Page:Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion volume 2.djvu/220

 take on this form of subjectivity, but rather self-consciousness has to sink itself in the One, while this latter, again, represented as the Other, is the principle of repulsion, in which self-consciousness regains its self-certainty. This process can be conceived of under the following form.

The state of servitude is, in fact, self-consciousness, reflection into self and freedom, which, however, is devoid of all general extension and rationality, and finds its determinateness, its content, in the immediate sensuous self-consciousness. It is the “I” as this particular individual, in immediate particularity, which is accordingly end and content. In the relation in which he stands to his Lord the servant finds his absolute, essential self-consciousness, and in view of Him he annihilates everything in himself. It is, however, just because of this that he regains his position as existing absolutely for himself, and his particularity or individuality just because it has been taken up into that intuition of the Absolute and is made to form its concrete side, is, owing to this relation, absolutely justified. The fear in which the servant regards himself as nothing, gains for him the restoration of his justification. But because the servile consciousness rests obstinately on its particularity, and because its particularity has been taken up into the unity immediately, it is exclusive, and God is—

2. The exclusive Lord and God of the Jewish people. It need not surprise us that an Oriental nation should limit religion to itself, and that this religion should appear as absolutely connected with its nationality, for we see this in Eastern countries in general. The Greeks and the Romans were the first to adopt foreign forms of worship, and all kinds of religion were introduced amongst the latter, and did not rank as national. In Oriental countries, however, religion is essentially closely connected with nationality. The Chinese, the Persians, have their State religion, which is for them only. Amongst