The Religious Significance of the Science of Knowledge
- Language:
- English
- Status:
- Complete work
- Authorship:
- Written by the author
- Condition of the text:
- No scanning noise detected (automatic measure over the whole text, not checked by hand)
- Extent:
- ~10,700 words · 51 passages
Cite this work
- APAJohann Fichte. (n.d.). The Religious Significance of the Science of Knowledge. Digital reproduction: SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/johann-fichte/the-religious-significance-of-the-science-of-knowledge
- MLAJohann Fichte. The Religious Significance of the Science of Knowledge. Digital reproduction, SigPhi, https://sigphiai.com/en/works/johann-fichte/the-religious-significance-of-the-science-of-knowledge.
- ChicagoJohann Fichte. The Religious Significance of the Science of Knowledge. Digital reproduction, SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/johann-fichte/the-religious-significance-of-the-science-of-knowledge.
Reference to the edition that SigPhi reproduces: SigPhi is its digital reproduction, not its publisher. The edition's year is not in the metadata (hence "n.d."), and the translator appears only when recorded.
What it is about
The religious side of the Science of Knowledge.
Context and history
The point where Fichte got into real trouble: in 1799 he was driven out of Jena on a charge of atheism for identifying God with the moral order of the world rather than with a person. This is the ground of that dispute. An old English translation. The catalogue also holds Fichte in German; the original is what should be cited.
Editorial context, not a citable source: unlike the passages of the work itself, these statements cannot be checked against the corpus.
Amongst this may also be classified the attempt to oppose my philosophy to Christianity, and to refute the one by the other. True, it has heretofore always been customary for the philosopher to make Christianity harmonize with his philosophy, and for the Christian to make his faith agree with his philosophical thinking; but this only proves that the men who undertook to do this knew neither philosophy nor Christianity. Our philosophy does not dream of such a thing. Christianity is wisdom of life, is popular philosophy in the true and highest sense of the word; and can not be any thing else without losing its rank and sinking down into the sphere of argumentation, and thereby admitting the validity of demonstration, and hence exposing itself to the dispute of philosophical systems. With Christianity as such original wisdom of life, our philosophy can not enter into a conflict; for our philosophy is only theory of that wisdom. Only the results of our philosophy might come into conflict with the results of Christianity; but let me ask, where are these results, and, I might add, where is true Christianity? Has it not in all cases, where it reaches us, passed through the crucible of that argumentative understanding? Again, it is charged that, according to my system, God is not to be the Creator and Governor of the world, that my system discards a divine Providence! Why, you dear, good unphilosophers! For you the whole distinction, the whole opposition whereby one philosophical system asserts this and another denies it, does not at all exist. If you are really good and religious, continue to take it in the sense in which it is true. I was not addressing you at all, but was speaking to philosophers, who may be assumed to know that distinction, and who yet take those dogmas in the sense in which they are not true. I only wanted to contradict them; and they, at least, ought to have understood me.…
Ask about this workWhat is The Religious Significance of the Science of Knowledge about?Summarize The Religious Significance of the Science of Knowledge brieflyWhat are the key ideas in The Religious Significance of the Science of Knowledge?
← Back to Johann Fichte