Absolute as Self-thinking Nous: A Critical Reflection on Hegel’s Interpretation of Aristotle’s Pure Actuality

One of the most controversial debates on Hegel’s Philosophy is the question of ancient or modern aspects of his philosophical system. On the one hand, focusing on Kantian dimension of Hegel’s Philosophy, some Hegel scholars have regarded his project as the completion and radicalization of transcendental philosophy. On the other hand, some others emphasize on Hegel’s conception and elaboration and also transformation of classical metaphysical concepts of Plato and Aristotle; hence, he introduced his new ideas in the context of ancient metaphysical tradition. Focusing on Hegel’s interpretation of Aristotle’s concept of God as self-thinking nous, this study shows to some extent, in explaining the most important concept of his philosophy i.e. the Absolute and its synonyms, that he is indebted to Aristotle. Although with his own conception of this concept, he opens a modern way to reinterpret the concept of absolute. Accordingly, the identity of subject and object has overcome the Kantian duality between apperception and the world, and the rejection of nature’s actuality in its immediacy has preserved the Kantian criteria of the conceptual determination of the world.