THE IDEALIST TRINITARIAN ADVENTURE
Fichte, but especially Hegel and Schelling, have had an enormous impact on the development of trinitarian thought. Through their creative philosophical interpretations of the ancient notion of Trinity they already influenced certain theologians of their day. But their enduring impact lay more in the influence, both direct and indirect, that they and their thought have exercised on much trinitarian thinking during the rest of the nineteenth century and especially throughout the twentieth on into the twenty-first centuries. We continue to feel their influence in trinitarian thinking even today.1
We can trace this influence back to the overall approach according to which, from early on, Fichte, Hegel, and Schelling, each in his own way, embraced and were fully enamored with what they understood to be the triadic structure of dynamically developing subjectivity. In their earliest philosophies they had not yet in an explicit way linked this overall fascination for triadic structure with the religious notion of Trinity. Yet their interest in the triadic predisposed especially Hegel and Schelling to consider Trinity from a variety of perspectives as they continued to develop their thought over many years.2
Johan Gottlieb Fichte: Setting the Stage
Fichte (1762–1814) was the earliest of the three to focus so intensely on what came to be this Idealist trademark, namely, the triadic structure of subjectivity. In his search to find a way to ground all experience and knowledge he rejected Kant’s notion of the thing-in-itself. He argued at length that all we had to deal with was consciousness as such.3 In his groundbreaking work of 1794–95, Science of Knowledge,4 he laid out his basic principle (Grundsatz), followed by two further principles. These three principles were to ground all science and thinking. He reworked various parts of this study over the years following its publication. But it was his initial formulation of the triadic structure of subjectivity which had such a great impact on Hegel and Schelling, and with which we can briefly remain in view of present interests.
Fichte argued that all we have to start with is the basic principle: I = I; I am I; I am (Ich = Ich; Ich bin Ich; Ich bin).5 Since the “I” does not adhere in anything else and underlies all experience, this is a principle of initial identity. With the affirmation of this first principle, Fichte is working out philosophy as a scientific knowing of knowing, a doctrine of knowledge based in one starting point. However, though this initial identity of the I is the certainty of my relation with myself, it does not explain its own reality, namely, being free as it is and yet limited. For Fichte, then, as a second principle the I posits or sets over against itself a not-I or not-self (Nicht-Ich).6 The I posits itself as limited by the not-I, which is an other over against the I itself. The third principle is the recognition that each of these first two principles determines the other.7 The I posits the not-I as limiting itself and the I limits the not-I. The I, as limited by the not-I, is passively posited. The I, as knowing it limits the not-I or object, is active. With this third principle Fichte accounts for the reciprocal interaction between self and other. These three principles underlie and ground the further elaboration of his systematic thought. He will go on later to work with a form of trinitarian expression.8 But it is really his initial insight into the dynamic triadic structure of subjectivity which, as modified and further developed by Hegel and Schelling, has had an impact through their thought on subsequent trinitarian thinking.9