruitful and multiply" (Gen. 1:28), thus fulfilling the creative, Godlike urge which follows from being made in His image (Gen. 1:27). In sexual union, the man returns to the place from which he entered the world, but he enters with his 'rib' (Gen. 2:22) from which Eve was originally formed. The man is Christ-like in that he completes the woman and saves her, while the woman models the Father because she is the creator of a new human. The offspring that proceeds from their union of love is the Holy Spirit. Again, what is fully human (sexuality) is, of course, physical, but it participates in God's own creative purposes and divine energies, drawing humanity to the Creator through the glorious divine-human pattern of sex.
Finally, in history and the created world, what is divine penetrates what is human, without destroying the uniqueness of either. This is pointed out most clearly in Hamann's "Biblical Meditations" (not included in this volume). History itself is God's book by which He instructs, chides, inspires, and warns. Typologically and allegorically understood, the Bible, one's own life story, and even pagan history and myth, reflect the Divine Author's intentions for His creatures. Again, this history is fully our own, but it is also fully God's.
Gwen Griffith Dickson's book is still the best book on Hamann in English and it contains some of the finest translations of Hamann into English. The book is published by De Gruyter and is prohibitively expensive for most ordinary readers, but found online or at a library, and read carefully, it will lead the reader into a rich engagement with a philosopher who is dramatically different than all his contemporaries.
The book's major argument is that Hamann's style of authorship, his 'metacriticism' (i.e., his criticism of criticism itself; his "pre- systematic" attack of untenable presuppositions; his corrective and curative urges) is 'relational' (22). By this Gwen Griffith Dickson means that Hamann's purpose is to bring the reader into a new relation with something or someone. Hamann's writings are not meant to impart information but assist the reader in getting over his or her own presumptions and prejudices and connect him or her to the well-spring of truth: ultimately, God Himself. By using authors' own words against themselves by ironic combinations to achieve new meaning while embedding them within a patchwork of allusions and quotations from biblical, classical, and contemporary authors, Hamann's own writings force the reader to question his or her standpoint (and so many cherished idols) again and again.
The key to all of Hamann's "authorship" is not his rejection of systems or anything approaching an 'irrationality' or 'existentialism.' It is, rather, the condescension of God to His creation, so that all that is physical is simultaneously divine—not in a pantheistic sense, but in a relational sense. All things participate in God, but via this participation, they do not lose their physicality or worldliness. Learned from Luther but also picked up through Nicholas of Cusa and Giordano Bruno, this recognition of the coincidentia oppositorum—the coincidence of opposites—is at the heart of Hamann's work. That Someone infinite and omnipotent decides to humble Himself in such absurd ways (and even creation itself is a mark of God's condescension), that what He creates is neither destroyed nor absorbed but loved and distinct, is a sign of this coincidence: what is Divine enjoys what is human, what is infinite stoops down to the finite; what is everlasting embeds His Word in time.
The relational experience of this coincidence of opposites is understood by Hamann in the classic Lutheran doctrine of the cummicatio idiomatum, the "communication of attributes" or properties in the God-Man, Christ. In Christ the humanity is not overcome by dignity, but neither does the humanity reduce the divinity. What is human participates in what is divine and vice versa, so that in Christ all of creation is both fully material and fully spiritual. Every tree is a communicated word from God and every man is the image of God on a small-scale. All things, therefore, bear God and proclaim God.
This work is most helpful in showing how Hamann's relational metacritical project is three-pronged: Hamann will unsettle and overturn any philosophy that destroys the unity of humanity and God which is achieved through language, sexuality, and history/creation.
In these areas God joins humans to Himself. In regards to language, God neither puts the capacity magically within each brain nor does He let humans figure it out on their own; rather, as a Parent, He teaches humanity how to speak. Their speech is, therefore, fully their own (i.e., fully human) and yet learned from God (i.e. fully divine). Hamann writes, "[Language is] the sign, symbol and pledge of a new, mysterious, inexpressible but all the more intimate union, participation and community of divine energies and ideas" (N III, 32:21-24).
Human sexuality also demonstrates our relation to God; through procreation, mankind obeys the first commandment given by God to "be fruitful and multiply" (Gen. 1:28), thus fulfilling the creative, Godlike urge which follows from being made in His image (Gen. 1:27). In sexual union, the man returns to the place from which he entered the world, but he enters with his 'rib' (Gen. 2:22) from which Eve was originally formed. The man is Christ-like in that he completes the woman and saves her, while the woman models the Father because she is the creator of a new human. The offspring that proceeds from their union of love is the Holy Spirit. Again, what is fully human (sexuality) is, of course, physical, but it participates in God's own creative purposes and divine energies, drawing humanity to the Creator through the glorious divine-human pattern of sex.
Finally, in history and the created world, what is divine penetrates what is human, without destroying the uniqueness of either. This is pointed out most clearly in Hamann's "Biblical Meditations" (not included in this volume). History itself is God's book by which He instructs, chides, inspires, and warns. Typologically and allegorically understood, the Bible, one's own life story, and even pagan history and myth, reflect the Divine Author's intentions for His creatures. Again, this history is fully our own, but it is also fully God's.
Gwen Griffith Dickson's book is still the best book on Hamann in English and it contains some of the finest translations of Hamann into English. The book is published by De Gruyter and is prohibitively expensive for most ordinary readers, but found online or at a library, and read carefully, it will lead the reader into a rich engagement with a philosopher who is dramatically different than all his contemporaries.
Displaying 1 of 1 review