Hybrid edition "Schelling's Berlin Philosophy of Revelation" (1841-45) (P 34383-G)

Hybrid edition "Schelling's Berlin Philosophy of Revelation" (1841-45) (P 34383-G)

In this project funded by the FWF (Austrian Science Fund, Project number P 34383-G), Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling's Berlin lectures on ‘Philosophy of Revelation’ (1841-45) are being made available to researchers in a text-critical hybrid edition at the Faculty of Protestant Theology of the University of Vienna. This project lays the groundwork for two additional modules dedicated to the digital edition of the ‘Berlin Schelling’ (1841-1854):

Module 1: Schelling's Berlin Philosophy of Revelation (1841-1845).

Module 2: Schelling's Berlin Philosophy of Mythology (1842-1846).

Module 3: Schelling's Berlin Presentation of Negative or Purely Rational Philosophy (1846-1854).

Schelling is one of the most important and influential representatives of German Idealism. His influence extends far beyond philosophy into various fields of knowledge. However, a reliable critical edition of his later works is still unavailable to researchers. Similarly, Schelling's extensive partial estate, which is kept in the archives of the BBAW (Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences), has not yet been made accessible to researchers. The posthumous edition of his late work by his son Karl Friedrich August Schelling (“Sämmtliche Werke”) cannot make up for this deficit.

The project addresses this serious gap in research and creates the first digital critical and genealogical edition of the Berlin “Philosophy of Revelation.” The scientific goal of the project is to break down the monolithic structure of the Philosophy of Revelation in the “Sämmtliche Werke” and to scientifically reconstruct its development in terms of the history of the work and the text. The project achieves this through a digital, database-driven, open-access edition. Schelling's late magnum opus, Philosophy of Revelation, underwent further development during his time in Berlin from 1841 to 1854. This is precisely what the version of the “Sämmtliche Werke” omits, suggesting an inner completeness of the text. Only a text-genetic edition that makes the historical development of the Philosophy of Revelation as transparent as its complex historical context of debate will enable a precise deciphering of his late philosophy, leading to a revision of classical patterns of interpretation of the 19th-century. The Berlin “Philosophy of Revelation” thus shows how Schelling not only initiated the historicization of the sciences that began in the middle of the century, but also productively incorporated it into his late thinking.

The hybrid edition is carried out in three interlinked pillars: a. digital open-access edition, b. scholarly indexing, and c. printed edition.