Herman Dooyeweerd has been praised as one of the most original philosophers of the Netherlands. [1] But many of Dooyeweerd’s most important ideas were first set out a hundred years earlier by the nineteenth century German philosopher, Franz Xaver von Baader (1765–1841). Dooyeweerd nowhere acknowledges the influence of Baader, but the similarity of so many of their key ideas must be more than coincidental. A comparison with Baader can help to interpret many of Dooyeweerd’s ideas that have long been unclear.

Dooyeweerd’s major work, De Wijsbegeerte der Wetsidee was published in 1935; [2] it was later revised as A New Critique of Theoretical Thought. [3] But the Wetsidee, or ‘the idea of the place of the law’ was first developed by Baader. And insofar as the New Critique was intended to be a critique of Kant (NC, I, 118), Baader had already given the same criticism of Kant, using much the same terminology. The following ideas of Dooyeweerd can all be found in Baader: (1) all philosophy is religious (2) the religious antithesis (3) the ‘Wetsidee’ (4) the dogma of the autonomy of thought (5) idolatry as the absolutization of the temporal (6) Ground Motives in history (7) the four types of Ground Motives (8) the three ideas within each Ground Motive (9) the method of antinomy (10) the use of Kant’s ideas to criticize Kant’s own Critique of Pure Reason (11) cosmic time (12) the supratemporal heart (13) the analogy of the prism (14) modalities (15) sphere sovereignty (16) sphere universality (17) analogies of time (18) anticipation and retrocipation (19) Man [4] as the temporal root (20) Christ as the Second Root (21) the centrality of love (22) pre-theoretical experience (23) the Subject-Object relation (24) the Gegenstand relation (25) theoretical synthesis and (26) cultural development as an unfolding.

Dooyeweerd says that he obtained some of these ideas from Abraham Kuyper (1837–1920). But Kuyper was himself influenced by Baader. Berkouwer quotes Kuyper as saying that he had been tempted ‘…to slide off into Baader’s theosophic stream, entranced by its hypnotic spell and tempted by its ethical force.’ [5] Kuyper gives the impression that he had overcome this influence. But Kuyper’s ideas of the dogma of the autonomy of thought, religious antithesis, social organicism, sphere sovereignty, and the centrality of the heart are all ideas that are first found in Baader. Kuyper even quotes Baader with respect to the dogma of the autonomy of thought.

Like Dooyeweerd, Baader is known for his Christian philosophy. It is said that he was ‘the only Christian philosopher in the grand style that Germany ever had.’ [6] Baader was a Roman Catholic, but he believed that the Russian Orthodox Church represented the best Christian path. [7] He considered Protestantism to be too literal and rationalistic, and he found Catholicism too rigid and ‘petrified.’ He was strongly opposed to any pietistic flight from rationality, but he was also opposed to the rationalism of the Enlightenment. Baader ignored the art of compromise, and his writings are very polemical. [8] For example, he invites his reader to take part in ‘a war of life and death’ (Werke, I, 385). A similar polemical spirit can be found in Dooyeweerd:

Baader was opposed to the Enlightenment’s mechanistic and atomistic idea of nature (Begründung, 92, ft. 4). Because of this, Baader is often referred to as a philosopher of Romanticism, which emphasized the unmediated knowledge of intuition, and the importance of our experience. But Baader’s Romanticism must not be understood as irrationalism or emotionalism. Nor should his emphasis on experience be misunderstood as a subjectivistic Erlebnis. Subjectivism is not compatible with Baader’s view of the Subject-Object relation. And unlike an irrationalist Romanticism, Baader emphasizes the importance of theory when it is seen in its proper relation to our experience.

Baader’s most important influences were Böhme, Eckhart and St. Martin. [10] He also studied Tauler, Suso, Ruysbroeck, Paracelsus, Kepler, Aquinas, Anselm, Eriugena, Augustine, the Church Fathers, Angelus Silesius, Oetinger and Swedenborg (Poppe, 126; Betanzos, 55). Baader derived his ideas not only from Christian sources, but from natural philosophy, hermetic and alchemical thought, and from the Jewish Kabbalah. [11] Baader was also familiar with the ideas of Freemasonry and the Rosicrucians, although he probably did not retain formal membership in these societies (Susini, I, 50). Baader is often referred to as a theosophist because of his views relating creation to an emanation from God. [12] But unlike some forms of theosophy, Baader’s theosophy is not pantheistic; he emphasizes the separation of Creator and creature. He is also opposed to any idea that would ascribe evil to God; he says that evil is a result of our free choice.

Baader’s writings are extremely difficult to read, even for German readers. Although he was known as a brilliant conversationalist, his style of writing is so notoriously difficult that it became known even in his lifetime as the ‘Baader style’ (Baaderstil) (Poppe, 109). [13] Franz Hoffmann, who edited Baader’s writings, acknowledges the difficulty of Baader’s style (Werke, II, lxxviii; cited by Sauer, 20). Baader’s sentences are much too long, with confusing linkages between clauses. He uses theosophical language, he frequently uses untranslated words from other languages such as French, and he sometimes invents new words. He often uses symbols and analogies. His writings are not systematic, but merely aphoristic. Baader said he did not mind if his work was regarded as unsystematic; he saw his own work in more organic terms, as ‘ferment,’ or ‘seeds’ (Werke, I, 153f; Schumacher, 33). The title of his main work, Fermenta Cognitionis, reflects this view. Many of his ideas are only developed in personal correspondence or in his reviews of other works.

Baader had an influence on his contemporaries Schelling, Hegel, Goethe, Jacobi, Novalis, Friedrich Schlegel, Jean Paul, Wilhelm von Humboldt and Clemens Brentano. [14] He visited Friedrich Schleiermacher several times (Werke, XV, 105; Betanzos, 72). The German jurist Friedrich Stahl comments favourably on Baader’s mysticism. [15] Despite these influences on his contemporaries Baader became isolated towards the end of his life, and after his death was for a time nearly forgotten. His obscurity is partly due to the dispute that Baader had with Schelling late in life. After Baader’s death, Schelling even tried to prevent publication of his collected works. Nevertheless, Baader’s writings continued to exert an influence on later writers such as Max Scheler, [16] A.W. Schlegel, Kierkegaard and Berdyaev. [17] Susini reports that there was a renaissance of interest in Baader in the years following the World War I. [18] We must also include Kuyper and Dooyeweerd in the list of people who were influenced by Baader.

(1) All philosophy is religious

Baader relates religion and science. He speaks of the ‘religiosity of science, and the scientific character of religiosity’ (Fermenta, p. 207). The title of one of Baader’s works shows his concern to unite these two domains: Über den Zwiespalt des religiösen Glaubens und Wissens als die geistige Wurzel des Verfalls der religiösen und politischen Societät in unserer wie in jeder Zeit (‘Concerning the conflict of religious faith and knowledge as the spiritual root of the decline of religious and political society in our time as in every time’). Baader says that religion (the so-called ‘spiritual’ domain), and science (the ‘natural’ domain), have a common religious root. Baader also wants to overcome the opposition between religion and philosophy (Elementarbegriffe, 534), and the opposition between religious faith and knowledge (Zeit, 49). [19] He says that religion must penetrate to the most inner regions of thought (Begründung, 57), and that faith and knowledge are not to be separated in history, in politics, in industry or in religion (Begründung, 52). These are all ideas seen later in Dooyeweerd and in neo-Calvinism generally.

Dooyeweerd and Baader also agree that, although all philosophy is religious, philosophy is not directed by theology. Theology is only one science among many (Werke, V, 254; cited by Sauer, 13 and 128; NC, I, 4).

(2) The religious antithesis

One of the main ideas of both Kuyper and Dooyeweerd is the religious antithesis. Baader also says that our freedom as creatures can be used in two antithetical ways—for or against God. When we use our freedom against God, we are denying our creation in the image of God (Elementarbegriffe, 544, 545). This antithesis affects our knowledge. We know differently if our hearts are with God rather than against God:

(3) The ‘Wetsidee’

Both Baader and Dooyeweerd use the word ‘subject’ in the sense of being subjected to God’s law. Dooyeweerd uses the French word ‘sujet’—the created being is subjècted to a law that does not originate from this subject itself (NC, I, 110; WdW , I, 76: ‘onderworpen zijn’). Baader speaks of being ‘subject’ in this same sense. The creature must be subordinated under the Creator (Werke, VIII, 84). This subordination is a ‘being subject.’ Baader speaks of subjection (‘Subjektion’) and also coins new words here, subjicierender and subjiziert (Werke, IV, 47 ft; Weltalter, 162; Zeit, 56).

Both Baader and Dooyeweerd speak of God’s law as a boundary between God and creation. Dooyeweerd says that the law limits and determines (begrenst en bepaalt) our selfhood (WdW , I, 14). Baader says that the law limits the creature; it is a Hemmung or limitation. The living creature finds himself or herself as living, acting and productive within such a limitation or boundary (Grenze). We are placed (gesetzt) in a magic circle (Zauberkreis) that cannot be crossed or broken through. This boundary is given to the creature as a holding fast, a placing (Setzenden), a bearing and a holding or nurturing (Begründung, 28, 29).

We are ‘fitted’ or placed (Gesteztsein) in this magic circle or ‘periphery.’ Baader derives the meaning of ‘fitted’ (setzen) from the word for law (Gesetz) (Begründung, 29 ft. 12). Each creature is set under its law, in a region or place in which it is to serve God. Our bliss is found only in fulfilling this law and serving God (Weltalter, 172, 178). The periphery is related to its supratemporal Center in an ‘organic’ relation. [21] We have free movement of life in the periphery when we are related to the Center:

The Dutch language does not permit the same play on words between ‘law’ and ‘fitted.’ But Dooyeweerd uses a similar idea of being placed into the temporal world. He uses the word gevoegd, which is translated in the New Critique as ‘fitted into’ the temporal world:

Baader says that it is only God who gives the law and who places or fits temporal beings:

Baader also emphasizes that God is independent from all creatures (Werke, XIII, 165, 191).

Dooyeweerd makes the same point—God is not subject to law:

(4) The dogma of the autonomy of thought

Baader says that if we do not freely accept being subjected to God’s law, we will attempt to set up our own law in an autonomous way. Such a person seeks the Origin in his or her own image, and not in the image of God. A person who denies God experiences a lawlessness (Anomie, Gesetzlosigkeit), or an inner lack of all laws. Such a person therefore attempts to give his or her own law (Selbstgesetzgebung or autonomy) (Zeit, 31). For example, Kant says that the ethical creature is the absolute giver of the law (Begründung, 34, ft. 20).

Kuyper specifically cites Baader in relation to this idea of autonomy, which he says is the human desire to rid itself of God:

Baader says that we can choose to find our center either in God or in our own self. We either affirm the Central Unity or we deny it (Zeit, 24). As Sauer says, if our center is in God, then we understand ourselves as ordered (gesetzt), as participating in a previously given Ground. Or we can choose to deny our true center and attempt to find our ground in our own self (Selbstsetzung) (Sauer, 28, citing Werke, XIV, 61f). The foundation of our existence can be immanent, insofar as it is founded in oneself by oneself, or ‘emanant’—founded in another being (Werke, II, 520).

Dooyeweerd says that our power of thought is fallen and could never serve as the basis for autonomy (NC, I, 100). Similarly, Baader holds (contrary to Kant, Jacobi and Fichte) that the Fall affected our reasoning ability (Begründung, 121).

(5) Absolutization of the temporal as idolatry

The denial of our true Center results in an absolutization of the temporal (‘Vergötterung oder Verewigung der Schein-Zeit’) (Zeit, 23). The negation of God always results in idolatry or the absolutization of the temporal (Werke, I, 21). This is what the Bible refers to as the denying ‘Spirit of Lies,’ and the ‘Murderer in the Beginning.’ It is the original lie of Lucifer, the proton pseudos (Zeit, 25, 41 ft. 21). Dooyeweerd also refers to this proton pseudos or ‘radical lie’ (NC, II, 561–563). Dooyeweerd says that this absolutizing is the source of the many –isms of thought, such as psychologism, historicism, etc. (NC, I, 46).

(6) Ground Motives in history

Dooyeweerd speaks of ‘Ground Motives’ in history; they are the fundamental driving forces of our thought and experience. He uses the Dutch word ‘grondmotief ’ (WdW , I, 472, 476), although he uses other terms more frequently, like ‘Ground Idea’ (‘grond-idee’: WdW , I, vi, 39, 52, 54, 57, 61, 89, 140); or ‘Ground Thought’ (‘grondgedachte’: WdW , I, vi) or ‘Ground Principle’ (‘grondprincipe’: WdW , I, vii) or ‘Ground Problem’ (‘grondprobleem’: WdW , I, 467) or even ‘Ground Antinomy’ (‘grond-antinomie’: WdW , I, 465).

Baader expresses a similar idea, using the term ‘Grund-Prinzip’ or ‘Ground Principle or Idea’ (Zeit, 60). Principles lie at the Ground (Grund) of our knowledge (theology, physiology, natural philosophy); these principles may be open or hidden (Werke, V, 254, cited by Sauer, 128). Baader also refers to ‘Religious Ground Attitudes’ (‘Grundeinstellungen’: Werke, II, 296; cited by Schumacher, 17) or ‘root convictions’ (‘Wurzelüberzeugungen’ or ‘idées causes or mères’: (Elementarbegriffe, 533).

Baader says that when our belief and knowledge seem to be in conflict, it is really only one belief fighting another belief (Zeit, 54). Our choice of Ground Principle is therefore a matter of faith or belief, and this belief is like a motive, or motivating force. Our faith (Glaube) is the Ground for our seeing and perception (Schauen und Erkennen), just as our motivation is the ground for the movement of our will. The motivation as ground and the movement on this ground are inter-related: just as we cannot move freely without holding onto a ground, so we cannot hold onto a ground without free movement. And so we cannot use our reason (Vernunft) without being free to believe, and we cannot believe without using our reason. Similarly, Dooyeweerd says that if there were not this battle of faiths, it should just be a matter of using logic and reason to convince each other (NC, I, 36). And Baader’s comparison of faith to a motive may explain why Dooyeweerd refers to Ground Principles as Ground Motives.

Like Dooyeweerd, Baader sees these Ground Principles as historical forces. It is the task of philosophy to find the Principle for each epoch or stage in time. Ground Principles do not apply only to individuals, but also to entire nations and collectivities (Volk) both in their normal and in their abnormal evolution, that is, either towards or away from God. Determining the Ground Principles therefore gives a ‘theory of history and society’ (Elementarbegriffe, 560, 561).

Baader says that there are two main principles that act against each other (Werke, II, 484, s.25; cited by Susini, 318). There is a basic opposition of eternally irreconcilable Gound Principles (Begründung, 46). Similarly, Dooyeweerd speaks of two primary Ground Motives: the biblical and the apostate; he subdivides the apostate Ground Motive into three subtypes: the Greek form/matter motive, the scholastic nature/grace motive, and the enlightenment nature/freedom motive. These three subtypes can also be found in Baader. All of these subtypes involve idolizing the temporal.

Baader says that a person who idolizes the temporal becomes subordinate to that to which he should be superior. The person does this in order to fill his or her emptiness (abîme) (Fermenta, V, 15, 16). If I oppose God’s law and try to set up another law, then I experience within myself two opposed laws. Baader cites St. Paul: ‘I am aware in my members of a law which is opposed to the good law’ [Weltalter, 178, referring to Rom. 7: 23]. When we try to understand space-time nature (or the creature) as something whole and complete in itself, we cease to experience a unity. Instead, a dialectic or antinomy is set up. This dialectical movement is caused by trying to hold onto a Dasein that is in itself groundless (Weltalter, 126, 127). Such a person places the ‘pivot’ of his contemplation or admiration within the temporal; he then finds a second center, and opposes this to the first (Fermenta, V, 15, 16). This causes an unceasing opposition – a dualism or dialectic – between these two centers, like the idol of Dagon that was always reversed (I Sam. 5: 3), or the two fighting snakes of Hermes. When we choose to absolutize one part of creation, the opposed pole (entgegengesetzten Pol) will arise (Zeit, 24, 25, 35, 37 ft 17).

Dooyeweerd also holds that an apostate ground motive will necessarily have a dialectic. There is a polar tension between the first absolutized aspect, and its correlata (NC, I, 64). [25] This polar tension is not the same as the primary religious antithesis (NC, I, 123).

(7) The four types of ground motives

a) The Christian Ground Motive: Creation, Fall and Redemption

For Baader, the content of religion is the relation among God, humans and the world (Schumacher, 33). This relation is set by God as Creator, who gives His law to which creation is then subject or subordinated. God is complete in Himself; He therefore did not have to create humans, but freely chose to do so. This is what is meant by ‘creatio ex nihilo.’ In the Fall, we separated ourselves from our relation with God, or what Baader calls our ‘Principle’ (Zeit, 29, ft. 9). Redemption is now required to allow a full restoration and reintegration (Wiederherstellung oder Reintegration). Baader’s fundamental idea of creation, fall and redemption corresponds with Dooyeweerd’s characterization of the Christian Ground-Motive.

Baader says that the redemption and restoration is a fulfillment, not a destruction of nature. He cites Tauler: ‘God is not a destroyer or hater of nature, but he fulfills [integrates] it’ (Begründung, 32 ft. 17; Fermenta, IV, 8). Dooyeweerd also speaks of nature being restored or renewed, although he cites Calvin (NC, I, 516).

b) The Greek form/matter Ground Motive

Baader says that form and matter are not to be viewed dualistically (Weltalter, 109). The Ionian school of philosophy founded by Thales placed the principle of all things in matter; opposed to this was the school of Pythagoras, who wanted to ascend from earth to heaven (Werke, V, 48; Schriften, II, 171). For Plato, both spirit and matter (hyle) are eternal (Werke, VII, 262 and II, 380). There is therefore in Greek thought a dualism or separation between form and matter. In his article ‘Über Starres und Fliessendes’ Baader says that when we see the static, fixed or the flowing as only that, then form and matter have been separated. The fixed is continuity; the flowing is the power of ‘penetration.’ When we separate them in a dualism like Plato’s, we are separating two ‘factors’ [aspects] of living substance. One factor then outweighs the other that is then suppressed; one factor is directed inwards, one outwards. But these factors are each half forces of nature, like the polarity in electricity and the power of gender. Instead of separating the two factors of form and matter, we need to combine and raise them up in a third that is higher. There is a ‘hidden androgyny.’ There needs to be a coherence (Kohärenz) of the two factors, of the confluence of the flowing and of the penetrating (Begründung, 13–16). Baader emphasizes that Spirit needs to be embodied in the world (Verleiblichung des Geistigen). Sauer says that Baader is opposed to any hypostatized Platonic Idea that is totally Other from the world; such an hypostatized idea would be irrelevant for the necessary mediation and redemption of the world (Sauer, 119, citing Werke, IV, 338). Baader says that we must not hypostatize the sensory qualities that we experience (Schriften, II, 146).

c) The scholastic nature/grace Ground Motive

Baader also opposes a separation between nature and supernature (Zeit, 57). The scholastics make a distinction between natural and supernatural knowledge; they place Verstand above Vernunft (Weltalter, 128). These theologians try to give a theory of the world from a perspective of supernaturalism where power, glory and freedom are opposed to our powerless imprisonment in nature (Begründung, 54). They separate the will from its unconscious drives, and they regard the creature as pure Intelligence, as a Will and a Reason without desires or senses (Begründung, 34). But in making this distinction, they confuse the suprarational (the transcendent) with something that is against nature or against reason (Begründung, 22, 34, 66). Supernaturalism sees spirituality as literally sense-less (Werke, IX, 64f; cited by Sauer, 35). This leads to a hyperasceticism; it is not a liberation of the senses, but a total absence of senses; it is like a self-castration (Fermenta, II, 23; p. 97). Baader quotes Böhme: it is pure arrogant pride to want to be before God without a body (Weltalter, 199). Supernaturalism has made supernatural idols (Fermenta, III, I).

d) The Enlightenment Ground Motive of nature/freedom

Baader says that Kant gave the supernaturalists new grounds to separate ethics from nature. If with Kant we name nature as all that is perceivable by our senses, then there is in nature not only a lack of ethical goals, but an actual opposition to such goals. The concept of freedom must then be posited over against the ‘outer necessity’ of nature (Begründung, 22, 42–44). Freedom is then viewed as Spirit or Geist that is opposed to the mechanism of nature. But Baader says that nature and Spirit must not be seen as dualistic principles (Werke, IV, 34; Begründung, 57). Spirit is not a fleeing from nature (naturflüchtig) (Sauer, 119). Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel also believe a dualism between non-intelligent nature and intelligence [Spirit] to be ‘primitive, constitutive, and unexplainable’ (Elementarbegriffe, 544). In other words, these philosophers use this dualism as a basic Ground Principle. Such a primal dualism (Urdualismus) ‘leads’ (leitet) their explaining thought process. Schelling’s thought is based totally on this polarity; he sees a darkness even in God. But we cannot explain this apparent dualism unless we acknowledge our subordination to a higher being, and our subjection to God’s law (Begründung, 26). The dualism is not original and constitutive, but is caused by one’s wish to remain in one’s own center (Zeit, 34, ft. 14).

When we make a dualism between freedom and nature, then morality is built on the concept of a pure autonomy. Morals are divorced from both God and nature. The supernaturalists, in opposing the naturalism that they hate, also end up with an ethic separated from nature. When ethics are separated from physics, ethics become groundless, godless, atheistic and irreligious. Instead, we should acknowledge the necessity of the embodiment in nature (Naturwerdung, Leibwerdung) of the ethical life and principles. There should be a coherence (Zusammenhang) of physics and ethics, of nature with Spirit. The failure to understand this coherence causes our ethics to be devoid of life. It also results in the idea that Spirit is only a ghost, and that the body is a corpse. Supernaturalists make the same mistake (Begründung, 34, 35, 49).

(8) The three ideas within each ground motive

Dooyeweerd says that each Ground Motive provides an answer to three transcendental ideas: Coherence, Totality and Origin (Archè). These transcendental ideas must have more than the merely regulative sense given to them by Kant (NC, I, 89). Baader makes the same objection to Kant’s use of the transcendental ideas—for Kant, the ideas are only regulative and only concern morality. These transcendental ideas must also illuminate the ‘natural’ world as well as our actions in physics. A theory of epistemology must also include a theory of creation (Begründung, 24, 25).

One of Baader’s main themes is the necessity of a coherence between the natural and the Spiritual [Geistlich]. He emphasizes the coherence between Intelligence and Nature (Elementarbegriffe, 550) and between ethics and physics (Begründung, 23, 49). Sometimes Baader uses the word ‘Zusammenhang’ (e.g. Weltalter 68—the coherence of all things in the All). Elsewhere he uses the word ‘Kohärenz’. The true coherence is an ‘embodiment’ which shows itself in the temporal region in ‘the array (Ordnung) of the periphery’ (Zeit, 36). This order of the periphery corresponds to Dooyeweerd’s coherence of temporal functions (aspects or modes).

Baader also refers to the idea of Totality. The Central Totality is different than just the sum of all the peripheral points (Peripherie-Punkte); rather, the Center stands as essence (Inbegriff ) over them. Just as the sum of all creation does not constitute a creator, so the Center is more than the sum of the periphery (Begründung, 63 ft. 7). Similarly, Dooyeweerd says that the religious Center of our existence expresses itself in all modal aspects of time but can never be exhausted by these (NC, I, 58). Baader identifies Man as the mirror of Totality (Schumacher, 57).

Although Man is the mirror of Totality (as the image of God), ultimately God is the absolute Origin and absolute Center of creation.

(9) The method of antinomy

Dooyeweerd uses the criterion of antinomy to distinguish one modal aspect from another. ‘Antinomy’ means ‘contradiction between laws.’ The laws of different modal aspects may not contradict one another, but this is what happens when we absolutize certain aspects. Antinomy is distinguished from contrariety within a modal sphere, as in logical contradiction (NC, II, 37).

In a similar way, Baader sees dualistic Ground Principles (or antinomies) arising whenever we absolutize one part of creation.

Any attempt to absolutize the periphery (the temporal), or to attempt the coordination of points on the periphery without their subordination to the Center will result in a polar dualism or antinomy (Weltalter, 331).

(10) The use of Kant’s ideas to criticize Kant’s own Critique of Pure Reason

The Encyclopedia of Philosophy says that Baader ‘turned the critical method he had learned from Kant against criticism itself.’ [26] Baader says that the first work of philosophy must be to seek out the mediations and limitations under which humans attain to the free use of their faculty of knowledge (Werke, I, 324). This sounds like Kant’s transcendental critique. But Baader says that these limitations are given by God’s law to which creation is subject. The law is a structural a priori—the law must always precede the finite being as its true a priori (Zeit, 32, 33 ft. 14). Sauter says that Baader took Kant at his own word: the Critiques are only a Propädeutik to a positive philosophy; we must take the step from a transcendental to a transcendent philosophy. [27]

Dooyeweerd also applies Kant’s transcendental critique against Kant (NC, I, 118). This is why Dooyeweerd’s work is A New Critique of Theoretical Thought. Kant sought to show the conditions under which thought is at all possible. But these conditions must show the possibility of the self itself that is thinking. There are conditions for the thinking that Kant takes for granted. The structure of our thinking experience has an a priori character. This is different from the Kantian notion of the a priori as meaning only ‘non-empirical.’ The a priori is ontical; it precedes thought as well as empirical investigation (NC, II, 550). Like Baader, Dooyeweerd says that the transcendental direction of theoretic thought pre-supposes the transcendent (NC, I, 88). Critical theory must lead to the genetic relativity of meaning (NC, I, 9).

(11) Cosmic time

Why does Dooyeweerd speak of ‘cosmic time’ instead of just ‘time’? It may be because cosmic time is more than merely physical, astronomical or even psychological time; cosmic time encompasses all these analogies. [28] Although this is true, cosmic time means more than this, and it is only when we compare it to Baader’s theory of time that we can understand Dooyeweerd.

Baader distinguishes three kinds of time (Zeit, 19). [29] ‘True time’ is the eternal or the supratemporal (überzeitliche); it encompasses a past, present and future. Our heart, the religious root, exists in this supratemporal, or true time. The time of our temporal world or cosmos is what Baader calls ‘appearance time’ (Scheinzeit). This cosmic time has only a past and a future, but no present (Werke, II, 27). There is only a present-less and separated ‘one thing after and out of another’ (‘nacheinander und auseinander’) in the periphery outside of the Center (Zeit, 57). Finally, there is false time, the subtemporal, in which the demons live. It has only a past. According to Baader, God has a different relationship to each region of time. In eternity, there is an indwelling (Inwohnung) by God, as love. In cosmic time, there is a bydwelling (Beiwohnung), when the intelligent agent cooperates with God, and acts as God’s organ. And finally, where God has been rejected, God still has a presence, but only as a ‘throughdwelling’ (Durchwohnung). This is God’s presence through His power alone; God treats beings in this region as mere instruments. This last category includes inanimate nature and those free agents who resist God (Werke, I, 283 ff; II, 38; IV, 348; V, 355; VIII, 317; IX, 171 ff; X, 294; XIV, 71ff, 120; Betanzos, 90; Weltalter, 163, 344).

Only the supratemporal (eternity) is true time. Eternity is not just infinitely protracted time. Spinoza’s idea of a ‘temporal eternity’ confuses the Creator with the creature in a pantheistic way (Elementarbegriffe, 538). The supratemporal is the now, the simultaneous Present, nontemporal and permanent. It is permanent in the sense that once we achieve it, we do not fall back into cosmic time. [30] But the supratemporal must not be seen as permanent in a static sense:

Our mistaken view of eternity is caused by our abstraction, which views rest (Ruhe) as static and lifeless (Elementarbegriffe, 535). Eternity should instead be seen as always resting in its movement and always moving in its Rest, as always new and always the same. There is a dynamism even within God, in the generation of the persons of the Trinity. God is eternal Life, eternal Being and eternal Becoming at the same time, an eternally proceeding Process (Schriften, I, 149; Weltalter, 139).

Dooyeweerd also emphasizes that the supratemporality of the heart must not be understood in this Greek metaphysical sense:

Baader says that natural philosophers falsely assume that temporality, materiality and change are primitive and constitutive. But cosmic time was not intended from the beginning of creation; it is a result of the Fall. The origin of cosmic time is in a pre-worldly Ereignis; our existence within time is that of Dasein (Elementarbegriffe, 541, 543). The Ereignis is again achieved at the end of cosmic time (Zeit, 39, ft 19). [31]

Cosmic time is a ‘suspension of the eternal.’ Time involves a sacrifice, and that is why the Scriptures speak of a Lamb that offers itself since the beginning of time (Elementarbegriffe, 561; Werke, IV, 53). Cosmic time begins with the cessation of the true present, and it ceases with the cessation of this cessation (Susini, 417). The continuation of cosmic time is only the appearance of a continual renewal moment by moment (Weltalter 217).

Cosmic time breaks up unity into nonunity, and into the elements of one’s being. Everything temporal is therefore not whole and not integral. Only Man was not originally destined for this brokenness within cosmic time (Zeit, 28, ft.9). This is why Man longs for the integration of wholeness or ‘holyness’ (Begründung, 105). Everything proceeding out of eternity, ‘has its time,’ and must make its way through time in order to return to eternity. The return to eternity is the reintegration of a being in its Principle. Our experience of temporal reality is therefore restless (Unruhe); there is a movement towards the other side, towards integrity, fullness and the enjoyment of being (Elementarbegriffe, 537–539).

Like Baader, Dooyeweerd speaks of cosmic time as the result of the fall. In the fall, the human selfhood ‘fell away into the temporal horizon’ (NC, II, 564). Dooyeweerd also refers to the restlessness of temporal reality (NC, I, 11).

Baader says that cosmic time is a half-reality. It has an ambiguity (Zweideutigkeit) and an undecided nature (Unentschiedenheit). Time allows a creature to be initially neither for nor against God, but to choose. We have the freedom to build our own heaven or hell. We have been given the power of the keys to open the supratemporal and to keep the subtemporal closed (Elementarbegriffe, 546–549).

The temporal cosmos is therefore an evil, but it is also a blessing. Time is ‘a gift as well as a punishment’ (Werke, XII, 417; cited Betanzos, 286). Time prevents the possibility of a total fall into nothingness, and it offers the possibility of redemption. ‘Time has been given us so that we will become free of time’ (Werke, XII, 419; cited by Betanzos, 280). Redemption is in cosmic time, which permits humanity to recover what was lost, although in fragmented and successive stages. [32] Our evolution (towards or away from God) must continue in time, and time gives us the opportunity to develop to our completed being. But not to progress is to regress (Begründung, 7; Werke, I, 27). At the end of cosmic time, we will find ourselves in our completed state either for or against God. In between the two extremes of being grounded in one’s supratemporal Center or finding oneself in the temporal periphery with a total loss of center, is the third situation, which Baader calls ‘movement in the periphery’ (Zeit, 25). In this situation, one is not grounded in one’s true Center, nor has one’s Center totally disappeared; instead, there is a movement in the periphery, and that is the appearance-time (Schein-Zeit).

(12) The supratemporal heart

Dooyeweerd says that the turning point for him was the discovery of the idea of the supratemporal heart (NC, I, v–ix). This idea is also found in Baader. The supratemporal heart is the center of Man. In Biblical language the heart is called the inner man, and it speaks of good and bad thoughts of the heart (Begründung, 79 ft. 9). Baader cites Tauler:

‘Creature’ here must be understood as meaning temporal reality, as distinct from the heart, which is supratemporal.

Baader makes a distinction between our inner and outer being. The inner (or higher) is the central heart; the outer is our temporal, creaturely, bodily, or ‘earthly’ reality. He also refers to the outer being as the ‘peripheral’ reality. Dooyeweerd says the ‘earthly’ cosmos is transcended by Man in his full selfhood where he partakes in the transcendent root (NC, II, 593).

It should be emphasized that this distinction between inner and outer, between central heart and temporal ‘earthly’ functions, is not to be understood as a dualism. The entire focus of Baader’s work is to counter any ideas of dualism. He describes the relation between center and periphery as an organic unity.

(13) The analogy of the prism

Dooyeweerd uses the analogy of a prism to explain how cosmic time breaks up reality into temporal diversity. He says that the prism is ‘a very old symbol’ (NC, I, 101). But he does not indicate from whom he obtained the analogy. Plotinus and Eckhart use the symbol, but only in the sense of a variety of rays of light coming from one source, and not in the sense of a spectrum of independent colours. The analogy of the prism must post-date Newton’s discovery that a prism breaks up light into the spectrum. [33]

Baader also uses the analogy of a prism breaking light into colours. He says, ‘Das klare Licht der Gottheit bricht sich in einer Vielfalt von Farben’ (Werke, VIII, 82; cited by Schumacher, 41). He also says that Wisdom is the magic mirror that contains all colours and forms (Werke, I, 186).

(14) Modalities

Dooyeweerd says that temporal reality is experienced in ‘modes of being.’ These modes are ‘hows’ and not the concrete ‘what’ of things (NC, I, 3 ft. 1). Baader also says that the temporal is only a mode (Weise) of production of the Absolute; the temporal is a mode or quality of the inexistence [34] of what has been ‘produced’ by the Absolute (Elementarbegriffe, 540; Werke, V, 81). He also refers to the mode (‘le modus, la manière’) of our existence (Fermenta, V, 13).

Usually, Baader refers to different modes of production as ‘elements’ or ‘factors.’ For example, he refers to ‘elements and factors of perception.’ In their central inner sense, these elements are identical; in their outer sense – the temporal world – there is only a composition of elements which are put together (zusammengesetzt) into temporal beings (Werke, IV, 100). Temporal beings are a result of the breaking up of the supratemporal unity—they are not an integral unity, but a non-unity (Nichteinheit); temporal things are put together and subject to dissolution (zusammengesetzt und auflösbar). (Elementarbegriffe, 538, 538). Temporal things have individuality only in time; their temporal life must lead to Death. But Man was not destined to remain in the region of brokenness (Zeit, 28 ft. 9).

Dooyeweerd also speaks of the transcendent identity of the modal functions that is experienced in the religious root of our existence (NC, II, 479). Dooyeweerd’s view of temporal beings is also similar to Baader’s view of things being put together (zusammengesetzt) in time. Structures of individuality are given by time and are wholly temporal. Temporal things are perishable; they do not have a supra-temporal selfhood; their thing-identity is only that of a temporal individual whole—a relative unity in a multiplicity of functions (NC, III, 65). Temporal beings have an ‘individuality structure’ based on a temporal ordering of the modes, and this is what gives temporal things their duration in time (NC, III, 79).

Sometimes Baader refers to these modes as different ‘spheres’ (Begründung, 17 ft. 6). He says that if we make a division between belief and knowledge in our religion, it will also infiltrate into all the other ‘spheres of our knowledge, belief and action’ (Zeit, 53). He refers to ‘particular modalities’ or ‘spheres’ of consciousness (Fermenta, IV, 13). His clearest statement referring to spheres is:

Baader also refers to modalities as functions. Each member of the Organism is given its function (Schriften, I, 89). Our sensory functions are not the same as our thinking functions; nor are the senses the source and origin of our thinking. Both functions are part of a total process of living (Werke, V, 53; cited by Sauer, 31). Like Dooyeweerd, Baader says that our capacities and faculties in the temporal region are not to be regarded as separate beings (or ‘whats’) (Fermenta, V, 23). Our feelings, imagination and concepts are functions and not substantial beings (‘als erstarrt gedacht’) (Werke, II, 223; cited by Sauer, 46). My sensory functions must not be abstracted from my own self (Werke, XII, 104; XI, 364; cited by Sauer, 32).

Baader does not provide a list of all fifteen modes or aspects as distinguished by Dooyeweerd. But Baader refers to some of the modes. Number and language are abstracted analogically (Fermenta, V, 11). He refers to thought, word and art (Fermenta, I, 23). He speaks of various different sciences (Wissenschaft): mathematics, geometry, experimental (physics) and the study of religion (Religionswissenschaft) (Begründung, 92, ft. 4). Baader also refers to the political, physical, ethical senses, and to the aesthetic (Weltalter, 241, 396).

(15) Sphere sovereignty

Baader uses the analogy of an organism to show the relation between the supratemporal unity and the temporal multiplicity of the cosmos. This analogy comes from Ephesians 1:10, where St. Paul speaks of the relation of the head to the limbs of the body. The head is the center and the limbs are the periphery; the limbs are subordinate to the head. The individual limbs or members can only relate to each other to the extent that they are unified with the head (Werke, IV, 232; V, 372). Baader uses this analogy to show (a) the relationship between the supratemporal heart and its temporal functions and (b) the inter-relationship of different societal institutions, and their supratemporal Center. Both uses of the idea are very much related to Dooyeweerd’s (and Kuyper’s) idea of sphere sovereignty. [36]

Baader emphasizes the importance of institutions. Society is not just the sum of its members. Real social power is not exercised by the individual human person, nor by an aggregate of individuals, but rather where humans form themselves in social organizations, family, tribe (Stamm) people (Volk/Zunge), or the church (Begründung, 59; Schriften, II, 369). Elsewhere, Baader refers to the institutions of the church, the state and universities (Werke, I, 150) as well as to guilds and corporations (Werke, II, 289; V, 276ff, 290).

Baader says that each societal organization (Gemeinschaft) has its own laws to which it is subjected. And each organization is independent with respect to other organizations, although all organizations are subordinate to the Center:

Each member of the Organism therefore has a reciprocal freedom and independence (Selbständigkeit) with respect to the others. This Selbständigkeit is only a relative autonomy, because each limb of the societal organism is subordinated and coordinated with the unity and coherence of all limbs (Werke, VI, 80; XIV, 104). Christianity emphasizes this organic view of subordination and coordination, and in this way it has freed society. Baader cites Tertullian in support of this assertion (Werke, II, 51; Weltalter, 259).

Not only our social institutions, but also our intellectual pursuits (the sciences, or ‘the community of intellectuals’) have a similar relation of subordination and coordination, of Center and periphery. Although they are also coordinated, each member of the intellectual community is independent of other members. But the members of an Organism are identical in their coherence and union (Begründung, 61). The different members of the Organism are ‘factors of life’ that have been separated in their [temporal] embodiment. These factors have a twofold ‘circulation’–among each other but also directly with the unfolded Unity. There is a dynamic reciprocal play (Wechselspiel) among them; this determines their freedom with respect to each other. (Schriften, I, 87; Werke, II, 5). But each of these factors, or periphery-points (Peripherie-Punkte) also has a relation to the Center (Begründung, 61, 63 ft. 7).

Dooyeweerd relates each of the special sciences to the investigation of a separate modality. Each science is independent and cannot be reduced any others, because of the sphere sovereignty of the modalities they investigate. But although we cannot unify or reduce one mode to another, the modes are identical in their supratemporal coherence (NC, II, 479).

Dooyeweerd’s idea of sphere sovereignty, as applied to social relationships, has sometimes been criticized as a conservative view of society. Is it not a justification of nineteenth century bourgeois Dutch or German life? But Baader does not support such a conservatism. In fact, Baader was the first German to refer to the working class as the ‘proletariat.’ In his 1835 article on the ‘Proletariatsproblem’ Baader pleads for justice on behalf of the exploited ‘proletariat.’ Christian love forbids economic exploitation of the weak. Baader proposes the representation of the working classes in the legislature. He also expresses concern about the exploitation of wage earners by business, and he advocates trade unions. The priests should care for the poor classes. Betanzos sees this as anticipating the later idea of ‘worker-priests.’ Betanzos points out that Baader’s Christian-social ideas predate the social analysis of Karl Marx, although different solutions are suggested. [37] Baader specifically disagrees with the views of Adam Smith, whose works he had read while in England (Betanzos, 63). The ideas of stock, loan and credit display an ‘atomized reason’ (Werke, VIII, 202f; Schumacher, 247).

Dooyeweerd does not develop these social ideas to the same extent. But as Goudzwaard points out, Dooyeweerd does make a plea against the exploitation of the proletarian worker in modern capitalism. [38]

(16) Sphere universality

Dooyeweerd’s emphasis on sphere universality is also to be found in Baader. Baader says that the Center is also in the periphery; the points on the periphery communicate with each other via the Center (Fermenta, VI, 1). The Center is the intermediary between two peripheral points; the Center inhabits, perhabits and cohabits the periphery (Fermenta, 250, note o). The Center is present in every single point, both as filling it and as containing it. The whole is placed in each part of the organism. ‘Totum in toto et totum in qualibet parte’ (Werke, I, 74; VIII, 74; cited by Sauer, 172).

(17) Analogies of time

Dooyeweerd suggests that he was the first to raise the issue of the analogical relations among the various modalities, and the use of these analogies in different branches of science (NC, II, 55). To be sure, Dooyeweerd has expanded the ideas of analogy. But he does not acknowledge the previous ideas of Herder, St. Martin, and Baader. [39] Baader says, ‘Everything reveals the grand process of analogy’ (Werke, XI, 127–128). Analogy is the universal key unlocking the one model in the universe (Weltalter, 56, 66). ‘Everything acts by analogy’ (Werke, XI, 77). And ‘Everything produces itself in nature by analogy’ (Werke, XI, 98).

For Dooyeweerd, analogies are based on ontological realities. As van Peursen says, analogies are not just linguistic jokes. Dooyeweerd’s idea is therefore opposed to modern text theory, postmodernism and cultural relativism. [40] This ontological basis for analogy is also evident in Baader—analogy is related to the idea of diversity coming from an original unity. Although the modalities are independent or sovereign, they have a relation to each other because they all come from one supratemporal unity. Unity exists behind multiplicity; because of this, the truth in one sphere cannot contradict truth in any other. All are subject to the same law and truth. Because there is one plan in the cosmos, there are correspondences; analogy permits us to pass from one domain to another. ‘Every living being is, as one, at the same time many’ (Werke, I, 145, 196; cited by Betanzos, 84).

For Baader, analogies are anthropomorphic. This is because things do not ‘exist’ except insofar as they are related to Man; we should therefore explain things by ourself and not ourself by things around us. [41] There is a pre-established harmony between Man and nature, microcosm and macrocosm. To interpret nature, we start with ourselves and use a method of analogy. Sensible or material nature is only a symbol or a copy of our interior or spiritual nature. Likewise, we can speak of sacred things because the spiritual finds its symbol in the sensible (Werke, XI, 11, 72, 75, 78, 88, 127; Susini, 106–110). In analogy, we animate nature; we consider it as a living person. That is why we can feel ourselves in each thing; each thing finds its source in us; we vivify all things with our feeling. Without us everything around us would be only a dead shell without life and without inner spirit (Werke, XI, 41, 78; Weltalter, 49).

An example of analogy is taken from mathematics. Baader says, ‘We begin with one and we end with the One (the Totality)’ (Werke, III, 319; cited by Sauer, 134). When we refer to the Totality as ‘One’, we should not think that the Totality is a number. We are using the word in an analogical sense, by an idea that points towards the Center. Even the idea of the Center should not be seen as a mathematical point, but rather as the ‘productive inner One in contrast to the external, phenomenal many’ (Werke, XII, 211; cited by Betanzos, 113).

(18) Anticipation and retrocipation

Our concepts refer to one another because our concepts all relate to the Central Unity. Baader says that our concepts do not build a row, but a circle; you can start wherever you want, as long as you go through to the Center. This idea is in contrast to linear thought that regards one individual thought as merely arrayed next to another thought and not understood. Baader says that if the concept cannot be shown to relate to the center, it is meaningless (Begründung, 109; Werke, XV, 160). When it is brought back to the Center, each concept leads and points to other concepts as either retrocipatory or anticipatory:

and elsewhere Baader says,

Sauer refers to this idea of retrocipating and anticipating concepts as a ‘double heuristic principle.’ The retrocipating concept is a kind of anamnesis—a looking back, a remembering of what has already come. This remembering is by turning within. Sauer uses the phrase ‘rückfragende sich er-innern’ (a questioning back by going within); this is a play on the word ‘erinnern’, which means ‘to remember’ and ‘er-innern’—to go within (Werke, IV, 105; Sauer, 65). It is our selfhood that allows us to remember; remembering is a making present (Vergegenwärtigung) (Werke, IV, 105). Baader says that consciousness is the work of memory (Gedächtnis). Time is measured in our soul (Gemüth) not by succession of ideas, but by consciousness. It is only because of the permanence of our selfhood that we can experience change and the passing of time. Not to measure time is the situation of dreams (Weltalter, 90, 91). Baader praised Fichte for describing ‘the mechanics or instinctive operation of the human mind in its struggle for awareness (preservation of consciousness) within the temporal flow of what is transient’ (Werke, III, 244; translated by Betanzos, 41).

Sauer says that, in contrast to retrocipation, which looks to the past in memory, anticipation seeks the coherence and reintegration that will occur in the future (Sauer, 123). When we anticipate the future, we attempt to shorten time (Elementarbegriffe, 555). Time is ‘the winter of eternity.’ As good gardeners, we can bring forth passing blooms of eternity, anticipating paradise. We anticipate outwardly what we already anticipate inwardly (Weltalter, 242).

This fits Dooyeweerd’s use of the terms. As we shall see, he describes pre-theoretical experience as composed solely of retrocipatory analogies. This experience is made possible by our supratemporal selfhood, which stands above the flow of time, and is able to form a unity of these passing functions. Dooyeweerd says that we have a sense of time only because eternity is set in our heart. [42] Retrocipatory moments are therefore a kind of looking back to what has occurred. In contrast, the anticipatory moments look to what is yet to be unfolded in the temporal world. And the final aspect in the anticipatory direction is the aspect of faith, which points beyond the temporal to the supratemporal fullness.

(19) Man as the Temporal Root

Dooyeweerd says that the image of God is the radical unity of all the different modalities in which they coalesce (NC, III, 69). The whole meaning of the temporal world is integrally (i.e. completely) bound up and concentrated in this unity (Roots, 30). Our temporal world, in its meaning differentiation and coherence, is bound to this religious root of humanity; it has no meaning and therefore no reality apart from this root (WdW , I, 65). To say that the temporal world has ‘no reality’ apart from its root in humanity means that it can be said have ‘inexistence’ (or what Baader refers to as ‘Inexistenz’).

To understand what Dooyeweerd means, we need to look at the roots of the word ‘existence.’ It comes from the Latin ‘ex-sistere’, meaning ‘to stand out,’ or in French, ‘sortir de.’ This standing out is in relation to a background. Humans have a pre-given essence given by God from which they emerge into existence. They are therefore ex-sistent beings.

Although he does not speak in terms of ‘essence,’ Dooyeweerd refers to our tendency towards an Origin as the ex-sistent character of our heart. He says that religion is the ex-sistent condition in which the ego is bound to its true or pretended firm ground. Even our absolutizing shows this ex-sistent character of the religious center of our existence. In the state of apostasy we attempt an autonomous ex-sistere. We need to be ‘pulled out of’ (ex-trahere) this state by God in order to regain our true ex-sistent position (NC, I, 58, 59). It is our religious center or supratemporal heart that has this ex-sistent character. Only humans have such a religious center, so in this sense, only humans are truly existent.

Because we are the temporal root, creation fell along with humanity in the Fall. Since the Fall, the image of God is only revealed in its true sense in Jesus Christ (NC, III 69).

These same ideas of selfhood as temporal root, and the substitution of Christ as the new religious root had been previously developed by Baader. Baader also speaks of our Existenz, and the fact that we have no being in ourselves. Our existence relates to a coming forth (Hervorgehens) and to a Ground (Begründung, 26, 29). Baader also says that this Existenz cannot be found in temporal reality itself. Anticipating Dooyeweerd’s later criticism of Heidegger, Baader objects to Schelling and Hegel. These philosophers ought to be searching for Sein itself beyond the relativity of Dasein. The idea of analogy is also foreign to them. But ‘existence’ cannot be used univocally of God and creatures (J. Sauter: Baader and Kant, 548 ft., cited by Betanzos, 44). Baader says that our Existenz relates to our central being that is free of time and space (Elementarbegriffe, 560). Man is the root-unity (Wurzel-Einheid) of nature. Man is not just a postscript to the rest of creation (Weltalter, 280). We are God’s final creation (Schlussgeschöpf ) (Werke, I, 299, 432; IV, 33). The idea of religious root is related to the fact that we are the image of God (Weltalter, 184). St. Paul says that Heaven and earth ‘live and move and have their being’ in God [Acts 17:28]. Because our central, supratemporal selfhood is the image of God, humans are truly the center of the material world (Werke, V, 31; XI, 78; Begründung, 48).

For Dooyeweerd, our supratemporal reality is not individual, but is the root of individualization:

What is noteworthy here is that Dooyeweerd uses the prism analogy to show not only the different modal aspects of our life, but also of individuality itself, and the emergence of individuality structures from a central unity. [44] Baader also uses the prism analogy to say that true humanity is not individual. No individual is completely and perfectly Man. The true humanity, or the divine within us, is divided among all. The one divine ray is broken into millions of colours; these are only fractions of the same Oneness and Image of God (Weltalter, 52). Each individual being is like a central point, receiving from all the other beings outside of the infinite periphery that constitutes his horizon, all that he can receive, and he sends in turn all that he can send. But for all the different particular centers, there is a general center, and a principal ray uniting each the first to the second. All the force of the influences of each individual on the others is channeled in the ray towards the center and then sent again to the points. Everything that is emanated from God is directed eternally towards Him, and nothing perishes of what He has expressed, and He is all in all (1 Cor. 15:28) (Werke, XI, 42).

(20) Christ as the Second Root

Man was created in God’s image, with a task to perform as the root of the rest of creation. In this first state, Man was above time and space. Humans were destined to have direct and full community with God (Zeit, 39). Man was placed in a nature that was already disturbed due to the previous fall of Lucifer. The human assignment was to free this nature and to reunite it. This responsibility gave to humans an incomprehensible dimension (unübersehbare Ausdehnung) within time (Elementarbegriffe, 551). As the root unity of the temporal world, Man was given stewardship (Verwaltung) over the temporal domain.

But God’s central action occurs above time; this is the central action of the Word. [45] It produces rays (Strahlen) within temporal reality. The original human task was to return those rays into their unity. [46] This task was not done, and a new root was required. In its present temporal state, there is no focus point, and the dispersed light does not warm (Weltalter, 97). Similarly, Dooyeweerd says that apostate humanity has lost the focus (brandpunt) of its existence (WdW , I, 25, 26).

Creation fell with Man just as a kingdom falls with its king. Baader cites Romans 8:19–22, where Paul speaks of all creation groaning for redemption (Susini, 286). This redemption can be done only by God Himself, because only God himself can unite us again with our root (Wurzel) (Werke, XII, 226; cited by Betanzos, 124). Because the center of creation was Man, redemption required a new human root was required; this is the reason for Christ’s incarnation (Weltalter, 188).

(21) The centrality of love

Baader says that cosmic time is a suspension of eternity. This suspension of eternity is related to Christ’s suspension of His power and glory in his kenosis (Phil. 2: 6,7). The Center itself submitted to a humbling or a descent. The beginning of time is therefore related to sacrifice: it is a suspension of a higher being’s full and integral existence (Elementarbegriffe, 556). Time always involves the descent of a higher being into a lower and narrower region (Zeit, 27, ft. 7). Christ was reduced to the humble state of the germ or root, in order to seed Himself into fallen beings. By this seed, the fallen being is given the possibility to ascend again (Wiederaufsteigung) or of growth (Wachstum). In this way, the fallen beings are united again within the Center and are lifted up into ‘true time.’ The dispersed powers are united, and the suppressed powers of potential growth are led on high (Zeit, 30). [47]

For Baader, Christianity is the foundation of all love (Fermenta, V, 311). Baader cites St. Therese: love is the general law of every manifestation of a superior in or by an inferior. (Schriften, II, 396). Christ’s kenosis is a demonstration of this love. The redemption or reintegration of creation is within time itself. The Mediator is in this world. Love becomes temporal with her erring children (Zeit, 29). And from the moment that we enter into time, this Mediator’s presence can be seen, like the Thread of Ariadne. You just have to open your eyes (Weltalter, 33).

Baader frequently uses the phrase amor descendit ut elevet or ‘Love descends in order to raise up’ (Zeit, 30). In the kenosis, the Center, the inner One, descends to the level of Organism or periphery without ceasing to be the Center or Principle. [48] Love descends from God to humans, it extends from ourselves to fellow humans [horizontally], and it descends from man to nature (Susini, II, 560, citing Fermenta, V). The downward aspect of love from humans to nature is expressed in our theoretical thought.

Baader devotes a great deal of attention to how love is expressed between humans. Betanzos gives an excellent summary of this horizontal aspect of love. Love is expressed by our ‘cohabitation’ with others; such cohabitation is ‘mutual subordination’ (Werke, II, 227). Baader emphasizes that mutual subordination is a very different basis for ethics than that given by Kant. Kant defines love as inclination to that which gives an advantage. Baader says that Kant’s reasoning about love is like a blind person speaking of colour (Susini, II, 525).

Love is a reciprocal embrace—of me in your embrace, and you in mine (Begründung, 83 ft. 14). But what I give up in my union with others is only my incompleteness and the lack of truth in my existence alone (Vorlesungen über speculative Dogmatik, Book 5, number 17, Werke, IX, 261; cited by Betanzos, 273).

Dooyeweerd also says that love is the central command of the law. Central love is love in its ‘religious fullness.’ It is different from love in its temporal modal meaning (NC, II, 152). This radical love can be found only in the imago Dei (NC, III, 71). God’s law is refracted by cosmic time into the rich diversity of cosmic law spheres. But love finds its religious root-unity in the central love-commandment that is directed to our heart. [49]

(22) Pre-theoretical Experience

Dooyeweerd says that our pre-theoretical experience is directed towards full reality. This experience is systatic, integral, and has factual immediacy. [50] It grasps reality in its plastic structure (NC, III 36). In pre-theoretical experience, we experience the continuity of cosmic time (NC, II, 4).

Dooyeweerd uses the word enstasis to describe our pre-theoretical experience (NC, II, 479). ‘Enstasis’ means ‘standing within.’ In pre-theoretical experience, we stand within our supratemporal selfhood, which allows us to experience the continuity of time. Enstasis refers to a ‘resting, pre-theoretical intuition,’ which we possess by virtue of our supratemporal selfhood:

Baader also refers to the resting in our selfhood as an enstasis; he contrasts it with the movement into the temporal world of extasis. Our resting selfhood is an ‘Ineinandergestürtz-Sein of the Center, as opposed to the becoming (‘werden’) of the peripherie (Begründung, 58). Our theory requires a movement outwards, and this requires an act of imagination, which is a movement from enstasis to ek-stasis (Susini, I, 378, 379). Baader distinguishes between a passive, contemplative knowledge, and a more active knowledge (Susini, II, 30). Our passive knowledge is the Subject-Object relation, where we contemplate, or are spectators of objects above and below us. Baader uses the words anerkennen, kennen and Wahrnehmen for this passive knowledge. Our active knowledge is erkennen. It is an active work, an effort of grounding (ergründung) and a battle (kampf ).

Baader also expresses the difference between our passive and our active knowledge as a difference in direction of our thought. In passive knowledge the direction is centrifugal; we sink into our Center. In active knowledge our thought goes in a centripetal direction, and we fly past the center (Elementarbegriffe, 546). The same distinction is made by Dooyeweerd; the Gegenstand-Relation is a divergent direction of consciousness as opposed to the concentric direction of consciousness that is directed towards the Center (NC, I, 57, 58).

(23) The Subject-Object relation

Both Baader and Dooyeweerd refer to pre-theoretical experience in terms of the Subject-Object relation. They use the terms ‘subject’ and ‘object’ differently than we are accustomed to in Western philosophy. As we have seen, they use the word ‘subject’ in the sense of being subject to God’s law. The word ‘object’ is also used differently. In the British empiricist tradition, an object is something that exists independently of us, and that we then perceive by our senses. The object has certain primary qualities that exist whether it is perceived or not. There are then certain secondary qualities that are perceived by us subjectively, but that do not inhere in the thing itself. Both Baader and Dooyeweerd reject the possibility of a thing existing in itself (‘Ding an sich’). Dooyeweerd says that the so-called secondary qualities are object functions within the thing itself. His rejection of any idea of a Ding an sich is related to the view of Man as the temporal root:

Dooyeweerd rejects the naïve realist view of sensation (NC, III, 22). So does Baader, who says that objects are not to be seen as the source of sensory impressions working upon a separate thinker (Weltalter, 48, 364). Our sensations are not the source and cause of our thinking function (Werke, V, 53). As Sauer says, there are for Baader no positivistic facts that are not already involved in the universal process of sensation, knowing and understanding (Sauer, 21).

Baader says that not all beings are subjects in the same way. There are different realms of being. In addition to humans, there are the realms of minerals, plants and animals (Fermenta, I, ft. m; Werke, IV, 150). The Subject-Object relation therefore concerns how subjects such as myself relate to other beings that are subject to God’s law. Baader’s idea of the Subject-Object relation has to do with the I and the Not-I. There is the Not-I above me, the ‘Thou’ that is opposite me (gegenüber), and the Not-I that is below me (Schriften, I, 57 ft.; Werke, VIII, 66).

Baader distinguishes between created and emanated beings. Man was breathed out by God, or emanated, in distinction to the world that was created (Zeit, 40). Humans have a supratemporal center, but animals do not. Because of this, an animal does not perceive time like we do; this also means that animals do not become bored (Elementarbegriffe, 553; Zeit, 27 ft.7). [52] We share with the animals what Baader calls ‘purely outer seeing.’ Animals do not share with us the inner seeing related to our central being (Zeit, 56). [53]

For Dooyeweerd, a key part of our pre-theoretical experience is the ability to distinguish between these same different realms of being (NC, III, 33). He distinguishes the material or inorganic, the vegetative or organic, the animal, and the human; the first three realms are each qualified by a different pre-logical aspect of temporal reality (NC, III, 83). But humans are not qualified by any aspect. Humans participate in all aspects, but their supratemporal center goes beyond all aspects (NC, I, 51; III, 88). Humans are the religious root and only humans have existence in the sense of ex-sistere. And Dooyeweerd says that only humans can enter enstatically into time by means of their intuition. Other creatures are ‘entirely lost in time’(NC, I, 32). They are ex-statically absorbed by their temporal existence (NC, II, 480). The human ex-sistere is therefore also related to enstasy, in the sense of a standing-within our supratemporal center.

(24) The Gegenstand relation

Dooyeweerd says that theoretical thought is based on what he calls the Gegenstand relation; the Gegenstand relation is not to be confused with the Subject-Object relation. Baader makes the same distinction. [54]

a) Gegenüber/tegenover

The word ‘Gegenstand’ is often translated as ‘object’. It literally means ‘that which stands over against.’ Dooyeweerd says that ever since Kant, the object of our thought has been identified with the Gegenstand. Kant viewed the Gegenstand as purely sensory; this sensory manifold is then formed by our thought in a logical act of the understanding (NC, II, 368). Neither Baader and Dooyeweerd accept Kant’s view of the Gegenstand; they use the word, but in a different way.

Baader says that our theory is based on a Gegenstand: ‘Philosophy is thinking or reflection over a Gegenstand’ (Werke, VIII, 36; cited by Sauer, 23). Since Kant and Fichte, the word ‘object’ has been used in the narrow sense of ‘that which finds itself in front of me.’ Baader says it should apply equally to that which is above and below me—to that to which I am subordinated and that which is subordinated to me. Fichte has completed reduced the concept of object to an enemy obstacle (Fermenta, V, 7). Our knowledge differs depending on which realm we are considering—the supratemporal, or one of the temporal realms [animal, vegetable, mineral]. The manner in which God knows Man, or in which Man knows an animal, are not the ways in which an animal knows Man or Man knows God). Our ‘knowing’ cannot be used in the same sense when the knowing subject finds itself face to face with (gegenüber) the known object, as when the subject stands above or below it. Knowing, insofar as it is downwards from a higher to a lower, is a ‘fathoming and a founding’ (Ergründung und Begründung), and also an ‘understanding and a circumscribing’ (Begreifen und Umgreifen) (Susini, II, 30, 31, citing Werke, I, 51, s.2; Weltalter, 116).

We are not normally face to face with the realms of minerals, plants and animals. But in the Gegenstand relation we attempt to place ourselves on the same level, to become gegenüber these other realms. We may compare this to Dooyeweerd’s view that theoretical thought involves a tegen-overstelling (WdW , I, 21). This expression has been translated as ‘opposed to’, meaning a kind of logical opposition or antithesis. It is perhaps better viewed as ‘standing opposite.’

For Baader, the Gegenstand relation demands a movement out of our supratemporal center to the realm of temporal reality in order to stand opposite it. The reason for moving into temporal reality is in order to act as a center for temporal beings which were previously unmediated. We make this movement out of love, in order to save those beings, just as Christ was incarnated in order to save us.

Dooyeweerd also speaks of theory as a movement out of oneself. As we have seen, he characterizes naïve experience as an enstasis, a resting. In contrast to this, thinking is a going outside of ourself; it involves an ek-stasis and a divergent direction. I understand this as an entering into cosmic time by the self whose Center stands outside of cosmic time.

b) Descent to and penetration of the temporal

All nonhuman realms are what Baader refers to as nonintelligent being; these realms are bound with Man in his unstable condition since the Fall, and they share in Man’s corruptibility (verderblichkeit). Humans must win and confirm in God the stability of these nonhuman realms. This is done if humans freely choose to be mediators for these nonintelligent beings—that is, to act as their center (Elementarbegriffe, 541, 544). Becoming the center of such nonintelligent beings is a ‘mediation of the unmediated’ (Vermittlung des Unvermittelten). The superior being descends to the inferior and forms its foundation or support. That which is the center is the superior being; that which is centered is inferior; by being center, I reduce the being to my will, power and domination (Werke, I, 42; Susini, II, 31). My true knowledge makes me the support, the pivot of the object known.

Just as God is able to be immanent in temporal reality, so we are to penetrate cosmic time. This penetration does not involve a mixture of identities—Baader refers to Böhme’s saying that Spirit can penetrate nature just as light penetrates fire (Fermenta, IV, 14). There are different ways of penetrating the animal, plant and mineral realms (Fermenta, I, 13; note m). All understanding or knowledge is a penetration (durchdringung) of a perception (Werke, XII, 84).

In the penetration of the temporal object, we understand its structure. But this penetration and domination is not to be done in an egotistical way. If I seek only my own pleasure, then I am subordinating the object to myself, and annihilating its objectivity. Love for the object is then only love for myself, the contrary of true love (Fermenta, I, 18). The penetration is to be an ‘inhabitation,’ not a ‘perhabitation.’ Inhabitation is knowledge in an immanent manner; it is a kind of participation or coexistence. I become interior to the being, and become a center for it. The knowing subject becomes inherent in the known object, like an artist in his work; like a father in his child and like God in Man. Such inhabitation is contrasted to perhabitation, where there is no essential link, but only an accidental, exterior juxtaposition or meeting with the thing; one only ‘crosses’ the object without stopping (Susini, II, 57). Our love for nature must also not be confounded with industrial or rational exploitation of nature. (Susini, II, 562, citing Fermenta, V).

Baader says that we are to be mediators for the nonintelligent world just as Christ was a mediator for us. In his kenosis, Christ suspended his own glory and self-sacrifice. Similarly, as helping beings we ourselves must enter into the other beings, and must ourselves become conceivable (Sichsatzlich-machen), to embody ourselves (einverleiben) or to seed ourselves (einsäen) into the beings that are still bound. Just as God descended into the temporal through Christ, so we descend into the temporal. To do this requires that we acknowledge our solidarity and sympathy with those beings that require our help (Elementarbegriffe, 554–559). I know that which I love in a different way than that which I do not love (Schriften, II, 140). Theoretical knowledge demands a double subjection—a subjection (Subjicirung) to God above as His creature, and a subjection to that which stands below. This double subjection gives us the ability to go out of our Center as well as to sink into it—both a centrifugal as well as a centripetal direction. Only as I subject myself to a Higher, do I have the power to subject that which is under me. Only serving can I rule. And only ruling do I serve. The Son of Man came into the world to give witness to the truth. That is the destined end for Man, too, as the image of God (Weltalter, 221, 222, 361). Our love is an affirmation of the Gegenstand by a denial of our self.

The purpose of our theorizing is therefore to restore the fallen temporal world. In each stage of our own evolution (towards or away from God), we have the ability to fulfill the law for such a temporal being and through this fulfillment to obtain the power or to create the ‘moment of its existence’ that it needs in order to go into a higher law and so to ascend. If we do not fulfill this obligation, we begin to feel the law as a burden (Elementarbegriffe, 553).

Dooyeweerd also speaks of our ‘penetration’ of the temporal world, and he relates this to theory. The supra-theoretical knowledge of the heart must ‘penetrate the temporal sphere of our consciousness’ (NC, I, 55). Dooyeweerd contrasts this penetration with pre-theoretical thought.

Dooyeweerd also speaks in terms of sacrifice, although he does not link it to theory. Veritable religion is absolute self-surrender (NC, I, 58). Love is self-surrender (NC, II, 149).

c) Intentionality

Dooyeweerd stresses that the object (Gegenstand) of our theoretical thought does not have a real (ontical) existence. It is only intentional, and does not correspond to the structure of empirical reality (NC, I, 39, 40). What does ‘only intentional’ mean? Dooyeweerd’s view of intentionality, and of the Gegenstand relation generally, have been seen as connected with his acknowledged dependence on Husserl’s phenomenology (NC, I, v). [55] For Husserl, intentionality is related to his idea of epoché, which is an attempt to get at the things themselves. But Dooyeweerd specifically rejects Husserl’s epoché (NC, II, 73). We must therefore look to a different meaning of intentionality than that of Husserl.

The concept of intentionality is a central point of Franz Brentano’s ontology of mind. Brentano’s classic statement of intentionality (Intentionalität) is found at: Psychologie vom empirischen Standpunkt (1874):

This has been translated as:

This statement has caused much discussion among phenomenologists. In particular, the meaning of ‘intentional inexistence’ has been unclear. I believe that part of the confusion has been caused by the English translation, which does not distinguish between Gegenstand and object. A further confusion has been caused by the fact that most of the discussion of ‘intentional inexistence’ has centered on our ability to imagine fictitious objects as such unicorns, or ‘the gold mountain’ or even of impossible objects, such as ‘the round square.’ But although intentionality includes such fictional objects, that is not the main point of the meaning of Inexistenz. Brentano’s point is that all ‘objects’ of thought have this quality of intentional inexistence. He applies it to ‘every mental phenomenon.’

Brentano specifically says that by the ‘object’ of thought we are not to understand a reality. It is an ‘immanent Gegenständlichkeit.’ This has frequently been seen as ‘immanence within thought’ as opposed to an existence outside of thought. But ‘immanence’ can also contrast our temporal existence to the transcendence of the supratemporal. This fits with Spiegelberg’s interpretation of ‘intentional inexistence.’ Spiegelberg says that the original meaning of ‘intentional inexistence’ was not nonexistence but ‘existence within something else.’ [58]

Baader also relates Inexistenz to immanence. For example, he says that Inexistenz is a synonym of the immanence of all things in God:

The temporal world as Inexistenz inheres in, dwells in, or subsists in our own existence. As existent beings, it is our mission to descend to the temporal world and to raise it up to its true existence. When we do that, the temporal world is eternally revealed to eternal creatures, such as the angels (Fermenta, VI, 17). [59]

This interpretation of ‘intentionality’ as a descent to temporal Inexistenz also fits with Dooyeweerd’s view of theory. He says that the Gegenstand of our thought does not have a real or ontical status because it is an abstraction from the full reality. In our theory, we must actively and freely [intentionally] make the movement from enstasis to exstasis, from our supra-temporal Existenz to that of immanent Inexistenz. None of the objects of our theoretical thought have real ‘existence’; they have a lower level of reality than our Selfhood, and we must make a conscious and intentional movement from the higher level to a lower level of being.

d) Theory as abstraction

Many of Dooyeweerd’s followers have rejected the Gegenstand relation, [60] and have replaced it with a view of theory as abstraction of the universal from the particular. [61] But Dooyeweerd does not see theory as the searching for universals in contrast to a pre-theoretical perception of the individual. The isolation of the individual is already a theoretical act! Thus it is incorrect to say that the pre-theoretical is directed to the individual and the theoretical directed to the universal. [62]

Similarly, Baader says that we ourselves make the individual parts by a division of the simple impression received by the soul. This division is an analytical act. Even in pre-theoretical comparisons, our impression (Vorstellung) is all at once. We focus out attention on the impression and then another comes; in the moment of comparison, a third is present in the soul (Weltalter, 90).

When Dooyeweerd says that theory is an abstraction, he means that it is an isolation of a part of the coherence of reality given in the continuity of cosmic time. In theoretical thought, there is an abstraction from the actual, entire ego that thinks. The ego is operating not merely in our thought, but in all the functions in which it expresses itself (NC, I, 5). Theory is the abstraction from the full systasis of meaning of the modal aspects of human experience. What has been theoretically isolated is never the datum. The real datum is the systatic coherence of meaning (NC, II, 431–433). Theory is therefore a dis-stasis. Dooyeweerd says that this dis-stasis is something given within the logical aspect of reality itself. Thus, the dis-stasis is not a result of the Gegenstand relation; theory only makes manifest a possibility in the logical aspect. But empirical reality itself functions in systasis (NC, II, 472).

According to Sauer, Baader uses the word ‘abstraction’ in this same sense–the merely theoretical (bloß theoretische) removes part from out of a larger coherence. It abstracts from out of our concrete historical and community life (Sauer, 30, ft. 11, citing Werke, I, 323). Baader says that abstraction is when we do not understand in our Center (Schriften, II, 140). The word ‘abstraction’ means distortion, deformation, misstatement (‘Enstellung, Entstaltung, Verkehrung’) (Werke, VIII, 356; cited by Sauer, 117). No abstract concept of God is therefore possible. Concepts are severed (abgesondert und losgelöst) from a larger whole. Concepts are to be contrasted with the idea of Totality which alone makes possible a meaningful interpretation and understanding of the world. [63]

e) Resistance

Dooyeweerd says that when we engage in theory, we experience a ‘resistance’ (NC, II, 467). The separation of aspects into logical and non-logical causes this resistance, because the separated aspect continues to express its coherence with the remaining aspects. The resistance therefore occurs because of sphere universality—the referring within each modal aspect to the other aspects.

Baader also speaks of a resistance when we move into the temporal world:

In a difficult passage Baader says that the resistance itself creates the Gegenstand. In theoretical thought, our thinking nature (Verstand) enters the temporal and this movement creates resistance. Just like a bird creates resistance by beating its wings in the air, so we create resistance by spreading our concepts. The resistance creates an other or Gegenstand for our thought. Baader calls it a ‘mechanical Thou’ (because we relate as Thou only to objects to which we are opposite or gegenüber). Our thinking function becomes aware of itself in this Gegenstand. The Gegenstand therefore supports our temporal thinking function. If [in apostate thought] we have lost our inner Ground Principle, we actually require such a Gegenstand for support. If we lose this supporting Gegenstand, this ‘Thou’ that supports and carries us, we then ‘lose’ our Self (unser Ich). Losing ourselves in the colours and strange shapes, we are not aware of ourselves until we find something that mirrors our self-consciousness. That is why we are so overjoyed when such spontaneity shines through the Gegenstand—for example, in observing a scene of nature (Schriften, I, 56, 57). But it is possible to remain lost, and this is the temptation of theory.

In supporting the self even in our apostate thinking, the resistance is there for our own good—to help us withstand the temptation of the temporal. The resistance is a weapon against this ‘outer embodiment’ of ourselves. In setting up the polarity in apostate thought, it acts as a kind of common grace (Zeit, 35–37).

f) The temptation of theory

Dooyeweerd says that theoretical thought has an antithetical nature: the logical aspect is opposed to [placed opposite?] the non-logical aspects (NC, I, 18, 39). This separation or ‘antithesis’ of aspects is not a real antithesis. I believe that this means that we are to temporarily (i.e. in time) act as if there were such a separation between our logical function and our other functions. The logical function carries within it this very possibility of dis-stasis. Dooyeweerd says that in theoretical thought, the Gegenstand or object is not opposite our true Center—our supratemporal I-ness—but it is rather opposed to something within the temporal diversity of aspects (NC, II, 467). The correlate to the object of thought is therefore not our true selfhood, but something that stands for our true I. We are to temporarily act as if our logical function were our center.

Dooyeweerd confirms that there is such a temporary separation of functions; there is an epoché involved in theoretical thought. He does not use this word in Husserl’s sense, but as meaning ‘refraining from.’ In theoretical thought, there is a refraining from the temporal continuity of the cosmic coherence of meaning (NC, II, 468, 469). [64] When this epoché is cancelled, we fall back into the enstatic intuitive attitude of naïve experience (NC, II, 482).

Because of this ‘refraining,’ we no longer experience time in its integral continuity. That is why Dooyeweerd says that theory can only approximate time (NC, I, 34). I believe that this means that we do not only abstract the Gegenstand from the fullness of temporal experience; we also abstract ourselves from the temporal coherence. But this suspension is meant to be temporary. The dis-stasis of theoretical thought is to be followed by a synthesis with our selfhood operating in an integral way.

Although we should proceed from the theoretical antithesis to the synthesis, we do not always do so. We are tempted to see our logical function as actually independent. This is the source of the dichotomistic belief of a distinction between body and soul:

I also see this temptation as the source of the impairment to our pre-theoretical experience that Dooyeweerd says is caused by theory (NC, III, 145).

Baader specifically refers to theory as a temptation (Versuchung) (Zeit, 27). Our freedom to be mediators for the temporal world can be used in two ways—either for or against God. Whatever we set free will continue to have either a liberating or a binding action (Elementarbegriffe, 544, 558). Thus, our theory can be used improperly. We can use our powers in an unlawful way, in order to hold inside ourselves what should remain outside (Zeit, 44 ft 25). We can give ourselves over entirely to the temporal. But the temporal world will then empty us like a bloodsucker, or a ‘Heart-sucker’ (Herzsauger). Such a person ends up believing himself or herself to be as empty as the world (Zeit, 41 ft. 21; Werke, II, 89; Weltalter, 385). I believe that this is what Baader means by ‘loss of Self.’ Although theory is a temptation, overcoming the temptation leads to a greater unity, and builds our character. A restored love is deeper than an ‘untested love’ (Betanzos, 125).

Like Dooyeweerd, Baader sees the Gegenstand relation as giving rise to a belief in a split between soul and body. He compares theorizing to a state of sleepwalking (somnambulism) or to dreams, where our inner sense becomes detached or dissociated from our outer senses (Werke, IV, 137; Susini, 378). There is an entzücken (enrapture), which is also felt as ecstasy. [65] This is a feeling of separation of body, spirit and soul; it is as if one were raised up by a charm (verzückt); transposed to a different world (hingeruckt) or partially absent (Werke, IV, 155). This state is contrary to nature; there is the danger that man may think he can be liberated from nature, from time and space (Werke, I, 265–268).

25) Theoretical synthesis

Dooyeweerd says that there is a dialectical method in theory. But the opposites are relative and not absolute, and we must search in theory for their higher synthesis (Roots, 8). We cannot get beyond the antithesis in the Gegenstand relation unless it is directed above itself to a transcendent supra-temporal concentration point (NC, I, 31). [66] This is done with the help of our intuition, which should not be viewed as a separate metaphysical faculty, but as the temporal bottom layer of the analytical function. Our intuition relates the intermodal meaning synthesis to the transcendent identity of the modal functions that we experience in the religious root of our existence. In intuition we recognize the theoretical datum, the Gegenstand, as our own (NC, II, 475–480). In other words, our intuition relates our theory to the experience of our supratemporal self. [67] For those who begin with a dualistic Ground Motive, no ultimate synthesis is possible; they are left with a primary religious dualism. Those caught in such a primary dualism may argue for the use of a dialectical logic to attempt to overcome antithesis in starting points (NC, II, 37). But this results only in a dialectical-logical unity, not a real unity (NC, I, 89).

Baader also emphasizes the importance of synthesis of two opposed conceptual standpoints. The two opposed viewpoints are ‘sublated’ (aufgehoben). Concepts have to be related back to their Center. Baader says that theory involves three steps. The first is the initial subordination or dissolution of true coherence, and our ‘embodiment’ in the periphery [this is the abstraction in which we form the Gegenstand]. The second step is the collection (Sammlung) of the dispersed ‘sparks’ in the temporal world, in order to reunite them in a higher order. The third step is when this unification or ‘higher embodiment’ is completed; there is then death or dissolution of the lower embodiment; it is like the scaffolding that collapses after the house is built (Zeit, 36).

Like Dooyeweerd, Baader emphasizes that there is a good and a bad dialectic (Weltalter, 129). The negative function of our abstracting, distinguishing Verstand is only a necessary moment in our thinking function; we must then restore the concrete (Schriften, II, 217). Baader also stresses the importance of intuition. From our initial intuition (Schauen) we move outwards in our theoretical abstraction; but we must return to this Schauen. [68] Otherwise, our thinking becomes an enemy; it then destroys and deadens our Spirit. The mistake in theory is not in the antithesis involved, in thought, but in failing to return to a synthesis.

Dooyeweerd makes the same point. He says that that Kant and his followers opposed the logical function to the other modal aspects of the integral act of thought.

Kant’s mistake was trying to find the starting point for synthesis in the antithetical relation itself (NC, I, 54). In other words, Kant took the theoretical antithesis as fundamental, and regarded the antinomies as necessary. Kant did not take into account the synthesis with the supratemporal self.

(26) Cultural development as an unfolding.

Dooyeweerd and Baader agree that our pre-theoretical experience is limited. Dooyeweerd calls this experience ‘naïve.’ Baader refers to our everyday experience—our concrete factual and historical experience—as ‘blind, unfree empiricism’ (‘blinden unfreien Empirie’) (Werke, 1, 330; cited by Sauer, 30).

Dooyeweerd says it is necessary to ‘deepen’ our pre-theoretical experience in theoretical analysis (NC, II, 470). Our pre-theoretical experience participates in all aspects, but only in their retrocipatory analogies (NC, II, 373, 383). Naïve experience is therefore not a completely integral experience, unlike the Romantic view of the pre-theoretical. In pre-theoretical thought the logical aspect is only actualized in its retrocipatory structure (NC, II, 120). Enstatical logical analysis is restrictively bound to sensory perception and can only analytically distinguish concrete things and their relations according to sensorily founded characteristics (NC, II, 470). [69] This is what makes the pre-theoretical experience naïve! (NC, III, 31). In theory and the subsequent synthesis, we discover the anticipatory moments. If anticipation means looking forward, this must be understood as a process that looks towards future wholeness or integration. The function of faith leads this opening process. The Christian idea of the opening-process is guided by faith in Christ as Redeemer. This does not mean an idealistic optimism, but recognizes a brokenness in spite of its direction towards the Root:

The Christian opening process therefore has an eschatological element. This passage also confirms that sphere universality has an eschatological sense. [70]

Baader also speaks of the successive unfolding of life, in which there is either a deepening or a closing (Zeit, 44 ft. 25). It is not sufficient to rest in the enstatic state. We must move ex-statically into the temporal world in order to co-create with God. If we do not do this we have failed our mission to ‘dominate’ the world.

Using Dooyeweerd’s language, I understand Baader to be saying that the retrocipatory functions were previously experienced as the highest. They now become the foundation of the unfolding process. In another passage, Baader speaks of some functions as leading other functions, and as accompanying other functions (als Leiter und Begleiter) (Schriften, II, 175). [71] And like Dooyeweerd, Baader sees faith as the function that opens our inner self (Weltalter, 278).

For Dooyeweerd, the opening process involves the ‘positivizing of principles’; these principles are given only potentially and must be actualized (NC, I, 105; II, 236, 335; II, 173). Baader also says that the law needs to be fulfilled in the finite being. Man has the power to fulfill the laws for creatures (Elementarbegriffe, 553). This response needs the cooperation of the finite being (Zeit, 32, 33). Man must organize and re-create the world; the laws are in the world but must be actualized. This is done by our perception (vernehmen, wahrnehmen) of the invisible laws that govern the earthly world. Nature is a book from which we decipher the divine characters or hieroglyphs in order to perceive the voice of God (Werke, XI, 29, 149). Similarly, Dooyeweerd says,

Positivizing is related to Baader’s idea of active knowledge, or erkennen. Susini compares erkennen to Claudel’s idea of ‘connaisance,’ or ‘co-naissance.’ It is a giving birth to something, a constructive knowledge. [72] But this constructive knowledge should not be confused with constructivism in today’s sense of the word. For Baader, erkennen is not a matter of inventing new principles, but of discovering them. It is a finden (finding), and not an erfinden (invention). The knowledge that we find derives from a source that ‘dominates’ and founds this knowledge. (Susini, I, 432; Weltalter, 261).

Both Baader and Dooyeweerd have challenged the dogma of the autonomy of thought. But if the theoretical Gegenstand relation involves moving into the temporal, and using our logical function as if it were separate, does this mean that Baader and Dooyeweerd have reintroduced the autonomy of thought? That is how Sauer interprets Baader. Sauer says that the Absolute is the transcendental ground that makes possible the autonomy of the subject (Sauer, 25). The existing conditions of our existence make possible our Selbstsetzung or autonomy. Sauer interprets Baader dialectically: he says that the two standpoints—grounded in God, gesetzt and autonomy (Selbstsetzung) limit each other. He interprets Baader in postmodern terms—that all our knowledge is therefore mediated through the temporal and the historical.

Some of Dooyeweerd’s followers have tried to interpret Dooyeweerd in this postmodern way—as advocating the idea that all our thought is mediated by the temporal. [73] They will find new arguments in support of this interpretation in Sauer’s reading of Baader.

But I do not believe that this kind of postmodern reinterpretation of Baader and Dooyeweerd is justified. The transcendental ground of our being is that which makes possible our autonomy, the idolization of the temporal (NC, I, 31 ft.1; Elementarbegriffe, 544). But autonomy is to be rejected; we must always move from analysis to the synthesis with our supratemporal experience. Sauer does not devote attention to cosmic time and the supratemporal Center. [74] The ‘mediation of the unmediated’ does not refer to our mediated knowledge, but rather to our mediation of temporal beings in order to lift them up to the unmediated. Like Baader, Dooyeweerd says that, although we are bound to time, we are not limited to our temporal functions (NC, II, 561). ‘All human experience, both in the pre-theoretical and in the theoretical attitudes, is rooted in the structure of the transcendent unity of self-consciousness’ (NC, II, 560). We have access to a transcendental self-reflection (NC, I, 7, 51; II, 491, 554). We can transcend theory in religious self-knowledge of God and self, which is rooted in the heart (NC, I, 55). It is only by standing in the transcendent fullness of truth that we can direct our subjective insight into the temporal horizon (NC, II, 572).

Those who attempt to interpret Dooyeweerd as a postmodern have also rejected his idea of the supratemporal heart. One reason for rejecting it is the belief that it implies a dualism, and involves a static view of eternity. [75] I have shown that this was not the intention of either Dooyeweerd or Baader. Others have raised the objection that to emphasize the Center is a sign of totalizing thinking. [76] But both Baader and Dooyeweerd say that our positivizations are fallible, and that those who do not share our Ground Motive can still discover truth. And neither Baader and Dooyeweerd believe in a static Unity or monism. It is true that they reject all dualisms. But non-dualism does not necessarily imply monism. [77] Their thought is entirely Trinitarian in emphasizing the respect for both unity and diversity within both the temporal and the supratemporal; there is a dynamism even within God.

Today’s movements of postmodernism, hermeneutics and constructivism have their own metaphysical assumptions. To reject the possibility of an immediate experience of the supratemporal is itself a metaphysical assumption. The nature of time is by no means settled in philosophy, in physics, psychology or theology. In fact, Baader’s ideas of cosmic time are still being debated. And many of the concerns of postmodernism come down to a question of the meaning of time. [78] Modern constructivist theories are still within a Kantian framework. [79] They are therefore still subject to the transcendental critique of Baader and Dooyeweerd.

Dooyeweerd emphasizes that the idea of cosmic time is the basis of his philosophical theory of reality (NC, I, 28), and that the idea of the supratemporal selfhood must be the presupposition of any truly Christian view. [80] Furthermore, he says that we can have actual experience of the supratemporal. This is Dooyeweerd’s mysticism.

Dooyeweerd rejects any mysticism that divorces itself from the temporal world. He is opposed to any idea of a ‘supernatural’ cognition (NC, II, 561–563). He also rejects any mysticism that fancies itself above God’s law (NC, I, 522). Mysticism is not something other than nature, but rather an insight into the true nature of reality. In the true religious attitude, we experience things and events as they really are, pointing beyond themselves to the true religious centre of meaning and to the true Origin (NC, III, 30). I believe that this ‘true religious attitude’ is itself a kind of mysticism, especially when we consider how it relates to the experience of our supratemporal heart to which we are related in our intuition. Dooyeweerd expressly describes the experience of the true religious attitude:

If this experience occurs in naïve experience, it must be a naïve experience that has been opened up by theory and subsequent synthesis, since there are no anticipations in pre-theoretical experience. Dooyeweerd’s description of this Biblical attitude might be compared to Stace’s idea of extrovertive mystical experience. [81] It is not a mystical experience divorced from the world. It is also not a ‘pure consciousness’ experience or nirvikalpa samādhi. It may be similar to what has been referred to as sahaja samādhi. [82] Dooyeweerd’s emphasis on the importance of experience is also evident in an eschatological sense: true Christian faith finds its fulfillment in the religious ‘vision face to face’ (II, 298). [83]

Baader speaks of a similar experience that he calls the Silberblick [Silver Vision]. In this experience, there is a reintegration of feeling and knowledge in self-transcendence; it is an unreflective reaching out (übergreifenden), an anticipation that manifests itself as a transient Silberblick (Werke, 4, 114; cited by Sauer, 51). It is achieved when our intuition (Anschauen) moves in the anticipatory direction (Zeit, 58, ft. 14; Fermenta, I, 23). We then can see with a ‘double light’—from out of the Center but also into the periphery. There is a coherence of inner and outer seeing. Ecstasy is an anticipation of this integrity.

I believe that this is what Baader refers to when he speaks of the mirroring of the Self in certain moments. But our glimpse of the supratemporal can also be a horror; this is when we see hell through our ‘infernal eye.’ In both kinds of seeing, we are anticipating the final state to which we are evolving—either with God or apart from God.

The similarities between Dooyeweerd and Baader will necessarily occasion a reevaluation of Dooyeweerd. I do not mean to deny all originality to Dooyeweerd; he has systematized many of Baader’s ideas, and he has related these ideas to subsequent philosophers such as Husserl and Heidegger. Dooyeweerd has also more fully investigated the analogical relations in the modal aspects, and in the individuality structures. But I believe that Dooyeweerd’s ideas can only be understood in relation to how these ideas were first used by Baader. I hope that their ideas of cosmic time, the religious experience of the supratemporal self, the religious root, the nature of pre-theoretical experience and the Gegenstand relation will be examined again by those who have previously rejected these ideas. Unless these ideas are accepted, there is no ontological basis for the ideas of sphere sovereignty, sphere universality, and the analogical relation between the sciences.

Dooyeweerd’s mysticism, and his emphasis on our central supratemporal experience can also provide a fruitful basis for ecumenical and inter-religious dialogue. And the idea of the Gegenstand theory as an act of love and kenosis can provide a basis for theoretical thought both for mystics (who too often have an acosmic view of reality), and for those scientists, who rightly want to reject the arrogant autonomy of modernism but who also want to resist the de-centering nihilism that is so characteristic of postmodernism. There is a structural a priori, and our theory is a discovery and a positivizing, but not our own construction. Our thought is ‘original’ only insofar as it points back to our Origin.

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