Johann Georg Hamann Quotes on Knowledge
Johann Georg Hamann was a German philosopher of language and religion, often called the Magus of the North. This page collects quotes attributed to Johann Georg Hamann on the topic of knowledge, drawn from across the philosopher's works.
Quotes
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Attributed to Johann Georg Hamann:
“Language is the mother of reason and revelation, their A and Omega.”
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Attributed to Johann Georg Hamann:
“All philosophy that ignores the senses is empty word-magic.”
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“Poetry is the mother tongue of the human race.”
Sämtliche Werken, ed. Josef Nadler (Vienna: Verlag Herder, 1949-1957), vol. II, p. 197. -
“Sämtliche Werken, ed. Josef Nadler (Vienna: Verlag Herder, 1949-1957), vol. II, p. 197.”
Poetry is the mother-tongue of the human race. -
“Sämtliche Werken, ed. Josef Nadler (1949-1957), vol. III, p. 32.”
Every phenomenon of nature was a word, — the sign, symbol and pledge of a new, mysterious, inexpressible but all the more intimate union, participation and community of divine energies and ideas. Everything the human being heard from the beginning, saw with its eyes, looked upon and touched with its hands was a living word; for God was the word. -
“Sämtliche Werken, ed. Josef Nadler (1949-1957), vol. III, p. 40.”
The philosophers have always given truth a bill of divorce, by separating what nature has joined together and vice versa. -
“Sämtliche Werken, ed. Josef Nadler (1949-1957), vol. III, p. 231.”
Without language we would have no reason , without reason no religion, and without these three essential aspects of our nature, neither mind nor bond of society. -
“Sämtliche Werken, ed. Josef Nadler (1949-1957), vol. III, p. 286.”
Not only the entire ability to think rests on language... but language is also the crux of the misunderstanding of reason with itself.