German idealist who read world history dialectically as spirit coming to know itself
Born in 1770 at Stuttgart in the Duchy of Württemberg, he followed Schelling to the University of Jena as a lecturer in 1801 and finished the Phenomenology of Spirit as Napoleon fought the battle of Jena in 1806. After editing a newspaper at Bamberg he was headmaster of a Nuremberg gymnasium from 1808 to 1816, where he published the Science of Logic. He became professor at Heidelberg in 1816 and in 1818 took the Berlin chair of philosophy, lecturing there with great renown until his death; he published the Philosophy of Right in 1821. His dialectical method, which resolves contradictions in a higher unity, sought to grasp the whole of reality as one system, and he saw world history as progress in the consciousness of freedom. After his death in Berlin in 1831 his followers split into Right and Young Hegelians.
Activities and affiliations
-
1808–1816
Germany state institutionsHeadmaster of the Nuremberg gymnasium
Education -
1816–1818
Germany state institutionsProfessor at Heidelberg
Scholarship and theory -
1818–1831
Germany state institutionsProfessor of philosophy, University of BerlinMain
Scholarship and theory
Career Timeline
- 1801–1807Lecturer at the University of Jena
- 1807Phenomenology of Spirit
- 1808–1816Headmaster of the Nuremberg gymnasium
- 1816–1818Professor at Heidelberg
- 1818–1831Professor of philosophy at Berlin
- 1821Elements of the Philosophy of Right