During the Spring semester of 1827, both Feuerbach and Stirner had attended Hegel's lectures on Religion, and in the Fall they again enrolled for his lectures on the History of Philosophy. In time, they drew the same conclusion: Hegel was a theologian. Feuerbach's judgment of 1843, that "speculative philosophy is the true, consistent and rational theology," supports the observation of Richard Kroner that "Hegel's philosophy is in itself a speculative religion—Christianity spelt by dialectic."

But whereas Feuerbach thought himself advancing by discovering Hegel's Geist to be God rationalized, and God to be Man alienated, Stirner drew another conclusion. Rather than advancing, Feuerbach had merely stumbled, and now looked up devoutly to another theophany, Man. To Stirner it really made very little difference whether the holy be called Geist, God, Man, or State, for the posture of all believers was the same [spineless].