HAMANN, JOHANN GEORG - Enciclopedia Cattolica, Vol. VI, p. 794

Machine translation of the 1948–1954 Italian original. The original text is authoritative.

HAMANN, JOHANN GEORG. — Philosopher, b. at Königsberg on 27 Aug. 1730, d. at Münster on 21 June 1788.

After a disorderly youth, the reading of the Bible effected in him a “conversion” of distinctly Pietist flavour (1758). This sense of mystical illumination remained thereafter a permanent feature of his life and was conjoined with an exaltation of sensuality as “the weapon of virility.” In an age of Enlightenment, H. conceived his own mission (Bestimmung) in a characteristically anti-rationalistic manner (even the most common affairs become prayer); in a mechanistic age, he did not believe in the abstract notion of a God who was once and for all the “mechanic” of the universe, but sensed the divinity as a spirit ever “present.”

Indeed, in his various letters, aphorisms, and pamphlets (among his most important or piquant works: *Gedanken über meinen Lebenslauf*; *Golgatha und Schebimini*; *Aesthetica in nuce*; *Abaelardi Virbi chimirische Einfälle...*; *Des Ritters von Rosencreuz letzte Willensmeynung*... etc.), there appears a conscious irrationalist: existence is vastly superior to reason, history is a “sealed book” that reason itself cannot open, religion lies beyond human gnostic endeavour (though at one point faith seems reduced to an apprehensive organ), and the “genius” of the individual surpasses abstract reason. Politically, H. opposed bureaucratic paternalism and enlightened despotism. His hermeticism further led him to discern in the unfathomable vitality of language the unifying and determining elements of the nation.

A restless spirit, lover of the “mystery” (he was dubbed the “magus of the North”), H. enjoyed immense fortune among subsequent Romantic generations: his fragmentism and hermeticism had indeed contributed to the crisis of geometric clarity and the spirit of system, central elements of Enlightenment rationalism.

BIBL.: *Schriften*, ed. F. Roth, 8 vols., Berlin 1821–43; C. H. Gildemeister, *J. G. H. des Magus in Norden Leben und Schriften*, 6 vols., Gotha 1857–73; *Sibyllinische Blätter des Magus* selected and introduced by R. Unger, Jena 1905; M. Petri, *J. G. H. Schriften und Briefe*, 4 parts, Hanover 1872–74; V. also H. J. G., *Tagebuch eines Christens*, ed. I. Nadler, Vienna 1949; Studies: H. Weber, *H. und Kant*, Nördlingen 1903; J. Blum, *La vie et l'oeuvre de J. G. H.*, Paris 1912; R. Unger, *H. und die Aufklärung*, Halle 1925; J. Nadler, *Die Hamannausgabe*, 1913; L. Bianchi, *H. und Herder*, Bologna 1930; A. Gerbi, *La politica del romanticismo*, Bari 1932, pp. 64–114; E. Metzke, *J. G. H. Stellung in der Philosophie des 18. Jahrhunderts*, Halle 1934; the Introduction by S. Lupi to J. G. H., *Scritti e frammenti di estetica*, Florence 1938; C. Antoni, *La lotta contro la ragione*, 1914, pp. 125–50; B. Croce, *Storia dell'estetica per saggi*, Bari 1942, pp. 156–60; P. Klossowski, *Les méditations bibliques de H.*, Paris 1948.