Søren Kierkegaard
Søren Kierkegaard was a Danish philosopher, theologian, and literary figure who is widely regarded as the founder of existentialism. Writing under a kaleidoscope of pseudonyms, Kierkegaard explored the subjective dimensions of human existence — anxiety, despair, faith, and the irreducible singularity of individual choice — in works that challenged the impersonal abstractions of Hegelian philosophy. His analysis of the three 'stages on life's way' (aesthetic, ethical, and religious), his concept of the 'leap of faith,' and his insistence that 'truth is subjectivity' opened an entirely new path in Western philosophy.
Key Ideas
Key Contributions
- ● Founded existentialism by insisting on the primacy of individual existence, subjective experience, and personal choice over abstract systems
- ● Developed the three stages on life's way — aesthetic, ethical, and religious — as distinct modes of human existence
- ● Articulated the concept of the 'leap of faith' — the decisive, non-rational commitment that carries the individual beyond the ethical to the religious
- ● Analyzed anxiety (Angst) as the psychological precondition of freedom — we are anxious because we are free to choose
- ● Argued that 'truth is subjectivity' — the most important truths concern the individual's passionate, inward relationship to existence
- ● Developed the concept of 'despair' (Sygdommen til Døden) as the fundamental sickness of the self, arising from the failure to become oneself
- ● Pioneered the method of indirect communication through pseudonymous authorship, allowing different existential perspectives to speak without authorial resolution
- ● Mounted a devastating critique of Hegelian systematic philosophy from the standpoint of individual existence
Core Questions
Key Claims
- ✓ Truth is subjectivity — the highest truth is not an objective proposition but the individual's passionate, inward relationship to it
- ✓ Life presents three fundamental modes of existence: the aesthetic (pleasure, immediacy), the ethical (duty, commitment), and the religious (faith, paradox)
- ✓ The leap of faith is not a rational inference but a radical act of commitment in the face of objective uncertainty
- ✓ Anxiety is the dizziness of freedom — we experience anxiety because we confront the open possibility of our own choices
- ✓ Despair is the sickness unto death — the condition of failing to become the self one truly is
- ✓ The Hegelian system comprehends everything except the one thing that matters: the existing individual
- ✓ Abraham's willingness to sacrifice Isaac reveals a 'teleological suspension of the ethical' — faith transcends and may even contradict universal moral law
- ✓ The crowd is untruth — genuine selfhood requires standing alone before God, not losing oneself in the anonymous mass
Biography
Early Life
Søren Aabye Kierkegaard was born on May 5, 1813, in Copenhagen, Denmark. His father, Michael Pedersen Kierkegaard, was a wealthy retired merchant burdened by guilt over a childhood curse against God and an extramarital affair. This atmosphere of melancholy, guilt, and intense religiosity profoundly shaped Kierkegaard's sensibility.
Kierkegaard studied theology at the University of Copenhagen, taking his degree in 1840. His engagement to Regine Olsen — which he broke off in 1841 in one of the most famous episodes in philosophical biography — became a defining event of his life. The reasons remain debated: Kierkegaard seems to have felt that his melancholy and his vocation as a writer made marriage impossible. The experience pervades his authorship.
The Pseudonymous Authorship
Between 1843 and 1846, Kierkegaard produced an extraordinary series of works under various pseudonyms, each representing a different existential standpoint. Either/Or (1843) juxtaposed the aesthetic and ethical modes of existence through two sets of papers — the sensuous, ironic reflections of 'A' and the moral earnestness of Judge William. Fear and Trembling (1843), written under the pseudonym Johannes de Silentio, meditated on the story of Abraham's willingness to sacrifice Isaac, exploring the nature of faith as a 'leap' beyond ethical rationality. The Concept of Anxiety (1844) analyzed anxiety as the psychological precondition of freedom and sin. Concluding Unscientific Postscript (1846) is his longest and most philosophical work, arguing that truth is subjectivity — that the most important truths are not objective propositions but the individual's passionate, inward relationship to existence.
The Attack on Christendom
Kierkegaard's later years were dominated by his attack on institutional Christianity. He argued that the Danish State Church had domesticated Christianity into a comfortable bourgeois respectability that had nothing to do with the radical, paradoxical, suffering-laden faith of the New Testament. His journal The Moment (Øieblikket, 1855) was a ferocious polemic against clerical complacency.
Death and Legacy
Kierkegaard collapsed in the street in October 1855 and died on November 11, 1855, at the age of 42. He was buried in the Assistens Cemetery in Copenhagen.
Kierkegaard's influence grew enormously in the 20th century. He is recognized as the father of existentialism; his concepts of anxiety, despair, authenticity, and the leap of faith influenced Heidegger, Jaspers, Sartre, Camus, Tillich, and Barth. His indirect method of communication through pseudonyms anticipated post-modern literary strategies.
Methods
Notable Quotes
"{'text': 'Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.', 'source': 'Journals, IV A 164', 'year': 1843}"
"{'text': 'Anxiety is the dizziness of freedom.', 'source': 'The Concept of Anxiety, Chapter I', 'year': 1844}"
"{'text': 'The most common form of despair is not being who you are.', 'source': 'The Sickness Unto Death (paraphrase)', 'year': 1849}"
"{'text': 'The crowd is untruth.', 'source': "On the Dedication to 'That Single Individual'", 'year': 1847}"
"{'text': 'A leap of faith — yes, but only after reflection.', 'source': 'Concluding Unscientific Postscript (paraphrase)', 'year': 1846}"
Major Works
- Either/Or Book (1843)
- Fear and Trembling Treatise (1843)
- The Concept of Anxiety Treatise (1844)
- Concluding Unscientific Postscript Treatise (1846)
- The Sickness Unto Death Treatise (1849)
Influenced
- Martin Heidegger · influence
- Jean-Paul Sartre · influence
- Albert Camus · influence
- Ludwig Wittgenstein · influence
Influenced by
- Martin Luther · influence
- Blaise Pascal · influence
- Friedrich Schelling · influence
- Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel · influence
Sources
- Either/Or (trans. Howard and Edna Hong, Princeton)
- Kierkegaard by Patrick Gardiner (Oxford: Very Short Introductions)
- The Cambridge Companion to Kierkegaard (ed. Alastair Hannay and Gordon Marino)
- Kierkegaard: A Biography by Joakim Garff
External Links
Translations
Discussions
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