Category: Kierkegaard

Kierkegaard on Becoming an Individual, Seriously

Here are two excerpts from Kierkegaard’s 1847 journal, written when he was 34 years old.

Kierkegaard is sometimes criticized for placing too much emphasis upon “the individual,” promoting a brand of individualism that places little if any value in social connections or community relationships.

In fact, nothing could be further from the truth.

Sadly, Kierkegaard’s philosopher MIS-interpreters have encouraged this common misunderstanding of the melancholy Dane by ignoring, or willfully remaining ignorant of, the centrality of Jesus Christ in Kierkegaard’s thinking.

Here is an example:

“Everyone would like to have lived at the same time as great men and great events.  God knows how many really live at the same time as themselves.  To do that (and so neither in hope nor fear of the future, nor in the past) is to understand oneself and be at peace, and that is only possible through one’s relation to God, or it is one’s relation to God.

“Christianity is certainly not melancholy, it is, on the contrary, good news – for the melancholy; to the frivolous it is certainly not good news, for it wishes first of all to make them serious.”

In other words, no one becomes the person, the unique individual, they were created to become until he/she stands submissively, and lives obediently, before the savior, Jesus Christ.  Only that authentic individual existing before God, who is who she is, who does what she does, who behaves as she behaves and decides as she decides because she lives to serve Jesus faithfully with all that she has to offer Him, will experience the joy of being her genuine, God-intended self.

That is authentic individualism, and it is only attained through the Good News of Jesus Christ.  Only these kinds of authentic individuals can compose a genuine Christian community where brothers and sisters in Christ serve each other freely and sacrificially.

In the American pursuit of secular individualism, constantly affirming the innate wisdom buried somewhere inside our inner rebel, that solitary soul fleeing God’s influence, we foolishly refuse to take ourselves seriously as sinners.

This is the Gospel’s first task:  to make us serious; serious about ourselves; serious about God.

It is the only route out of banal frivolity into eternal joy.

In this light, I suspect that the United States may be the least serious “Christian” nation on earth, nurturing a populous sucking at the teats of the most frivolous media culture – including the supposedly Christian media – ever devised.

Don’t live like the typical American consumer.  Set your sights on becoming an authentic Individual, please, before it is too late.

Kierkegaard on Christian Faith — Risking the Improbable and Accepting Failure

Few people understand Christian faith more clearly than Sǿren Kierkegaard.  Here is another section from his book, Judge For Yourself (pages 99-100 in the Hong, Princeton edition).  A few words of explanation may help if you’ve never read Kierkegaard before.

Faith is risking the improbable because (a) it is impossible to prove empirically that you have truly encountered God, and (b) there is no measure of empirical probability that Jesus of Nazareth is God incarnate.

Thus, faith risks the improbable.  A significant challenge for modern folks who insist on evidence.

Some people (Kierkegaard calls them lightweights) claim to venture the risk of faith, but only because they think that anything done “in faith” is guaranteed success; that is, success in earthly terms.  Success as they define success.

Hear the faithful Dane speak to us today (emphasis is mine):

“Here is the infinite difference from the essentially Christian, since Christianly, indeed, even just religiously, the person who never relinquished probability never became involved with God.  All religious, so say nothing of Christian, venturing is on the other side of probability, is by way of relinquishing probability.

 “But then is the essentially Christian utter folly and are the sensible people right – it is intoxication?  No!  Admittedly many a one has thought that he was venturing Christianly when he ventured to relinquish probability, and it was pure and simple folly even according to the view of Christianity.  Christianity has its own characteristic way of restraining…the point to check carefully here is to see whether the venturing actually is in reliance upon God.

 “To connect God’s name with one’s wishes, cravings, and plans is easy, far too easy for the lightweights; but it does not follow that their venturing is in reliance upon God. No, in relinquishing probability in order to venture in reliance upon God, one must admit to oneself the implications of relinquishing probability – that when one then ventures it is just as possible, precisely just as possible, to fail as to succeed…That one ventures in reliance upon God provides no immediate certainty of success; the dubiousness in the lightweights’ venturing in reliance upon God lies precisely in their understanding this to mean that they must be victorious..  But this is not venturing in reliance upon God; this is taking God in vain.”

Entrusting our lives to Jesus Christ ensures a right relationship with our heavenly Father here and now.  It also guarantees an eternity with Him in the world to come.  But neither faith nor Jesus promise to give us whatever we hope and pray for, no matter how “faithful” our intentions or “glorious” we think it might be for God.

So, do we trust in Jesus and follow Him for his own sake?  Or do we have ulterior motives?

Kierkegaard on Reading Scripture

Had I ever become a seminary professor, I would have made all my students read For Self-Examination and Judge for Yourself! by Sǿren Kierkegaard.  Either book is a good place to begin for anyone who is unfamiliar with my favorite “melancholy Dane” and wants to start reading Kierkegaard on their own.

Both books, published in 1851, only 4 years before his death at age 42, are a clarion call to genuine Christian living.  Kierkegaard particularly focuses on the centrality of Scripture, not simply as a book to be read or studied, nor as a source for Sunday sermons, but as a compelling Word from God that must be obeyed.

The only sufficient goal of all Bible-reading is personal transformation, and transformation only happens for those who surrender to God’s instructions by DOING what scripture says.  Reading without response is like a single person pretending to be married while eating alone every night.

Here is Kierkegaard’s advice (from For Self-Examination) for anyone whose Bible-reading has stalled because of its many difficult, hard to understand passages:

“…perhaps you say, ‘there are so many obscure passages in the Bible, whole books that are practically riddles.’ To that I would answer: Before I have anything to do with this objection, it must be made by someone whose life manifests that he/she has scrupulously complied with all the passages that are easy to understand; is this the case with you?…

 “In other words, when you are reading God’s Word, it is not the obscure passages that bind you but what you understand, and with that you are to comply at once.  If you understood only one single passage in all of Holy Scripture, well, then you must do that first of all, but you do not first have to sit down and ponder the obscure passages.  God’s Word is given in order that you shall act according to it, not that you shall practice interpreting obscure passages.  If you do not read God’s Word in such a way that you consider that the least little bit you do understand instantly binds you to do accordingly, then you are reading God’s Word.”

Following Jesus with Kierkegaard: The Best Apologetics is a Genuine Christian Life

Certain sectors of American evangelicalism are devoted to the study of  apologetics, that is the defense of the Christian faith and the relieving of  doubts.  Some seminaries even offer doctoral programs in apologetics, as if an advanced degree will make anyone a better evangelist, or a more successful resolver of doubts.

Don’t misunderstand me.  I am not opposed to advanced education.  But I am leery of the American penchant for professionalizing normal aspects of the Christian life with advanced degrees and curriculae.

What’s next?  A Ph.D. in spiritual direction?  I am afraid to look, but I fear that somewhere, someplace, someone is already offering degrees in spirituality.

Alas…

In 1851 Sǿren Kierkegaard (1813-1855) published For Self-Examination: Recommended to the Present Age and Judge for Yourself!: For Self-ExaminationRecommended to the Present Age.  These books continue his investigations into genuine Christian discipleship and what true believers must look like in a society where Christianity has degenerated into either a passé, cultural artifact, a mere act of mental assent or an emotional high.

Is the problem that such cultures need more or better apologists to alleviate people’s doubts about Christ?

In Judge for Yourself!, Kierkegaard insists that the best answer to anyone’s doubts about Christianity is an authentic Christian life lived in front of them, a life of obedient discipleship devoted to the imitation of Christ.

He writes:

“Imitation, which corresponds to Christ as the prototype, must…be affirmed again…Without introducing imitation it is impossible to gain mastery over doubts.  Therefore, the state of things in Christendom is such that doubt has replaced faith. And then they want to stop doubt with — reasons…They still have not learned that it is wasted effort — indeed, that it feeds doubt, gives it a basis for continuing. They are still not aware that imitation is the only force that can break up the mob of doubts and clear the area and compel one, if one does not want to be an imitator, at least to go home and hold one’s tongue.

“Imitation, which corresponds to Christ as prototype, must be advanced, be affirmed, be called to our attention.

“…The Savior of the world, our Lord Jesus Christ, did not come to the world in order to bring a doctrine…he did not try by way of reasons to prevail upon anyone…His teaching was really his life, his existence.  If someone wanted to be his follower, his approach, as seen in the Gospel, was different from lecturing.  To such a person he said something like this: Venture a decisive act; then we can begin.

“Venture a decisive act [Jesus says to us]; the proof does not precede but follows, is in and with the imitation that follows Christ.  That is, when you have ventured the decisive act, you become heterogeneous with [i.e. contrary to, standing against] the life of this world, cannot have your life in it, come into collision with it.  Then you will gradually be brought into such tension that you will be able to become aware of what I am talking about. The tension will also have the effect upon you that you understand that you cannot endure it without having recourse to me [Jesus] — then we can begin.  Could one expect anything else from the truth?“

Faith in Jesus is the decisive venture, the ultimate risk, the act of obedience compelling us to live an upside-down, counter-cultural life in a fallen world simply because our Savior tells us to.