Reading for Example: "Sense-Certainty" in Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit

Andrzej Warminski
Diacritics, Vol. 11, No. 2, The Ghost of Theology: Readings of Kant and Hegel. (Summer, 1981),
pp. 83-95.
Stable URL:
http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0300-7162%28198122%2911%3A2%3C83%3ARFE%22IH%3E2.0.CO%3B2-R
Diacritics is currently published by The Johns Hopkins University Press.
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at
http://www.jstor.org/about/terms.html. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained
prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in
the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use.
Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at
http://www.jstor.org/journals/jhup.html.
Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed
page of such transmission.
The JSTOR Archive is a trusted digital repository providing for long-term preservation and access to leading academic
journals and scholarly literature from around the world. The Archive is supported by libraries, scholarly societies, publishers,
and foundations. It is an initiative of JSTOR, a not-for-profit organization with a mission to help the scholarly community take
advantage of advances in technology. For more information regarding JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.
http://www.jstor.org
Sun Mar 2 09:21:14 2008
"Sense-certainty, or t he 'this' and 'meaning' [ Di e sinnliche Cewissheit;
oder das Diese und das Meinen]," t he first part of the first chapter of Hegel's
Phenomenology, has exemplary status in t he book and in commentaries on
t he book. It is not onl y t he first example of the dialectical movement at work
in a particular content-i.e., t he first figure of apparent knowing-and as such
can be taken as a model for the figures t o fol l ow, but, as t he beginning, it is in
Hegelian terms necessarily also t he (as yet unreflected) end. That is, just as on
t he first page of t he Phenomenology proper we begin wi t h "i mmedi ate
knowing, knowi ng of t he immediate [unmittelbares Wissen, Wissen des Un-
mittelbaren]," so on t he next-to-last page we end wi t h immediacy, the only
difference being t he difference in the former whi ch has become identity in t he
latter: "For the self-knowing Spirit, just because it grasps t he Concept, is t he
immediate identity wi t h itself, whi ch, in its difference, is t he certainty of
immediacy, or sense-consciousness-the beginning from whi ch we started
[Denn der sich selbst wissende Ceist, ebendarum dass er seinen Begriff erfasst,
ist er di e unmittelbare Cleichheit mi t sich selbst, welche i n ihrem Unterschiede
di e Gewissheit vom Unmittelbaren ist, oder das sinnliche Bewusstsein-der
Anfang, von dem wi r ausgegangen]" [PhC, 5631.1 Insofar as this beginning
whi ch is also an end is Being-"and sense-certainty's truth contains nothing
but t he sheer being of t he thing [ und ihre Wahrheit enthalt allein das Sein der
Sache]" [PhC, 791-it is analogous t o t he itinerary of t he big Logic whi ch also
goes from empty, pure Being [Sein, reines Sein] t o "fulfilled Being" [ nun auch
' Al l references marked as PhG followed by a page number are to: C. W. F. Hegel,
Phanomenologie des Geistes, ed. lohannes Hoffmeister (Hamburg: Felix Meiner, 1952).
All other page references within the body of the text are to the twenty-volume Theorie
Werkausgabe of Hegel's works published by Suhrkamp and are given by volume and
page number.
READING FOR EXAMPLE: t
DIACRITICS Vol . 11 Pp. 83-96
0300-7162/0113-0083 $01.00 1981 by The JohnsHopkins University Press
"SENSE-CERTAINTY" 1 '
IN HEGEL'S
PHENOMENOLOGY OF SPIRIT '
ANDRZE) WARMINSKI
There is a trap in dialectic: even while it is the very movement of the content insofar as
it accomplishes its being by self-constitution, or is the art of retracing and tracking the
relations of the summons and the response, of the problem and the solution, even while
dialectic is in principle an epithet, it becomes, as soon as one takes it for a slogan,
speaking about it instead of practicing it, a power of being, an explanatory principle.
What used to be the manner of being of Being becomes an evil genie [un malin gknie]. I, - -
Fa-
.rb d - -_
0 Dialectic, says the philosopher, when he notices that perhaps the true philosophy --_ -
laughs at philosophy. Here, dialectic is almost someone, like the irony of things; it is a
spell thrown over the world which causes our expectations to be turned to derision, a
cunning power, behind our backs, which disconcerts us, and which, on top of every-
thing, has its own order and rationality. Not only is it therefore a risk of non-sense, but
much worse-the assurance that things have an other sense than the one we are in a
position t o grant them.
T P / #
-Maurice Merleau-Ponty,Le Visible et L'invisible
erfiilltes Sein] [6, 5721. I t is no wonder, then, that for commentators the dialectic of
sense-certainty has "exemplary and normative value" and is "decisive for the interpre-
tation of Hegel's philosophy" [Pierre-Jean Labarriere, Structures et mouvement dia-
lectique dans la Ph~nomenologie de I'esprit de Hegel (Paris. Aubier-Montaigne, 1968),
p. 76; and Jean Hyppolite, Logique et existence (Paris. Presses Universitaires de
France, 1953), p. 171. Jacques Derrida's Clas [Paris. Galilee, 1974; p. 241, one exemplary
reading of that philosophy and of this beginning, would seem to agree, for i t too
begins with Hegel's sense-certainty. "quoi du reste, aujourd'hui, pour nous, ici, mainte-
nant, d'un Hegel? / Pour nous, ici, maintenant. voila ce qu'on n'aura pu desormais
penser sans lui. / Pour nous, ici, maintenant. ces mots sont des citations, deja, toujours,
nous I'aurons appris de lui [what besides remains today, for us, here, now, of a
Hegel?/ For us, here, now. that is what wi l l have been impossible henceforth to think
without hi m. / For us, here, now. these words are quotations, already, always, we wi l l
have learned i t from him.]." Now this beginning-like Hegel's, adouble beginning-has
received much attention, but its peculiar doubleness has not been remarked. For if
this beginning is, as Eugenio Donato puts it, "emblematic" of all beginnings, i t is not
because i t just repeats Hegel "to indicate the necessarily mediatized nature of repre-
sentation" and because i t "tells of the absence of privileged origins" ["'Here,
Now' / 'Always Already'," Diacritics 6, No. 3 (Fall 1976), 251-such representation and
such absence are eminently dialectizable-but because rather than just deferring the
beginning, i t introduces into i t an unsublatable asymmetry. That is, there is a difference
between the first and the second reading of "for us, here, now" [pour nous, ici,
maintenant]: in the first reading, these words are "what" [ce que] one [impersonal on]
wi l l henceforth not be able to "think" [penser] without Hegel; in the second reading,
these words are precisely "these words" [ces mots], "already, always" quotations, we
wi l l have learned from Hegel. In other words, to think the "here," the "now," and the
"we" of "for us" is still an activity mastered by the system of the ol d Hegel: that is, i t is
still inscribable i nto a history of self-consciousness whether i t be that of the
Phenomenology or of the Logic. But to learn that the "here," the "now," and the "we"
of the "for us" are words which are already always quotations requires a different
activity, one not as easily (or not at all) recuperable for the System. The repetition of
the word "we" [nous] in the second reading indicates the problematic nature of such
learning: if we will have learned from Hegel that the word "we" (in "for us") is a
quotation, then we have t o recognize that whenever we say "we"-for example, when
we say that "we will have learned . . ."-we are indeed not recognizing ourselves but
quoting ourselves. And such self-quotation-and can quotation ever be that of a self,
a subject?-requires another "we," another "Hegel," another "here" and "now," and
an other activity to read them. That such reading is not a given and not t o be taken for
granted is clear from Derrida's double beginning. both Hegel's and his own and
neither his own nor Hegel's. Hence before asking what i t means for us-who, we?-to
learn that these words (here, now, for us) are always already quotations-i.e., what i t
means to read them-let us first ask what i t would mean to think these words.
Thinking the here, the now, and the we would mean, from the beginning, en-
gaging in a dialogue, a question and answer session, in which we hold our thinking,
our conceptualizing [das Begreifen], at a distance, or at least apart from mere taking
up [Aufnehmen] and apprehending [Auffassen]. "The knowing which is first of all or
immediately our object can be none other than that which is itself immediate knowing,
knowing of the immediate or of that which is. We have t o behave just as immediately
or receptively, that is, not to change anything in the object as i t offers itself and t o
hold conceptualizing apart from apprehending [Das Wissen, welches zuerst oder
unmittelbar unser Cegenstand ist, kann kein anderes sein als uasjenige, welches selbst
unmittelbares Wissen, Wissen des Unmittelbaren oder Seienden i st . Wir haben uns
ebenso unmittelbar oder aufnehmend zu verhalten, also nichts an ihm, wie es sich
darbietet, zu verandern und von dem Auffassen das Begreifen abzuhalten]" [PhC, 791.
As always, we begin with a re-doubling of the beginning. the first words of the
opening sentences introduce the partners i n the dialogue-a knowing [Das Wissen]
and the "we" [Wirl-as well as the relation between them. That is, just as [ebenso] the
first figure of apparent knowi ng is an immediate knowing, knowi ng of the immediate,
so our relation t o i t has t o be equally [ebenso] immediate i n order that we may al l ow
i t t o examine itself, t o test itself against its own standard of truth. I n other words, our
relation t o our object-immediate knowing-is the same as that object's relation t o
its own object-i.e., the immediate, that whi ch is-and this symmetrical sameness is
expressed i n t he word ebenso (just so, just as, equally, etc.). But there is a negative
already bui l t i nt o this relation i n that we can behave [verhalten] immediately and add
nothi ng t o our taki ng up [Aufnehmen] of the object onl y if we leave out, forget,
negate, put down, as i t were, what we already know and act as though we knew onl y
as much and i n the same way as sense-certainty knows. But, of course, i n order t o
leave out ourselves, our knowing, our contri buti on [Zutat], we have t o have been
there i n the first place. this knowi ng "is first of all or immediately our object [zuerst
oder unmittelbar unser Cegenstand ist]." I n other words, as the Introducti on [Ein-
leitung] t o the Phenomenology had announced, the examination of apparent knowing
appears from the beginning under the doubl e aspect of the natural consciousness
-here "sense-certaintyc'-and t he "we"; the question i s not so much what sense-
certainty or we know but rather the re-doubling of this knowledge, that is, what we
have here is knowi ng of knowing, knowledge of knowledge, i.e., self-conscious know-
ing, knowi ng turni ng upon itself. Sense-certainty, however, does not know that, and
we cannot t el l i t what i t does not know but rather have t o let i t discover on its own
what i t is i n truth-what its truth (Being, Sein) i s i n truth, what i s is i n truth-through a
process of experience (whi ch is, i n a sense, a re-experience for us, wi t hout whi ch re-
experience we woul d not be i n truth "we"). In short, for sense-certainty and for us
experience woul d mean answering the question contained i n t he opening sentences
and its rhetoric of being and nothi ng ("can be none other [kann kein anderes sein]")
-i.e., "What i s sense-certainty?"-and answering that doubl e question twi ce: once
for sense-certainty and once for us.
The (doubl e) answer t o this question i s given i n the opening sentence of the next-
to-last paragraph of "sense-certainty": "It is clear that the dialectic of sense-certainty
is nothi ng else but the simple history of its movement or of its experience, and sense-
certainty itself is nothi ng else but just this history [Es erhellt, dass di e Dialektik der
sinnlichen Cewissheit nichts anders als die einfache Ceschichte ihrer Bewegung oder
ihrer Erfahrung, und di e si nnl i che Cewissheit selbst nichts anders als nur diese
Ceschichte ist]" [PhC, 861. If the answer t o the question "What is sense-certainty?"
reads "Sense-certainty is (its own) history," then this answer calls for a doubl e
reading-by us and by sense-certainty-and a rewriting of both question and answer.
I n spite of (or rather because of ) its rhetoric of being and nothi ng [nichts anders als
nichts anders als], whi ch echoes the first sentence, this answer forces us t o reread
Being-the "is," the copula-and thus the truth of sense-certainty. That is, Being-as
object and as subject-has turned out t o be the name not of the richness of immediacy
but rather of an empty abstraction, a contentless universality, whi ch i n order not t o
mean nothing, t o distinguish itself from nothing, has t o be thought as mediated, as
having and bei ng a history. a history of sense-certainty's movement from one object
of knowi ng t o a new object of knowing. But whereas we realize that this movement is
also an inversion of consciousness itself, that t he new object of knowing-perception
[Wahrnehmung], say-is also a new subject of knowing, natural consciousness forgets
this, its own, history and has t o begin t he movement all over again and test its
knowi ng against a new object whi ch i t takes as found, given, immediate, and not as
what i t is: i.e., the result of a history (of knowi ng). "Natural consciousness also always
reaches this result, whi ch is what is true i n it, and makes t he experience of i t ; but i t
also forgets i t again and again and begins the movement all over again [Das naturliche
Bewusstsein geht deswegen auch zu diesem Resultate, was an i hr das Wahre ist,
i mmer selbst fort und macht die Erfahrung daruber; aber vergisst es nur ebenso i mmer
wieder und fangt die Bewegung von vorne an]" [PhC, 861. What this answer amounts
to, then, is that the question "What is X?" is the wrong question and "X is . . . " is the
wrong answer so long as we thi nk the "is," the copula, undialectically, unspeculatively,
i.e., i n terms of the one-sided identities of formal logic. I f i n the dialectical movement
that is its history sense-certainty learns (incompletely) how t o read itself-i.e., how t o
answer the question "What is . . .?"-we learn how t o re-read the question of that
question-i.e., t o answer t he question, "What is t he 'what i s. . .?' ?"
Before we ask about the conditions of this speculative dialogue, the scene framed
by such speculative question and answer, some more general remarks on the exemplary
predicament of sense-certainty are i n order. Commentators go astray when they take
t he "sense" i n "sense-certainty" at face value and interpret this section as Hegel's
cri ti que of a radical empiricism. For rather than beginning wi t h some ki nd of ineffable
uni ty of knower and known, subject and object, we begin wi t h a division whi ch
already marks the titles of this section: sense/certainty, the this/meaning. I n short, we
begin wi th certainty and not wi th the senses; any pristine, original experience untainted
by t he language of knowi ng has been discarded as soon as we introduce the word
"consciousness" [Bewusstsein] which, i n Hegel's thought, is always consciousness of
something (and therefore always entails t he given oppositions of knower/known,
subject/object, self/other, etc.). As we have already suggested i n our remarks on the
question of sense-certainty, Hegel's cri ti que is directed not so much at sense-certainty
as at its language, its rhetoric, a certain misreading of t he verb "to be." In not being
able t o read t he copula speculatively sense-certainty is very much in the position of
what Hegel calls Vorstellung-representation, sometimes translated as "conception"
or "p~cture-thi nki ng." Vorstellung is an in-between acti vi ty or faculty of the mi nd
whi ch takes i t s content both from the senses and from thought. In a general sense, i t is
what we do everywhere and always (except when we read philosophical texts specu-
latively, i.e., except when we read as the "we"). I n paragraph twenty of the Ency-
clopaedia of the Philosophical Sciences, Hegel tries t o distinguish this (picture-)
thi nki ng of Vorstellung from the thi nki ng of thought. This is not such an easy matter,
for "there are conceptions constituted by materials emanating from self-conscious
thought, such as those of law, morality, religion, and even of thought itself, and i t
requires some effort t o detect wherein lies t he difference between such conceptions
and thoughts having t he same i mport [hat jedoch di e Vorstellung auch Stoff zunl
Inhalt, der aus dem selbstbewussten Denken entsprungen ist, wi e di e Vorstellungen
vom Rechtlichen, Sittlichen, Religiosen, auch vom Denken selbst, und es fallt ni cht so
l ei cht auf, wori n der Unterschied solcher Vorstellungen von den Gedanken solchen
lnhalts zu setzen sei]" [8, 72-73]. The fault i n Vorstellung is that i t leaves t he determi-
nations of thought side-by-side i n a relation of conti gui ty and is stuck either i n empty
and sterile tautology, saying that Right is Right, Cod is God, etc., or i t disperses itself i n
a mul t i pl i ci t y of isolated determinations again related t o one another by mere conti -
guity, saying that God is the creator of t he world, all-wise, almighty, etc. In short,
Vorstellung is torn between the one of an empty subject and t he many of dispersed
predicates, and i t is in this sense like sense-certainty whi ch can onl y say that "This is
this," "Now is now," "Here is here," and "Sense-certainty is sense-certainty" on t he
one hand, or that "This (now and here) is the night, the day, a tree, a house, etc.," that
"Sense-certainty is this and that, now and then, here and there, etc." on t he other
hand. According t o paragraph twenty, the reason Vorstellung leaves i t s determinations,
its predicates, side-by-side is that it disregards the binding, linking, indicated t o them
i n their subject [der Verbindung ungeachtet, die ihnen i n ihrem Subjekte angewiesen
ist] 18, 731. What such an indicating, pointing, sign, that points t o the bi ndi ng of
subject and predicate i n the subject woul d be like is not clear from this context, but
its nature is certainly problematic. that is, i t woul d be a sign that coul d poi nt t o an
act, or, better, the subject woul d be a sign that points t o itself, but the self that i t
points t o woul d be less l i ke a subject and more like an act, a bi ndi ng contract [Ver-
bindung], as i t were, of the subject wi t h itself. In other words, this sign-subject woul d
be like an utterance whose status as either constative or performative cannot be
decided: like the utterance "I am sorry" whi ch may state that "I feel bad" or may
perform the act "I apologize." I n order t o bi nd together the t wo utterances of Vor-
stellung-"I am I" and "I am A and B and C etc."-the subject has t o say "I am sorry"
t o itself. Before deci di ng whether i t has anything t o apologize for (or feel bad about),
let us determine more precisely t he structure of the subject's dialogue wi t h itself, for i t
may help us t o return t o the speculative dialogue of "sense-certainty" and the "we."
I n distinguishing conceptual, pholosophical thinking [begreifendes Denken] from
mere rati onal i zi ng, argumentation [das Rasonnierenl-a purel y formal t hi nki ng
[forn-rales Denken] that can be i denti fi ed wi t h a Vorstellung that takes its content
f r om t hought -t he Preface [Vorrede] t o t he Phenonlenology distinguishes their
readings of the proposition: whereas argumentation takes t he subject as a fixed basis
whi ch it leaves behind when it goes over t o its predicates, conceptual thi nki ng reads
t he predicates as negations of the subject, i.e., as negations belonging t o the subject,
whi ch i t uses t o return t o the subject i n a movement of reflection. But this movement
of reflection is by no means simple. "Usually, t he Subject is first made the basis, as
t he objective, fixed self; from here the necessary movement t o the mul t i pl i ci t y of
determinations or predicates proceeds; here the knowing I itself steps i nto the place of
t he former subject and is t he l i nki ng of the predicates and t he subject hol di ng them.
But since that first subject enters i nt o the determinations themselves and i s their soul,
t he second subject, namely t he knowi ng one, still finds i n t he predicate that whi ch i t
thought t o have finished wi t h and through whi ch i t wants t o return i nto itself, and
instead of being able t o be the agent as argumentation i n t he movement of t he
predicate, whether t o attach this or that predicate, i t rather still has t o do wi t h the self
of the content, and should not be for itself but rather together wi t h i t [Sonst 1st zuerst
das Subjekt als das gegenstandliche fixe Selbst zu Crunde gelegt; von hier ausgeht di e
notwendige Bewegung zur Mannigfaltigkeit der Bestin-rn-rungen oder der Pradikate
fort; hier tri tt an di e Stelle jenes Subjekts das wissende I ch selbst ein und ist das
Verknupfen der Pradikate und das sie haltende Subjekt. l ndem aber jenes erste Subjekt
i n di e Bestin-rn-rungen selbst eingeht und ihre Seele ist, fi nder das zweite Subjekt,
naml i ch das wissende, jenes, nl i t den? es schon fertig sein und woruber hinaus es i n
sich zuruckgehen will, noch in? Pradikate vor, und statt i n den7 Bewegen des Pradikats
das Tuende als Rasonnieren, ob jenenl dies oder jenes Pradikat beizulegen ware, sein
zu konnen, hat es vielmehr mi t dem Selbst des lnhalts noch zu tun, sol1 ni cht fur sich,
sondern mi t diesen? zusammensein]" [PhC, 50-511. If we seek enlightenment of this
tortuous last sentence (of paragraph sixty of t he Preface), and go t o J. N.Findlay's
commentary t o the Phenomenology i n t he back of Miller's translation, we are thrown
back, disappointed, ont o this sentence: after a rather unhelpful paraphrase, t he com-
mentator adds, i n parentheses, suddenly switching t o telegram style: "(Paragraph very
di f f i cul t owi ng t o identification-in-distinction of the conscious wi t h t he logico-gram-
matical subject)." I f the identification-in-distinction of t he knowi ng wi t h the "logico-
grammatical subject" i s what this sentence is about, then it i s no wonder that this
sentence i s so di ffi cul t, for its subject is precisely the dialectical movement itself. To
paraphrase, after t he second subject, t he knowi ng "I" [das wissende l ch], steps i nt o
t he place of t he first subject, i.e., the subject of t he proposition-that is, after the
proposition is understood, given a meaning, read, supported by an understanding
subject who thus binds together subject and predicates-it finds another subject
whi ch new subject is neither 1) simply the subject of argumentation (because that
first subject has gone over i nt o the predicates) nor 2) simply the addi ti on of new
predicates (because those predicates have been fi l l ed by t he first subject's entering
i nt o them and becoming their soul) but rather i t is 3) the self or the subject of the
content itself. In other words, the second or knowi ng subject recognizes itself i n t he
first subject but because that first subject has gone over i nt o its predicates, this recog-
ni t i on is not sterile tautology but the absorption of the second subject by the subject
of t he content itself. This falling of the second subject i nto t he subject of t he content
is what makes this movement rigorously dialectical: t he i mmanent movement of t he
content itself. If we reduce this properly dialectical sentence t o the form of a propo-
sition-e.g., "the second subject finds t he first subject i n the predicate [das zweite
Subjekt findet das erste Subjekt noch in7 Pradikate vor]" or "the second subject is the
first subject (i n the predicate) [das zweite Subjekt ist das erste Subjekt (in? Pradikate)]"
- we fi nd that i n order t o read it we have ro re-perform t he very movement that is i t s
subject: that is, as readers of this sentence, we are t he second subject who puts itself
i n the place of the (first) subject of the proposition; but just like that second (knowing)
subject what we f i nd i n the predicate of this proposition (i.e., "the first subject") i s
precisely the (first) subject whi ch has entered i nt o these predicates (i.e., "the second
subject"). I n short, neatly (and dialectically) enough, we, t he second subject, fi nd in
t he predicate ourselves, the second subject (whi ch was t he subject of the proposition
but had entered i nto the predicate), and thereby become t he subject of the content
itself, in this case the (speculative) proposition itself. We cannot read Hegel's sentence
(speculatively) wi t hout this sentence's reading us (speculatively).
If this movement is the general structure of the dialogue whi ch takes place
between the subject and itself, consciousness and self-consciousness, natural con-
sciousness and the "we," "sense-certainty" and t he "we," then t wo of its essential
moments should be remarked: 1) the substitution of t he first subject by the second
knowi ng subject whi ch i s in this case put i n terms of a theater metaphor-"here the
knowi ng I steps i nto the place of the first subject [hier tri tt an die Stelle jenes Subjekts
das wissende Ich selbst ein]"; and 2) the comi ng together of the second subject wi t h
t he self of the content whi ch is here put i n terms of the ought, the shoul d t''. . . ought,
should, not be for itself but rather together wi t h the self of the content [ sol l ni cht fur
sich, sondern nl i t diesem zusammensein]." When Hegel later illustrates this movement
by the example "God is being [ Cot t ist das Sein]," t he identification of the second
subject wi t h the subject of t he content is again put i n the mode of the "ought": "it
[ t he subject] is still immersed i nt o the content, or at least the demand is there that i t
be immersed i nto i t [ist es i n den l nhal t noch vertieft, oder wenigstens ist die Forderung
vorhanden, i n i hn vertieft zu sein]" [PhC, 511. I n regard t o the first moment, we ask:
1) what is t he theater, the play, and the scene in whi ch the second subject takes the
place of the first?; and 2) what is the nature of this substitution of one subject for the
other? I n regard t o the second moment, we ask: 1) is the i denti fi cati on of t he second
subject wi t h the subject of t he content onl y one that should take place, a demand, or
is i t one that does take place?; and 2) if i t is a demand, then what is its guarantee, its
necessity? I n short, does a recognition take place or onl y a demand for or cl ai m t o a
recognition? If we try t o answer the questions in regard t o the first moment by going
from t he reading of the speculative proposition t o the reading of the speculative pre-
sentation of sense-certainty, for example, the answers are clear. the theater i n whi ch
the play of substitutions (of one subject for another) takes place is language, which,
according t o the last paragraph of sense-certainty, "has the di v~ne nature of imme-
diately inverting [converting, perverting] the meaning and making i t i nto something
else and thus not letting i t get i nt o words at al l [welches die gottl i che Natur hat, die
Mei nung unmittelbar zu verkehren, zu etwas anderen-r zu machen und so sie gar ni cht
zum Worte komn-ren zu lassen]" [PhC, 88-89]. This inversion [verkehren] performed
by language is very much l i ke the inversion [Umkehrung] of (natural) consciousness
itself as i t travels the road of despair [ Weg der Verzweiflung] from one figure of
apparent knowi ng t o the next; i t i s an inversion that "we" observe and indeed ac-
compl i sh insofar as i t "takes place, so t o speak, behind the back of natural con-
sciousness [gleichsam hinter seinen-r Rucken vorgeht]" [PhC, 741. As such, this in-
version [verkehren] woul d be better translated as conversion, as Hans-Georg Gadamer
interprets i t i n an essay on Hegel's passage on thet' inverted world"[verkehrte Wel t] in
the Phenomenology: he notes "that ordinary German usage qui te confidently dis-
tinguishes between falsch (false) and verkehrt (inverted or backwards). Of course an
answer whi ch inverts things or gets them twisted is not correct, but the elements of
truth are recognizable in i t and onl y need t o be put right. A false answer, on the other
hand, contains no such possibility of making i t right. Thus, for example, the information
someone gives you can be called falsch if i t is deliberately given wi t h the i ntent of
deceiving-but i n such a case i t coul d not be called verkehrt. For an answer whi ch is
verkehrt i s always one whi ch was meant t o be correct and whi ch turned out t o be
false. I n this sense too t he n~al um is t he conversio boni " ["Hegel's 'Inverted World',"
i n Hegel's Dialectic (New Haven. Yale U. Press, 1976), p. 521.
The dialectical conversion that takes place whenever the "we" confronts t he "I"
of natural consciousness, language confronts mere "opining" or "meaning" IMeinungl,
is structured l i ke an exemplary moment of conversion i n the New Testament.
Christ's combat with Legion [Cf. Jean Starobinski, "Le combat avec Legion," in Trois
fureurs (Paris: Callimard, 1974). pp. 73-1261. After Christ has crossed the sea and come
ashore i n a foreign land, "a man with an unclean spirit [ein Mensch mi t einenl
unsaubern Ceist]" [Markus 5:2] approaches hi m. "Who had his dwelling among the
tombs; and no man could bind him, no, not with chains [der seine Wohnung i n den
Crabhohlen hatte. Und niemand konnte i hn mehr binden, auch nicht nl i t Ketten]"
[Markus 5:3]. This man is unbound in a figurative sense as well, for when Christ asks
him his name, the reply is, "My name is Legion: for we are many [Legion heisse ich;
denn wir sind viele]" [Markus 5:9]. That is, because he is possessed by many devils,
the one man is simultaneously, metonymically, as i t were, an "I" and a "we" which
heithey cannot bind together on hisitheir own: he is a walking anacoluthon. The
denouement of the story is well-known: Christ allows the devils to be driven out of
the man and into the swine (which are thereupon driven off a cliff and into the sea),
thereby restoring him to his right reason and converting him into a disciple. This
combat is for us exemplary of dialectical conversion on account of its essential
moments: both symmetrical and asymmetrical. That is, what we have here is a con-
frontation of Logos and Legion (etymologically, logologically, related to one another)
with a one and a many on each side of the struggle, the difference being the difference
on each side: Christ, the Logos, being bound (by the "Holy," as opposed to the
"unclean," Spirit) to the many in the mystery of the Holy Trinity; Legion, the anti-
Logos, completely unbound. If Christ is able to convert Legion into Logos or at least
into a sign that points to the one Word, i t is because he is able to read the anacoluthon
of the "I" and the "we." This reading is properly speculative, properly dialectical, in
that i t takes place by means of an asymmetry in the combat, which amounts t o a
properly determinate negation: that is, whereas Christ does not give his name and yet,
and therefore, is recognized immediately by Legion-as though there were an im-
mediate understanding or contract between the god and the demon, Word and anti-
Word-Legion's having to give his/their name can be taken as the moment and the
sign of hisitheir falling into the power of the Logos. Christ here is and wields the
power of the Negative: because he does not give his name, he is the no one who can
bind Legion t o himself ("and no one could bind him [ und niemand konnte i hn mehr
binden]"). Christ dis-possesses Legion of his "we" (the demons) and re-possesses
Legion with his own "we" (the good Word, etc.). This story of dispossession and re-
possession is very much the story of Vorstellung and thought, the first subject (of
argumentation) and the second (knowing) subject, "sense-certainty" and the "we,"
and like these dialogues, i t has for a condition the essential symmetry of the partners:
Logos and Legion (the speculative "we" and the "I") share the same terrain and the
same universe of discourse, no matter how negative the realm i nto which the Logos
has to descend, how negative the negation. Indeed, the greater the negation-the
land of the tombs, or death, ultimately-the greater the positive synthesis. But the
story of Logos and Legion can serve not only to illustrate-as by example-dialectical
con-version but may also help us t o re-pose our question about the second moment
of the dialectical movement-the coming together of the second subject with the
subject of the content, i.e., whether i t takes place or only a claim to i t is made.
Namely, i s there another verkehren-one more like perversion than conversion-in
language and by language that is not merely the inversion of the correct answer, that
does not come up against i t i n the same universe ("turned i nto one") of discourse as
other of the same. Is there an other Legion whose anacoluthon is not unbound and re-
bound quite as easily-a Legion who does not give his/their name? Posing the question
is not an easy matter, f orwe cannot simply take the side of Legion-with some kind of
polytheism, pluralism, schizophrenia, or schizo-culture, etc.-but rather need an
other point of view entirely. Perhaps one way t o begin reading this story and Hegel's
story is, as i t were, from the point of view of (pardon our saying so) the swine
sacrificed for the glory of the Logos and determinate negation-a pure loss (about two
thousand head, according to Mark), sheer excess. Finding the equivalent of this pure
loss, sheer excess, in the play of substitutions, the dialogue, between sense-certainty
and the "we" is also not an easy matter, for we cannot, again, simply take the side of
sense-certainty (as some commentators have done). And since this excess (or lack?)
would be a Legion that does not give his/their name-an unreadable anacoluthon, as
i t were-the task becomes more difficult because language is the theater in which this
play (of substitutions, conversions, perversions) is staged. What is another Legion in
the Logos, we ask, and try to remember that the "answer" to this "question" would be
one that disarticulates such question and answer, such dialogue.
If we return to the dialogue of "sense-certainty" and the "we," we cannot help
but remark a number of disquieting elements. first of all, the downright ludicrousness
of the dialogical proceedings. Few commentators have failed to note the arbitrariness,
unfairness, indeed bullying that victimized sense-certainty undergoes at the hands of
the "we." Nietzsche, who mercilessly criticized Socrates' dialectical questioning-the
bully Socrates surrounded by beardless youths and senile ol d men asks "What is the
beautiful, the good, the just, etc.?" and receives an answer for example "Alcibiades is
beautiful, good, just, etc."-because the nature of his questions ("What i s. . .?")already
decided the matter beforehand, i.e., in metaphysical terms, in terms of essence and
accidents, etc., Nietzsche would be equally scornful of Hegel's procedure in sense-
certainty. For not only do we ask sense-certainty the same ol d question-for example,
"What is the Now? [was ist das /etzt?]"-but we do not even wait for it to answer-"we
answer for example: the Now i s night [antworten wir also zum Beispiel: das jetzt ist
die Nacht]" [PhC, 811. The proceedings, especially in the case of the question "What
is the Here," bear a suspicious resemblance to games played in a school playground at
recess-e.g., tapping someone's shoulder behind the back, causing him to turn his
head that way, and then looming up on theother side: "The Here i s not a tree, but
rather a house [Das Hier ist nicht ein Baum, sondern vielmehr ein Haus]" [PhC, 821.
This indecorousness-matched in the Phenomenology only by the crass humor of the
section on "Physiognomy and Phrenology" [Physiognomik und Schadellehrel-is
somewhat distressing for anyone expecting "the earnestness, the pain, the patience
and work of the negative [der Ernst, der Schrnerz, die Ceduld und Arbeit des
Negativen]." Equally disquieting is all the textual paraphernalia in this episode of
consciousness: for example, i n order to test the truth of sense-certainty "Now is the
night," we write i t down and return, later, with this inscription t o sense-certainty; and
i n the final paragraph there is even mention of "this piece of paper on which I write
this or rather have written this [dieses Stuck Papier, worauf ich dies schreibe oder
vielmehr geschrieben habe]" [PhC, 881. And never mind the usual Hegelian surfeit of
puns and wordplays: not only on aufheben but on nlein (possessive adjective) and
Meinung (opinion), wahr and aufbewahren, etc. Al l this rampant "textuality" is
certainly made t o order for what is called "deconstructive" reading, and one could go
far with i t: i n particular, the two skits on the "Now" and the "Here" lend themselves t o
readings that could be called "grammatological" and "rhetorical" (or "tropological")
respectively. A good example of the former is Werner Hamacher's reading of the
double inscription of the "Now": he shows that the very text, the very proof, of sense-
certainty's inability to say what i t means when i t says "Now"-i.e., its inability t o say
one, particular, self-identical, self-simultaneous "Now"-is based on another, one,
self-identical, self-simultaneous moment of reading and writing during which the
"we" is able to compare the first inscription ("Now is the night") and the second
(implied) inscription ("Now is the day") ["pleroma-zu Genesis und Struktur einer
dialektischen Hermeneutik bei Hegel," in his edition of Hegel's Der Ceist des Christen-
tums (Berlin: Ullstein, 1978)l. In other words, the question is precisely the question of
Hegel's own text: the necessarily self-identical piece of paper on which he writes this
and this, and is able to compare them, i.e., is able to read himself. The example of the
"Here" lends itself well to a "tropological" reading insofar as i t is put in terms of
turning: "The Here is e.g. the tree. I turn around, and this truth has disappeared and
turned into its opposite [Das Hier ist 2.5. der Baum. Ich wende mich um, so ist diese
Wahrheit verschwunden und hat sich i n die entgegengesetzte verkehrt]" [PhC, 821.
The turning here plays the same role as the writing i n the example of the "Now": i t
both suppresses a (particular) "Here" and preserves a (universal) "Here," but, at the
same time (and in the same place), i t presupposes a fixed point, a posited literal
meaning, against whi ch t he turni ng or tropi ng can be measured. I n both readings, t he
wri ti ng and turni ng are constitutive (undialectically, untranscendentally) and can be
taken as just different words for Aufhebung (sublation, supercession, or "elation" as
Geoffrey Hartman translates i t : what the deconstructive reading shows i s that i n the
case of this one key word Hegel's System depends ultimately (undialectically) on the
possibility of reading t wo mutual l y excluding meanings at once, simultaneously, and
that this reading "at once" i n a non-particular and non-universal here and now is t he
condi t i on of dialectical space and t i me and not vice versa. I n short, t o paraphrase t oo
quickly, the onl y thi ng that cannot be aufgehoben (sublated) is Aufhebung (sublation)
"itself," and Jean-Luc Nancy's La Remarque sp4culative [Paris. Galilee, 19731is a good
example of t he strategies of such readings.
What we are seeking, however, is a less tangible, as i t were, textual (stage?)
"property," something less imposing than Aufhebung and ostensibly less scandalous
and less visible than the example of writing. That is, we are less interested in the
examples than i n t he strategy of example, exempliflcatlon, i n this section, for ex-
amples-both visible and invisible-are ubiquitous i n sense-certainty. For one thing,
they mark the interplay between the "we" and sense-certa~nty, indeed, the passage
from questions posed by the "we" t o answers that we give, for example, i n the place
of, i n the voice of, the ' l ' l of sense-certainty. This is already a bi t unsettling insofar as i t
provides a slightly different picture of the dialogue between the "I" and the "we"than
we have been led t o expect by t he passage in the Preface on t he first and the second
subjects: not onl y do we, the knowi ng subject, step dramatically i nt o the place of
sense-certainty) that is the problem, but rather the linguistic nature of our speaking
for i t : that is, "for example" [ zum Beispiel] here marks a shift between literal and
sense-certainty) that i s the problem, but rather the linguistic nature of our speaking
for i t . that is, "for example" [sum Beispiel] here marks a shift between literal and
figurative senses. When we ask "What is the Now?" and answer for sense-certainty, for
example, "Now i s t he night" what we do is t o take t he question literally, as i t were, as
though we (pl ayi ng the role of sense-certaintyj di d not hear the (invisible) quotati on
marks around the "Now." I n short, playing t he role of sense-certainty for example is
not so much a matter of putti ng on and taking off masks as i t i s a question of reading
and misreading. And this question cannot be spirited off t he stage as easily as we
dispose of the body of sense-certainty. One clue is the text's effacement of the act of
reading (the example, for example) at the end of t he passage on t he "Now": when, at
noon, we come back t o t he truth ("Now is the night") we h a v ~ written down we do not
read it, according t o the text, but we l ook at i t . "If now, this noon, we look again at t he
wri tten-down truth, we shall have t o say that i t has become stale [Sehen wi r jetzt,
diesen Mi ttag, die aufgeschriebene Wahrheit wieder an, so werden wi r sagen mussen,
dass sie schal geworden ist]" [PhC, 811. In any case, the question is: can we step up t o
sense-certainty and step back wi t hout losing or gaining anything whi l e taking those
steps? Can one assume the language of another wi thout being tainted or contaminated
or parasitized by i t ? The question, as always, is that of translation. In order t o test t he
truth of translation a simple experiment i s sufficient: translate something i nt o another
language, German for example, and then try t o get i t back by translating back i nt o
English. A certain opacity, a certain asymmetry, is part of that process, an opacity and
asymmetry that has nothi ng t o do wi t h the "faithfulness" of t he translation or wi t h
particular and universal, immediacy and mediation, etc. but rather wi t h a shift of
reading: i.e., distinguishing literal and figurative senses. In short, if the passage between
t he knowi ng "we" and sense-certainty takes place for example, i.e., by the translation
of example, then the (dialectical) symmetry of that relation is in question: that is, the
relation is not one of a subject and an object who can come up against one another in
the same space at t he same time, but rather is a relation determined by the reading
(,and wri ti ng) of example, the translation of Reispiel.
Now, on the surface, Hegel's text is not at all bothered by example, by the transla-
t i on of Beispiel. Indeed, i t gives us a genetic history of t he word as converted (l i ke
Legion) for the ends of the speculative "we." I n t he thi rd paragraph of this section,
Hegel's text makes a first distinction between the essence and the excess in sense-
certainty. "But when we look at t he pure bei ng whi ch makes up the essence of this
certainty and whi ch i t pronounces as its truth, we see that much more is involved. An
actual sense-certainty is not onl y this pure immediacy but an example of i t [ An dem
reinen Sein aber, welches das Wesen dieser Gewissheit ausmacht und welches sie als
i hre Wahrheit aussagt, spielt, wenn wi r zusehen, noch vieles andere beiher. Eine
wirkliche sinnliche Cewissheit ist ni cht nur diese reine Unmittelbarkeit, sondern ein
Beispiel derselben]" [PhG, 801. I t is hard t o tel l exactly what the word "example"
[Beispiel] means here, but the context and the first sentence of the fol l owi ng paragraph,
whi ch puts "example" [Beispiel] i n opposition t o "essence" [Wesen] -"This distinc-
t i on between essence and example . . . [Diesen Unterschied des Wesens und des
Beispiels . . .]"-makes i t clear: that is, Beispiel refers t o that side of the knower/known,
subject/object, relation whi ch is taken t o be inessential, accidental, that whi ch i s not
t he truth of knowing. As such, the word Beispiel seems t o derive from Hegel's home-
made verb beiherspielen (i n t he passage quoted above) whi ch Mi l l er renders as "is
involved"-when we l ook at this pure being, "we see that much more i s involved
[beiherspielt]"-but whi ch coul d be translated literally as "to play on the side"-i.e.,
when we l ook at this pure being, we see that more i s i n play, that more is playing t o
t he side of this essence l i ke an excessive ornament or decoration. In short, sense-
certainty i s not onl y some pure immediacy but rather is made up of essence and
accident, mai n event and side-show, play and by-play. But that the translation of
beiherspielen (playing on the side) i nt o Beispiel (example) is not unproblematic
becomes clear when we l ook more closely at the translators' hesitancies i n rendering
beiherspielen: for spielt noch vieles andere beiher, Mi l l er writes "much more i s
involved"; Baillie writes that "there i s a good deal more i mpl i ed i n that pure being";
and Jean Hyppol i te comes closest t o t he "literal" meaning wi t h "Mais dans ce pur 6tre
[. . . ] i l y a encore bien autre chose en jeu." The translators are equally uncertain when
t he verb beiherspielen returns (twi ce) later i n sense-certainty. I n stating that the Now
as universal is indifferent t o particular Now's (l i ke "Night" and "Day"), the text uses
t he formulation "gleichgultig gegen das, was noch bei i hm herspielt [indifferent t o
what plays t o the side of i t]" [PhC, 811; and later t o express the indifference of the
universal "I" t o its particular apprehensions (of a house or a tree, etc.), the text says
again "gleichgultig gegen das, was noch beiher spielt [indifferent towards that whi ch
plays t o the side]" [PhC, 831. Mi l l er renders these t wo as "indifferent t o what happens
i n it"; Baillie: "indifferent t o what is still associated wi t h i t"; and Hyppol i te is again
most "literal" in writing "indifferent a ce qui se joue encore pres de lui" and "indifferent
a I'egard de t out ce qui est encore en jeu." If we list these examples of properly un-
translatable examples, i t i s t o poi nt out not onl y their ubi qui ty i n t he text of sense-
certainty but also the fact that the translators do not know, cannot tell, what i s
involved, implied, associated wi th, or what happens, or is en jeu i n Hegel's text when
t he verb beiherspielen makes its entrance. And i t is important t o know what or who is
i n play (or at work) when this verb enters, for i t names that extra, accidental, ines-
sential excess whi ch at each stage of the argument is t o be distinguished from the
essence or truth of sense-certainty. The distinction between essence and example
[Beispiel] is from the beginning clearly marked and clearly meant t o govern the
fol l owi ng reversals: that is, sense-certainty begins by taking its object as t he essence
and i t s knowi ng as the example [Beispiel], but then finds that the object is imperma-
nent and inessential, so i t asserts that t he subject, the "I," is the essential and t he
obj ect is the example, etc. But the problem is not just the meaning, the translation, of
t he verb beiherspielen (t o play on the side) but rather its transformation i nto Beispiel
(example)-the derivation of "example" from "playing on the side." Jean Hyppolite's
footnote t o the first occurence of the verb and its translation i nt o Beispiel helps t o
pose the question. "Hegel emploie i ci les mots 'Beispiel' et 'beiherspielen.' L'exemple
est ce qui se joue a c6te de I'essence. Le singulier et I'universel ne se penetrent pas."
Now Hegel is certainly entitled t o play on the word Beispiel and t o give it the meaning
"particular, inessential, excess" i n opposition t o "universal, essential, truthu-in short,
as though i t meant side-show, by-play-but the trouble is that he cannot reconcile
this meaning wi t h the meaning t he word has i n the t wo dialogues between the "we"
and "sense-certainty": i.e., an illustration, a story, a parable, a speaking on the side,
by-spell. How mediate between playing on the side and saying on the side, by-play
and by-spell, except by a pun, paronomasia (an other naming, naming besides)? And
the problem i s serious insofar as i n Hegel's original "derivation" of Beispiel from
beiherspielen, the word Beispiel has both meanings. by-play and by-spell. That "an
actual sense-certainty is not only this pure immediacy, but an example [Beispiel] of i t"
means both "by-play1'-particular, inessential, etc.-and "example" as i t later appears
i n the text (and as i n its "normal" usage). And these two meanings are not reconcilable,
not mediatable, because they are not symmetrically opposed. just as the relation
universal/particular is of a different order and a different ki nd from the relation
literal/figurative. Perhaps i t is no accident, as one says, that "by-spell," the English
cognate of Beispiel, meant not onl y "parable, proverb," etc. but also "one whose
worthlessness is proverbial, who becomes a byword" and "an illegitimate child, a
bastard." Rather than a genetic history of Beispiel, the text's pun (as non-translation)
tells a story more like a "genealogy" i n Nietzsche's sense. one that reveals an ille-
gitimacy and a usurpation at and as the "origin."
Again, the problem is not the pun or Hegel's carelessness i n choosing his words
but rather the disarticulation of the dialogue of sense-certainty that the word Beispiel
covers up. For rather than being any ki nd of carelessness, the word-play on Beispiel
becomes a (non-dialectical) necessity as soon as we pose the question "What is sense-
certainty?" and answer "Sense-certainty i s sense-certainty and an example [Beispiel]
of sense-certainty," That is, if we conti nue this line of questioning, and ask "What is
the question 'What is . . .?'?,"we have t o answer "The question is the question and an
example of the question" and, again, "The answer is the answer and an example of
t he answer." Now all of the examples i n this chain are eminently dialectizable i n that
each is the name of a particular, immediate, sublatable excess-a t oo much by-
play-that comes up against the Logos on the same terrain (even if the Logos has t o
descend among the tombs t o convert i t ). But the logic of this self-questioning and
self-answering Logos demands that we finally ask still another question-"What i s the
example?"-and fi nd that we have t o answer i t . "The example i s the example and an
example of example." And this answer-this second (or thi rd?), other example, the
example of example-is one that renders asymmetrical the dialogue of speculative
question and answer: that is, i n the phrase "example of example," the word "of" marks
a genitive whose ambiguity i s not confined t o the possibility of reading i t as either
objective or subjective genitive (and, dialectically mediated by a history of sense, as
both) but rather one that disarticulates such (subjective or objective) genitive appropri-
ation altogether. An example can never represent or exemplify itself enough as example
t o recover its own excess, the excess of example "itself," for there wi l l always be one
more [or less) as yet unreflected and forever unreflectable and unmediatable example
l eft over or missing: (no) more Beispiel ( t o be read like the "plus" in Jacques Derrida's
"plus de metaphore" ["La mythologie blanche," Marges (Paris: Ed. de Mi nui t , 1972),
p. 2611). The text's punning on beiherspielen and Beispiel-its (impossible) translation
of one i nto the other (when each is not the other of the other)-is one mark of this
example (of example), Beispiel of Beispiel, but its traces are disseminated throughout
Hegel's text i n that t o ask a question and t o give an answer is not just t o ask a question
and give an answer but also t o give an example of asking a question and giving an
answer. In short, insofar as we can never question and answer without giving examples
of question and answer, all questions and all answers are always already parasitized
by the question (and the "answer") of the example of example, Beispiel of Beispiel. I n
other words, when "Hegel," the text, in the thi rd paragraph of sense-certainty says
"example" [Beispiel], he says example-better, reads and writes example-for example,
and that ("for") i n t wo senses, 1 ) he says example i n place of example "itself" i n that
he usurps the one (usual) meaning of the word (parable, illustrating narrative, by-
spell) and puts i n its place another meaning (playing on the side, by-play); and 2) he
says "example" for example, i.e., as example, as example of saying "example." And
because t o say this latter example i or example always means t o give the example of
example, i t is impossible t o say it. We cannot speak for example without the example's
speaking for us, that is, without the example's turning us into an example (of saying
"we") so that we do not know whether we are saying "we" or quoting "we" (i.e., giving
an example of saying). In short, speaking for example is always in danger of speaking
against itself, but non-oppositionally, hence i t would be better to say (read or write)
that speaking for example is always in danger of speaking by itself. And such a
speaking, such a saying of the example for example, of the example for us, is not what
the Preface had in mind when i t demanded that we the knowing subject fall into the
text and become one with the subject of the content, for this speaking is not that of a
self or a subject but of example, Beispiel, "itself." Reading (and writing) for example
would be the simulacrum of "conceptual thinking" [begreifendes Denken]. The fact
that our speculative reading of the sentence on the first and the second subjects
cannot take place unless in addition t o distinguishing the identity and the difference
of the first and second subjects we also read (and write) the first and the second
subjects as within or without quotation marks would be a reminder of the claim of
Beispiel and reading for example. Like Legion, Beispiel, example, says (reads and
writes): Beispiel heisse ich; denn wir sind viele [Example is my name, for we are
many]-a sentence in which the asymmetry of calling, naming [heissen], and being
[sein] is to be read as a mark, the signature, of Beispiel, example, "itself," the one and
the many that does/do not give its/their name. If "Hegel" had been able to read this
example, if he had known what "wer'-who, we?-know, he would not have been
able to write (the Phenomenology of Spirit, for example), but he would perhaps have
written something else (for example Nietzsche's Zarathustra?). In other words, what
we do-when we read not as a "we" but for example-here and now, everywhere and
always, is to read the Hegel (a Hegel? un Hegel?) who could not, di d not, write (except
for example, except the Phenomenology of Spirit for example) but who nevertheless
(always already and always not yet) wrote something else for example.*
*Thi s essay is the thi rd part of a longer (exempl ary) reading of Hegel whose iirst part is:
Andrzej Warmi nski , "Pre-positional By-play," ~nGlyph 3, ed. Samuel Weber et al , (Bal ti more:
The johns Hopkins U. Press, 19781, pp. 98-117.