Let us start with Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. His respect for
the Greeks was firmly rooted in him at a young age when he was
studying in Tubingen. After completing high school in Stuttgart
in 1788, he enrolled in the Tübingen Stift, which was more like a
barracks than a university at the time. Also arriving were Friedrich
Hélderlin, who would go on to be a great German poet, and a little
later Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling, who was five years younger
than them. The latter had only just turned 16 when he started
university with special permission (Gyenge 2005.). Their effect
on each other is immeasurable, which is thoroughly demonstrated
by amanuscript from this period (Das älteste Systemprogramm des
deutschen Idealismus, The Oldest Systematic Program of German Ideal¬
ism) whose author is indeterminable. It is either Hegel, Schelling, or
Holderlin. Or all three, at the same time or one after the other. Or
who knows? It can never be determined conclusively now, although
there are different theories on the subject. Even I have written in
support of one, but now I find the theory of multiple authorship
likely (Gyenge 2005, pp.239-242.)‘. If we take it as such, Hélder¬
lin’s effect can be identified in large part by his enthusiastic love
culture, starts with the Greeks. This does not mean that the wisdom of
the Far East is not interesting, but there is no direct connection between
the two. It is entirely obvious that the Buddha, despite being roughly his
contemporary, had no effect on Heraclitus, who knew nothing about him.
This is why it is the utmost primitive ignorance to accuse Hegel or Kant of
racism. Please examine the tradition spanning Seneca through St. Thomas
Aquinas to Leibniz and Heidegger, in which the point of reference is always
Greek philosophy. The entire European philosophy was born on the islands
and the shores of the Mediterranean Sea and was strengthened in a grove
in the vicinity of Athens.
4 Isupported the argument behind Schelling’s authorship (as did Manfred
Frank). I did this because at the time I was still interested in the science,
and I thought the best wait to be worthy of its greatness was by constructing
an own theory: as senseless and convoluted as possible, something nobody
would understand, not even ourselves most of the time, only let it be new
when compared with what came before.)