who, two years later, was to work out convincingly the literary argument for the priority of Mark. But the historian is quite subordinated to the literary critic, and, when all is said, Wilke takes up no clearly defined position in regard to Strauss's main problem, as is evident from his seeking to retain, on more or less plausible grounds, a whole series of miracles, among them the miracle of Cana and the resurrection.
For most thinkers of that period, however, the question "myth or history" yielded in interest to the philosophical question of the relation of the historical Jesus to the ideal Christ. That was the second problem raised by Strauss. Some thought to refute him by showing that his exposition of the relation of the Jesus of history to the ideal Christ was not justified even from the point of view of the Hegelian philosophy, arguing that the edifice which he had raised was not in harmony with the ground-plan of the Hegelian speculative system. He therefore felt it necessary, in his reply to the review in the Jahrbucher fur wissenschaftliche Kritik, to expound "the general relationship of the Hegelian philosophy to theological criticism,"[1] and to express in more precise form the thoughts upon speculative and historical Christology which he had suggested at the close of the second volume of his "Life of Jesus."
He admits that Hegel's philosophy is ambiguous in this matter, since it is not clear "whether the evangelical fact as such, not indeed in its isolation, but together with the whole series of manifestations of the idea (of God-manhood) in the history of the world, is the truth; or whether the embodiment of the idea in that single fact is only a formula of which consciousness makes use in forming its concept." The Hegelian "right," he says, represented by Marheineke and Goschel, emphasises the positive side of the master's religious philosophy, implying that in Jesus the idea of God-manhood was perfectly fulfilled and in a certain sense intelligibly realised. "If these men," Strauss explains, "appeal to Hegel and declare that he would not have recognised my book as an expression of his meaning, they say nothing which is not in accordance with my own convictions. Hegel was personally no friend co historical criticism. It annoyed him, as it annoyed Goethe, to see the historic figures of antiquity, on which their thoughts were accustomed lovingly to dwell, assailed by critical doubts. Even if it was in some cases wreaths of mist which they took for pinnacles of rock, they did not want to have this forced upon their attention, nor to
- ↑ Streitschriften. Drittes Heft, pp. 55-126: Die Jahrbilcher fiir wissenschaftliche Kritik: i. Allgemeines Verhaltnis der Hegel'schen Philosophic zur theologischen Kritik: ii. Hegels Ansicht fiber den historischen. W ert der evangelischen Geschichte (Hegel's View of the Historical Value of the Gospel History) ; iii. Verschiedene Richtungen innerhalb der Hegel'schen Schule in Betreff der Christologie (Various Tendencies within the Hegelian School in regard to Christology). 1837.
