Hegel

American  

[hey-guhl] / ˈheɪ gəl /

noun

1. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich 1770–1831, German philosopher.

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Hegel British  

/ hɪˈɡeɪlɪən, ˈheɪɡəl, heɪˈɡiː- /

noun

1. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich (ɡeˈɔrk ˈvɪlhɛlm ˈfriːdrɪç). 1770–1831, German philosopher, who created a fundamentally influential system of thought. His view of man's mind as the highest expression of the Absolute is expounded in The Phenomenology of Mind (1807). He developed his concept of dialectic, in which the contradiction between a proposition (thesis) and its antithesis is resolved at a higher level of truth (synthesis), in Science of Logic (1812–16)

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Other Word Forms

• Hegelian adjective
• Hegelianism noun

Example Sentences

Hegel was a metaphysician whose insistence that Geist, or spirit, pervades the historical process and moves it to some grand culmination is difficult to distinguish from New Age mysticism, and hence charlatanism.

From Salon • Mar. 28, 2026

Plato and Hegel, in case you were wondering.

From The Wall Street Journal • Jan. 9, 2026

The conflict between right and wrong is far less compelling, as Hegel understood, than the collision of sides with competing claims to legitimacy.

From Los Angeles Times • Dec. 4, 2024

"These findings provide rare insight into the clandestine cyber operations that traditionally remain concealed from public scrutiny or are simply never caught by such victims," Hegel said.

From Reuters • Aug. 7, 2023

“Nobody can take Hegel seriously. Have you read him closely? He’s funny, very funny. But Hume and Voltaire and Locke felt the same way about Africa,” Odenigbo said.

From "Half of a Yellow Sun" by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie