Meaning, Language and Absolute. On the Trail of a Dialogue between the Young Hegel and Jacobi

The aim of this paper is to show how Hegel’s early speculation on language intertwines with Jacobi’s handling of the Sprache. At the root of the analogy that links the Hegelian analysis of the language to Jacobi’s one, we can find the instance of restoring the human being’s entirety. This implies on one hand a decisive questioning of understanding [Verstand], and on the other hand the recognition of the primacy of life over what is pure concept and speculation. In the first and second part of the essay, I will try to outline the development of the linguistic problem both in Jacobi’s and the young Hegel’s philosophies as a specific declination of the relationship between abstraction and life. Finally, in the third part I will carry out a brief comparative examination in order to identify some points of convergence and the limits of this convergence between Jacobi and the young Hegel.