Isaiah Berlin’s book on Hamann is lively engaging, but Berlin doesn’t get Hamann. For instance: “Hamann’s constantly repeated point is that revelation is direct contact between one spirit and another, God and ourselves.”
Not. The opposite is the case: His constantly repeated point is that God speaks to the creature through the creature (as Berlin earlier recognizes). It’s the bid for “direct contact” that Hamann detests, because it bypasses Scripture, history, bodies, and all the rest of empirical creation.
Dear Reader,
Can I be direct with you?
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