CHAPTER 2
THE THREE STAGES
2.0 Introduction
In this chapter we shall see how Sǿren Kierkegaard conceives life as a journey through three stages, i.e., aesthetic, ethical and religious. This concept is very important in the study of Kierkegaard because this is the basic idea in his philosophy of religion.
This chapter forms the main part of my paper, because herein, I make an attempt to put together Kierkegaard’s whole idea with regard to religion. As we proceed with it, we will discover that Kierkegaard conceives human life not as a gradual evolution but as an ascent through three well defined stages. Between aesthetic and ethical stage is
irony and between ethical and religious stage is
humour. These are the two sub-stages. He says, “We are meant to mount up from level to level till we come at last face to face with God.”
However, he also mentions that we need not compulsorily go through all the three stages of life, which means, there are some who may not go through all the three stages.
2.1 The Aesthetic Stage
The aesthetic stage is mentioned as the first stage of one’s life by Kierkegaard in his book
Either/
or. This stage does not refer merely to sensuality but the art of deriving maximum amount of pleasure from experience. In this stage, a person is deeply involved in the “world of immediacy.”
It is said that “the person whose relation to existence is defined by immediacy is seldom deeply committed to anything in life, for when they lose interest in something or see a more attractive alternative, they simply change direction.”
Some of the indications of an aesthetic life-style are like, “ self-indulgent beer-drinking, cigarette-smoking ‘couch potato’ who sits in front of the ‘box’ every evening watching football after his regular night out with the ‘lads’ at the local pub.”
We may call it a form of hedonism. Kierkegaard is quite clear that one is always free either to choose it or to reject it. The supreme pleasure that one may mention at this stage is that of deceiving the deceiver. It refers to taking complete advantage of the other person without any feeling for that person. Here he mentions of a girl who is taken advantage of and used as an object and not cared for afterwards.
For a man in aesthetic stage using others as means just for personal satisfaction is perfectly justified. For him, the art of life is said to consist in seeing a woman as an object and using her without falling a victim to her beauty. In this case, falling a victim refers to consenting to marriage. The philosophy of an aesthete is, “If you marry you will repent and if you don’t you will regret still.”
This implies that one should do only those things that will give maximum pleasure and that one should never stick to one thing even when it comes to friends. Here we see that an aesthete seeks for maximum amount of pleasure without any responsibility. The aesthete’s aim in life is to enjoy as much as he can, and leave the past enjoyments once it seems no longer significant. An aesthete lives “always in the moment and in its fleeting pleasures and satisfactions.”
In this stage of life there is no room for ethics and morality rather, a complete hedonism. It is said, “when a man proposes to view the world simply as a spectacle in which he is not involved, it is essentially an aesthetic attitude that is being adopted.”
An aesthete always tries to remain “in the moment of pleasure and to forget all continuity and personal involvement in his life.”
Towards the end of the aesthetic stage, Kierkegaard says, “All efforts to make reality minister to hedonistic appetites are self-defeating in the end. The worldly pleasures appear very attractive but no sooner you go close, it disappears and something else appears.”
He also says that the only thing which waits on life after the aesthetic stage is boredom. When one has tried all tricks possible to satisfy oneself physically and found only misery instead, the moment of
irony comes in. In this sub-stage of
irony the person no longer remains in the “tossing sea of immediate experience, rather he has won safely to the land and looks back with mingled contempt and pride on what he has escaped.”
Again he continues thus, “The hurricane of criticism makes the structure typical of aesthetic stage no longer habitable. It offers no more secure abode but it does leave the ground clear for conscience to build on.”
Though the aesthetic stage seems very fashionable and pleasing to a common man it has also lot of drawbacks. This is the reason why Kierkegaard proposes the next stage in life’s journey, i.e., the ethical stage. Thus, after experiencing the hollowness of aesthetic stage, the aesthete longs for a meaningful existence and moves on to a higher level of ethical existence.
2.2 The Ethical Stage
Is there any possibility of getting out of the aesthetic stage? The answer to this question is the ‘Ethical stage.’ In the aesthetic stage, one is caught up doing lot of things to derive pleasure and one lands up desolate, hated and cursed by all. At this stage of life one may ask: But what can one possibly do at this situation? The best thing to do would be (as proposed by Kierkegaard) to “accept oneself for what one is forsaken, hated and desolate yet a king.”
For, to make choices in one’s life gives one a tremendous amount of self-confidence and this is what exactly happens at the ethical stage. At this stage of life, man who is able to choose no matter what the circumstances are, “becomes himself.”
It is indeed a great thing to be oneself. In the ethical existence, the “individual’s inner world becomes of greater importance than his outer existence.”
Ability to make one’s decision is indeed something immense and Kierkegaard himself says, “To decide is to take one’s life into one’s hands and to be master of oneself. The courage to take risks and to grapple with one’s destiny is basic to higher achievements.”
The practice of moral choices in life, such as, duty and responsibility are the common characteristic of this new phase of life. “Thus to commit oneself now becomes a positive duty and marriage no longer a cause for regret rather a decision by which one is able to share one’s love in the deepest way with one’s partner.”
At this stage, “the ethical man abandons the attitude of the spectator and starts making commitments.”
A truly ethical person has a “highly rational approach to reality and believes in the necessity of self-denial”
for the purpose of upholding common good. At this juncture, one may question, what is the basis of all these changes? Of course, personal effort contributes a lot but Kierkegaard would say, “The metaphysical basis of this ethics is the result of the identification of individual with the absolute, that is, God. It is pride which prompts a man to isolate oneself from his fellow human beings and makes him seek solely for his personal benefits and pleasures.”
Therefore identifying oneself with God is basic to ethical stage.
Here Kierkegaard brings in another important point, i.e., as far as one has sinned, one cannot be transparent to the Absolute, therefore one needs to repent. There must be repentance between man and his maker, but as we see, repentance is beyond ethical stage; it is something higher. Kierkegaard is of the opinion that repentance alone builds the broken relationship back with God, which means to reach God we need to go even beyond ethical stage. When we repent, the sub-stage of humour fills the person. “It is not yet religious, but close to it, because it achieves a deliverance from strain of defeat and present struggle of something which is to rob these of their significance.”
Humour somehow shows us the pettiness of past life and enables us to forgive ourselves because our faults are seen to be trifles. It is similar to
irony but warmer and more personal than
irony.
Irony preserves one’s own ego in superiority and looks with indifference on the faults around.
Irony comes between aesthetic and religious stage. We may thus agree with Allen, “
Humour helps us shake off our burden and go our way rejoicing. It brings reconciliation and helps us forgive ourselves.
Humour smiles but at its heart there is something like a secret pain.”
2.3 The Religious Stage
Kierkegaard holds that “human life comes fully to itself when the individual stands alone before his God.”
In several essays, Kierkegaard, through his pseudonym characters, presents an exposition of ethical stage with some religious background. But we may ask: “Why does a life lived on the aesthetic plane lead only to despair? According to Kierkegaard, man has in him something else which cannot be satisfied by life of the senses. This something else is the Eternal.”
He also makes mention of higher forms of life than that of ethical. He speaks of experiences heavily weighted with sorrow that make individual exception from ‘individual’ and ‘universal,’ which he calls
religious stage. He also states that “the man who has felt the dread within him, yet obstinately persists in an existence in the sphere of the senses is doomed to despair.”
He is so categorical in his emphasis on the issue of the religious existence that he goes on to assert, “If men had forgotten what it means to exist religiously, they had doubtless also forgotten what it means to exist as human beings.”
In this section of the chapter, we shall see what Kierkegaard writes about religious stage in two of his important books, i.e.,
Fear and Trembling and
Repetition.
2.3.1 Fear and Trembling
In his book
Fear and Trembling, Kierkegaard mentions of collision between ethical and religious moods of life, a collision which produces sense of religious fear and trembling. In
Fear and Trembling, Kierkegaard brings in the biblical story of Abraham and Isaac to explain his ideas about the religious stage. In the biblical story of Abraham and Isaac, we read how God demands that Abraham should sacrifice his only son. This event brings Abraham into a collision between ethical on one side and obedience to God’s command on the other. Ethically, it is murder but religiously it is sacrifice. It is from this contradiction that fear arises. Here we find Abraham, “though filled with a great love for his child, was prepared, nevertheless, to suspend temporarily the requirements of ethics and to slay his offspring, because he believed it to be required of him by his personal relationship to God.”
We observe that Abraham’s obedience was an act of total surrender. However, we can somehow guess that he also believed God would give Isaac back to him by restoring him to life. Therefore, “Abraham’s faith was not directed toward a blessing to be gained in the life beyond but to a blessing which was immediate.”
In Abraham’s obedience to God’s call, we see how he takes a leap of infinite resignation, wherein he completely surrenders his will to God. Not only that, he also goes further to the level of faith wherein he trusts God’s goodness unconditionally. In Abraham, we see “a religious man par excellence and a fine example of how great is the distance separating the ethical sphere from the religious sphere.”
The movement of faith may be termed as the positive movement because it is by faith that Abraham regained Isaac. But Kierkegaard says, “Faith and infinite resignation belong to the world of the inward, they do not have outward characterization.”
This is the reason why we cannot know who exactly is the man of faith. Physically, the man of faith looks like any other man and indeed he has same feelings as any other man. Thus, finite things, (i.e., the worldly pleasures) are not renounced by the man of faith because he does not like them, but he sacrifices them for the sake of God in spite of his attachments to them. We may therefore note that breaking away from the temporal is always associated with suffering. Here we see that a man who has reached a religious stage makes two movements, that is, the ‘infinite resignation’ and the ‘movement of faith’. This is technically termed as ‘infinite double movement’ by Kierkegaard.
In the ‘infinite resignation,’ a man breaks with the temporal. It is a movement which brings peace and rest but in itself does not constitute faith; it precedes faith. The “Stage of infinite resignation according to Kierkegaard is the last stage prior to faith and without which faith cannot be reached.”
In other words, resignation is required to arrive at faith.
In the case of Abraham, he resigns his life and reconciles himself to the pain and it is then that miracle happens. He also goes on further, i.e., he believes that by virtue of the ‘absurd’ that he would get back what he surrendered, for God can do all things. He recognizes the impossibility and yet believes the ‘absurd.’ This may be termed as the ‘paradox of life and existence’ in the words of Kierkegaard. Sometimes faith and resignation seem similar but they are not, because for an act of resignation faith is not required, but through resignation one gains one’s eternal consciousness. “The knight of faith contrarily to the knight of infinite resignation is willing to lose his reason, or rather let go of it, for faith begins where thinking leaves off.”
In resignation, one makes renunciation of everything and this movement is made by the individual alone. By faith, one makes renunciation of nothing but one is said to acquire everything. It may be noted that “by faith Abraham did not renounce his claim upon Isaac, but by faith he got it.”
Resignation can be compared to the Biblical phrase, ‘dying to the world’. We may then apprehend that movement of infinite resignation and that of faith is reached through reflection. But Kierkegaard asserts that “no reflection can bring about these movements, they require leap in existence…”
He held that in life every movement which brings about a real change consists in a ‘leap’ or an ‘act of freedom.’
According to Kierkegaard, “The ethical as such is universal and applies to every individual. The ethical task of the individual is to realize the universal.”
As soon as an individual tries to go against the universal he sins and lot of ethical problems arise. In spite of the fact that he gives lot of importance to universal or the ethical, he leaves some space for exceptions. In the subsequent discussions, we will see how he speaks of ‘teleological
suspension of the ethical’ and ‘absolute duty towards God.’
2.3.1.1 Teleological Suspension of the Ethical
Here a question can be asked if teleological suspension of the ethical is really possible. In other words, can we neglect our ethical duty which is universal and do just the contrary if God wants it to be done? In the case of Abraham, we see that ethics is suspended. We all are aware that killing is unethical but Abraham is told to do something unethical. Of course, in some exceptional cases it seems to be justified, for instance, in the legendary story of Agamemnon, he sacrifices his daughter for the good of the state. But in the case of Abraham, we observe that there is no relation to the universal or the common good or any group of people or race. It is purely private affair and an act entirely contrary to the universal ethical code of conduct, yet his action is identified with God’s will. At this point, Kierkegaard very interestingly mentions that one has religious experience through these paradoxes of life. He says:
In this contradiction lie the religious horror, dread and distress. But when the ethical is suspended as in the case of Abraham and the individual exists over against the universal, how does he then exists? Abraham believed that he moved in the sphere of the paradox. He had been confronted with a religious reality superior to all the demands of human ethics. If this is not the case his action becomes murder. The question here is not whether an individual shall act against his conscience or not, but whether there is an inward value or something that is deeper and more real than the ethical categories of our cultural life.
Kierkegaard considers faith as the “greatest passion of the soul.”
In the story of Abraham, we realize that Abraham’s relationship with God was of a private nature that is it was not connected with community, state, humanity and tradition. But we see here that “because of his absolute relationship to God the ethical consciousness with its obligation to the universal requirements was suspended in favor of religious consciousness.”
This is what Kierkegaard means when he says that the individual has become higher than the universal. Faith is said to consist in this paradox, that is, “particular is higher than the universal ethical maxims.”
2.3.1.2 Absolute Duty towards God
Another problem we face in Kierkegaard’s book,
Fear and Trembling is, “Is there such a thing as an absolute duty towards God?”
Actually speaking, the ethical is the universal and as such the divine. This is what Kierkegaard himself held in the early part of his life. Normally, it is considered that duty as such becomes divine when referred to God and, in this sense, duty toward neighbour becomes duty towards God. But this does not mean that there is no duty towards God, because then God would be invisible and an un-important thought.
Kierkegaard further says that “the paradox of faith is that the individual determines his relationship to the universal by his relationship to God,”
as seen in the case of Abraham. It is quite clear that “the man of faith is not ignorant of the universal (ethical), he knows it as his home and abiding place, but he also knows that when he travels a solitary path and where because of his absolute relationship with God the man of faith cannot make himself intelligible to others.”
The distress and the dread that the man of faith experiences in this paradox of faith actually arises from the fact that, humanly speaking, he is entirely unable to make himself understood by the common people. “Kierkegaard greatly emphasizes the deep pain that a man of faith must endure throughout his ordeal of resignation.”
Kierkegaard himself notes that “in the ‘paradox of faith’ one individual cannot make himself understood by another even though both are in the very same circumstances.”
Thus, in the religious stage, one is obliged to rely upon oneself alone. Indeed, the man of faith feels pain for not being able to make understood by others, but at the same time he does not desire to guide others because he is a witness and not a teacher. He does not intend to teach others because he believes that “what is truly great is equally accessible to all,”
for faith is something that is absolute relationship, which no man can teach another.
For Kierkegaard, faith is not objective knowledge but a subjective attitude. Therefore, ‘paradox of faith’ consists precisely in this, “that there is an inwardness which is incommensurable with the outward.”
Here we may also note that there is a close relationship between aesthetic and the religious stage. In this is the relationship, the secrecy which was regarded as harmful in marriage now becomes part of the individual’s inner religious life.
2.3.1.3 Concealment
There is yet another problem here. The question that may be asked here is, “Was Abraham ethically justified in concealing his purpose from Sarah, Eleazar and Isaac?”
Some say, ethical needs manifestation, but we see Abraham silent. He could not reveal it to anyone because even his nearest would not understand him. His concealment was due to absolute relationship with God. The distress and the anguish of the paradox constituted in the silence.
In our daily life, we realize that ethics do not solve all the problems. We are aware of the fact that “when the individual by his guilt has gone outside the universal he can return to it only by virtue of having come as the individual into an absolute.”
It is said that “as soon as sin makes its appearance ethics comes to grief precisely upon repentance; for repentance is the highest ethical expression, but precisely as such it is the deepest ethical self-contradiction.”
We are also aware that repentance recognizes the presence of sin and that the ethical has been broken or violated. By his sin the individual has placed himself beyond the ethical. For him to restore his own innocence is ethically unattainable. Repentance is no paradox but where it leaves off paradox begins. Here Kierkegaard mentions that if by repentance one can continue in loving relationship with God then it is man who does everything for his salvation. Precisely it is for this reason that “he who believes the atonement is greater than the one who repents most deeply.”
This is what religious position of Kierkegaard means.
Kierkegaard points out that the method of reaching the ethical restoration by despair alone is impossible. When one despairs, one can indeed by oneself despair of everything, but when one does it one cannot by oneself come back. “It is at this moment of decision that individual needs divine assistance.”
Kierkegaard gives us three categories of religiosity. The first one is based purely on the ethical experience of God, i.e., God is the universal background to one’s life and one accepts one’s duty as from God. His relationship to God is never private relationship rather universal to all men. In the second category, he mentions of how some sin of the past prevents one from entering into a positive relationship to life. A deeper penetration to one’s personal life is necessary in order to restore relationship with Absolute. Here, we see infinite double movement taking place: it is of infinite resignation and movement of faith. The religious or absolute is found in an area where power of understanding ceases. In the third category, we have the case of Abraham. Here he is regarded as righteous, without sin. Hence there is no room for repentance. The break with the ethical is not to be understood in that sense. Both his reason and feelings are in conflict, his feelings with the “downward movement of resignation and his reason with the upward movement of faith.”
The downward movement is the teleological suspension of the ethical. Both movements together are infinite double movement.
Kierkegaard views all men as idolaters and that passion of the soul is centered in desire. Desire, he assumes, has absolute reign over personality, which God alone should have. Therefore, we need to dethrone the man’s presumed ethical existence and establish fear of God as absolute sovereign. Therefore, he proposes ‘infinite double movement.’ The personality which has been penetrated by sin because God is not acknowledged as absolute sovereign cannot be restored to spiritual health except by the ‘infinite double movement.’
2.3.2 Repetition
Repetition, published on the same day as
Fear and Trembling, presents religious problem from a new perspective. We may note that “Repetition properly so called is recollected forwards, therefore, repetition, if it is possible, makes a man happy, whereas recollection makes him unhappy.”
The teleological suspension of the ethical is here psychologically aggravated. In fact, this work of Kierkegaard may be regarded as an essay in experimental psychology. “Here an aesthecist seeks to clarify if repetition of a previous immediate explanation is possible. But realizes that there is no such thing as repetition.”
In
Repetition, a mention is made of a young man who is unhappy in love. He is engaged to a young girl whom he loves deeply but after engagement he realizes that marriage will make neither of them happy. Kierkegaard himself writes in one of his journals “that he would become unhappy was clear enough and that the girl too would become unhappy was no less clear.”
Indeed, the young man loved the girl but the problem of the young man was that he lived in constant reference to the past. He did not believe in the repetition, and love of the recollection made him unhappy. In the case of the young man, “some psychological peculiarity motivated him in suspension of his ethical duty to marry the girl.”
Here, the young man is convinced that his love cannot be expressed in marriage, therefore feels justified in breaking the engagement. But he is confused if he is guilty for doing such an unethical thing. He is also worried whether he will be able to be the person he was. But if this (repetition) is possible, there should be repetition within his personality. While he is confused about the possibility of the repetition, he also exclaims, “He who does not comprehend that life is a repetition, and that this is the beauty of life, has condemned himself and deserves nothing better than what is sure to befall him namely, to perish.”
Anyway, he is anxious about his decision. When all these thoughts trouble the young man, he finds refuge in the Book of Job. “Job knew he was right before God and he is conscious that God too knows it though the whole existence contradicts him.”
Indeed, humanly speaking Job is in deepest crisis of his life. But Kierkegaard says, “The situation in which Job has been placed is called a ‘trial of probation’ and this category is neither aesthetic nor ethical, it is transcendent category, thus, in the end Job is rewarded doubly this is called repetition.”
“Repetition occurred in Job’s life when it was regarded as impossible by human values, when hope had vanished and when everything seemed lost. The young man of repetition is waiting for a similar experience which will make him capable of being a husband.”
At a certain moment, the young man receives the news that girl is married to someone else. This news brings about repetition in the young man’s life, that is, he is again himself, he understands everything and existence seems to be more beautiful than ever. But here we see that repetition of the young man was aesthetical.
According to Kierkegaard, “Repetition is essentially a religious category. When life has been broken down by sin to pieces and immediate relationship with God is destroyed then repetition is the restoration of personality to its pristine integrity and restoration of new immediate relationship with God.”
Repetition is a religious movement which involves absurdity or faith. It is a new birth, an answer to the question of Nichodemus about rebirth.
Actually, the problem of the relationship of the young man to the girl was due to the melancholy which he received from his father in his childhood. “This melancholy was not only innate and inherited from the father it was mysteriously connected with a dark spot in father’s life.”
The source of melancholy seems to arise most likely because of a “deep piety towards the father thrown into conflict with the discovery of the negative side of his life.”
No doubt, the engagement period made him happy for sometime, but it did not last long and this made him realize that the melancholy he was going through was part of his nature and a burden which he could never get rid himself of. In the final countdown, he tried different means to get rid of the marriage.
2.3.2.1 To Hide the Sadness
Due to his superior mind, the young man could hide his sadness and never make it a part of the girl’s life, but he feels that by doing so, he will deceive her and not be a true self. It would also be contrary to a true ethical basis for marriage, for lovers are supposed to have no differences between them.
2.3.2.1 To Initiate the Girl into His Melancholy
“The second possibility of the marriage is to initiate the girl into his melancholy”
so that together they might bear the tragedy of his life. However, he believes that “melancholy came as punishment from God it would be necessary to met it in a religious conception of life.”
Therefore, he thinks of developing his fiancé religiously, but he is not successful, because she does not have religious disposition. “For him, religion is the basis of equality, but she loves a human being, that is, a young man more than she loves God and in the end she fails to leap over into the religious sphere where two might have met in an equality of religion.”
2.3.2.2 To Break the Engagement
The third possibility is that of breaking the engagement. “When the young man recognizes the impossibility of arriving at a mutual religious understanding, he returns to her the ring and breaks off the engagement.”
But this is a heavy blow to her and so she tries to write to him in despair, saying, that she cannot live without him and then she goes on to take the name of God, Christ and by every good remembrance that binds him. This makes him feel compassionate towards the girl.
2.3.2.3 To Make an Effort to Set Her Free
There is only one possibility left, i.e., “of laboring to set her free. This is the last stage of engagement and a state of horror. He tries his best to change his outward appearance to that of hypocrite, scoundrel and depraved man to set her free from an unbearable marriage.”
It is also noted that Kierkegaard was partly successful in pretending to be a scoundrel, but “the one person he failed to deceive was Regine, who saw through the ruse and refused to accept the breach. In consequence it was doubly distressing to both of them.”
Actually, all these he does for the love of the girl. “Finally he succeeds in breaking down her love and the period of horror ends in a feeble break.”
The young man then takes up courage and tells the girl that it is all over. He speaks to her in a gentle voice but in a firm manner, so that she would no longer persuade him. Of course, it was a dreadful thing to take this bold step for the young man, but that was the only possibility left. Thus the young man prepares to accept all consequences following this decision.
The young man in the story feels that marriage is a wrong option. He is of the opinion that mutual understanding is a must for mutual commitment and she does not understand him, therefore marriage for him is meaningless. The young man, in spite of his convinced decision, feels that he has done something wrong. He is not sure if he is guilty therefore he feels he cannot repent. But he feels that he must wait to be informed by reality that he has done wrong. Therefore, a personality conflict arises in him between repentance and existence.
The young man consoles himself by comparing himself to Job, a just and a God-fearing character in one of the books of the Old Testament. “The young man’s idea was to construct his life ethically in his inmost being and to conceal the melancholy under the form of deceit. He was forced back to a lonely understanding with God, and in his relationship with men, misunderstanding.”
The God- relationship becomes the deeper level in his personality though he was not able to live in that level, but as soon as he comes out of that level, he feels restless and uncomfortable. Here, Kierkegaard mentions that God, though loving and compassionate father, does not give one only joys in life, rather some pain too as in his case. Kierkegaard further says that we can experience God only individually and He speaks to man through man himself.
On the basis of guilty or not guilty, Kierkegaard presents the characteristics of the religious sphere in the life of a person thus:
“Religiosity is not a form of doctrine but a mode of life.”
Religiosity cannot be contained merely in doctrines though one needs them. “Religiosity is a personal and individual matter.”
In the case of the young man, problem arises from his conception of marriage, i.e., Christian marriage ceremony. Therefore, it is a personal concern which must be solved at all cost. We see here that Kierkegaard is religiously concerned. “The religious man cannot make himself immediately understood. His life possesses a mystery.”
This problem cannot be understood by intellectual analysis or judgment. The girl could not have understood him precisely because of this reason.
Since religious man’s actions are dominated by his God relationship, he becomes the particular individual greater than the universal. His life is a lonely understanding with God. Religious existence is essentially suffering as in the case of the young man of the story narrated. Even Feuerbach (1804-1874) and Pascal (1623-1662) held that suffering was an essential part of the Christian life. Suffering is considered as something necessary for the religious experience. Some even go to the extent of saying: ‘The more the suffering the more the religious existence.’
The contrast between the three stages of existence is characterized as follows: Aesthetic existence is essentially enjoyment. The ethical existence is essentially struggle and victory and the religious experience essentially suffering. As Kierkegaard emphasizes:
Religion is here defined not as intellectual knowledge and indoctrination but as existential appropriation. Language, arts, handicrafts one man can teach another but in an ethico- religious sense one man cannot essentially benefit another. Therefore in an essential sense not even an emperor can introduce to his subjects.
The religious experience is said to be unique and related itself to the inward, hence there is no direct communication of religiosity from one person to another.
2.3.3 Conclusion
In this chapter the emphasis has been on Kierkegaard’s philosophy of religion as put forth in two of his important books, Fear and Trembling and Repetition. In reading Kierkegaard, we realize that he has many things for our reflection. Of course, we need not accept everything he says as gospel truth but he does speak sense. In his philosophy of religion, we see how he gives self and this importance to the self is always in relation to God the almighty. In Kierkegaard, we clearly see an existentialist.
We also realize in Kierkegaard that we need to give importance to the person because after all, it is the person who matters ultimately. We see how he considers human frailty with respect and how he suggests as to how one can come out of it. The most important message that Kierkegaard seems to offer us is that reconciliation is possible only in God to whom we should approach with faith, not simply with reason. Thus, Kierkegaard successfully presents the primacy of God in one’s life in an existential way.
CHAPTER 3
KIERKEGAARD’S VIEW ON FAITH AND CHRISTIANITY
3.0 Introduction
Kierkegaard, being a Christian author, has a lot to contribute to the understanding of Faith and Christianity. In his description of the stages of life, Kierkegaard speaks of three stages in which the last and the highest stage is the religious stage. He again subdivides the religious stage into two categories, i.e., Religion (A) referring to general religion and Religion (B) referring to Christianity, the higher being Christianity. In this chapter, we shall see what Kierkegaard has to say regarding faith and Christianity. Actually, it is very difficult to distinguish between faith and Christianity because both the terms refer to the same reality. But here the two topics have been put in two sub-sections just for the sake of convenience. It will however be seen that very often both these themes overlap.
3.1 Faith
When Kierkegaard gained prominence and recognition in
Germany in the late 20
th century, he was primarily known as a religious writer. As Hanny attests: “Even Heidegger, whose debt to Kierkegaard is considerable, suggests that his importance lies more in the religious aspect of the authorship then in any positive contribution his works make to philosophy as such.”
When we read Kierkegaard we realize how often he speaks of the ‘leap’ from one level in life to another. This ‘leap’ actually refers to making decision in faith. He says thus: “A great leap of faith is the most daring act that any man can perform and without such a leap, no really authentic life is possible.”
The leap that Kierkegaard speaks about is not related to relative and habitual choices in one’s life, rather it refers to the absolute choice, the choice which each individual makes. This ‘leap’ has infinite significance for the individual, for such a choice or venture transforms the individual completely. In this type of undertaking, the person concerned, at first does not understand faith as anything else than madness. But after he has made the absolute venture, he becomes another individual. Thus, this undertaking in one’s life may be described in the words of Kierkegaard as, “a gulf that understanding cannot bridge either forward or backward.”
This is why faith can never be understood or explained rationally. The decision of faith it is said, “entails an ethical decision to renounce the world, to break off all attachments, especially the most cherished.”
Kierkegaard further says that, “the transition that one makes from one stage of life to another consists always of absolute choice which includes the whole personality.”
Thus we may say with Kierkegaard, “Faith is the leap par excellence a transition which requires divine assistance.”
It is said that faith lays hold of the improbable because this involves that the individual believes against one’s understanding. In Kierkegaard’s view, faith therefore is “not a category of possibility prior to knowledge, so that one may later go beyond faith; faith rather is the final Christian medium of existence.”
Faith is something supernatural which is beyond human rationality and understanding. We see in the case of the story of Abraham how the ethical duty is suspended for the higher pursuit, i.e., for the greater glory of God. This is because “the human and finite world is grounded in that which is larger than itself, namely the Infinite.”
And sometimes the infinite takes priority over the finite and the ethical norms, because after all, finite things are the product of that infinity.
Our act of faith or pursuit for the absolute may bring about fear and anxiety, for faith involves some loss or weakening of worldly connections including our bodily self. Faith thus involves dying away to finite things like family, friends and lovers. Thus, “Faith in the religious sense pertains to what exceeds the limits of human rationality and understanding.”
In Kierkegaard’s writings, we often find the use of the word ‘paradox,’ especially when it comes to the idea of faith and the religious level of existence. When we speak of paradox, we should keep in mind that he does not refer to logical paradox. “A logical paradox is the kind of sentence which asserts that opposites are both true or both false.”
According to the logicians, a paradox of such character is impossible to reflect on. But there is a different kind of paradox, i.e., behavioral ones. Kierkegaard does not advocate logical paradoxes, for he was well informed about this difference. “He distinguished a behavioral paradox from a logical one. He gives no indication that Christianity involves a person in logical paradoxicality. Indeed, he attacks this type of sloppy thinking.”
It is quite clear that “Paradox in Kierkegaard’s literature is existential rather than logical. Christ as the absolute paradox in his writings is not Christ as the logical contradictory, for one cannot violate that rules of logic and make sense.”
Paradoxicality in Christianity is that of interests and values and not a logical one.
Further, Faith is not a belief, as Kierkegaard emphasises. But “it is one which involves the whole self, not merely the logical faculties, but one’s entire being.”
Faith is said to occur after doubt and despair and this is why Kierkegaard says that Christianity presupposes a second birth, a man’s highest transformation of himself. He believes that God or the Infinite can neither appear nor be known. “The infinite cannot be grasped or understood by any rational effort or thought or synthesis. The infinite can be affirmed nonrationally and hence, passionately, at the limits of thought,”
i.e., by faith. This is why he says that faith is beyond rationality.
3.2 Christianity
Kierkegaard conceives of a Christianity that had very little to do with structures, hierarchy, dogmas and rituals. For him, to be a Christian is to “strive after Christian existence.”
In Christian existence, what matters is not the externals but the inner disposition and the individual’s personal experience. He thus bluntly remarks:
A Christian existence has no necessary connection with being a member of a church, believing dogmas, accepting a creed, or dutifully attending Church. The Church cannot administer salvation through a salaried religious bureaucracy or the dispensing of Sacraments. It is all too easy to be Christian in this way.
It is true that Kierkegaard does not deny the fact that church can give guidance to the individual in his search for a personal relationship with God. However he maintains that the personal search, with its difficulties and achievements, must exist in man before the church can guide him. A true Christian at heart, “dares to risk his whole life in the decision to become a Christian.”
A true Christian knows that he can “never ‘be’ a true Christian but will always only be ‘becoming’ a Christian by renewing his relationship with God and making it the decisive fact of his life. In this, he has the invaluable guidance of Jesus Christ.”
Kierkegaard is of the opinion that one does not become Christian by being baptized, confirmed, and being married in the church and not even by frequenting the church from time to time on Sundays. He says that “Christ wanted not admirers who memorize certain formulas but followers.”
Thus, a true Christian in his view faces a life of self-sacrifice.
At every moment a Christian must struggle to renew his relationship with Christ. His existence is filled with suffering, with being offended by the radical demands of Christ, with repenting one’s failures, and with fear and trembling. In this way of life, there is no security but only everlasting risk. In this way of life, the reward, if at all it can be called, is not a harmonious life and a peaceful existence, but a life which fulfills itself in the light of its eternal. Such a life-style is always unique. However it is said that “no man, no process, and no trick can relieve man from the burden of going from the very bottom to the pinnacle of an authentic existence alone, suffering and struggling.”
In Kierkegaard’s view, “Christianity presupposes a maximization of despair.”
The paradox of Christian life is rooted in what Kierkegaard calls the unhappy relation between our organized system of values and the demand of Christianity. This demand may include one’s complete renunciation of the worldly goods. To be a Christian is to give up all interests and goals in order to follow Christ. Thus, for him, “No one is a Christian by first birth. One must become an unconditional believer, whereby he is willing to give up all personal conditions and preferences.”
He says that adequacy of religion consists not in “logical cogency of one view over the other, not in intelligence and argumentation, but in interestedness.”
The adequacy of one’s view over other is a function of one’s interest, passion, subjectivity and concern. It has very little to do with rationality or logic.
Christianity may be looked at, as both a view of existing and a way of existing. To grasp Christianity as a view of existing only is to understand Christianity, but it is not to become a Christian. There is tremendous difference between knowing what Christianity is and being a Christian. And of course, the difference lies in the ‘personal experience’ of dread and despair and ultimately the leap of faith. For Kierkegaard, being Christian is to grasp Christianity as a way of existing and to live by it. Therefore, for him, “the perfection of the Christian life does not come when one understands what is said. It is realized only when one makes it actual in new birth.”
No wonder, Kierkegaard’s such views on Christianity caused upheaval among the people.
3.3 Conclusion
This chapter of my paper depict Kierkegaard’s views on Faith and Religion. Going through his works one can easily sense the existential character of his writings. Being an existentialist, he gives a lot of importance to experience, feelings and subjectivity in one’s spiritual journey. The emphasis given to subjectivity and human experience is perhaps the peculiar contribution of Kierkegaard in the world of philosophy.
When he speaks of faith, he says, the act of faith consists in the ‘Leap.’ It is a jump which one makes from one level of existence to another. ‘Reason’ cannot comprehend this act of ‘leap’; for it is beyond it. Divine assistance is pivotal in this leap of faith. It involves one’s whole being, not merely reason.
Speaking about the Church, Kierkegaard says, the dogmas and the hierarchy of the church cannot give salvation to the people. However, he does not deny the fact that the established Church can be of some help to the individual. He is of the opinion that what can make a person a true Christian is the personal effort of striving to be true Christian which should begin even before one has accepted Christianity. He does not view Christianity as an easy and comfortable life, but as a process of renunciation, sacrifice and a giving up of the people and things we love the most. Thus he proposes a Christianity, i.e., personal, experiential and existentially real.
GENERAL CONCLUSION
As I come to the last pages of my study and reflection on Kierkegaard’s Philosophy of Religion, I feel it has made me realize a lot of unknown facts that a human person goes through in one’s life. To sum up, I will present a synthesis of my whole study on Kierkegaard’s Philosophy of Religion. I will also try to present the relevance of the topic and give my personal reflections.
The first chapter of my paper situates, Sǿren Kierkegaard, the ‘precursor of existentialism.’ Here, the major events of his life are narrated: Kierkegaard had a happy childhood and being youngest in the family he was the centre of attraction in the family. As a child he was physically frail and this made him feel distressed. He was also made fun of, by his school companions, for the same. As a young man, he did his college studies in the University of Copenhagen. He had a good memory and did well in his college studies. One of the most drastic steps he took in his life was after his college studies; it was in 1841 when he broke the engagement with his fiancé Regine Olsen. This was the result of his inherent melancholy which is suspected to have originated in the discovery of his purinatical father’s infidelity towards his mother. In the last days of his life, he attacked the established church of Denmark because of the hypocrisy and the double lives the clergy were living. As a philosopher, he is against Rationalism and Hegelism. In fact, his philosophy is the result of his attacks on Hegelism. He emphasizes on the importance of the individual and a personal experience unlike the Rationalists.
The second chapter of my paper, elaborates the three stages of life that a person is invited to go through by Kierkegaard. The first stage that Kierkegaard speaks of, is the Aesthetic stage. In this stage, a person lives a hedonistic life; here a person is carried away by pleasure, enjoyment and merry-making. After enjoying all the pleasures that an aesthetic stage can offer, a person experiences the meaninglessness in such a life. This realization makes the person look out for a better and a more meaningful existence. Thus, the person moves on to the next stage i.e., the Ethical stage. In this stage, the person lives according to the ethical norms and the social guidelines and finds a certain meaning in doing so. But this stage of life do not have a solution to sin. As far as the ethical norms are concerned there is no way out, of sin. The only way a person may free oneself of sin is through repentance, and repentance is ethically impossible. It has no place in ethics. Therefore, there is the need for the next stage of life, i.e., the Religious stage. Repentance is possible only in the religious stage of life. At this level, the sacrifices, sufferings and self-denial becomes meaningful. The religious stage of life facilitates forgiveness and reparation. In Fear and Trembling, we see how Abraham obeys God and goes to sacrifice his only son, despite the fact that ethical norms would not allow it. In this act of faith, Abraham goes beyond ethics and finds meaning in fulfilling God’s command. By this act, Abraham practices teleological suspension of the ethical and an absolute duty towards God. He also conceals his consent to sacrifice Isaac, from Sarah and Eleazer, because he knew that he would be misunderstood. In Repetition, a story of a young man is narrated. In this story the young man breaks the engagement with his beloved, because he feels that by marrying his fiancé he would be doing injustice to her, as he was a melancholic man. This decision brings lot of pain and suffering in the life of the young man, but he accepts them all, because he believes that in doing so, he is able to live a genuine Christian life. In this story, the young man is compared to Job, a Biblical character who had to go through lot of suffering, but did not lose faith in God. Similarly, the young man feels that in spite of his suffering, God will reward him for his fidelity, as Job was rewarded. There is the sub-stage of humour between aesthetic stage and the ethical stage and the sub-stage of irony between ethical stage and the religious stage.
The third chapter of my paper deals with Kierkegaard’s views on Faith and Christianity. Faith, according to Kierkegaard, is an experience that goes beyond reason and human understanding. Faith operates at the level of personal experience. when it comes to Christianity, he says that it is the highest level of existence. A true Christian is the one, who practices the values of Christ in a personal life, with conviction. In this endeavour the established structures of the Church are of little help to the individual; though sometimes it does. The most important thing in being a Christian, is the personal effort to be a true Christian.
In the Philosophy of Religion presented by Kierkegaard, the faith aspect is given an utmost importance. It seems quite clear to me, that it is at the level of religious existence and at the level of faith that we realize our true self and experience boundless joy which no other way of existence can provide us with. When it comes to the issue of faith and God, reason takes a back seat and we do things that God requires of us though it may seem utterly senseless according to the standards of human reasoning. It is in ‘rational meaninglessness’ that we plunge ourselves to God and surrender to Him completely in faith, and once we surrender to him all the ‘meaninglessness’ that we experience makes sense to us. Here the ‘intellectual darkness’ is glowed with the light of God’s wisdom.
Each of us is called to reach a religious level of existence, where, faith in God becomes a hallmark. We do not reach this level suddenly and without any effort. A person in this spiritual journey may experience a rational crisis and even dread and despair. Often one may also experience ‘utter meaninglessness.’ But one needs to go ahead, for it is only when all reasoning has failed that one gains ground to arrive at the religious stage of existence. Religious existence consists of complete self-denial and detachment from the worldly goods. Thus, for a worldly man the religious level of existence does not make any sense. The religious stage of life often looks like a stage of utter failure, for at this level, man of faith has to go through a lot of pain, suffering and even misunderstanding. In fact, Kierkegaard himself says that religious level of existence is the stage of suffering. However, in all these sufferings, discomforts and struggles a man of faith finds solace in God.
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Posts
Gabriel Marcel (1889-1973). Only child of a highly cultivated agnostic Catholic father (French Minister). His mother died when he was four, he was brought up by maternal aunt. He had a carefree and happy childhood. Hated “abstract and inhuman school system.” He experienced clash between free personal life and object oriented school years. Loved theatre (he published 15 of his 20 dramas. Loved music- Called it his true vocation.) He was against systematizing expression in philosophy. Marcel’s phenomenology of man is not Cartesian “I think” nor the existentialist “I exist” but the incarnate interpersonal “we are.” His Philosophical anthropology begins as social anthropology: “existence is co-existence.” 
