When Hegel erkläres - what Philosophers do

Philosophers deal with truth. Linguistically, we may aspect what Searle calls representative speech acts from them. They assert, they affirm, they conclude, they explain. When Hegel opens his enchanting preface to the Phenomenology with "Eine Erklärung, wie sie einer Schrift in einer Vorrede nach der Gewohnheit vorausgeschickt wird", the English translator (Pinkard) writes: "to begin, as writers usually do in a preface, by explaining", or (A.V. Miller): "It is customary to preface a work with an explanation" .

What kind of explanation? "über den Zweck, den der Verfasser sich in ihr vorgesetzt": "of the author's aim" ("sich vorsetzen" means: put in front of himself, like a glass), and about tendencies and relations to other thinkers. Indeed, the preface could contain an explanation. Certainly not a causal derivation of the theoretical work. Maybe a conceptually clear exposition of the author's point of view? But that would be the text in itself, not the preface. Explanation? If we take a look at the German word "Erklärung", we immediately see that it derives from "klar", Latin "clarus, a" (therefore Cicero, in his admirable Italian translation, chooses "chiarimento", wrongly).

The English correspondent would be "to declare". In fact, the German "erklären" can also be used in this sense: "to declare war": "Krieg erklären".

Hegel writes: "Erklärung über den Zweck", not "des Zwecks". "A declaration of the author's aim", that is what he is talking about.  

Later on, Hegel asserts: "Die Forderung von dergleichen Erklärungen sowie die Befriedigungen derselben gelten leicht dafür, das Wesentliche zu betreiben": "The demand for such explanations, as also the attempts to satisfy this demand, very easily pass for the essential business philosophy has to undertake". Again, these are "Erklärungen" of "aims and results", which in a preface necessarily are not developed through the movement of thought, as Hegel critically remarks: these are declarations. 

In his preface, Hegel is talking about the problem of declaring aims and results. Philosophers explain, that is sure, but they declare as well. What is the difference? An explanation remains true and clear independently of the author. A declaration instead does only make sense if we see the subject behind: somebody declares something, and indeed we continue treating philosophical thought as linked to historical persons, whatever the constant reference to something like "Hegel" or "Kant" may mean.