An Origin of Morphology as a Method of Comparative Religion : Focusing on Hegel’s Jena Writings

This paper reexamines the philosophical origin of morphology as a method of comparative religion in Hegel’s early Jena writings. Morphology is a philosophical endeavor that traces the structure of manifestation through which Absolute Spirit realizes itself in the ethical community’s spirit and individual’s self-consciousness via religious representations. This structure entails two directions: the realization of Absolute Spirit in self-consciousness through ethical life, and the recognition of Absolute Spirit by self-consciousness through ethical life. Though bifurcated, these two movements converge in the realization of individual freedom and self-consciousness. Under this dual structure, world religions are categorized into three types―natural religion, art religion, and revealed religion―each of which is driven by the deep logic of manifestation and development impelled by Absolute Spirit. Morphological analysis of the process by which Absolute Spirit is realized in self-consciousness through ethical life reflects the logic of development and manifestation across stages of nature, spirit, reconciliation between nature and spirit, and the dynamic of unity and differentiation. The morphological analysis of the process through which self-consciousness comes to recognize Absolute Spirit through ethical life mirrors the logic of progression within the Phenomenology of Spirit, particularly the development of consciousness from immediate awareness to conceptual knowledge.