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Schelling's philosophical views. Philosophy of Friedrich Schelling

Human civilization does not know a historical example when the owner of an analytical mind initially decides to become a philosopher. The thinker achieves a special status through personal experience, observation of the variability of life, and establishment of the role of man in the cycle of the universe. Sometimes a figure is called a thinker posthumously, centuries later, because contemporaries could not understand, realize, or appreciate the depth of research reasoning. Sometimes the sage himself denies the obvious fact of his philosophical nature.

For example, Schelling's philosophy began with the cognitive interest of an inquisitive mind to comprehend the wisdom of nature, to form a political worldview about revolutionary events. Only after a while did the thinker, just like his opponents and associates, understand what his real purpose was.

Life path of a German philosopher

The ambiguous biography of the sage, full of ups and downs, begins in 1775, when an heir named Wilhelm Joseph was born into the pastor’s family.

The young man graduated from the University of Jena. Being young and ardent, Schelling greeted the French revolution with enthusiasm, believing that it would mark the beginning of social and personal freedom. But Wilhelm's attention turned from political games to philosophical teachings, which deeply touched the man's soul. The theories of Newton and Kant gave rise to thoughts in the future philosopher about the search for world unity.

The thirst for knowledge did not prevent Joseph from acquiring physical passion - the young man married the former wife of the romantic philosopher Schlegel.

For forty years, starting in 1803, Schelling was engaged in scientific and teaching activities in different cities of Germany. After receiving the status of an ordinary professor, the title of nobility reached the rank of chairman of the royal scientific academy.

But the scandalous story of plagiarism of the thinker’s scientific records by his competitor undermined the philosopher’s faith in the “purity” of research activity. Therefore, the scientist left teaching and indulged in travel until he died in 1854. Two years after Schelling's death, the Bavarian king erected a monument in honor of the philosopher in the city of Ragaz.

The first stage of Schelling's philosophizing

The creative worldview of the thinker was very changeable, just like the scientist himself. Joseph's receptive, gifted character left an imprint on the philosophizing of the sage. Wilhelm studied the body of works of his predecessor colleagues (Plato, Bruno, Spinoza, Fichte, Kant), contemporaries and formed a separate opinion about each, which was transformed after receiving a new piece of information. Having met Hegel's ideas in a friendly manner, Wilhelm, after disagreeing with the thinker on some issues, sharply changed his attitude towards Friedrich, even to the point of hostility.

Based on behavior similar to that typical of Schelling, the philosopher’s scientific activity is classified into several periods. But for organizational convenience, the work of the German thinker was divided into two stages, before and after the treatise “On Evil.”

The first negative philosophical period of the scientist is characterized by classifying philosophy among the rational sciences, which are comprehended within the boundaries of common sense. Wilhelm's opinion is constantly changing to the point of being the opposite. The philosophical and spiritual absolute idealism inherent in the first stage became the basis of the thinker’s natural philosophy. A little later, absolute idealism is transformed into transcendental. And even later it turns into a real-idealistic philosophical identity. The knowledge of existence according to Schelling extends to religion, philosophy, art, moving from antiquity, the Middle Ages to the New Age.

The second stage of Schelling's philosophizing

The second positive (as Joseph characterized) philosophical period of the scientist comes down to the knowledge of the first principle not by reason, but by experimental revelation. The rationalism of the first stage was replaced by the positivity of not just actual, but possible actual experimental knowledge of existence through God. Here the divine theogonic process, which personifies mythology for Schelling, is explained. With the concept of mythology, Wilhelm brings out a new type of religion - free, which differs significantly from natural belief. Thus, the thinker completes his own theological system.

How did Schelling’s ideology affect the development of philosophical thought?

The influence of the philosophizing of the German sage on the development of the research thought of his followers and contemporaries is great, but not unambiguous.

Schelling saw his role in natural philosophy as extremely significant. If you look at this from the side of cold reason, then the thinker’s teaching is characterized by an alternation of basic ideas, for which he was nicknamed the “philosophical Proteus.” But the common common sense inherent in all periods of Schelling’s teaching activity promotes a diverse knowledge of the beginning of being, which helped adherents find their path.

Wilhelm's concepts were reflected in the scientific vision of European (including Russian) philosophers, literary figures, doctors, and lawyers.

Philosophical meaning of transcendental idealism

Schelling entered into some invisible natural-philosophical impasse, which did not allow the thinker to fully realize the depth of the truth of knowledge. Therefore, Wilhelm’s natural philosophy acquired a transcendental-idealistic character when the author published the scientific work “The System of Transcendental Idealism.” Transcendentalism, as a movement that studies those philosophical aspects that cannot be comprehended through experience, gave Joseph the opportunity to leave free space for unprovable hypotheses.

Idealism, according to Schelling, consists of system-hierarchical categories, which are divided into opposing subcategories, which subsequently again form a single whole. Thus, the constructed conceptual integrity approaches practical action guided by the will of man. The will goes through a process of self-improvement until it reaches maximum development - the desire to commit deeply moral actions. In short, free will becomes morally practical.

The philosopher’s transcendental idealism differs from the mainstream in that Wilhelm moved from words to action, that is, idealistic categories moved, thereby raising Schelling’s concept to the level of a system of evolving consciousness.

The German figure developed the principle of self-consciousness identified by Fichte, improved it, and later his colleague Hegel refined the system to its evolutionary peak.

Solving the problem of contradictions between object and subject

The natural philosophical concept of the thinker faced the problem of the spirituality of nature. For a long time, Mother Nature was an inanimate object, but scientific research has clearly established its organic essence. Thus, nature from an inorganic form of being grew into organic multiplicity, became spiritualized, and became a subject. Having received a subjective status, nature received self-expression in anthropology and culture.

Natural philosophy obliged us to deal with inanimate natural hypostasis, and transcendental philosophy with living reincarnation. Hence, a conflict arose between the object and the subject, which showed the need for a compromise construction of object-subject relations.

The highest stage of development of a natural subject is the human race, since only man has a personal “I” and the ability to think.

This view of the previously established natural duality (non-material, non-spiritualized concept averaged between objective being and subjective consciousness) brought nature to a new level. The natural essence was revealed in everything at once: spirit, matter; consciousness, being; object, subject, which emphasized its special significance.

Philosophy of identity

The author’s formed ideas led to the only correct, in his opinion, solution - the philosophy of identity. Schelling believed that the superiority of thinking over being leads to closed research conclusions. Only cohesion, equality, and non-fragmentation of philosophical concepts can lead to the main goal of scientific research. The principle of identity is the absence of separation between the ideal object and the real subject. The identical position eliminates the need to search for initial authority.

But for the practical use of the principle of identity, the correct tool is needed, which Schelling sees in art. Only works of art are capable of harmoniously combining practical knowledge with theoretical knowledge, emphasizing the social significance, depth, and objectivity of knowledge.

Philosophizing about identity is characterized by the use of intuition of the intellect, which acts as an objective-subjective unity. This unity reduces the faceless concept of “nothing” (neither nature, nor soul) to the great omnipotent “something”, which identifies a rational indifference to priority.

Philosophizing revelation

For many years, searching for the truth, Schelling, like other representatives of European philosophical thought, concentrated on the study of facts - what has already been given, but for what reason it has been given is unknown. The scientist examined “dead information.”

One day, a philosopher came to the conclusion that answers can be found by approaching the opposite side of the question. That is, studying the “living” source of information, which was the mind, is much more productive. Thus, the thinker took the path of positive thinking. This area was close to medical psychoanalysis, so some of Wilhelm's followers were physicians.

The unlimited possibilities of the human brain revealed in Schelling a gift for the philosophy of revelation. But philosophizing was not limited to the abilities of the intellect.

Having gone a long way in analyzing the mental states of the individual, Joseph turned to religious belief. As a young philosopher, Wilhelm worshiped the person of God. As he grew older, the German thinker looked at the Christian religion differently. The highest degree of knowledge of the human mind strives towards the knowledge of the Lord God. But when Schelling tried to explain the divine phenomenon philosophically, confusion ensued. The sage reflected: “if it is generally accepted to consider the Almighty to be infinite in time and space, then how is he able to be spiritualized in a specific mortal man, Jesus Christ?” The inexplicability and illogicality of religious dogmas led the thinker to begin to criticize the Bible.

1. Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling(1775 - 1854) was a prominent representative of the objective idealism of German classical philosophy, a friend, then an opponent of Hegel. He enjoyed great authority in the philosophical world of Germany at the beginning of the 19th century. before the appearance of Hegel. Having lost an open philosophical discussion to Hegel in the 20s. XIX century, lost his former influence and failed to restore it even after Hegel’s death, taking his chair at the University of Berlin.

The main goal of Schelling's philosophy is to understand and explain "absolute" that is, the origin of being and thinking. In its development, Schelling's philosophy passed three main stages:

natural philosophy;

Practical philosophy;

Irrationalism.

2. In his natural philosophy Schelling gives explanation of nature and does this from the standpoint of objective idealism. The essence of Schelling's philosophy of nature in the following:

The previous concepts of explaining nature (Fichte's "not-I", Spinoza's substance) are untrue, since in the first case (subjective idealists, Fichte) nature is derived from human consciousness, and in all others (Spinoza's theory of substance, etc.) a restrictive interpretation of nature is given ( that is, philosophers try to “squeeze” nature into some framework);

nature is "absolute"- the first cause and origin of everything, covering everything else;

Nature is the unity of the subjective and objective, the eternal mind;

Matter and spirit are one and are properties of nature, different states of the absolute mind;

nature is an integral organism with animation(living and inanimate nature, matter, field, electricity, light are united);

The driving force of nature is its polarity - the presence of internal opposites and their interaction (for example, the poles of a magnet, plus and minus charges of electricity, objective and subjective, etc.).

3. Schelling's practical philosophy resolves issues of a socio-political nature and the course of history.

The main problem of humanity as a whole and the main subject of philosophy, according to Schelling, is the problem of freedom. The desire for freedom is inherent in the very nature of man and is the main goal of the entire historical process. With the final realization of the idea of freedom, people create a “second nature” - legal system. In the future, the legal system should spread from state to state, and humanity should eventually come to a world legal system and a world federation of legal states.

Another major problem (along with the problem of freedom) of Schelling’s practical philosophy is the problem of alienation. Alienation is the result of human activity, the opposite of the original goals, when the idea of freedom comes into contact with reality. (Example: the degeneration of the high ideals of the Great French Revolution into the opposite reality - violence, injustice, even greater enrichment of some and impoverishment of others; suppression of freedom).

The philosopher comes to the following conclusions:

The course of history is random, arbitrariness reigns in history;

Both the random events of history and purposeful activity are subordinated to strict necessity, to which man is powerless to oppose anything;

Theory (human intentions) and history (real reality) are very often opposite and have nothing in common;

There are often cases in history when the struggle for freedom and justice leads to even greater enslavement and injustice.

At the end of his life Schelling came to irrationalism- denial of any logic of regularity in history and perception of the surrounding reality as inexplicable chaos.

1. Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling (1775 – 1854) is the only case in the history of philosophy of a child prodigy who, at the age of 16, defended his master’s thesis on the interpretation of the biblical myth of the Fall. Schelling studied in Tübingen and Leipzig; in 1798 he was appointed, with the assistance of Fichte and Goethe, extraordinary professor of philosophy in Jena, where he joined the romantics of Fr. and A.V. Schlegel, whose wife, Caroline, he later married. Schelling was Secretary General of the Royal Academy of Educational Arts, lectured in Erlangen, and was a university professor in Munich and Berlin. In Ragaz, where Schelling died, King Maximilian II of Bavaria erected a monument to him in 1856.

2.Schelling was a prominent representative of objective idealism, a friend and then an opponent of Hegel. He enjoyed great authority in the philosophical world of Germany at the beginning of the 19th century. before the appearance of Hegel. Having lost an open philosophical discussion to Hegel in the 20s. XIX century, lost his former influence and failed to restore it even after Hegel’s death, taking his chair at the University of Berlin. The main goal of Schelling’s philosophy is to understand and explain "absolute" that is, the origin of being and thinking. In its development, Schelling's philosophy passed three main stages:

natural philosophy;

Practical philosophy;

Irrationalism.

3. In his natural philosophy, Schelling gives explanation of nature and does this from the standpoint of objective idealism. The essence of Schelling's philosophy of nature in the following:

Previous concepts of explanation of nature (Fichte's "not-I", Spinoza's substance) are untrue, since in the first case (subjective idealists, Fichte) nature is derived from consciousness

man, and in all others (Spinoza’s theory of substance, etc.) a restrictive interpretation of nature is given (that is, philosophers try to “squeeze” nature into some framework);

nature is "absolute"- the first cause and origin of everything, covering everything else;

Nature is the unity of the subjective and objective, the eternal mind;

Matter and spirit are one and are properties of nature, different states of the absolute mind;

nature is an integral organism with animation(living and inanimate nature, matter, field, electricity, light are one);

4.Schelling's practical philosophy resolves issues of a socio-political nature and the course of history.

The philosopher comes to the following conclusions:

The course of history is random, arbitrariness reigns in history;

Both the random events of history and purposeful activity are subordinated to strict necessity, to which man is powerless to oppose anything;

Theory (human intentions) and history (real reality) are very often opposite and have nothing in common;

There are often cases in history when the struggle for freedom and justice leads to even greater enslavement and injustice.

At the end of his life Schelling came to irrationalism- denial of any logic of regularity in history and perception of the surrounding reality as inexplicable chaos

Fichte Johann Gottlieb (1762-1814) - German philosopher, born into the family of a craftsman and already as a boy had to work at the machine.

He developed Kant's idea of philosophy as a science, understanding it as a “doctrine of science” - a scientific doctrine. He believed that philosophy is a fundamental science that helps to develop a unified method of cognition.

Scientific teaching is focused on the study of the conditions of knowledge.

Having abandoned Kant's dualistic position, he tried to eliminate Kant's idea of objects in themselves and derive the entire content of knowledge from the activity of our Self. The basis of knowledge is self-consciousness as a creative activity aimed at oneself, at the “I.” “I” is the identity of subject and object.

Fichte pointed out the contradiction of the concept of a “thing in itself” - unknowable, not influencing the world of phenomena and at the same time containing within itself the cause of phenomena. Having eliminated this contradiction, he sought to transform Kant's critical method into subjective idealism. For Fichte, genuine reality– unity of subject and object; The world is a “subject-object, with the leading role played by the subject.”

Fichte proposes to distinguish and contrast a real event with an imaginary one that exists only in consciousness. According to Fichte, the attention of consciousness can also be occupied by a fact that was in the past. Since both when observing a real event and when remembering past actions, a part of a person’s life, a part of time, seems to disappear, Fichte believes it is possible to declare both phenomena - the imaginary and the really existing - equally real. Where is the criterion for such reality? In the subject! - Fichte answers. When perceiving an object or thinking about the past, a person forgets himself. Self-forgetfulness is one of the characteristics of a person experiencing a connection with reality. From here definition of reality: something that tears you away from yourself, and there is something that really happens and fills this moment of your life.

Having arrived at such a general definition of reality, one cannot identify what is associated with a person’s action in the field of imagination with what does not directly depend on him. Thus, it turns out two series of reality: one creates itself, the other arises as a result of a creative act of consciousness of the one who needs its existence.

The flow of all objective reality is considered as its possible awareness by man: the real exists only in connection with human life. Then he abstracts himself from objective reality, studying the “real” only as a fact of consciousness, as “an inner feeling and function of the soul.

His scientific teaching deals only with the definitions of consciousness. In the process of cognition, the subject’s consciousness acts as an active and creative principle. The process of cognition goes through 3 stages (three fundamental principles of theoretical science):

- “I” asserts itself;

- “I” opposes itself to “NOT-I”, or an object;

- “I” and “NOT-I,” limiting each other, form a synthesis.

Without a subject there is no object.

Heine wrote: “I” is not at all an individual “I,” but a world “I.” Fichtean thinking is not the thinking of any individual, it is universal thinking, manifesting itself in the individual.”

The central place in Fichte's philosophy is occupied by the problem of human freedom. Freedom is an a priori moral self-determination, which manifests itself in human activity and coincides with absolute rationality. We recognize the world as really existing, and in this sense it is a product of our mind. The “I” refutes things. And this is the basis of our freedom, as following duty and moral rules, the thinker believed.

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Schelling's philosophy

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Conquering heights, Schelling's duality
1. Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling ( 1775 - 1854) was a prominent representative of the objective idealism of German classical philosophy, a friend, then an opponent of Hegel. He enjoyed great authority in the philosophical world of Germany at the beginning of the 19th century. before the appearance of Hegel. Having lost an open philosophical discussion to Hegel in the 20s. XIX century, lost his former influence and failed to restore it even after Hegel’s death, taking his chair at the University of Berlin.
The main goal of Schelling's philosophy is to understand and explain " absolute", that is, the origin of being and thinking. In its development, Schelling's philosophy passed three main stages:
natural philosophy;
practical philosophy;
irrationalism.
2. In his natural philosophy Schelling gives explanation of nature and does this from the standpoint of objective idealism. The essence of Schelling's philosophy of nature in the following:
the previous concepts of explaining nature (Fichte's "not-I", Spinoza's substance) are untrue, since in the first case (subjective idealists, Fichte) nature is derived from human consciousness, and in all others (Spinoza's theory of substance, etc.) a restrictive interpretation of nature is given ( that is, philosophers try to “squeeze” nature into some framework);
nature is "absolute" - the first cause and origin of everything, encompassing everything else;
nature is the unity of the subjective and objective, eternal reason;
matter and spirit are one and are properties of nature, different states of the absolute mind;
nature is an integral organism with animation ( living and inanimate nature, matter, field, electricity, light are united);
The driving force of nature is its polarity - the presence of internal opposites and their interaction (for example, the poles of a magnet, plus and minus charges of electricity, objective and subjective, etc.).
3. Schelling's practical philosophy resolves issues of a socio-political nature and the course of history. The main problem of humanity as a whole and the main subject of philosophy, according to Schelling, is the problem of freedom. The desire for freedom is inherent in the very nature of man and is the main goal of the entire historical process. With the final realization of the idea of freedom, people create a “second nature” - legal system. In the future, the legal system should spread from state to state, and humanity should eventually come to a world legal system and a world federation of legal states. Another major problem (along with the problem of freedom) of Schelling’s practical philosophy is the problem of alienation. Alienation is the result of human activity, the opposite of the original goals, when the idea of freedom comes into contact with reality. (Example: the degeneration of the high ideals of the Great French Revolution into the opposite reality - violence, injustice, even greater enrichment of some and impoverishment of others; suppression of freedom).
The philosopher comes to the following conclusions:
the course of history is random, arbitrariness reigns in history;
both random events of history and purposeful activity are subordinated to strict necessity, to which man is powerless to oppose anything;
theory (human intentions) and history (real reality) are very often opposite and have nothing in common;
There are often cases in history when the struggle for freedom and justice leads to even greater enslavement and injustice.

Schelling philosophy German classical

At the end of his life Schelling came to irrationalism - denial of any logic of regularity in history and perception of the surrounding reality as inexplicable chaos.

Schelling's philosophy

Natural philosophy. Schelling's philosophical development is characterized, on the one hand, by clearly defined stages, the change of which meant the abandonment of some ideas and their replacement by others. But, on the other hand, his philosophical work is characterized by the unity of the main idea - to cognize the absolute, unconditional, first principle of all being and thinking. Schelling critically reconsiders Fichte's subjective idealism. Nature cannot be encrypted only by the formula of the non-I, Schelling believes, but it is not the only substance, as Spinoza believes.

Nature, according to Schelling, represents the absolute, not the individual Self. It is the eternal mind, the absolute identity of the subjective and objective, their qualitatively identical spiritual essence.

Thus, from Fichte's activity-based subjective idealism, Schelling moves on to contemplative objective idealism. Schelling shifts the center of philosophical research from society to nature.

Schelling puts forward the idea of the identity of the ideal and the material:

Matter is a free state of absolute spirit, mind. It is unacceptable to oppose spirit and matter; they are identical, since they represent only different states of the same absolute mind.

Schelling's natural philosophy arose as a response to the need for a philosophical generalization of new natural scientific results that were obtained by the end of the 18th century. and aroused wide public interest. These are studies of electrical phenomena by the Italian scientist Galvani in connection with the processes occurring in organisms (ideas of “animal electricity”), and by the Italian scientist Volta in connection with chemical processes; research on the effects of magnetism on living organisms; theories of the formation of living nature, its ascent from lower to higher forms, etc.

Schelling made an attempt to find a single basis for all these discoveries: he put forward the idea of the ideal essence of nature, the immaterial nature of its activity.

The value of Schelling's natural philosophy lies in its dialectics. Reflecting on the connections that natural science revealed. Schelling expressed the idea of the essential unity of the forces that determine these connections, and the unity of nature as such. In addition, he comes to the conclusion that the essence of every thing is characterized by the unity of opposing active forces. which he called "polarity". As an example of the unity of opposites, he cited a magnet, positive and negative charges of electricity, acid and alkali in chemicals, excitation and inhibition in organic processes, subjective and objective in consciousness. Schelling considered “polarity” as the main source of activity of things; with it he characterized the “true world soul” of nature.

All nature - both living and inanimate - represented for the philosopher a kind of “organism”. He believed that dead nature is just “immature intelligence.” “Nature is always life,” and even dead bodies are not dead in themselves. Schelling seems to be in line with the hylozoistic tradition of Bruno, Spinoza, Leibniz; he goes to panpsychism, i.e. the point of view according to which all nature is animated.

The consequence of the emergence of Schelling's natural philosophy was the undermining of the foundations of Fichte's subjective idealism and the turn of classical German idealism to objective idealism and its dialectics.

Practical philosophy. Schelling considered the main problem of practical philosophy to be the problem of freedom, on the solution of which in the practical activities of people depends the creation of a “second nature,” by which he understood the legal system. Schelling agrees with Kant that the process of creating a legal system in each state must be accompanied by similar processes in other states and their unification into a federation, the cessation of war and the establishment of peace. Schelling believed that achieving a state of peace between nations in this way is not easy, but one must strive for it.

Schelling poses the problem of alienation in history. As a result of the most rational human activity, not only unexpected and random, but also undesirable results often arise, leading to the suppression of freedom. The desire to realize freedom turns into enslavement. The real results of the French Revolution turned out to be inconsistent with its high ideals, in the name of which it began: instead of freedom, equality and fraternity came violence, fratricidal war, the enrichment of some and the ruin of others. Schelling comes to the conclusion: arbitrariness reigns in history; theory and history are completely opposite to each other: history is dominated by blind necessity, against which individuals with their goals are powerless. Schelling comes close to discovering the nature of historical regularity when he speaks of objective historical necessity working its way through the multitude of individual goals and subjective aspirations that directly motivate human activity. But Schelling presented this connection as a continuous and gradual realization of the “revelation of the absolute.” Thus, Schelling imbued his philosophy of the identity of being and thinking with theosophical meaning, an appeal to the absolute, i.e. to God. From about 1815, Schelling's entire philosophical system acquired an irrationalistic and mystical character, becoming, in his own words, “a philosophy of mythology and revelation.

Accepting Fichte's idea of the mutual position of subject and object, Schelling (1775 - 1854) showed interest mainly in the objective principle. Fichte is interested in human affairs, Schelling is concerned with the problem of nature, its transition from an inanimate state to a living one, from objective to subjective.

Reflecting on the achievements of natural science and technology, Schelling publishes the work “Ideas for a Philosophy of Nature.” Reflecting on the mystery of nature, Schelling searches for the source of its unity. And in his next work, “On the World Soul,” relying on the idea of the unity of opposites, he tries to unravel the mystery of life. Schelling expresses the idea that at the basis of nature lies a certain active principle that has the properties of a subject. But such a beginning cannot be the individual Berkeley, for whom the world is the totality of his ideas, nor can it be the generic subject of Fichte, who derives the “not-I” of the world from his “I.”

According to Schelling, this is something different, very dynamic. And Schelling is looking for this something through the prism of the latest discoveries in the fields of physics, chemistry, and biology. He expresses the idea of the universal interconnection of nature, which determines the expediency of all its processes.

In 1799, in his work “First Sketch of a System of Natural Philosophy,” Schelling makes another attempt to outline the basic principles of the philosophy of nature. If Kant called his philosophy “criticism”, and Fichte called “the doctrine of science”, then Schelling designates his teaching with the concept of “natural philosophy”.

The main idea of this work is that nature is not a product, but a productivity.

She acts as a creative nature, not a created one. In its “potentiation,” nature strives toward its subjectivity. At the level of “mechanism and chemistry” it appears as a pure object, but at the level of “organism” nature declares itself as a subject in its formation. In other words, nature evolves from dead to living, from material to ideal, from object to subject.

The source of the development of nature is its ability to split. Nature itself is neither matter nor spirit, neither object nor subject, neither being nor consciousness. She is both, combined.

In 1800, Schelling published “The System of Transcendental Idealism,” where he raised the question of supplementing natural philosophy with transcendental philosophy.

Considering nature as an object, one can trace its evolution from inorganic to organic and reveal the tendency to spiritualize nature and discover the formation of its subjectivity. This is the subject of natural philosophy.

Considering nature as a subject, one can trace nature’s desire to objectify itself through the process of objectification and deobjectification, through anthropogenic human activity, through the study of culture as second nature. This is the subject of transcendental philosophy.

At the intersection of natural philosophy and transcendental philosophy, it becomes possible not only to adequately represent the object-subject, but also to construct a subject-object relationship.

Our “I” ascends from dead matter to living, thinking matter and closes in on human behavior. “I” does not just think, but thinks in categories - extremely general concepts.

Schelling builds a hierarchical system of categories, demonstrates how each category falls into two opposite ones and how these opposites merge into one, even more meaningful concept, approaching the practical sphere of human activity, where free will already dominates. The will, in turn, goes through a number of stages of development, the highest of which is readiness for moral action. Consciousness becomes morally practical.

In Schelling's transcendental idealism, philosophical categories first came into motion, and the philosophical system of the German thinker declared itself as a system for the development of consciousness. Fichte's idea of self-awareness received concrete embodiment. And a little later, Hegel will create an even more impressive picture of the ascent of consciousness to its more perfect forms.

The logical development of Schelling's views was his “Philosophy of Identity.” According to the thinker, neither thinking nor being should be considered as the fundamental principle of existence. We must proceed from the identity of spirit and nature, the real and the ideal, “the indivisibility of object and subject.” The principle of identity eliminates the need to search for causal dependence and search for priorities. In this unity, nature appears as an object (created) and as a subject (creative). Creative nature has its own history. She creates to the best of her consciousness.

Substantiating the principle of the identity of created nature and creative nature, Schelling is faced with the problem: how to correlate the theoretical and practical, subjective and objective, finite and infinite. Schelling sees the means of this connection in art as the highest form of knowledge, personifying objectivity, completeness and universal significance. In concrete, and therefore finite, artistic activity and works of art, it is possible to achieve infinity - an ideal unattainable either in theoretical knowledge or in moral action.

The artist creates, like nature, resolving the above-mentioned contradiction. Therefore, art must be an instrument of philosophy, its completion. Schelling embodies this idea in his work “Philosophy of Art”.

Each of Schelling's works is a unique step in his philosophical evolution.

In “The Philosophy of Identity” Schelling introduces the concept of intellectual intuition, considering it no longer as self-contemplation of the “I”, but as a reflection of the absolute, personifying the unity of object and subject. This unity is no longer spirit, nor nature, but the “impersonality” of both (like the point of indifference of the poles in the center of a magnet), this “nothing” containing the possibility of everything. The idea of indifference as a potential seemed heuristic, and Schelling returns to it in his work “Philosophy and Religion”, where he considers the question of how the potential of “nothing” is realized into “something”, therefore the balance of the objective and subjective at the point of indifference is disturbed. Why does “nothing” invert into “something” and the Absolute gives birth to the Universe? Subsequent reflections lead Schelling to the conclusion that the birth of the world from the Absolute cannot be explained rationally. This rational fact belongs not to the mind, but to the will of man.

Free will “breaks” the Absolute, asserting itself. Since this is an irrational fact, it cannot be the subject of philosophy, understood as the rational derivation of all things from an original principle. Therefore, negative, rationalistic philosophy should be supplemented with positive one. Within the framework of "positive" philosophy, the irrational will is comprehended empirically, in the "experience of revelation", identified with mythology and religion. With this “philosophy of revelation” Schelling completes his philosophical system, which received an ambiguous assessment.

Schelling had to clarify his position: “I am different:

a) from Descartes in that I do not affirm absolute dualism that excludes identities;

b) from Spinoza in that I do not assert absolute identity, excluding any dualism;

c) from Leibniz in that I do not dissolve the real and the ideal in one ideal, but affirm the real opposition of both principles with their unity;

d) from materialists in that I do not dissolve the spiritual and the real entirely in the real;

e) from Kant and Fichte in that I do not posit the ideal only subjectively, on the contrary, I contrast the ideal with something completely real - two principles, the absolute identity of which is God." For all his similarity to everyone else, he was similar only to himself. Schelling's philosophical views evolved He was in constant search, touching on the most pressing issues.

His thoughts on historical progress are also interesting. He notes that supporters and opponents of the belief in human perfectibility are confused about what should be considered a criterion of progress. Some believe that the hallmark of progress is the state of morality, not realizing that morality is derivative, that its criterion is absolutely abstract. Others rely on the state of science and technology. But the development of science and technology is inherently an ahistorical factor.

If we take into account that the goal of history is the gradual implementation of the legal system, then the criterion of social progress can only be the measure of society’s approach to this goal through the efforts of a creative and active person. (See: Schelling F. Soch. T.1.M., 1987. P.456).

In Schelling's philosophy the following stages are built: natural philosophical and transcendental; "philosophy of identity"; “philosophy freely; “positive philosophy”; “philosophy of mythology and revelation.” One can evaluate the philosophical work of F. Schelling in different ways, but one should not rush and label him a mystic, reactionary, etc.

His philosophy had a significant influence on European thought, including Russian philosophy. P.Ya corresponded with him. Chaadaev, his lectures were listened to by the famous Slavophile I.V. Kireevsky, his student was the head of Russian Schellingism, Professor of Moscow University M.G. Pavlov. A.S. also met with Schelling. Khomyakov, who highly valued the work of the German thinker, and especially his “Philosophical Letters on Dogmatism and Criticism.”

In the 20th century Schelling's irrational ideas were developed in the philosophy of existentialism. In addition, his philosophical system, maintaining continuity with the teachings of I. Kant and I. Fichte, became one of the theoretical sources of the philosophy of G. Hegel.

Philosophy of the late Schelling

The main problem and at the same time the main contradiction of the philosophy of late Schelling are determined primarily by the fact that the philosopher, on the one hand, remains faithful to the idea of the Absolute, absolute identity, moreover, more and more decisively and definitely gives it religious significance, and on the other hand, he acutely experiences the undoubted for there is a gap between the Absolute and reality. This “falling away from the Absolute” is characteristic, according to Schelling, of all previous philosophy of modern times, regardless of whether it consciously made such a break or, on the contrary, appealed beyond measure to the absolute and the divine. Therefore, recognizing the merits of the outstanding thinkers of modern times to the culture of mankind, Schelling is inclined to believe that for entire centuries only “negative philosophy” existed. And only now the task is to create a positive philosophy, addressed not to abstract entities, but to the existence, reality of things, events, circumstances.

Naturally, on this path, opposition to Hegel, who intended to transform everything real into a simple logical otherness, came to the fore. Hegel's merit, according to Schelling, is that he realized the logical nature of his philosophical system. “However, this retreat into the sphere of pure thinking, to the pure concept, was connected - which becomes obvious from the very first pages of Hegel’s Logic - with the claim that the concept is everything and leaves nothing outside of itself,” said Schelling, denying thereby any claim of Hegelianism to the role of not only negative, but also positive philosophy.

Absolute idealism of the logicist type (mainly of the German type) in the history of thought is opposed, according to Schelling, by the philosophy of an empiricist orientation, developed mainly by the British and French and which came closer to solving the problems of positive philosophy. But it also requires both rethinking and a new synthesis with the ideas of the absolute.

Read by Schelling in the winter semester of 1832-1833. and in the summer of 1833, the course “Positive Philosophy” provides an answer to the question of how this new philosophy as a system should be built. The first part of this system should be a kind of introduction - with a justification of the idea itself, the essence of “positive philosophy”, its differences from other philosophical systems. The second part of the system is the “philosophy of mythology,” and the third is the “philosophy of revelation.”

The philosophy of mythology, according to Schelling, has as its subject not the praise of myth and the mythological way of thinking, but their careful philosophical understanding. Schelling, not without reason, reproaches the former rationalist philosophy for relegating myth and mythology to vanished phenomena. It is true that the Past (and the philosopher tried to comprehend it in “World Epochs”) is closely connected with myth-making. However, the Present and the Future will feel more than once, Schelling prophesies, the unfading significance of myths for human life. Schelling consistently examines various theoretical explanations of myths - poetic, religious and others, quite specifically and with arguments refuting these mythologies. The research project proposed by Schelling himself and its main idea are as follows: “Mythology is a historically inevitable moment in the development of consciousness. In religion, it corresponds to pantheism-polytheism. Initially, according to Schelling, monotheism (the idea of a single God) is inherent in human nature, but for In order for such an idea to take root in consciousness as something true, it must go through its negation. A triad arises: primitive monotheism - polytheism (mythology) - monotheism of Christianity (revelation). Positive philosophy as a whole is devoted to the justification and interpretation of monotheism."

Romanticism - new in philosophy

The year 1797, which Schelling spent in Leipzig studying natural science and natural philosophical quests, was very important for the formation of a new ideological direction, which later became known as romanticism. During this period, everything in the world is parodied. Kant with his reverence for the law, Fichte, who glorified the revolution, Rousseau, who idealized nature. The most important hypostasis of romanticism is irony." In irony," said the theorist of romanticism Friedrich Schlegel, "everything should be a joke and everything should be serious, everything should be simple-minded - frank and deeply feigned. It arises when the flair and art of life and the scientific spirit are combined, when The complete philosophy of nature and the complete philosophy of art coincide with each other. It contains and evokes in us a feeling of an insurmountable space between the unconditional and the conditioned, a feeling of the impossibility and necessity of the entire completeness of utterance. It is the freest of all liberties, because thanks to it. a person is capable of rising above himself, and at the same time, every kind of regularity is inherent in it, since it is unconditionally necessary. It should be considered a good sign that harmonious vulgarities do not know how to relate to this constant self-parody, when it is alternately necessary to believe, then not to believe, until they begin to feel dizzy, they take a joke seriously, and take something serious for a joke.” Romantics value laughter. They saw it as a means to unchain consciousness. And freedom of spirit is the goal of romanticism. They were accused of laughing for the sake of laughter itself; for them, they say, nothing is sacred. It's not fair. Romanticism is always not only the overthrow of ideals, but also the affirmation of ideals, moreover, direct and immediate, without roundaboutness and subterfuge. The ideal of romantics is a free person. "Only the individual is interesting." Interest in the individual will not, however, develop into individualism, selfish narcissism, neglect of others and suppression of them. Romanticism is universal, it is for overcoming any intolerance, any narrowness. For a romantic, any individuality is interesting - a person, a people, all of humanity as something unique in the God-created world. The romantics knew how to talk about their ideals not only in an ironically ambiguous way, but also in a sublime - political, with outright enthusiasm. Romantics in nature are not “the product of their disordered imagination,” but absolute reality. (The cult of nature will soon bring them together with Schelling). Nature is not an object of conquest, but of worship. Poetry is an art - a means to penetrate its secrets without violating the primordial harmony. The poet and the true natural scientist have a common language, the language of nature itself. Only the full range of developed human potentials makes a person a natural being and leads to merging with nature. Romantics knew how not only to dream and daydream about the distant, unrealistic, but also to find their ideals in the close, everyday, human. Who can blame them for being inconsistent? Life itself is full of contradictions. And for romantics it is life itself. They shun abstract thinking, seeing in it, if not a dead feeling, then, in any case, a gray and stunted life. In literature they are looking for a universal form that would most fully correspond to the richness of life. They are against the rigid boundaries of the artistic genre. The universal form is seen in the novel (hence the name “romanism”). “A novel is life in the form of a book,” says Novalis. The model for them is Goethe's Wilhelm Leicester. However, Friedrich Schlegel also classifies Shakespeare's dramas as "novels". The term has not yet been established, the concepts have not been clarified, “romantic” for romantics means “comprehensive”, “corresponding to life”, “taken from history.” At the same time, another meaning of the word arises - “going beyond everyday life.”

The romantics could not help but pay attention to the rising philosophical star - Schelling. In March 1797, Friedrich Schlegel, then an ardent Fichtinian, published an enthusiastic review of the article by Fichte and Schelling in the Philosophical Journal. While he was cooling towards Fichte, he was cooling towards Schelling. He absolutely did not like “An Idea for a Philosophy of Nature.” But Schelling's personality is attractive. And despite the fact that for romantics he appears as frozen. For them, “His so-called energy is just a blush on the patient’s cheeks. For him, his whole life consists of only pros and cons.” (F. Schlegel to Schleermacher). But still, despite all the disagreements, Schelling was a regular guest of Schlegel. He was also a direct member of the Jena Circle of Romantics, which existed in 1799 until the spring of the following year. He was not only a regular guest in A.V.’s house. Schlegel, he settled here in September. He shared many of the beliefs of the romantics, their disappointment in the ideals of the Enlightenment and the French Revolution, their desire to find new paths in spiritual life - in philosophy, in science, in art. They were brought together by a love of nature (something Fichte could not boast of); However, the difference in aspirations served as an obstacle: the romantics dreamed of “merging with nature.” Schelling thought about how to know it. The Romantics accepted the idea from Kant and the idea of the duality of existence developed by Schelling - the world of nature and the world of freedom. But Schelling tried to build a system of natural philosophy and system transcendental philosophy, while the romantics rejected the very idea of ordered thinking. Hence, their cult of irony, which was not always to Schelling’s taste. The Romantics are full of reverent attitude towards religion, and Schelling has not yet done away with Enlightenment skepticism.

According to Schelling, religion cannot be metaphysics. But Kant’s interpretation of religion “in the aisles of reason alone” is also not correct. Religion is not morality and not a means of strengthening it. Religion is a special feeling of dependence on the infinite. But, despite all of Schelling’s ordeals, he was always more of a naturalist than anything else. What comes first: spirit or nature? “Every philosophy must proceed from the fact that either nature is created by rationality, or rationality by nature.” Natural science has a tendency to move from nature to spirit. The naturalist discovers laws, rationalizes nature; thanks to this, natural science turns into natural philosophy, “which is the basis of philosophical science.” The antipode of natural philosophy is transcendental philosophy. It comes from the primacy of the subjective spiritual principle. Schelling calls it “another foundation of philosophical science,” (by no means the only one and not even the first!) this is “knowledge about knowledge.”

Schelling remains full of love for nature and respect for natural science. “No matter how hard you try to get rid of nature, it always insists on its own” - he reminds those who are ready to brush aside the world around us with this Latin saying. In his new work, Schelling simply moves on to a different set of problems. Those that Kant posed were partly decided, and partly made a subject of reflection. Kant's main discovery in the Critique of Pure Reason is the activity of knowledge. Schelling expands the scope of this discovery. According to Kant, reason is active, feelings are passive: the intellect constructs concepts, feelings are only amplified (excited) by surrounding things. The simplest act of cognition is sensation. The entire reality of knowledge is based on sensations, and Schelling calls any philosophy “failed” that “is unable to explain sensations.” The old rationalists ignored sensations; the empiricists saw their meaning, but could not explain what it was. However, external influence is not enough to understand the sensation. To answer the question about the origin of a sensation means to name the cause that gave rise to it. But “the law of causality is distributed only to homogeneous things (things belonging to the same world) and does not allow the transition of one world to another. In view of this transformation of the original being in knowledge, it would be understandable if it could be shown that representation is also kind of being: such an explanation, in any case, is put forward by materialism, a system that the philosopher could only welcome if it really fulfilled its promises. However, materialism in the form that it has existed so far is characterized by complete incomprehensibility, and if. it becomes understandable, it cannot be distinguished from transcendental idealism."

Most valuable knowledge! Schelling is still drawn to materialism, but he is not satisfied with the lack of dialectics in the materialism he knows. The idea of the activity of cognition logically leads to another idea, barely outlined in epistemology by Kant and picked up by Schelling - the idea of historicism. Schelling outlines a system of concepts, which, in his opinion, coincides with the actual movement of knowledge and the construction of the real world. "Philosophy is the history of self-consciousness passing through different eras." The term “epochs” was previously used only in relation to the history of mankind; Schelling includes it in the theory of knowledge.

The original identity of object and subject, spirit and matter is of an active nature. Two opposing types of activity - real, subject to limitation, and ideal, unlimited, merge into something third, which is sensation. It is ideal and real at the same time, passive and active. In the “first era,” self-awareness goes from simple sensation to productive contemplation. The concept of productive, or intellectual, contemplation is the most important in the system of transcendental idealism. This is knowledge about the subject and at the same time the generation of it. How is a material object constructed? Matter exists in three dimensions, which are created by the action of three forces - magnetism, electricity and chemicals. The action of magnetic force is unilinear, this is how the measurement of length is born; electricity spreads over a plane, a chemical process takes place in space. The “second era” extends from productive contemplation to reflection (thinking about oneself).

The “third era” is reflection before the act of will. Thus, I self-consciousness ascends from dead matter to living, thinking matter and further to human behavior. We think in categories - extremely general concepts. Schelling not only lists them - relation, substance and accident, extension and time, cause and effect, interaction, etc. He is trying to build their hierarchy, to show how the category splits into two opposite ones, how these opposites merge again in one, more meaningful, behavioral sphere of human activity. Possibility, reality, necessity - these are the last steps of this ladder of categories, which leads us to a new, upper floor, where free will reigns. The protagonist of history is a person endowed with free will. But, Schelling emphasizes, a rational being, being in complete isolation, cannot rise to the consciousness of freedom, not even capable of realizing the objective world. Only the presence of other individuals and the individual’s never-ending interaction with them leads to the completion of self-consciousness. We are, therefore, talking about the social nature of human consciousness and activity.

Morality and law regulate the relationship between the individual and society. Schelling accepts the Kantian categorical imperative (“You must want only what all rational beings in general can want”) as a principle of human behavior, accepts the Kantian idea of primordial evil in man and the inclinations of good inherent in him, which should prevail as a result of moral education.

Following Kant, Schelling sees the ideal of social order in the establishment of a universal legal system, which should extend to relations between states. No state can count on security unless an interstate organization is created, a “state of states,” a kind of federation, the members of which would mutually guarantee their inviolability. In case of conflict among peoples, a common Areopagus should be created, which would include representatives of all cultural nations with the right to use the joint force of all countries against a violator of international peace. In addition to the “romantic school,” Schelling also went through Kant’s transcendental school. He firmly understood that knowledge is a product of the imagination, this “great artist,” as the Kinegberg sage called the imagination. A person only knows what he can do. The world we know is our work of art. It is not decent to speak about him in the dry “geometric” language of Spinoza. Plato's poetic language is appropriate for this purpose. To this day, Schelling expounds or interprets what Kant wrote in his articles on the philosophy of history.

Common with the Romantics, careful reading of Kant. It allowed Schelling to speak out for the first time on the topic of philosophy of art, and very successfully. He borrowed the thesis from Kant - art overcomes the gap between nature and freedom - it is an intermediate sphere that has the qualities of both. As a type of creativity, it combines conscious and unconscious components. Kant compared the natural organism to the organic structure of a work of art. Schelling makes two important distinctions. The organism is born whole; the artist sees, but can create it in parts, creating from them something later inseparable. Further, nature begins with unconsciousness and only, in the end, comes to consciousness: in art the path is different - a conscious beginning and an unconscious completion of the work begun. And one more important difference. A work of nature is not necessarily beautiful. A work of art is always beautiful. Art is higher than philosophy in one more respect: “Although philosophy reaches the greatest heights, it carries only a particle of man to these heights. Art allows one to reach these heights to a whole person"But if art alone has the gift of transforming into objectively significant that which a philosopher is able to express exclusively in the form of subjectivity, then one more conclusion can be drawn from this. Namely: since philosophy was once born at the dawn of the sciences from poetry, like that , as this happened with all the other sciences, which were precisely approaching their perfection, then we can hope that now all these sciences, together with philosophy, after their completion, in many separate streams, will flow back into that all-encompassing ocean of poetry from where they originally came And today the spirit of poetry is indestructible in science. Creativity, perhaps, is akin to creativity in art. Schelling does not name Kant here, but continues his observations. In the “Critique of the Power of Judgment”, Kant contrasted two types of creativity: the artist is a genius, the nature of his insight is not amenable. to a reasonable interpretation, it is a different matter for a scientist; in his activity everything depends on education and perseverance. Later, Kant made an amendment: invention, that is, the creation of something that did not exist before, is the lot of a “genius”; he can also manifest himself in science. Schelling spoke of two types of invention: "scientist" and "brilliant". In the first case: “a whole system is created in parts, as if by folding.” It doesn't require "genius". It occurs when the idea of the whole precedes the parts. And in one more case: when paradoxical ideas are affirmed that are ahead of time, “crazy” ideas, as they say today. The creativity of a scientific "genius", as well as an artistic one, is accomplished "through a sudden coincidence of conscious and unconscious activity." Schelling clearly pronounces what Kant could only guess at. The unity of science and poetry existed in ancient times in the form of mythology. Schelling predicts the emergence of a "new mythology". And he reports that he has been working on a book about mythology for many years, which will be published in the near future. One conclusion can be drawn from all this: Schelling gives preference to art.

Influenced by Romanticism

At the beginning of 1805, under the pseudonym Bonaventure, Schelling's book "Night Vigils" was published in the series "Journal of New German Original Novels", published by the Saxon publishing house "Dienemann". Initially, no attention was paid to it, only in our century it gained wide popularity: it was seen as an anticipation of the prose of the Expressionists, Kafka, and Hesse. In the last century it was published three times, in the current century - twenty-three. In our country this book is strangely almost unknown. It was only in 1980 that excerpts from it first appeared in the two-volume book “Selected Prose of German Romantics.” In the academic five-volume “history of German literature” it is not even mentioned. Our researchers of German romanticism are also silent about it. The work caused controversy, firstly about its authorship, and secondly about the views of the author, his mood: “The mature Schelling of 1804, speaking in a strict scientifically academic guise, and at the zenith of his fame, an aristocrat of spirit, belonging to the heights of the idealistic era, aimed at speculative exploration of the secrets of the highest artistic creativity, could not deal with the young publisher." And further: “Can we find in Schelling a view of the world and the life of Bonoventura? Will we find in him at least a trace of that desperate fragmentation and disharmony, gloomy pessimism and nihilism, disgust for the world and contempt for the people of the “Night Vigils”? But the book This is by no means nihilistic, as it might seem at first glance. In it you can find social criticism, satire, parody, gloomy irritation - everything, but not nihilism, from the first short story - about a dying atheist and an evil priest - and right up. Until the last scene in the cemetery, where “Nothing” is repeated three times, relating only to the attempt to resurrect the mortal shell of a person, his “role,” the author does not question the existence of eternal, imperishable in the human Self, unshakable values.

Under the influence of romanticism, Schelling, who had previously been drawn to natural philosophy, turned to art. Belonging to the Jena circle, from the very beginning he was in a kind of opposition to its main representatives. In "Night Vigils" there is a noticeable closeness to romanticism, and a desire to overcome it, show it from a funny side, parody it, and look at life with sober eyes. Schelling, as an author, is not characterized by any one, once-for-all-found manner. He was always searching and experimenting. Moreover, having tested himself in some new literary form, he never returned to it, looking for something new, without, however, renouncing what he had done. How does the philosophy of art relate to the aesthetics of romanticism? You can’t help but think about this when you start reading “Philosophy of Art.” If we ignore the features associated with the personality of this or that romantic, then in general romanticism in aesthetics can be reduced to three cults - the cult of art, the cult of nature, and the cult of creative individuality.

Art for romantics is the highest form of spiritual activity, surpassing both reason and reason. Poetry is the heroine of philosophy, philosophy is the theory of poetry, said Novalis. He was convinced that in the future people would only read fiction. A poet understands nature better than a scientist. For poetry flows directly from nature. Nature is inexhaustible, it is richer and more complex than science knows about it. Therefore, a romantic poet, speaking about nature, means something more than what an ordinary person understands by nature; he worships in nature something mysterious, unknown, in fact, supernatural. The creative gift of the artist seemed to the romantics to be such a natural-supernatural force. The artist is an unconscious instrument of a higher power. He belongs to his work, and not it to him. Schelling accepts all three of these positions. But with significant reservations and amendments. Yes, art is the highest spiritual potential, but this does not mean that artistic disorder should reign in the head of a philosopher. Philosophy is a science and not a science at the same time. Like science, it appeals to contemplation and imagination, like science it requires a system. The method of designing, building a system, which has justified itself in natural philosophy, Schelling tries to apply

and to the philosophy of art. To define a concept means to indicate its place in the system of the universe. “To construct art means to determine its place in the universe. Determining this place is the only definition of art.” Here Schelling is not a romantic, but the immediate predecessor of the enemy and critic of Hegel's romanticism. Schelling compares logical views of art with historical ones and speaks of the contrast between ancient and contemporary art. “It would be a significant shortcoming in construction if we did not pay attention to this in relation to each individual form of art. But due to the fact that this opposition is considered only as exclusively formal, construction is reduced precisely to negation or sublation. Based on this opposition, we will at the same time directly take into account historical side of art and can only hope to give our construction as a whole final completeness." As for the romantic cult of nature, Schelling fully shared it. We know Schelling's passion for the organic, for the living. Morality is supranatural - it is a divine spark kindled directly in man, in his consciousness is full of passion for nature, but he cannot forget the lessons of Kant. And he also cannot erase the conscious moment in the artist’s work. Creativity is the unity of the unconscious and the conscious. At this point, Schelling also differs from the romantics; he continued to stand apart within the romantic. movement, see its weaknesses, and try to remake them.

Schelling's main philosophical works

The most fruitful period in Schelling’s activity was the period when he created “natural philosophy.” Using natural scientific discoveries of the end of the 18th century, in his “Philosophy of Nature” he formulated the idea that unconsciously, spiritual nature, due to the presence of dynamic opposites, develops along certain steps, at one of which man and his consciousness appear. This position was directed against subjectively - Fichte's idealistic philosophy, which Schelling was initially interested in. Schelling's merit was that he created the doctrine of the dialectical development of nature. Schelling believed that after the question of the emergence of consciousness, the question of how consciousness becomes an object that exists outside the subject should be raised. and with which the latter’s idea is consistent. The philosopher explores this problem in “The System of Transcendental Idealism” (1800). The various stages of consciousness development are discussed here.

Philosophy of art

“Philosophy of Art” arose when Schelling’s philosophical development clearly indicated a turn to religious and mystical ideas, reflected in the dialogue “Bruno” (1802) and the works “On the Method of Academic Study” (1803) and “Philosophy and Religion” (1804) . Here Schelling makes an attempt to reconcile his philosophy with the Christian religion. The Incarnation of Christ appears to him as an eternal emanation of the finite and the infinite. The goal of Christianity, according to Schelling, is the gradual merging of religion, philosophy and art. The turn to religious mysticism was reflected in the “Philosophy of Art”. However, this work still preserves many ideas that were formulated by Schelling in the early period of his activity, in particular during the period of his studies on philosophical problems of natural science.

The principle of historicism

The idea of a holistic consideration of all phenomena of art is in close connection with the principle of historicism. Already Herder, Schiller, Goethe expressed the idea of the need for a historical approach to art. Schelling tried to make the principle of historicism the starting point in his analysis. The philosopher's plan, however, could not be realized. The fact is that in Schelling's absolute there is no movement and development, and, consequently, no time. And since the system of arts reflects nothing more than the absolute, where time ceases to exist, then, naturally, the arts also end up being withdrawn from time.

Art and mythology

The problem of mythology occupies a large place in the “Philosophy of Art”. The philosopher believes that “mythology is a necessary condition and primary material for all art.” Schelling associates the problem of mythology with the attitude towards the derivation of art from the absolute. If beauty is the “clothing” of the absolute into the concrete - sensual, but at the same time direct contact between the absolute and things is impossible, some intermediate authority is required. The latter are ideas, breaking up into which the absolute becomes accessible to sensory contemplation. Ideas thus connect the pure unity of the absolute with the finite diversity of individual things. They are the essence of the material and, as it were, the universal matter of all arts. But ideas as an object of sensory contemplation, according to Schelling, are the same as the gods of mythology. In this regard, Schelling devotes great attention to the construction of mythology as the universal and fundamental “matter” of art. Schelling outlined the concept of mythology in a systematic form in the “Philosophy of Mythology and Revelation”, as well as in the works “World Ages” and “The Samothrace Mysteries”. This concept is quite contradictory. On the one hand, Schelling approaches myth from a historical point of view. Thus, comparison of ancient and Christian mythology leads the philosopher not only to the idea of the historical variability of myth, but also to the identification of the distinctive abilities of ancient and new art. Along with this, Schelling often understands myth as a specific form of thinking, independent of any historical boundaries. a symbol, i.e. with a sensual and indecomposable expression of an idea, with artistic thinking in general. From here the conclusion is drawn that neither in the past, nor in the present, nor in the future, art is unthinkable without mythology. If the latter is absent, then, according to Schelling, the artist. The philosopher himself creates it for his own use. The philosopher hopes that in the future a new mythology will arise, enriched and fertilized by the spirit of the new time. The philosophy of nature, in his opinion, should create the first symbols for this mythology of the future. Having formulated general aesthetic principles, Schelling begins to consider individual types and genres of art.

Ideal and real series in art

Schelling's philosophical system rests on the postulation of two series in which the absolute is concretized: the ideal and the real. The system of arts is divided accordingly. The real series is represented by music, architecture, painting and plastic arts, the ideal - by literature. As if feeling the tension of his principle of classification of arts, Schelling introduces additional categories (reflection, submission and reason), which were intended to concretize the initial positions. However, even in this case the classification remains quite artificial.

Music and painting

He begins his characterization of individual types of art with music. This is the weakest part, since Schelling knew this type of art poorly, which forced him to limit himself to the most general remarks (music as a reflection of the rhythm and harmony of the visible world, a reproduction of becoming itself, devoid of imagery, as such, etc.). Painting, according to Schelling, is the first form of art that reproduces images. She depicts the particular, the particular in the universal. The category that characterizes painting is subordination. Schelling dwells in detail on the characteristics of drawing, light and shade, and color. In the dispute between supporters of drawing and color, he advocates a synthesis of both, although in practice it is clearly seen that drawing is of greater importance to him. Along with drawing, light is also of great importance for Schelling, so Schelling’s ideal in painting is dual: it is either Raphael (drawing!), or Correggio (chiaroscuro!).

Architecture and sculpture

Schelling sees art that synthesizes music and painting in plastic art, which includes architecture and sculpture. Schelling views architecture largely in terms of its reflection of organic forms, while at the same time emphasizing its kinship with music. For him it is “frozen music.” In the plastic arts, sculpture occupies the most important place, because its subject is the human body, in which Schelling, in the spirit of the most ancient mystical tradition, sees a meaningful symbol of the universe. The sculpture completes the real series of arts.

Schelling's philosophical views. Philosophy of Friedrich Schelling

Life path of a German philosopher

The first stage of Schelling's philosophizing

The second stage of Schelling's philosophizing

How did Schelling’s ideology affect the development of philosophical thought?

Philosophical meaning of transcendental idealism

Solving the problem of contradictions between object and subject

Philosophy of identity

Philosophizing revelation

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Schelling's philosophy

Nature, according to Schelling, represents the absolute, not the individual Self. It is the eternal mind, the absolute identity of the subjective and objective, their qualitatively identical spiritual essence.

Thus, from Fichte's activity-based subjective idealism, Schelling moves on to contemplative objective idealism. Schelling shifts the center of philosophical research from society to nature.

Schelling puts forward the idea of ​​the identity of the ideal and the material:

Matter is a free state of absolute spirit, mind. It is unacceptable to oppose spirit and matter; they are identical, since they represent only different states of the same absolute mind.

Schelling made an attempt to find a single basis for all these discoveries: he put forward the idea of ​​​​the ideal essence of nature, the immaterial nature of its activity.

The consequence of the emergence of Schelling's natural philosophy was the undermining of the foundations of Fichte's subjective idealism and the turn of classical German idealism to objective idealism and its dialectics.

The main idea of ​​this work is that nature is not a product, but a productivity.

The source of the development of nature is its ability to split. Nature itself is neither matter nor spirit, neither object nor subject, neither being nor consciousness. She is both, combined.

In 1800, Schelling published “The System of Transcendental Idealism,” where he raised the question of supplementing natural philosophy with transcendental philosophy.

Considering nature as an object, one can trace its evolution from inorganic to organic and reveal the tendency to spiritualize nature and discover the formation of its subjectivity. This is the subject of natural philosophy.

Considering nature as a subject, one can trace nature’s desire to objectify itself through the process of objectification and deobjectification, through anthropogenic human activity, through the study of culture as second nature. This is the subject of transcendental philosophy.

At the intersection of natural philosophy and transcendental philosophy, it becomes possible not only to adequately represent the object-subject, but also to construct a subject-object relationship.

Our “I” ascends from dead matter to living, thinking matter and closes in on human behavior. “I” does not just think, but thinks in categories - extremely general concepts.

The artist creates, like nature, resolving the above-mentioned contradiction. Therefore, art must be an instrument of philosophy, its completion. Schelling embodies this idea in his work “Philosophy of Art”.

Each of Schelling's works is a unique step in his philosophical evolution.

Schelling had to clarify his position: “I am different:

a) from Descartes in that I do not affirm absolute dualism that excludes identities;

b) from Spinoza in that I do not assert absolute identity, excluding any dualism;

c) from Leibniz in that I do not dissolve the real and the ideal in one ideal, but affirm the real opposition of both principles with their unity;

d) from materialists in that I do not dissolve the spiritual and the real entirely in the real;

If we take into account that the goal of history is the gradual implementation of the legal system, then the criterion of social progress can only be the measure of society’s approach to this goal through the efforts of a creative and active person. (See: Schelling F. Soch. T.1.M., 1987. P.456).

In the 20th century Schelling's irrational ideas were developed in the philosophy of existentialism. In addition, his philosophical system, maintaining continuity with the teachings of I. Kant and I. Fichte, became one of the theoretical sources of the philosophy of G. Hegel.

Philosophy of the late Schelling

Romanticism - new in philosophy

Influenced by Romanticism

Schelling's main philosophical works

Philosophy of art

The principle of historicism

Art and mythology

Ideal and real series in art

Music and painting

Architecture and sculpture

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Schelling puts forward the idea of the identity of the ideal and the material:

Schelling made an attempt to find a single basis for all these discoveries: he put forward the idea of the ideal essence of nature, the immaterial nature of its activity.

The main idea of this work is that nature is not a product, but a productivity.