Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion

Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel's Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion (LPR; , VPR) outlines his ideas on Christianity as a form of self-consciousness. They represent the final and in some ways the decisive element of his philosophical system. In light of his distinctive philosophical approach, using a method that is dialectical and historical, Hegel offers a radical reinterpretation of the meaning of Christianity and its characteristic doctrines. The approach taken in these lectures is to some extent prefigured in Hegel's first published book, The Phenomenology of Spirit (1807). Publication history Hegel's conception and execution of the lectures differed significantly on each of the occasions he delivered them, in 1821, 1824, 1827, and 1831. The first German edition was published at Berlin in 1832, the year after Hegel's death, as part of the posthumous Werke series. The book was rather hastily put together by Philip Marheineke, mainly from students' copies of the lectures delivered during different sessions, though it also contained matter taken from notes and outlines in Hegel's own handwriting. In 1840, two of the Young Hegelians, Bruno Bauer and Karl Marx, began work on a second edition, which appeared under Marheineke's name. In the preparation of this second edition, the editors drew largely on several important papers found amongst Hegel's manuscripts, in which his ideas were developed in much greater detail than in any of the sketches previously used, including the "Lectures on the Proofs of the Existence of God," which Hegel was revising for the press when he died. Marheineke had also fresh and very complete copies of the lectures made by some of Hegel's most distinguished pupils.