## 1. Life and Works



Soren Kierkegaard was born to Michael Pedersen Kierkegaard and
Anne (Lund) Kierkegaard in Copenhagen on 5 May 1813, the youngest of
seven children. He spent most of his life in and around the Danish
capital, traveling abroad on only a handful of occasions (mostly to
Berlin, including to hear Schelling's lectures).
Kierkegaard's father, who had been born to a poor family in
Jutland, had become wealthy as a merchant in Copenhagen. Michael was
devoutly religious, and young Soren was brought up as a
Lutheran but was also shaped by a Moravian congregation in which his
father played a prominent role. Kierkegaard was in turn deeply
influenced by his father, about whose "melancholy" much
has been written. One alleged cause of this, much speculated upon,
concerns the story that Kierkegaard's father believed he and his
family to have been living under a curse because of his having cursed
God as a cold and hungry child.



After a prolonged period of study at the University of Copenhagen,
Soren received a first degree in theology and a
*Magister* degree in philosophy, with a dissertation dealing
with irony as practiced by Socrates (*On the Concept of Irony with
Continual Reference to Socrates*). The *Magister* degree
was the equivalent of a contemporary doctorate, the title being
changed to "doctor" some years later. He then completed
the pastoral seminary program that qualified him to become a priest in
the Lutheran state church. However, Kierkegaard was never ordained and
never became a pastor, though he preached on occasions in various
Copenhagen churches.



In 1840 Kierkegaard became engaged to the eighteen-year-old Regine
Olsen. He quickly came to believe that he had made a terrible mistake
and that he could not marry her. His reasons are not fully known but
have been the subject of a great deal of speculation, much of it bound
up with Kierkegaard's own "melancholy" and
relationship to his by then deceased father. In the letter returning
her ring, Kierkegaard asks Regine to forgive him, the one who
"whatever else he was capable of could not make a girl
happy" (cited in Hannay 2001: 155). In his journals, he expands
on this, reflecting several years later that within six months of
marriage to him she would have "gone to pieces", as there
was "something spectral about me", which would make a
"real relationship" with him impossible (PJ 421-2).
Regine vigorously opposed ending the engagement. After fruitlessly
seeking to change her mind, Soren embarked on a misguided (and
unsuccessful) scheme to free her from attachment to him by pretending
to be a scoundrel who had trifled with her affections. Finally, in
1841 he broke the engagement for good and fled to Berlin for a brief
time, perhaps in part to escape the public scandal of the whole
affair. Kierkegaard remained unmarried for the rest of his life, his
will bequeathing to Regine what remained of his worldly goods, to make
the point that to him the engagement was just as binding as a
marriage. Regine--or rather, her husband on her
behalf--declined to accept the bequest, except for a few personal
items that Regine wanted.



The period following the end of the engagement was one of the most
productive of Kierkegaard's authorship. Work on the text that he
considered properly to begin his authorship, *Either/Or*, began
almost as soon as he arrived in Berlin, and it was published in 1843.
Between that year and 1846, several other works appeared: *Fear and
Trembling* (1843), *Repetition* (1843), *Philosophical
Fragments* (1844), *The Concept of Anxiety* (1844), several
collections of *Upbuilding Discourses* (1843, 1844),
*Prefaces* (1844), *Three Discourses on Imagined
Occasions* (1845), *Stages on Life's Way* (1845),
*Concluding Unscientific Postscript* (1846), and *A Literary
Review*, better known in English as *Two Ages* (1846).



It is clear enough that some of Kierkegaard's early writings
contained disguised communications to Regine, who soon married another
man (Johan Frederik Schlegel, later Governor-General of the Danish
West Indies), which meant that Kierkegaard could not communicate
directly with her. He hoped she might come to realize that he still
loved her, but also understand why he could not go through with the
marriage. Biographies of Kierkegaard often focus on the broken
engagement in detail, and commentators have sometimes gone to great
lengths to find "messages to Regine" in
Kierkegaard's texts, some more plausible than others. However,
Regine was far from the only person who could be described as
"that individual" to whom Kierkegaard dedicated many of
his works.



Two other biographical episodes are worth mentioning. First, in
1845-6 Kierkegaard became embroiled in a controversy with
*The Corsair*, a satirical literary magazine that included
cartoons mocking many of Denmark's most prominent public
figures. Initially Kierkegaard was spared this treatment, and indeed
was on friendly terms with Meir Goldschmidt, a Jewish intellectual who
was the magazine's editor. However, after Kierkegaard (in the
persona of one of his pseudonyms) goaded the magazine by attacking P.
L. Moller, an aspiring scholar who wrote for *The
Corsair*, Kierkegaard became the object of a series of nasty
attacks, which included mocking his personal appearance. This might
seem inconsequential, but all the main figures involved had their
lives dramatically changed. Soren, whose chief recreational
occupation had been daily walks around Copenhagen, in which he
conversed with many people, taking what he called "people
baths", became reclusive, unable to endure the curious and
sometimes jeering groups of people who stared at him. As a result, he
gave up the idea of becoming a pastor, feeling a call to "remain
at his post" as an author. Following the "*Corsair*
affair", Kierkegaard--who had intended the *Concluding
Unscientific Postscript* to bring his authorship to an
end--embarked upon a second, highly productive period of writing,
the fruits of which include *Upbuilding Discourses in Various
Spirits* (1847), *Works of Love* (1847), *Christian
Discourses* (1848), *The Sickness Unto Death* (1849),
*Practice in Christianity* (1850) and several more discourses
(for the full list, see the Chronology below).



Second, in the last two years of his life, Kierkegaard, known as a
defender of Christian faith, embarked on a controversial attack on the
Danish state church, a target that symbolized all that he thought was
wrong with "Christendom" as a whole. The attack on the
Church was made in the name of "New Testament
Christianity", which Kierkegaard thought the Church had
betrayed. The war was waged in newspapers and in a pamphlet
(*Ojeblikket,* variously translated as *The
Moment* or *The Instant*) that Kierkegaard himself founded
and for which he wrote ten issues. These writings are markedly
different from the rest of his work. Obviously intended for a broad
audience, they employed searing wit and satire, making no attempt to
be subtle or nuanced. Amid this public battle, Kierkegaard collapsed
on the street, paralyzed, and was taken to hospital. He died there a
few weeks later, on 11 November 1855. A tentative diagnosis of the
cause was tuberculosis of the spine marrow. Towards the end,
Kierkegaard affirmed to Emil Boesen--a lifelong friend and a
priest in the church that Kierkegaard had attacked--that he was
still a believer in Christ.



Kierkegaard's biographers paint dramatically different pictures
of these events. Walter Lowrie's early biography (Lowrie 1938)
is a work of loving devotion, as Lowrie spent a great deal of his
later life translating Kierkegaard into English. Joakim Garff's
portrait (2000, English translation 2005) is far more critical and
provides unflattering interpretations of many of the key events in
Kierkegaard's life. The biographies by Alastair Hannay (2001),
Stephen Backhouse (2016), and Clare Carlisle (2019) all fall somewhere
in between these two extremes.



Although Kierkegaard died aged only 42, his writings are vast. One
aspect of these writings likely to strike those encountering him for
the first time as peculiar is the fact that--aside from the
"attack upon Christendom" writings of the final years and
a voluminous body of journal and notebook entries--the authorship
divides broadly into two distinct kinds of text: those written under a
variety of pseudonyms (the "pseudonymous" authorship) and
those written under his own name (the "signed" or
"veronymous" authorship). Several of the pseudonymous
authors, some of whose names are significant, represent different
life-views, such as the contrast between the "aesthetic"
and "ethical" lives sketched through the multiple voices
of *Either/Or* (more of which below). Others represent figures
who explore the life of faith from perspectives outside Christianity
(such as Johannes *de silentio*, the author of *Fear and
Trembling*) and Johannes Climacus (a self-described
"humorist" whose two books, *Philosophical
Fragments* and its *Concluding Unscientific Postscript*,
are written from a standpoint that falls short of the paradoxical
"Religiousness B" that represents Christianity in the
latter work). One way of characterizing this pseudonymous authorship
is to think of it as one vast novel, with the various pseudonymous
authors who figure in the works being characters therein. Although
some (e.g., Mackey 1986) have claimed that "S.
Kierkegaard" is ultimately just another pseudonym, this remains
a minority view.



Amongst the signed literature, there are different types of texts,
such as "upbuilding" or "edifying" discourses
(*Taler*: speeches; talks); "deliberations;"
(*Overveielser*) and reviews. In the early 1840s, Kierkegaard
often published a collection of such discourses at the same time as a
pseudonymous work, describing them as offered with the right and left
hand respectively. Scholars have sometimes distinguished these earlier
religious discourses from later, explicitly Christian discourses,
which latter group would include one of the most important works of
Kierkegaard's mature ethics, *Works of Love*.
Technically, the essays about Christian love that make up that text
consist not of "discourses" (*Taler*) but
"deliberations" (*Overveielser*). According to
Kierkegaard's own explanation of the distinction in his
journals, whereas an upbuilding "discourse" presupposes
that people know what, say, love is and aims to win them over to it, a
"deliberation" must first unsettle a comfortable way of
thinking, and so also aims to awaken; provoke; and sharpen thought. As
noted, in addition to his published works Kierkegaard kept extensive
journals and notebooks, clearly expecting--correctly--that
these too would eventually be published.



The use of pseudonyms gives the reader the additional--some would
say prior--task of wondering where Kierkegaard stands in all
this. One figure with a peculiar status amongst the pseudonyms is
Anti-Climacus, the only pseudonym other than Johannes Climacus to
author more than one book (*The Sickness Unto Death* and
*Practice in Christianity*). Many scholars have treated
Anti-Climacus as only "weakly" pseudonymous, taking him to
articulate views Kierkegaard himself holds, but which he considers
himself to lack the authority to pronounce in his own name. In this
sense, Anti-Climacus has often been read as the "highest"
Kierkegaardian voice.



Some strategies have been defended as giving a window into
Kierkegaard's own views in relation to the pseudonyms. One is to
look for common themes and conceptual perspectives that are shared by
most or (in some cases) nearly all the pseudonyms, such as the view
that there are distinct "stages" or "spheres"
of existence (to be discussed below). It is reasonable to see these
common elements as distinctively "Kierkegaardian". Another
strategy is to compare the pseudonymous works to the signed works, on
the assumption that the latter provide a baseline because they embody
what Kierkegaard wanted to put forward under his own name. This
sometimes makes it possible to have some idea of what Kierkegaard
himself thought of the pseudonyms. Some, such as Johannes Climacus,
seem closer to Kierkegaard than others, such as Judge William and the
Seducer in *Either/Or.* Part of the evidence for this is that
Kierkegaard inserted his own name on the title page as editor of the
two Climacus books, describing this as a "hint" for those
who care about such things.



It certainly seems rash to attribute all the things said by the
pseudonyms to Kierkegaard, especially since Kierkegaard himself
explicitly requested that anyone citing these works should make the
attribution to the pseudonyms rather than himself (CUP I 627/SKS 7,
571). On the other hand, even if the pseudonyms had been actual
individuals distinct from Kierkegaard, it would not follow that they
never say things he would agree with, and it seems reasonable to think
that Kierkegaard had some ends of his own that he seeks to accomplish
by the creation of the pseudonyms.



What were those ends? In *The Point of View for My Work as an
Author* (written 1848, published posthumously)
Kierkegaard--in his own voice--claims that he was from first
to last a religious author, and thus that the pseudonymous works also
serve religious ends, despite the fact that many of those works are
not explicitly religious in character. This claim has been hotly
contested, with some critics arguing that *The Point of View*
represents what Kierkegaard later wanted his readers to think rather
than being an honest account of his intentions--and that other
elements of his writings, such as the journals, are similarly
unreliable (see, e.g., Fenger 1976 [1980], Mackey 1986, Garff 2000
[2005]). Interestingly, Kierkegaard seems in part to concede his
critics' point, since he admits that the unity he sees in the
authorship was not one he had in mind from the beginning, but rather
one that he came to understand as the authorship developed. In any
case, Kierkegaard agrees that an author's assertions about his
work should not always be taken at face value, and he asks his readers
to discern for themselves whether the unity he claims to be present
helps to make sense of the whole. A rough characterization of the
unity Kierkegaard himself sees could be summarized as follows:
Kierkegaard believes that genuine religious faith requires
"inwardness" or "subjectivity" as its
presupposition. The pseudonymous works, including those not explicitly
religious, can be seen as intended "indirectly" to
encourage readers to "become subjective", thus providing a
better possibility of an understanding of religious existence. One
piece of evidence Kierkegaard brings forward in support of the
religious character of the writings is the fact that the early
pseudonymous works were always "accompanied" by signed
religious works. Thus, one cannot reasonably claim that the religious
is something that only emerges relatively late in the course of his
authorship.



One can therefore understand why, at least in retrospect, Kierkegaard
saw the whole of his authorship, including the pseudonymous works, as
devoted to the cause of "reintroducing Christianity into
Christendom", one of the characteristic ways he describes the
goal of his writings. This phrase captures both the idea that
Kierkegaard saw himself as a defender of "New Testament
Christianity" and the way he saw himself as a critic of the
"cultural Christianity" found in Denmark at the time,
which assumed that virtually every Dane was a Christian and
thus--Kierkegaard thought--conflated even lukewarm
"nominal" Christianity with genuine faith.
Kierkegaard's critique of "Christendom" led to
tensions with his older brother, Peter Christian Kierkegaard, who was
a follower of N. F. S. Grundtvig, a hugely influential Danish pastor
and author who had, in Soren's eyes, blended Scandinavian
culture and Christian faith in a way that was detrimental to the
latter.



One interesting feature of Kierkegaard's reception is that,
despite his own Christian motivations, the writings have often had a
huge influence on non-Christian thinkers, who have found inspiration
in elements of his thought--such as the analysis of human
existence (see
 section 2
 below)--that can be detached from Kierkegaard's own
religious framework. These would include such figures as Heidegger and
the Swiss psychiatrist and pioneer of existential psychotherapy,
Ludwig Binswanger, who judged *The Sickness Unto Death* as a
text which more than any other had the potential to "advance the
existential-analytic interpretation of schizophrenia"
(Binswanger 1958: 297; cf. also Laing 1960). It is also intriguing
that Kierkegaard was translated into Japanese before he was translated
into English (albeit initially via German rather than directly from
Danish). The influence of Kierkegaard is clear in later Japanese
thinkers such as Kitaro Nishida's attempt to create a synthesis
between eastern Buddhist thought and European philosophy. (On
Kierkegaard in Japan, see Otani 1957 [2011], Mortensen 1996, Giles
2008; for Kierkegaard's reception in other non-western
European/north American contexts, see Stewart 2007-17, Vol. 8
Tome III.) In some ways this breadth of reception is not surprising
since the "inwardness" Kierkegaard sought to cultivate is
human inwardness, and many of his analyses and descriptions do not
presuppose any dogmatic foundations.



One theme that can be found in both the pseudonymous and signed
writings is the distinction between direct and indirect communication.
Kierkegaard consistently maintains that ethical and religious truth
cannot be directly or "immediately" communicated to
others. Understanding such truths requires a "double
reflection". Since they are truths that pertain essentially to
existence or how life should be lived, it is possible to have a purely
verbal or conceptual understanding of such truths that is nonetheless
a misunderstanding. To successfully grasp such communications, the
recipient must not only understand the sentences communicated, but
must think through what it would mean to embody or
"reduplicate" those ideals in existence. Kierkegaard
thinks that the communicator must keep this in mind and artistically
attempt to communicate in a manner that will discourage purely verbal
understanding and encourage appropriation. The use of the pseudonyms
is in part an attempt to do this. Rather than simply tell us in a
didactic manner about the various forms human existence can take, such
as the aesthetic, ethical, and religious lives, the pseudonyms embody
these various ways of understanding human life. Kierkegaard hopes that
readers who engage with the pseudonymous characters might come to
understand their own lives better, in much the same way as
encountering the characters in a great novel can foster greater
self-understanding, whether one sees oneself as like those characters
or as very different from them. There is thus a strong novelistic or
"poetic" character to the pseudonymous authorship, and it
seems right to pay attention to the literary form of
Kierkegaard's work, just as Plato scholars often pay close
attention to the literary form of Plato's dialogues.


## 2. Kierkegaard's Analysis of Human Existence: Despair, Social Critique, and Anxiety



Kierkegaard does not think of the human self predominantly as a kind
of metaphysical substance, but rather more like an achievement, a goal
to strive for. To be sure, humans are substances of a sort; they exist
in the world, as do physical objects. However, what is distinctive
about human selves is that the self must become what it is to become,
human selves playing an active role in the process by which they come
to define themselves. This idea is familiar from existentialist
thinkers such as Sartre, and we can thereby understand why Kierkegaard
is often described as the "father of existentialism"
(however unhelpful that label may otherwise be). However, as we shall
see below, one important difference from Sartre is that for
Kierkegaard the idea of existentialist "self-creation"
(or, perhaps better, "self-shaping") needs to be
synthesized with "self-acceptance:" a recognition that the
self is in some sense given by our limitations and certain facts of
biology and history (for this terminology, see Rudd 2012).



Kierkegaard's picture of selfhood is perhaps most clearly on
display in *The Sickness Unto Death,* one of two works in his
authorship described on the title page as "psychological".
Although *Sickness* is attributed to the "higher"
pseudonym Anti-Climacus, much of its account of the structure of the
human self can be found in other Kierkegaardian writings, both signed
and pseudonymous. Like Hegel, Anti-Climacus holds both that human
beings are to be understood as "spirit", and that spirit
must become itself through a process. The major difference is that
Hegel sees spirit as manifested in all of reality and particularly in
humanity as a whole, whereas Anti-Climacus focuses on the individual
human self.



Perhaps another similarity to Hegel is that there is a
"dialectical" character to the human self understood as
spirit. Becoming spirit is seen as an on-going "synthesis"
of contrasting fundamental characteristics: the finite and the
infinite, the temporal and the eternal; the necessary and the
possible. Much about the self is fixed and cannot be chosen. Humans
are born with particular biological characteristics, in a particular
place and time, into a world that is not of their own making. However,
as self-conscious beings, humans still contain possibilities to be
actualized. *The Sickness Unto Death* describes various ways in
which humans fail to synthesize these contrasting features and thus
fall into despair, which is seen not merely as an emotion but as the
state in which the self fails to become a self in truth. For instance,
the person in the grip of the "despair of possibility"
loses contact with necessity and thus lives in a world of imagination
that is disconnected from actuality. While such a person recognizes
that concrete possibilities must be chosen from a range of options,
they misuse their imagination to generate an endless series of
possibilities, thus postponing (and evading) the need for choice and
action. The task is somehow to actualize "the eternal"
(possibilities) as a temporal being. The person in the "despair
of necessity" is on the other hand a fatalist of sorts who,
having lost hope, sees no imaginative possibilities that can be
incorporated into his or her life. Necessity alone, Anti-Climacus
claims, is suffocating. Possibility is, spiritually speaking, like
oxygen: one cannot breathe pure oxygen, but neither can one breathe
without it.



There is in Kierkegaard's view of the human self as spirit one
other fundamental difference from Hegel's concept of spirit.
Hegel's dialectic (at least on some interpretations) comes to
rest when the conflicting moments are reconciled in a final, higher
unity. For Kierkegaard, however, the human self is fundamentally
temporal and (at least prior to death) is always an unfinished
project. The task of balancing the elements of human selfhood
(necessity and possibility, eternity and temporality) so as to avoid
despair is never completed short of the grave.



Despite Kierkegaard's reputation as an
"individualist", he does not see the process of becoming a
self as one that is carried out by an autonomous, isolated self. As
self-conscious beings, humans can "step back" from
themselves and "relate themselves to themselves". However,
Anti-Climacus insists that the human self cannot "relate itself
to itself" alone, but always by "relating ... to
another". All of us in some ways live in relation to ideals, but
those ideals come from outside the self and provide a basis for
self-definition. Anti-Climacus clearly thinks that for the human self
to be healthy, free from the despair that is "the sickness unto
death", the "other" who is the basis for the self
must be God, who created the self but gave it a kind of freedom by
"releasing it from his hand, as it were" (SUD 16/SKS 11,
132). However, both Kierkegaard and Anti-Climacus recognize that in
reality most human selves are defined by "others" very
different from God. We attempt to ground our identities in
"worldly distinctions" such as riches and fame or define
ourselves by our devotion to abstractions that have the potential to
become idols, such as nation, race or class. On Kierkegaard's
view, only when one is defined by a commitment to what is absolute and
infinite (God) can one be freed from the constricting labels and
conformist roles that society attempts to impose on all of us. This is
particularly so in a modern society that is shaped by "the
press", and which seeks to "level" the distinctive
individual who dares to be faithful to an individual calling. This
influential critique of modern societies is found in such essays as
*A Literary Review*. There, Kierkegaard describes the aspects
of disengagement mentioned above in connection with certain modes of
philosophizing (see further
 SS3.1
 below) as part of a broader problem with the culture of his age. He
contrasts the passionate "age of revolution" with
"the present age"--indolent; excessively reflective;
apathetic; and envy-fueled. Each age has its risks, but one of the
problems with the present age is precisely that it is one of
"leveling", in which genuine excellence is stifled by the
"monstrous abstraction" (TA 90/SKS 8, 86) which
Kierkegaard labels "the public", an unaccountable
"phantom" created by "the press" and in whose
name all kinds of injustices are perpetuated. While Kierkegaard was
surely influenced here by the "Corsair affair", his
analysis of "the present age" has often been taken as an
astute anticipation of concerns later critics have raised about the
mass media (and, latterly, elements of social media: one might think
of the "algorithms" of Facebook and Twitter as the kind of
faceless, anonymous "phantoms" that Kierkegaard had in
mind).



As already noted, Kierkegaard believes that the task of becoming a
self requires "inwardness" or "subjectivity",
and that merely amassing objective knowledge or taking a detached
perspective on intellectual questions by itself leads one away from
selfhood. In *Concluding Unscientific Postscript* Johannes
Climacus argues that reflection, though a crucial and necessary
element in human life, by itself cannot lead to choices (see Evans
2006: 311-326). In an argument that resembles David Hume's
claim that "reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the
passions...", (Hume 1739-40 [1888: 415]) Climacus
says that reflection itself has a kind of inner infinity. A person
thinking about a decision can always go on thinking and so long as
that is happening, cannot decide. What must happen is that the person
must desire to make a choice, and thus will to stop the process of
reflection by identifying with a possibility to be actualized.



Prior to the analysis of despair given in *The Sickness Unto
Death,* Kierkegaard's pseudonym Vigilius Haufniensis (a
Latinized version of "The Watchman of Copenhagen")
provided an influential treatment of another significant human
psychological state in *The Concept of Anxiety*. On the surface
this book is an inquiry into the nature of original or
"hereditary" sin, but in reality it probes the nature of
human choice in general, particularly the origins of evil. While
Haufniensis claims that evil or sin cannot be scientifically explained
because it has its origins in freedom, he nonetheless believes that
anxiety helps us to understand how sin is possible. Anxiety is not
merely a pathological condition which is a symptom of disease, but
part of the human condition itself. It is an awareness of freedom.
When we are anxious, we feel a "sympathetic antipathy" or
an "antipathetic sympathy" (CA 42/SKS 4, 348) in which we
are both drawn towards and repelled by some possibility. How exactly
freedom comes to be misused is not made altogether clear by
Haufniensis, who says that



> 
> 
> anxiety is the dizziness of freedom, which emerges when the spirit
> wants to posit the synthesis and freedom looks down into its own
> possibility, laying hold of finiteness to support itself. (CA 61/ SKS
> 4, 365)
> 
> 
> 



This "looking down" produces anxiety, which is the state
that precedes sin, though Haufniensis is clear that a morally free
action always comes from a "leap" and cannot be seen as
necessary (CA 48-51/SKS 4, 353-7). Perhaps the best
scholarly treatment of these matters is found in Michelle Kosch
(2006), who convincingly argues that Kierkegaard is responding to
Kant-inspired debates about human freedom and autonomy in Fichte and
Schelling, and usefully shows the relevance of Kierkegaard's
views to contemporary debates about the human will. Haufniensis does
claim that when freedom is misused, anxiety takes on a pathological
character, but the cure is not the total elimination of anxiety.
Rather, what is crucial is to learn to be anxious properly:
"Whoever has learned to be anxious in the right way has learned
the ultimate" (CA 155; SKS 4, 454).


## 3. The "Spheres of Existence" or "Stages on Life's Way"



A common way to interpret Kierkegaard's thought is in terms of
three "existence-spheres": the aesthetic, the ethical and
the religious. The idea that there are precisely three such spheres is
an over-simplification, as this reckons without important subdivisions
in this schema (such as different kinds of aesthete; the different
resonances of especially "the ethical" in different texts;
sub-divisions in the religious ("Religiousness A" and
"Religiousness B"); and the "boundary zones"
of "irony" and "humor".) Nonetheless, this
structure does give some purchase on Kierkegaard's view of
different ways to become--or fail to become--a human
"self". Indeed, some have seen "becoming a
self" as *the* key topic of Kierkegaard's thought,
and the existence-spheres as crucial to understanding this. One way of
approaching the existence-spheres is to see them as different views of
what gives a human life value. Kierkegaard often uses an imagery of
height in describing the spheres, such as a famous passage in *The
Sickness Unto Death* in which Anti-Climacus accuses most people of
living in a multi-story house and yet preferring to live in the
basement (in "sensate" categories as opposed to aiming to
become "spirit") (SUD 43/SKS 11, 158). That is,
Kierkegaard often reads as if the existence-spheres operate in a
hierarchy, with the aesthetic as "lowest" and
Religiousness B as "highest". However, this is arguably
too simple: even if Kierkegaard does see the movement from the
aesthetic and the ethical to the religious as progress, it would be a
mistake to think of this in a purely linear way. There are ways in
which an ethical character such as Judge William may be inferior to an
aesthete such as "A", and insights to be found in the
aesthetes that are not repudiated or surpassed by what might be
described as a "higher" pseudonym.



Kierkegaard also describes these spheres as "stages"
(*Stadier*)--as in the title *Stages on Life's
Way.* The term "stage" might be taken as a
psychological descriptive term, but this too can be misleading.
Kierkegaard is certainly not simply providing an empirical description
of how humans develop. It is true that children are natural aesthetes,
and that this is where human existence always begins. So one might say
that a typical human life would begin with aesthetic concerns, develop
ethical commitments, and over time, reflecting on the problems posed
by ethical existence, could struggle with religious questions which
are linked to the problems of guilt and suffering that ethical life
raises but does not solve. However, not everyone follows such a path,
and even when someone does, the later stages do not simply replace the
earlier ones. Kierkegaard consistently maintains that all human life
contains an aesthetic dimension, so the aesthetic is never really left
behind.



Furthermore, humans for Kierkegaard are spiritual creatures, and this
means that the transitions from one stage to another do not happen
automatically or inevitably. Rather, the transitions are achievements
that require the transformation of the "passions" that
shape a human life, what Kierkegaard calls "subjectivity"
or "inwardness". It is for this reason that, for instance,
the aesthete can choose to remain an aesthete, making this way of life
a rival to an ethical or religious life. When understood in this way
the term "spheres" seems superior to "stages"
as it recognizes that these different views of human existence can be
rivals, with different views of what makes human life worthwhile and
meaningful. Even though Kierkegaard himself clearly believed that deep
and authentic forms of ethical life point towards the religious, he
also recognizes that there are forms of ethical life that are at best
religious in a conventional or superficial way (as illustrated,
arguably, by Judge William, to be discussed in
 SS3.2
 below). Let us turn, then, to aspects of each of the
"existence-spheres" in more detail.


### 3.1 The Aesthetic



The first volume of *Either/Or* consists of the papers of a
nameless young man, known only as "A", who in a series of
sometimes witty, sometimes rambling, sometimes astute and sometimes
despairing writings, presents a view of what it means to live
"aesthetically". As is clearest in his essay "Crop
Rotation", he sets himself the task of living to avoid boredom
at all costs. On one level, the aesthetic life can be understood as
the ceaseless pursuit of "the interesting". But there is
an irony in this: paralleling Kant's notion of a judgment of
beauty as involving *disinterested* satisfaction, the aesthete
ultimately brings an attitude of disinterested, disengaged
contemplation to life as a whole, viewing it as a spectacle to be
savored rather than as involving "tasks" or projects to be
fulfilled. His is the view of a spectator rather than a player. Often
seen as a critique of German romanticism, this highlights a vital
distinction in Kierkegaard's thought, between the engaged and
disengaged perspectives. Kierkegaard thinks that the disengaged,
theoretical standpoint on life will necessarily overlook crucial
existential problems, since these only properly come into view from a
first-person perspective. To draw on one of Climacus' examples,
understanding in the abstract that since I am mortal, I will one day
die, is very different from earnestly confronting what my certain
death means for how I should live my life.



The aesthete emerges as an isolated figure, recommending the reader of
"Crop Rotation" to avoid boredom and preserve freedom by
rejecting anything which involves the self in relationships of
inter-dependence, such as marriage, friendship, or useful career.
While recognizing most people's need to work for a living, he
nevertheless counsels against allowing career or other people to be
part of one's identity-conferring commitments. In his critique
of the aesthetic life, the ethicist Judge William goes on to argue
that this is to cut oneself off from precisely the kind of freely
chosen projects that give human life its value and purpose.



The two extremes of the aesthete life, contrasting sensuousness with
misused imaginative reflection, are illustrated by two kinds of
seducer. The first, illustrated by Don Juan (which "A"
approaches through the version of the character in Mozart's
opera *Don Giovanni* in his essay "The Immediate Erotic
Stages or the Musical Erotic") has as the object of his desire
the sensual alone, as opposed to the features of a woman which make
her a distinct individual. Nor, on this account, is Don Juan himself
an individual, since to be so is to be determined "by
spirit". Indeed, "A" claims, once we think of Don
Juan as an individual--as opposed to a sensuous force that can
only properly be expressed in music--he becomes a
*comical* figure.



As his papers reveal, one way in which "A" differs from
Don Juan is that "A" sees a far greater use for the
imagination. "A" contrasts a "vulgar"
understanding of crop rotation--always seeking new external
stimuli--with tackling boredom through utilizing the capacity of
the imagination. By standing back from the world, relating to it in a
disengaged manner, one's experiences become raw material for
imaginative possibilities, such as by cultivating arbitrariness
(reading part of a book; seeing the middle of a play). "A"
himself fully realizes (see for instance the section entitled
"Diapsalmata") that his lifestyle has led to a kind of
despair--he claims that living "artistically" is only
possible once "hope has been thrown overboard" (EO I
292/SKS 2, 282)--but he sees aesthetic possibilities even in his
despair. After all, tragedy is one of the great categories of drama,
and "A" seems to have the capacity to step back from and
observe his own life as a kind of tragic play. Perhaps "A"
thinks that despair is preferable to boredom and can thus be a
strategy in its avoidance.



The flaws of his worldview are writ large in the demonic author of the
last and longest part of the first volume of *Either/Or*, the
"Seducer's Diary". (The text leaves unclear whether
we are supposed to take this to be "A" himself.) This
second seducer--another Johannes--represents an extreme
misuse of the imagination: someone so far gone in the life of the
imagination as to have become damaged by it. Johannes gains his
gratification from the art of planning seduction, with ultimate
success sparking boredom and the desire to move on. The Diary's
painstaking account of the details of a particular seduction plot
reveal him as deeply manipulative; thoroughly disengaged (viewing
woman as--merely--an endlessly fascinating topic for his
observations and reflections); and ultimately self-deceived, both
about his motives and about whether a life lived almost entirely in
the realm of the imagination is a defensible human life. Johannes the
Seducer has embraced a reflective type of enjoyment, including
"reflective grief", as a form of aesthetic experience that
can be sustained, perhaps recognizing that the "immediate"
sensuousness of Don Juan cannot be realized in an actual person.
Nevertheless, his turn away from "immediacy" does not seem
to work; he constantly seems to need jolts of immediate enjoyment and
desire to rejuvenate his projects. When his seduction of his quarry
Cordelia finally succeeds, the actual sexual encounter seems strangely
anti-climactic, and it is immediately followed by boredom and even
cynicism. Yet one level of the Seducer's self-deception subtly
indicates the demands of the ethical: by convincing himself that he
hasn't really treated these women so badly, Johannes shows that
on some level he recognizes that the ethical does make demands on him.
Many of these points are subtly elaborated in Karsten Harries'
rich commentary on *Either/Or* (Harries 2010).


### 3.2 The Ethical



Kierkegaard's most famous spokesman for the ethical life is
known as Judge (or "Assessor") William. In his
two--very--long letters to his young friend "A",
William's strategy has an "indirect" element: he
aims to show how the ethical life provides what the aesthete claims to
care about (for instance, romantic love) better than the aesthetic
life itself can. (Witness the titles the book's editor, Victor
Eremita, gives to the letters: "The Aesthetic Validity of
Marriage" and "Equilibrium between the Aesthetic and the
Ethical in the Development of Personality".) At the heart of the
Judge's worldview is the idea that living a fully human life
necessarily involves the kind of commitments of which "A"
is so wary: relationships and social roles can legitimately be
identity-conferring in an important sense. This is a key respect in
which the "ethical self" contrasts with the isolated
"self" of the aesthete. (It also highlights the importance
of *love* in Kierkegaard's thought (see
 SS3.3.3
 below).) Part of William's strategy is to try to show
"A" that he has deeper desires than he recognizes.
"A"'s namelessness has often been taken as a signal
that the aesthete in an important sense lacks a self; the Judge aims
to show that the aesthete's living for "the moment"
means that the self becomes nothing more than a series of such
moments. The ethical self, by contrast, seeks a coherence and a kind
of unity that can endure over time, rather than being a series of
disconnected episodes. Relationships and social roles are, for the
Judge, key to this.



In this approach, however, "the aesthetic" is not just
something that is transcended, but rather something that is taken up
into the higher existence-spheres in a transformed way. For instance,
at the heart of William's praise of marriage is the idea that
this is the way in which romantic love endures--and is a better
expression of love's own demands. Marriage also illustrates the
idea of the ethical as the sphere of "openness" or
transparency: marriage embodies the ethical life insofar as it
provides an environment in which two people can progressively reveal
themselves to each other over a lifetime. (*Fear and Trembling*
will go on to contrast the "openness" of the ethical with
different forms of concealment found in both the aesthetic and the
religious.)



The Judge's second letter stresses the importance of
*choice*. He urges "A" to "choose
despair", by which he means: recognize that despair arises from,
and is essential to, the aesthetic life, and that an authentic self
cannot be achieved thorough the aesthetic life alone. (As hinted at in
 section 2
 above, aspects of the human self--possibility, necessity,
finitude, infinitude--have their own characteristic forms of
despair, each rooted either in a lack of imagination or in a misuse of
the imagination.) His key theme is to try to persuade the aesthete
that choosing "aesthetically" is not really choosing at
all; that he needs to "choose choice itself:" take
responsibility for the person he has become, as the first step in
aiming to change it. One way of glossing the claim that
"A" lacks a self is that the aesthetic life is one of
self-alienation (the Judge alleges that "A"
"continually hover[s] above" himself (EO II 198/SKS 3,
192)). By contrast, the ethical self contains elements of
self-acceptance--the facticity of one's life--as well
as what might be called "self-shaping"--that which
can be chosen (Rudd 2012). As the Judge puts it, "the I chooses
itself--or, more correctly, receives [or 'accepts']
itself [*det modtager sig selv*]" (EO II, 177/SKS 3,
172). In this way, the ethical self strives for a balance which avoids
the despair of possibility (the excessive plenitude of choice that
paralyses the will) and the despair of necessity (the complete absence
of choice). At the heart of this notion of choice is the view that
freedom is found in voluntary self-limitation, as illustrated by the
Judge's claim that his devotion to his work, his wife and his
children is less a sacrifice than the source of his joy and
satisfaction. Precursors of this view which are likely influences on
Kierkegaard here include Luther's idea that freedom is being
able to transcend the demands of one's baser inclinations
willingly to obey God's law (see especially "The Freedom
of a Christian"), and Hegel's recognition of our mutual
interdependence in the thought that true freedom involves recognizing
that what may initially appear to be a "constraining
other" is, in a deeper sense, part of the self. Contemporary
parallels which have interested Kierkegaard scholars include Harry
Frankfurt's idea that unlimited "freedom" would lead
to the evaporation of identity (see for instance Frankfurt 1988:
177-190) and the importance of acquiring a "higher
order" will (see the essays in Rudd and Davenport 2015).



In all this, we see that a key contrast is between a life viewed in
terms of mere *possibilities* (the aesthetic) and in terms of
"tasks" (the ethical). Insofar as a person recognizes
"choice" as a task (as opposed to being an essentially
arbitrary selection from an array of possibilities), she has
effectively already chosen the ethical.



Interpreters of Kierkegaard have disagreed on whether the ethical is a
necessary, if intermediate, stage on the route to a
"higher" existence-sphere, or whether there is an element
of naivete to William's valorization of conventional
social norms (cf. Hegelian *Sittlichkeit*) which sophisticated
aesthetes have already seen through and rejected. A related debate has
arisen from Alasdair MacIntyre's claim, in his *A Short
History of Ethics* and *After Virtue,* that the choice
between the aesthetic and the ethical is arbitrary or
"criterionless", (MacIntyre 1981 [1984]).
MacIntyre's view has been much discussed since, though
Kierkegaard scholars have been almost unanimous in their rejection of
it. MacIntyre subsequently amended his position, while nevertheless
re-stating the "criterionless choice" charge in a
different form (see MacIntyre 2001, esp. 344). Subsequent discussion
has focused on whether Kierkegaard's project is in fact far
closer to MacIntyre's own than the latter realized, one
component of this debate being whether it is helpful to think of the
ethical in terms of some sort of "narrative unity" (for
contributions, see the essays in Davenport and Rudd 2001, Lippitt
2007, Rudd 2012, Davenport 2012, Lippitt 2013b [for an overview],
Stokes 2015, the essays in Lippitt and Stokes 2015, and Compaijen
2018).



Certainly, the Judge's somewhat complacent trust in
*Sittlichkeit* raises several important questions. Do we really
have such clearly defined positions and duties? Can
*Sittlichkeit* do justice to individual uniqueness? What
underlying principle can justify which roles and projects we
"choose" to take on? Without an answer to this last
question, some have seen there to be a hidden complicity between the
aesthetic and the ethical, such that the ethical is not really the
advance on the aesthetic that the Judge supposes. And this conception
of the ethical certainly founders against conceptions of the religious
existence-sphere envisaged elsewhere in the authorship. The Judge sees
himself as a religious person, but his religiosity does not seem as
central to his identity as his earthly commitments. Certainly, his
religious faith does not challenge or unsettle his conventional
lifestyle, as would be the case in Kierkegaard's later
descriptions of a religious life that is distinctly and radically
Christian.



Of each of the three existence-spheres, the ethical is perhaps the
hardest to pin down, the meaning of the term shifting across texts. In
both *Either/Or* and *Fear and Trembling* (in the
judgment of most scholars), the ethical is seen primarily as
*Sittlichkeit*: grounded--as for Hegel--in social
requirements and expectations. (That said, there has been considerable
discussion about whether the conception of the ethical in *Fear and
Trembling* is Kantian (e.g., Pojman 1984, Hampson 2013), Fichtean
(Kosch 2006) or Hegelian (e.g., Evans 2004, Walsh 2009, Westphal
2014)). But there is an important difference between the two texts.
Judge William seems mostly oblivious to the possibility that there
could be a need for anything higher than this kind of ethical life.
However, in *Fear and Trembling* Johannes de silentio is
fascinated by the Biblical story of the *akedah*, the binding
of Isaac by Abraham (Genesis 22: 1-18). Abraham is seen as
embodying a life of faith that cannot be reduced to
*Sittlichkeit,* for reasons that we shall see in the next
section.



*Concluding Unscientific Postscript* offers an account of the
ethical life that sees it as the beginning of a kind of
"immanent" religious existence ("Religiousness
A") that is possible for humans apart from any transcendent
revelation. Here the ethical life requires "an absolute relation
to the absolute" that relativizes all earthly commitments,
leading to resignation, suffering, and, ultimately, an encounter with
guilt. Religiousness A, which is distinct from Christianity (what
Climacus calls "Religiousness B") is seen a providing the
"pathos" or inwardness that is necessary for a person to
become a Christian, though even here there is no direct or immediate
transition possible to Christianity as a "transcendent"
form of religious existence.



A price is paid, however, for focusing exclusively on the pseudonymous
works for accounts of Kierkegaard's account of "the
ethical". The most obvious exclusion would be *Works of
Love*, arguably the most important work of Kierkegaard's
mature Christian ethics. But it would also overlook some profound
reflections to be found in the upbuilding discourses on virtues needed
for ethical as well as religious life (such as courage, forgivingness,
gratitude, hope, humility, patience) as well as more unusual spiritual
qualities (such as "joy" [*glaede*]) and, of
course, faith itself. (For an in-depth treatment of
Kierkegaard's account of a number of virtues, see Roberts
2022.)


### 3.3 The Religious and the Life of Faith



While Kierkegaard does not explicitly explore faith, hope and love as
the three theological virtues, all three notions play important roles
in his thought, and can be used to amplify his view of the religious
life.


#### 3.3.1 Faith



Faith is a major theme across Kierkegaard's authorship. It is
the central issue of *Fear and Trembling* (which as noted
explores the nature of faith through an investigation of one of its
key biblical exemplars, Abraham), while in later writings Kierkegaard
explores in various ways the nature of specifically Christian
faith.



Since *Fear and Trembling* is probably the best-known and most
read of Kierkegaard's works, the views of its pseudonymous
author are often taken to be Kierkegaard's own. But since
Johannes de silentio claims to be an outsider to "faith",
and repeatedly tells us he cannot understand Abraham, this is a
dangerous move. Johannes' focus is on the events of Genesis 22,
wherein Abraham receives the shocking command to sacrifice his
long-awaited son Isaac on Mount Moriah. Abraham shows his willingness
to do so over a three-day journey, right up to the binding and drawing
of the knife. Yet at the last minute God sends an angel to prevent the
killing, Abraham instead sacrificing a ram caught by its horns in a
thicket.



This is the exemplar of faith that Johannes struggles to understand.
He tells and retells the story of Abraham in multiple versions, aiming
to get closer to understanding faith by contrasting it with
superficially similar but ultimately different cases of
what-faith-is-not. One development in scholarly interpretation over
the decades has been a shift away from a tendency in some earlier
scholarship to leap instantly to the three Problems in the second part
of the book (what Johannes calls its "dialectical"
sections)--especially the first, as to whether the story of
Abraham contains a "teleological suspension of the
ethical". The importance of paying attention to the earlier
sections of the book is now widely recognized. This includes the early
account, in the section entitled "Attunement" or
"Tuning Up" (*Stemning*), of four different
versions of the Abraham story. We might call them
"sub-Abrahams" (cf. Lippitt 2016). All of them are
prepared to obey God, but each differs in various ways from the
Abraham who is the "father of faith". This should warn us
off readings which suggest that the central message of the
text--and of faith--is simply the importance of being
obedient to God. Another key contrast (in the section entitled
"Preliminary Outpouring from the Heart") is between faith
and "infinite resignation". The "knight of infinite
resignation" has an openness and comprehensibility to Johannes
that the enigmatic "knight of faith" lacks. In a strategy
not uncommon in Kierkegaard's authorship, faith is illustrated
by drawing a parallel with love. Specifically, silentio illustrates
the distinction between faith and infinite resignation through a story
of two different versions of a young lad who falls in love with an
unattainable princess (FT 34ff./SKS 4, 136ff.). Infinite
resignation--the first move in the "double movement"
of faith--involves the renunciation of important goods or
commitments in favor of those considered to be "higher".
This sacrifice, while painful, contains a certain "peace and
rest and consolation" (FT 38/SKS 4, 140). Yet the knight of
faith manages fully to value finite goods (Isaac or the princess) in a
way that his infinite resignation counterpart does not. Commentators
have disagreed on how to interpret this (see, e.g., Mooney 1991, R.
Hall 2000, and Davenport 2008; for a summary, see Lippitt 2016:
59-73). But a key notion seems to be that whereas infinite
resignation is something that I can achieve through my own will, the
knight of faith both recognizes his dependence upon a divine power
beyond himself and trusts in God's promises--even in the
most extraordinary "trial" of the *akedah*--in
a way that appears to an outsider like Johannes as
"absurd". Remarkably, the knight of faith is able to take
a genuine joy in the finite world, receiving it back (in the form of
Isaac or the princess) despite having given it up in
"resignation". Crucial here is the idea that God's
promises are for *this* life, not just an after-life. The true
measure of Abraham's faith is less his willingness to sacrifice
Isaac than his trust and hope that he will "receive him
back"--in this life, not just in eternity.



Each of the three Problems begins with the idea that "the
ethical as such is the universal", a different dimension of
which is brought out in each Problem. Does Abraham's faith
contain a "teleological suspension of the ethical"?
Abraham seems to offend against "the universal" in four
ways, all closely related. First, he makes of himself an exception to
what universality demands (one ought not to kill one's innocent
offspring). This--secondly--amounts to the
"paradox" that the "single individual" stands
higher than the universal. Hegelian concerns about the dangers of
subjectivity--such that *Moralitat* (concerning an
individual's inner will or intention) needs to be subordinated
to *Sittlichkeit* (the customs, norms and institutions of a
rational society)--are relevant here. The problem with Abraham is
that his private relationship to God is given priority over his duties
as a social creature. Thus--third--Abraham stands in a
direct, unmediated relation to God and so--fourth--he cannot
explain his actions in publicly available, shareable language. The
radical privacy of his God-relationship is key to understanding the
difference between the knight of faith and the "tragic
hero", the next on the list of what-faith-is-not. The stories of
Agamemnon, Jepthah and Brutus (FT 50-2/SKS 4, 151-3) each
offers another case of a father feeling the obligation to sacrifice
his own offspring for a cause conceived of as "higher".
The key difference is that each of these can explain himself by giving
a publicly comprehensible account of his actions (such as a military
leader's duties to the state overriding those to his own
family). These explanations are within the realm of the ethical
conceived of as the universal, whereas--according to
Johannes--Abraham has no such explanation available to him. His
faith is a "purely personal virtue" (FT 52/SKS 4, 153) as
opposed to the virtue of *Sittlichkeit* embodied by the tragic
hero. This relationship between the single individual and the
universal is further explored in Problems II and III. The former
focuses on whether our duty to God is absolute; and what that implies
in the case of the kind of direct God-relationship exemplified by
Abraham. The lengthy Problem III, which--focusing on
Abraham's silence--considers whether concealing his purpose
from others (such as his son, wife and servant) was ethically
defensible. Problem III in particular has divided commentators, some
viewing it as somewhat rambling, others as crucially
important--especially those who attribute significance to the
book's motto, and its apparent suggestion that the book may
contain a hidden message not understood by the messenger (Johannes
himself?). For these latter, the story of Agnete and the merman (FT
82ff./SKS 4, 183ff.), with its discussion of sin and
repentance--important themes elsewhere in Kierkegaard's
authorship--has seemed particularly important (e.g., Green 1993,
Mulhall 2001, Krishek 2009; for an overview, see Lippitt 2016:
196-206).



As noted above, what Climacus in the *Postscript* labels
Religiousness A is a religion of immanence that requires no
transcendent revelation. Genuine Christianity, on Kierkegaard's
view, emphatically does rest on such a revelation. Johannes Climacus,
in *Philosophical Fragments,* provides a humorous and ironic
attempt to "invent" something that looks suspiciously like
Christianity. He begins with an account of the Socratic view
(understood very much in terms of Plato's Socrates) of
"the Truth" and how it is obtained, and then seeks an
alternative to the Socratic view that the Truth can be found through
"recollection". The alternative requires a teacher who is
divine, but who out of self-giving love becomes human. (The irony and
humor consist in a mock attempt to "invent" something
whose essence is that it cannot be a human invention.)



*Fragments* offers the first delineation in Kierkegaard's
authorship of the idea that Christian faith is centered on the
incarnation ("the God-man"). The incarnation is claimed to
be the "the Absolute Paradox", and it is variously
described as "a contradiction", or "the most
improbable" (PF 52/ SKS 4, 256) of all things. Although both
Climacus and Kierkegaard, in later writings, insist that the
incarnation must be seen as an historical event, since otherwise we
are "back to Socrates", they reject any attempt to base
faith in the God-man on historical evidence. Rather, faith in the
incarnation is seen as something that is given directly to the
disciple by the God-man, though the encounter (for later generations)
is mediated through historical testimony. (Kierkegaard's
non-evidentialist account of faith can be usefully compared to the
externalist account of faith found in contemporary "Reformed
epistemology" (Evans 2006: 169-182, 183-205)).
Though Kierkegaard does not write about epistemology in a systematic
manner, he writes about knowledge and belief in many places (see Piety
2010 for a good overview of his thoughts on such matters). His views
of moral and religious knowledge can also be compared to the
contemporary development of virtue epistemology, which puts more
emphasis on the character of the knower in the acquisition of
knowledge, in contrast to most modern epistemologies, which have
focused largely on evidence and said little about the traits or
characteristics that might make it possible for a person to grasp the
truth.



Calling the incarnation a "contradiction" has suggested to
some that Kierkegaard is a radical fideist who sees Christian faith as
requiring a rejection of reason by believing what is logically
contradictory, a view applauded by some (e.g., Shestov 1936 [1969]),
and decried by others (e.g., Pojman 1984). However, it is far from
obvious that Kierkegaard saw Christian faith this way. To
Kierkegaard's Danish contemporaries, the term for
"contradiction" (*Modsigelse*) would not have meant
only or even mainly a logical contradiction. Rather, Kierkegaard
frequently uses the term to describe a tension or incongruity. Human
existence itself is described as involving the same
"contradiction" as the incarnation, the synthesizing of
temporality and eternity, and Kierkegaard also says that all humor
focuses on contradictions (by which he clearly means something like
incongruity (Lippitt 2000: 8-11)). Kierkegaard certainly sees
the incarnation as something that human reason cannot understand; as
such it poses "the possibility of offense" for a person
who is unwilling to recognize that there could be truth that
transcends immanent human capacities. However, Kierkegaard also
insists that offense is not more rationally justified than is faith.
Faith and offense are opposite and rival passions, and neither can be
fully justified by reason. (For more on these issues, see Evans
1992.)



In Kierkegaard's later writing, both in signed works and in the
writings of Anti-Climacus, the offense of faith is often described
more in ethical than intellectual terms. In these writings the
barriers to faith are seen as pride and selfishness, since faith in
Christ requires a radical willingness to love the neighbor, a category
which even includes one's enemies.


#### 3.3.2 Love



Scholarship over the last two decades or so has increasingly
recognized the importance and profundity of Kierkegaard's
thought on love (see, e.g., R. Hall 2000, Ferreira 2001, A. Hall 2002,
Evans 2004, Furtak 2005, Krishek 2009, Lippitt 2013a, 2020, Strawser
2015). The question of what it means to love well is one that runs
through many of his writings, pseudonymous and signed. As alluded to
above, *Either/Or* contrasts the aesthetic picture of erotic
love as immediate immersion in the infatuation of "first
love" or hyper-reflective seduction ("love" as a
kind of game) with married love as preserving love in time (living
simultaneously in "hope" and "recollection:"
developing a shared history, properly related to a shared past and a
shared future, and thus making love "historical".) For the
Judge, such love may be made "eternal" by being freely
taken upon as one's duty. Related themes are also explored in
*Stages on Life's Way*. *Fear and Trembling*,
often approached as being about a clash of duties (between
Abraham's duty to his God and ethical duties conceived of in
terms of "the universal"), may just as well be approached
as an apparent clash of loves (for God; for Isaac).



However, Kierkegaard's most significant text on love is the
signed *Works of Love*, a series of fifteen
"deliberations", typically on a key New Testament passage
on love. A central issue in this text is the love that is at stake in
the command to love our neighbors as ourselves. The form of love that
for Kierkegaard is at the root of all true love is
*Kjerlighed*, which in many of its uses can reasonably be
understood as "neighbor-love" and as a form of
*agape*--provided we understand this as a quality that
human beings are capable of manifesting (albeit with a divine source),
not just a quality of God himself. Several deliberations contrast
neighbor-love with forms of "preferential" love (erotic
love [*Elskov*] and friendship). Contrary to what has often
been claimed (e.g., Adorno 1939 [2003], Logstrup 1956 [1997]),
Kierkegaard is not opposed to erotic love and friendship, but
concerned about the risks inherent within them, chiefly the way in
which they may often manifest "selfish" forms of
self-love. The key difference between them and neighbor-love is that
the preferential loves arise "naturally" for humans,
whereas neighbor-love does not. "The neighbor" includes
everyone, and we are to strive to love all--including our
enemies. This is so counter-intuitive to the "natural"
human, Kierkegaard claims, that it needs to be commanded (WL
24-5, SKS 9, 32-3). Furthermore, the duty to love must be
grounded in divine authority; no human authority is sufficient.
Neighbor-love--in which God is the "middle
term"--is often portrayed as a kind of purifying agent,
which is capable of transforming otherwise potentially disordered
kinds of love and preserving "the equality of the eternal"
in love. Precisely how has been a matter of recent scholarly
controversy (for contributions, building on a dispute between Ferreira
2001 and Krishek 2009, see for instance Lippitt 2013a, Davenport 2017,
Hanson 2022). Nevertheless, Kierkegaard stresses that love is still
genuine even when one *needs* to be loved: in this sense, his
conception of love is very different from those who would draw a hard
and fast distinction between, say, *agape* and *eros*
(e.g., Nygren 1930-36 [1953]).



Kierkegaard's focus on the *works* (or deeds) of love is
also key. He does not approach love simply as an occurrent feeling,
but as a "passion", which for him is something like a
powerful basic disposition that can give shape to a whole life,
expressing itself in actions as well as in emotions. Underlying this
passion is a certain way of *seeing*: Kierkegaard's is a
"vision" view of love (Ferreira 2001, esp. 99-116).
Far from being a generalized form of benevolence or compassion,
neighbor-love requires paying attention to the *particular*
neighbor we encounter, seeing the other in all her distinctive
concreteness and specificity, and desiring what is good for that
individual in particular. Relatedly, love has its own epistemic
standards rooted in a certain generosity of spirit, a recognition that
underpins important discussions on how attitudes of trust or mistrust;
hope or despair, can help or hinder our interpretation of ambiguous
evidence about people (cf. the deliberations "Love Believes all
Things--and Yet Is Never Deceived" and "Love Hopes
All Things--and Yet Is Never Put to Shame".) Another
important theme--at the heart of the second love
commandment--is how we should love *ourselves*. The
commandment takes it as a given that we do: like others who have
written on self-love (from Aristotle and Aquinas to Harry Frankfurt),
Kierkegaard is interested in "proper" and
"improper" ways of doing so. To love oneself
properly--in a non-selfish way--is not only allowed but
required. The neighbor, remember, includes everyone--and everyone
includes you. An appropriate kind of hope for and trust in oneself,
plus self- forgiveness, properly understood, may be taken to be
important modes of proper self-love (Lippitt 2013a: 136-80).


#### 3.3.3 Hope and Other Virtues



Despair--discussed in
 SS2,
 SS3.1, and
 SS3.2
 above--has long been recognized as a key Kierkegaardian theme.
Along with anxiety, it remains one of Kierkegaard's key
psychological-religious concepts. Hope--which Kierkegaard most
commonly discusses under the name of "expectancy"
(*Forventning*)--may be seen as despair's
antithesis. Indeed, it has been argued that despair is at root the
unwillingness to hope, and that hope is essential to the task of
becoming a self (Bernier 2015, cf. Lippitt 2015a). On such a view,
faith contrasts with despair because faith includes a willingness to
hope.



In the discourse literature, Kierkegaard explores the structure of
various other virtues of the ethical
and--particularly--religious life. Aside from extensive
discussions of faith and love, he also explores hope, courage,
humility, patience, honesty, gratitude and meekness
(*Sagtmodighed*), amongst others. There are also extensive
discussions of such qualities as joy and contrition, and peculiarly
Kierkegaardian qualities such as (spiritual) sobriety and
"earnestness" (*Alvor*). The philosophical task of
unpacking these qualities is almost always in the service of the role
they play in the religious or specifically Christian life. While
Kierkegaard's approach to these qualities is often not
explicitly to talk of them as virtues (perhaps because of the negative
resonances of talk of "virtue" in his native Lutheran
tradition--but see Vos 2020), it makes sense to do so given that
each may be thought of as contributing to the formation of character.
Broadly in line with the classical tradition, he typically sees each
such quality as involving certain ways of thinking, feeling and seeing
correctly. One significant difference with the classical Greek
tradition, however, is that Kierkegaard holds, along with many other
Christian thinkers, that some of these human excellences cannot be
achieved merely through human willing but require divine grace and
assistance. There is a growing recognition of Kierkegaard as being a
largely untapped source of insight into understanding the role of
numerous virtues in the task of allowing oneself to be "built
up". (See, e.g., Lippitt 2020, Roberts 2022: for a contrary
view, skeptical about associating Kierkegaard with the virtue
tradition, see Walsh 2018.)



Kierkegaard's theological concerns often influence what he says
about human character. One example illustrating this is his view of
forgiveness. While forgiveness is not (unlike say anxiety or despair)
a topic to which he devotes an entire book, it is a theme that emerges
in many places in the authorship. Although Kierkegaard's
interest seems to be in what it means to be a *forgiving
person* (an aspect of what it means to be a *loving*
person), the primary lens through which he views forgiveness is the
divine forgiveness of sins. This means that he is as interested in the
difficulty of our *accepting* forgiveness as the difficulty of
our being able to forgive. To accept forgiveness requires
"sin-consciousness:" an awareness of oneself as being in
the wrong. For Kierkegaard, this is extremely difficult for such
prideful creatures as we are. The capacity to forgive sin *per
se* (as opposed to individual wrongs) is the "chasmal
qualitative abyss" (SUD 122/SKS 11, 233) between God and
humanity. The refusal of God's forgiveness is itself a
manifestation of pride, rooted in a misguided sense of our
self-sufficiency and a failure to recognize our radical dependency. In
*The Sickness Unto Death*, Anti-Climacus claims that the
despair of the forgiveness of sins is itself a sin
("offense",) which can only be transcended in faith. This
theological background plays an important role in what Kierkegaard
goes on to claim about self-forgiveness and interpersonal forgiveness
(such as the need to avoid such vices as pride and self-righteousness,
and the need to cultivate "before God" such capacities as
generosity of spirit, humility and hope). His fundamental approach to
these forms of human forgiveness, as well as the divine forgiveness in
which they have their origins, is to explore them as "works of
love" (see Lippitt 2020).


## 4. Trajectories in Kierkegaard Scholarship



The vast range of Kierkegaard's influences makes the task of
summarizing the most important secondary literature close to
impossible. For the literature selected would depend upon which
approaches to Kierkegaard the author finds most fruitful. In this
section, we aim to sketch some key trajectories of interpretation,
giving sample references of each kind of approach.



One axis along which Kierkegaard commentators may be divided is
between those for whom the primary task in understanding Kierkegaard
involves locating him accurately in his historical context (e.g.,
understanding his complex relationship to German idealism and
romanticism, and to contemporaries such as the Danish Hegelian Hans
Lassen Martensen), and those for whom Kierkegaard is interesting
primarily because of the ability his texts have to contribute to
issues of more recent or contemporary interest (philosophical;
theological; literary; social or political; etc.). An excellent
example of the former approach would be much of the work of Jon
Stewart. For many years, Niels Thulstrup's
*Kierkegaard's Relation to Hegel* (1967 [1980]) was
thought to have decisively shown that Kierkegaard took little from
Hegel. However, Stewart's *Kierkegaard's Relations to
Hegel Reconsidered* (2003)--note the plural in the
title--argues convincingly that many of the targets Kierkegaard
had in mind in his attacks on Hegelianism were Danish followers of
Hegel who may have misunderstood or misapplied Hegel in significant
ways. Thus, Kierkegaard's relation to Hegel is much more complex
and nuanced than has sometimes been thought. Stewart aims to show that
Kierkegaard was responding specifically to debates in 1830s and 1840s
Denmark about Hegel's philosophy (especially its significance
for theology), a *milieu* in which Martensen was a crucial
figure.



This does not mean, nor does Stewart claim, that there are no
disagreements between Kierkegaard and Hegel. Stewart divides the
Kierkegaard corpus into three main periods: up to and including
*Either/Or* (where Kierkegaard is most open to Hegel's
philosophy); from *Fear and Trembling* to the
*Postscript* (where the attacks on "Hegelianism"
are most pronounced and polemical); and *Works of Love*
onwards, where the waning of Hegel's influence in Denmark means
that Kierkegaard's criticism diminishes. Here a certain positive
influence of Hegel re-emerges, for example in the method of *The
Sickness Unto Death*.



Critics have disagreed as to whether Stewart's analysis closes
the gap between Kierkegaard and Hegel excessively, for instance
regarding the two figures' different views of the relationship
between philosophy and religion. One central issue concerns the proper
attitude of the philosopher. As we have noted, Kierkegaard opposes a
kind of disengaged "objective" standpoint, while Hegel at
least in some places maintains that such an attitude is necessary for
philosophy to be "scientific". Hegel famously claims that
"philosophy should beware of the wish to be edifying"
(Hegel 1977: 6; originally published 1807), which seems directly
contrary to the Kierkegaardian claim at the end of *Either/Or
II:* "Only the truth that edifies is truth for you"
(EO II, 354, translation modified/ SKS 3,331). Another point of
tension is the Hegelian aim to produce a "system"
encompassing the whole of reality, whereas Kierkegaard's
pseudonym Johannes Climacus insists that a system of existence is
impossible for anyone but God (CUP I, 118-125/SKS 7, 114
-120).



Stewart later went on to become general editor of a monumental series:
*Kierkegaard Research: Sources, Reception, and Resources,*
which includes a huge amount of work of this historically oriented
type (amongst others). Michelle Kosch's work on Kierkegaard in
relation to German idealism (Kosch 2006) is another exemplary instance
of historically oriented work, while Fred Rush's book on
Kierkegaard in relation to romanticism (esp. Schlegel) and idealism
(esp. Hegel) also provides helpful historical context (Rush 2016).



Examples of the less historically oriented type of Kierkegaard
scholarship are highly varied. Some have looked to Kierkegaard as a
kind of proto-Derrida, a deconstructionist *avant la lettre*
(e.g., Poole 1993; for an overview of deconstructionist and
postmodernist readings of Kierkegaard which does not conflate the two,
see Shakespeare 2013). Similarly, the question has been raised as to
whether Kierkegaard can plausibly be read as a proto-phenomenologist
despite preceding Husserl (e.g., Hanson 2010; see also Welz 2013).
Others have seen some intriguing commonalities between Kierkegaard and
Wittgenstein, either the *Tractatus* or later writings,
sometimes focusing on the ostensibly narrow but (it is claimed)
ultimately deeply significant question of how we should read the
"revocation" of the *Postscript*, and what this
reveals about the proper method of philosophy with regard to religious
questions (e.g., Cavell 1969; Conant 1989, 1993, 1995; Lippitt &
Hutto 1998; Phillips 1999; Mulhall 2001; Schonbaumsfeld 2007).
MacIntyre's claims about Kierkegaard's proper place in the
history of philosophy--allegedly, as a critical figure in the
failure of the Enlightenment's attempt to offer a rational
justification of morality--spawned a veritable scholarly
sub-industry, not only aiming to show where MacIntyre was wrong in his
interpretation of Kierkegaard, but of how Kierkegaard in fact
anticipated many highly MacIntyrean themes. As noted above, a central
focus of debate has been whether Kierkegaard may be read--like
MacIntyre--as a proponent of a narrative-based account of
practical identity, where a "narrative structure" is
needed to make a human life intelligible, actions and intentions
needing to be located in a temporal, social and teleological context
in order to be understood. However, this may be seen as part of a
broader school of interpretation, which finds some intriguing
parallels between Kierkegaard and several major recent anglophone
moral philosophers. Besides MacIntyre, these would include Harry
Frankfurt (see, e.g., Mooney 1996, esp. 65-76 and the essays in
Rudd and Davenport 2015); Iris Murdoch (e.g., Martens 2012); Charles
Taylor (e.g., Khan 2012) and Bernard Williams (e.g., Mooney 1996, esp.
65-76, Compaijen 2018). The shift in moral philosophy during the
later decades of the twentieth century and into the
twenty-first--from mid-1900s concerns about the nature of ethical
language and debates about realism versus anti-realism in ethics, to
broader concerns about what makes human lives meaningful, the nature
of human flourishing, and the moral psychology of the
virtues--has been seen by many Kierkegaard scholars as a move
(albeit mostly an unwitting one) in the direction of more
"Kierkegaardian" concerns. Within this school of
interpretation, some key claims have been that Kierkegaard holds a
teleological view of the self; a belief that the quest for
"narrative unity" is an important element in achieving
ethical selfhood; and a rich view of the virtues (Davenport and Rudd
2001; Davenport 2012; Rudd 2012). Even skeptics about the second view
(e.g., Lippitt 2007, 2015b) have tended to agree on the first and
third.



Another major fault line in Kierkegaard scholarship concerns the
divide between scholars who take Kierkegaard's Christian
commitments seriously and those who find them something of an
embarrassment, and whose approach to the texts seems to be to ask what
can be salvaged despite these commitments. The former approach is
exemplified in much of the work of Evans (1983, 1992, 2009, 2019),
which has consistently tried to show that Kierkegaard's writings
can be helpful in making sense of the religious life in general and
Christianity in particular. The latter type of work has sometimes
taken the form of reading Kierkegaard "against
Kierkegaard" (e.g., Adorno 1933 [1989], Theunissen 1993 [2005]).
Finally, quite a bit of work has also been done on Kierkegaard's
view of women and gender (see for instance Walsh 2022.)


## 5. Conclusion



Kierkegaard is a beguiling but frustrating thinker, full of
provocations and insights but also difficult to nail down. He has thus
been interpreted in many--often incompatible--ways, and this
is likely to continue to be so. Much of his thought remains highly
relevant to our day, including his critique of mass society and
conformism, and his attempt to show emotions and passions as essential
elements of authentic human life. In his writings on ethical and
religious life, he tries to show that a disengaged, objective stance,
far from facilitating knowledge, is a barrier to knowing the truth.
His perspective on religion and society is likely to elicit objections
from opposite sides of the contemporary political spectrum, since he
sharply criticizes "Christendom", including contemporary
versions of Christian nationalism (see, e.g., Backhouse 2011), while
also rejecting the claim of some liberals that religion should be
excluded from our common life, which requires a supposedly neutral,
disengaged stance that Kierkegaard sees as neither possible nor
desirable. If the
"analytic"--"continental" distinction
still has any value, then Kierkegaard has appealed to philosophers on
both sides, sometimes providing fine conceptual analyses yet also
doing philosophy in a highly literary mode. He himself can be seen as
"that individual" to whom he dedicated many of his works,
a writer who succeeded in his goal of communicating
"indirectly", in a manner that demands
"subjective" engagement if his work is to be read to
maximum advantage.


## Chronology of Kierkegaard's Works



1838

* *From the Papers of One Still Living. Published against his
Will by S. Kierkegaard* (*Af en endnu Levendes
Papirer*)

 
1841

* *On the Concept of Irony with Continual Reference to
Socrates* (*Om Begrebet Ironi med stadigt Hensyn til
Socrates*)


Kierkegaard's *Magister* dissertation.

 
1843

* *Either-Or: A Fragment of Life* edited by Victor Eremita
(*Enten-Eller. Et Livs-Fragment*)
* *Two Upbuilding Discourses* by S. Kierkegaard (*To
opbyggelige Taler*)
* *Fear and Trembling: A Dialectical Lyric* by Johannes de
silentio (*Frygt og Boeven. Dialektisk Lyrik*)
* *Repetition: A Venture in Experimenting Psychology* by
Constantine Constantius (*Gjentagelsen. Et Forsog i den
experimenterende Psychologi*)


Published the same day as *Fear and Trembling*.
* *Three Upbuilding Discourses* by S. Kierkegaard (*Tre
opbyggelige Taler*)
* *Four Upbuilding Discourses* by S. Kierkegaard (*Fire
opbyggelige Taler)*

 
1844

* *Two Upbuilding Discourses* by S. Kierkegaard (*To
opbyggelige Taler*)
* *Three Upbuilding Discourses* by S. Kierkegaard (*Tre
opbyggelige Taler*)
* *Philosophical Fragments or a Fragment of Philosophy* by
Johannes Climacus, published by S. Kierkegaard (*Philosophiske
Smuler eller En Smule Philosophie*)
* *The Concept of Anxiety: A Simple Psychologically-Oriented
Reflection on the Dogmatic Problem of Original Sin* by Vigilius
Haufniensis (*Begrebet Angest. En simpel psychologisk-paapegende
Overveielse i Retning of det dogmatiske Problem om
Arvesynden*)
* *Prefaces: Light Reading for Certain Classes as the Occasion
may Require* by Nicolaus Notabene (*Forord.
Morskabsloesning for enkelte Stoender efter Tid og
Lejlighed*)


Published on the same day as *The Concept of Anxiety*.
* *Four Edifying Discourses* by S. Kierkegaard (*Fire
opbyggelige Taler*)

 
1845

* *Three Discourses on Imagined Occasions* by S. Kierkegaard
(*Tre Taler ved toenkte Leiligheder)*
* *Stages On Life's Way: Studies by Various Persons,
compiled, forwarded to the press, and published by Hilarius
Bookbinder* (*Stadier paa Livets Vej. Studier af
Forskjellige*)
* *Eighteen Upbuilding Discourses by S. Kierkegaard*

A collection of the above-mentioned *Upbuilding Discourses*
from 1843 and 1844.
* Article in *The Fatherland* (*Foedrelandet)* in
which Frater Taciturnus (a character from *Stages on Life's
Way*) asked to be attacked in *The Corsair*

 
1846

* *Concluding Unscientific Postscript to Philosophical Fragments:
A Mimetic-Pathetic-Dialectical Compilation, An Existential
Contribution, by Johannes Climacus, published by S. Kierkegaard
*(Affslutende Uvidenskabelig Efterskrift til de philosophiske
Smuler)**
* *A Literary Review*: "Two Ages"--novella
by the author of "An Everyday Story"--reviewed by S.
Kierkegaard (*En literair Anmeldelse*)

 
1847

* *Upbuilding *Discourses in Various Spirits by S.
Kierkegaard** (*Opbyggelige Taler i forskjellig
Aand*)
* *Works of Love: Some Christian Reflections in the Form of
Discourses by S. Kierkegaard* (*Kjerlighedens Gjerninger. Nogle
christelige Overveielser i Talers Form*)

 
1848

* *Christian Discourses* by S. Kierkegaard (*Christelige
Taler*)
* *The Crisis and a Crisis in the Life of an Actress by Inter et
Inter* (*Krisen og en Krise i en Skuespillerindes
Liv*)
* *The Point of View for my Work as an Author: A Direct
Communication, A Report to History* by S. Kierkegaard
(*Synspunktet for min Forfatter-Virksomhed. En ligefrem Meddelelse,
Rapport til Historien*)


Published posthumously.

 
1849

* Second edition of *Either-Or*
* *The Lilies of the Field and the Birds of the Air: Three
devotional discourses* by S. Kierkegaard (*Lilien paa Marken og
Fuglen under Himlen. Tre gudelige Taler*)
* *Two Ethico-Religious Treatises* by H.H. (*Tvende
ethisk-religieuse Smaa-Afhandlinger*)
* *The Sickness Unto Death: A Christian psychological exposition
for edification and awakening* by Anti-Climacus, published by S.
Kierkegaard (*Sygdommen til Doden. En christelig
psychologisk Udvikling til Opvoekkelse*)
* *"The High Priest"--"The Tax
Collector"--and "The Woman who was a Sinner":
three addresses at Holy Communion on Fridays* by S. Kierkegaard
*("Yppersteproesten"--"Tolderen"--"Synderinden",
tre Taler ved Altergangen om Fredagen*)

 
1850

* *Practice in Christianity* by Anti-Climacus, published by
S. Kierkegaard (*Indovelse i Christendom*)
* *An Upbuilding Discourse* by S. Kierkegaard (*En
opbyggelig Tale*)

 
1851

* *On My Work as an Author* by S. Kierkegaard (*Om min
Forfatter-Virksomhed*)
* *Two Discourses at the Communion on Fridays* by S.
Kierkegaard (*To Taler ved Altergangen om Fredagen*)
* *For Self-Examination* Recommended to the contemporary age
by S. Kierkegaard (*Til Selvprovelse*)
* *Judge For Yourselves!* Recommended to the contemporary age
for Self-Examination. Second series, by S. Kierkegaard
(*Dommer Selv!*)


Published posthumously.

 
1854

* "Was Bishop Mynster 'a witness to the truth,'
one of 'the true witnesses to the truth'--*is this
the truth?*" by S. Kierkegaard in *Foedrelandet*
("Var Biskop Mynster et 'Sandhedsvidne', et af
'de rette Sandhedsvidner', *er dette
Sandhed?*")


The first of 21 articles in *Foedrelandet*.

 
1855

* *This Must Be Said, So Let It Be Said,* by S. Kierkegaard
(*Dette skal siges; saa voere det da sagt*)


Newspaper article.
* *The Moment* by S. Kierkegaard
(*Ojeblikket*)
* *Christ's Judgement on Official Christianity* by S.
Kierkegaard (*Hvad Christus dommer om officiel
Christendom*)
* *The Changelessness of God: A Discourse* by S. Kierkegaard
(*Guds Uforanderlighed. En Tale*)