Comparing Descartes And Hegel's Philosophy

Descartes and Hegel are both important models in the world of philosophy; particularly they play key roles in trying to make sense of a philosophical God, and his role in our lives. Descartes reasoned that since he does not freely create what is in his consciousness, something else outside of his consciousness and, thus, greater than him must also exist. On the contrary, Hegel’s central philosophy rested on the idea that people have purpose because they have stories. In addition, Hegel believes God’s purpose is shown through history. Notably, each of these philosophers had revolutionary ideas on the reason God exists. Amidst these two differing viewpoints, I believe that Descartes’s idea that God is a perfect being, incomprehensible, and infinite, compared to Hegel’s idea that God reveals his purpose through history, in my opinion, makes more sense.
In order to pass a judgment on which philosophical model’s idea of God makes more sense, it is important to understand each of the philosopher’s visions individually. Therefore, for the sake of this essay, I will start off with discussing Hegel’s philosophy of God and history. In his mind, God changes …show more content…
Hegel believed that history is a process by which God increases his knowledge and defines himself, until he finally reaches the state of absolute knowledge, that is, the realization that he is God. Similarly, Hegel believes that the history of us human beings and our society as a whole is just the history of God himself. Descartes heavily focused on the Cogito Ergo Sum. He based the premises of the existence of a divine being off of the fact that we are thinking things with an idea of perfection, which has to come from a perfect being, God. All in all, to my way of thinking, Descartes’ ideas of God make more sense because he acknowledges that God is almost