In the Name of the Future: Prophecy as Critique in Schelling and Tillich

Abstract

My goal in this paper is to show how the question of the future in Schelling can be a starting point for a political reading of his metaphysics. Since the 1960s, German Schelling researchers like Jürgen Habermas and Hans-Jörg Sandkühler have repeatedly reiterated their critical judgment that “Schelling is not a political thinker.”1 When we look at Schelling’s work, it quickly becomes apparent that political philosophy in the narrower sense occupies a very small space in it.