Introduction
This is a companion volume to my introduction to Hegel.[1] It is intended as an introduction to
Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit, his first, perhaps greatest work, arguably the most
important philosophical treatise of the nineteenth century. Although one of the greatest of all
philosophical classics, it is a dark book that yields its secrets only slowly.
In preparing this volume, I have tried to strike a balance between detail, intelligibility,
and finding a way into the work as a whole. The resultant compromise deals with the entire
text while omitting much of the detail that is properly the focus, often the main focus, of
scholars. I have not tried to say more than absolutely needs to be said to help readers find a
way into the book. The scholarly apparatus is limited to indicating just enough of Hegel's
other writings and of the secondary literature to aid readers interested in pursuing various
issues in more detail. The discussion mainly follows Hegel's exposition, paragraph by
paragraph, and, when it appears to be necessary, sentence by sentence. My aim is to help
readers who are not Hegel scholars, although they may have considerable knowledge of
philosophy, as well as others who may have only a general philosophical background to read
the text of the Phenomenology with comprehension. For the most part I have refrained from
criticizing Hegel's theory, not because it is beyond criticism, but because my aim here is
limited to introducing it.
The Phenomenology is difficult to comprehend, particularly for a first-time reader, since
it is not even clear what it is about. Hegel's treatise is a good example of what he famously
calls "the Bacchanalian revel in which no member is not drunk."[2] Wilhelm Windelband's observation many years ago
that the generation capable of understanding this book was disappearing is almost a truism.[3]
It is said that there is no unitary interpretation of the work.[4] It has been suggested that no
single interpretation can be adequate.[5] It has been claimed that there is no unity to the book
since its transitions are merely arbitrary.[6]
Any reading of the Phenomenology requires an overall view of the book as a whole. At
present, there is an emerging awareness of epistemological themes in Hegel.[7] I will be
following Adolf Krister Phalén[8] and more recent writers such as Kenneth Westphal,[9] Robert
Solomon,[10] and Terry Pinkard[11] who see Hegel as an epistemological thinker. Perhaps no
one denies that aspects of the Phenomenology, above all the early chapters, concern
knowledge. The present reading differs from others mainly in holding that the work as a
whole, with its many topics, can be read as a unified epistemological theory. I contend that,
following Hegel's suggestion, we should comprehend his entire book as a single theory of
knowledge running through different phases from cognition (Erkennen) to absolute knowing.
A special feature of this book is the attention devoted to the relation between Hegel and
other thinkers, both earlier and later, as an aid in comprehending his theory. There is no
alternative to understanding Hegel against the background of prior philosophy, since he knew
it well and consciously reacted against it. There is frequently no better clue to Hegel's own
view than his reading of other views. He consistently attempts to take up in his position all
that is positive in the prior philosophical tradition. His theory clearly reflects his desire to
enter into dialogue with the entire preceding philosophical tradition. To an often unsuspected
extent, much of later philosophy consists in a dialogue with Hegel.[12] It is often easier to
understand aspects of his theory when we see how later thinkers react to them.
Particular attention is paid to Hegel's relation to German idealism, within which his
theory emerged, including Fichte and Schelling but especially Kant. His reading of the critical
philosophy is often decisive for the formulation of his own position. He reads Fichte and
Schelling, his great contemporaries, in terms of their contribution to the further development
of Kant's line of thought.
In the Phenomenology, perhaps even more than elsewhere in his writings, Kant is
constantly present to Hegel at every step of the discussion. Hegel is critical of Kant, since he
holds that the latter's critical philosophy, strictly interpreted, leads to skepticism. Yet it would
be a mistake to regard Hegel as breaking decisively with his great predecessor. Kant distinguishes
between the spirit and the letter of a theory.[13] Hegel regards the spirit of the critical
philosophy as speculative idealism. In rejecting Kant's own form of empiricism, more precisely
in rejecting the Kantian conception of the thing-in-itself presupposed in the critical philosophy,
he defends and develops its spirit against its letter.

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