Page:Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion volume 2.djvu/360

 second form was that of the spiritual religion, of Spirit which does not get beyond finite characterisation. So far it is the religion of self-consciousness, that is, of absolute power, of necessity in the sense which we have given to these terms. The One, the Power, is something defective, because it is abstract Power only, and is not in virtue of its content absolute subjectivity, but is only abstract necessity, abstract, simple, undifferentiated Being. The condition of abstraction in which the Power and the necessity are conceived of as still existing at this stage, constitutes their finitude, and it is the particular powers, namely, the gods who when characterised in accordance with their spiritual content first make totality, since they add a real content to that abstraction. Lastly, we have the third form of religion, the religion of freedom, of self-consciousness, which, however, is at the same time a consciousness of the all-embracing reality which constitutes the determinateness of the eternal Idea of God Himself, and a consciousness which does not go outside of itself, which remains beside itself in this objectivity. Freedom is the essential characteristic of self-consciousness.

B.

THE METAPHYSICAL NOTION OR CONCEPTION OF THE IDEA OF GOD.

The metaphysical notion of God here means that we have to speak only of the pure Notion which is real through its own self. And thus the determination or definition of God here is that He is the Absolute Idea, i.e., that He is Spirit. Spirit, however, or the Absolute Idea, is what appears simply as the unity of the Notion and reality in such a way that the Notion in itself represents totality, while the reality does the same. This reality, however, is Revelation, actual manifestation, manifestation which is for self. Since manifestation, too,