Only if one considers in what sense, for Hegel, Logic and Religion have each to be the other in its own register, can one understand how Hegel’s idealism is sui generis, quite different from Kant’s or that of other post-Kantian idealists – a difference which comes strikingly home with the special meaning that myth must have in his case. The satisfaction of reason which the philosopher celebrates in the medium of the pure concept in the Logic is but the speculative counterpart (not the schema) of the reconciliation that the religious community celebrates in containing the evil which, since at issue for it is the identity of individuals as individuals, is endemic to it. This is a reconciliation which would not be possible without reason – that is, without a language for which there can be a Logic – but is not itself logical. Hegel’s claim, though problematic, is not mystifying, and it can still speak to us.
