Kierkegaard's Christian Existentialism

just as Marx Kierkegaard's philosophy is a reaction to the Hegelian synthesis, the idea that philosophy practically closed its doors once Hegel met the ultimate purpose or goal of human life or understood the ultimate goal of human life, Hegel's encyclopedic system was a kind of end of philosophy if you accepted the arguments he presented, and Kierkegaard hated everything about the Hegelian system, he hated its smug certainty, its kind of megalomaniacal breadth, its rationalism, and what he really disliked most was that. Perhaps it was the Greek Promethean element of this rationality, in other words there is a kind of division of the difference between Athens and Jerusalem between reason and faith in Hegel's system or if he does not divide the difference, he reconciles them in a way that Kierkegaard He found it totally inconsistent with his own experience of both reason and religion.

Kierkegaard is surely one of the most morbid and emotionally disturbed writers in the history of Western philosophy. I like it a lot. I find it really fascinating. He is without a doubt one of the funniest and has a completely morbid sense of humor. There are so few philosophers with a good sense of humor, Kierkegaard is one of them so if you have the opportunity to read this, read it with a sense of humor and I think you will appreciate it much more now what Kierkegaard thinks is that it is impossible to completely systematize the human being. . existence it is possible to give a good coherent rational explanation of the purpose of human life and in fact he thinks that the problems here come from the mixture of Greek humanistic Promethean rationality and the strictly understood tradition of biblical faith and religion in other words,

kierkegaard

is We are going to reformulate the problem that has existed since the time of Augustine, at least of connecting faith and reason, but only at the cost of undermining reason, undermining the Greek element in the Western intellectual tradition and becoming something of a work modern, the faithful servant of God, the man who will not blaspheme who will not be skeptical of god and his wisdom regardless of what the circumstances are now

kierkegaard

believes that the orientation a person takes toward the world determines his behavior determines his activities determines the level of human existence to which he can ascend and what is worse than this is that Kierkegaard has faced the problem of religious faith and is not willing to look the other way and accept any of the easy compromises between reason and faith, the kind of whistling in the dark we get with hegel that it's both.

It really is the same and that Christianity can easily be reconciled with Greek rationalist philosophy, strictly speaking, God says no, you must choose between one and the other, then the question arises who will we choose, whether we will choose the life of faith or life. of rationality, should we choose an orientation toward nature as our primary ontological assumption or are we going to go with nature plus nature plus, in this case, celestial nature plus some metaphysical realm, so we have to choose between naturalistic ontologies and metaphysical ontologies? between Athens and Jerusalem we have to choose between religious faith and rational certainty and the question is what criteria could we offer for any of the decisions we would have to make and, to make the question even more difficult, what possible grounds for this judgment could we offer? does not presuppose what you are trying to prove, in other words, if you presuppose a naturalistic ontology and if you presuppose that rationality is the key human fact and that you want to orient your philosophy towards human life rather than some kind of metaphysical construct, then you can start there and then show that it makes sense to have a naturalistic ontology and a humanistic orientation towards life and emphasize rationality if, on the other hand, you want to adopt a position like that of, say, St.

Augustine or Luther, who think. that if there is a conflict between reason and faith, well, faith wins every time luther augustine people like this prefer the metaphysical ontological conception they prefer to emphasize faith as opposed to reason they prefer to emphasize the tradition that leaves jerusalem as if to pose as opposed to the tradition that comes out of athens now if you assume that the bible is the divine and authoritative word of god if you assume that the tradition that comes out of jerusalem is the true revelation of god's intentions if you assume that the life of faith is superior to life of reason, then it will not be difficult for you to demonstrate that the life of faith is superior to the life of reason;

In other words, you can choose between these two sets of alternatives between the profane and the sacred between Athens and Jerusalem between a human-centered worldview and a god-centered worldview and everyone makes that decision, the difficulty is When you ask them why they make that decision correctly, they cannot give you any explanation that does not presuppose what they are trying to prove because the orientation is built into their justification to legitimize that choice, so Kierkegaard, like any good philosopher , like any morbidly introspective person, decides that he is going to try to dig deeper, get to the real foundation of this problem, find out how we are going to be able to choose between the life of faith and the life of reason and, for Kierkegaard, he can simplify it a little by talking of the actual orientation. what a given person desires and says that the great choice in life between the humanistic and the divine or between Athens and Jerusalem is whether you are oriented towards the pleasurable life, what he calls the aesthetic life and under the aesthetic life what is It refers to physical sensual pleasures, sex and alcohol, and I don't know of any physical sensual pleasures.

In addition to that, as a component of aesthetic life, there are also intellectual pleasures, in other words, it does not leave aside intellectual hedonists. A lot of philosophers like that when he talks about the aesthetic life, the pleasure-seeking life, he's essentially talking about the Greek life, like the life of rationality, not necessarily rationality in the continental sense, more likely rationality in the sense in which Hume uses it instrumentally. rationality rationality used as a means to satisfy our desires our desires can be the physical satisfaction of our pleasure neurons or they can be intellectual satisfactions that we obtain by reading works of philosophy it is completely possible to be an aesthetic man and not have scandalous sex In life, You can bring out your aesthetic desires in the field of art if you frequent art galleries regularly and that is your main consolation in life, that is the greatest pleasure you get.

You are still an aesthetic man because your orientation is towards pleasure, whether physical. or if it is mental or intellectual and God believes that it is natural for human beings that we are born in the world of flesh, the world of space and time, and that the natural rational orientation of human beings will be the pursuit of pleasure whether physical. or intellectual and as a practical matter, if you look back in history, it is not difficult to find people who like pleasure, it is not even difficult to find them now, it is a natural state of human affairs, this unfortunate tendency, this fact in which we are born. the aesthetic life or what it is is the most natural choice and in this sense of natural reason the most reasonable that human beings, particularly uneducated human beings, can make Nietzsche think or God thinks that is the analogue of sin original with which we are born in this world. with a natural predisposition to follow the aesthetic life that shows how depraved we are, which is why Kierkegaard believes that, being a deeply religious thinker, we must choose between the life of pleasure and the ethical life, that is the other alternative and what What he understands by ethical life is the person who pursues moral justice regardless of pleasure.

What he means by moral righteousness is the person who ultimately follows God's divine law, whether he immediately recognizes it or not. He thinks that every real ethical judgment, every ethical judgment that is not a path. to pat ourselves on the back and tell ourselves not only how virtuous we are but how intelligent we are to be able to discern the ultimate foundations of human virtue. Well, well, Kierkegaard says that the only real alternative to the life of pleasure is the life of the ethical man. The person who follows moral rules for themselves in this sense has many connections with the Kantian project.

Both Kant and Kierkegaard are trying to negotiate this. labyrinth of elements of the Athenians and the tradition that comes from Jerusalem and while Kierkegaard finds a beautiful and profound synthesis that does not abdicate the reasonable and rational responsibilities of the philosopher, Kierkegaard does renounce that, he moves away from Kant and heads towards the life of pure faith in which reason is either superfluous or a distraction, then for Kierkegaard there is a defined hierarchy in human existence, there are better and worse options and the fundamental choice that all human beings must make is between aesthetic and ethical life, so now the question arises what standard we can find. that will allow us to cover this whole area, the whole set of alternatives that will allow us to decide what is the best we can do and this is where Kierkegaard makes an important contribution to philosophy;

He is often considered one of the founding members. one of the most important precursors of what in 20th century philosophy is called

existentialism

, he says that individual human beings in the particular place and time in which they exist must choose between the aesthetic life and the ethical life and he brings this together in a book. It is called or is two volumes the first volume is the ether the second volume is the or the ether is the aesthetic life the or is the ethical life you are faced with a choice and it should be or should not be you can create a pragmatic compromise that splits the difference between Both of you, if you do that, you're the quintessential aesthetic man because you wouldn't want to deny yourself the pleasure of having a kind of dilettante connection with religion, so no, he's as tough as Kant is. either you are an aesthetic person or you are a moral person, an ethical person and there is no happy medium, there is no possibility of compromise, so we are forced to make a profound and tremendously transcendental decision.

What makes Kierkegaard a precursor of

existentialism

is that he holds the view that there is no criterion for making this decision; In other words, he confronts us with the grim and horrible reality of choice without criteria. make a decision, you have no standards by which to make your decision, good luck and you also have no choice as to whether to make the decision or not, you must decide, good luck, so the kicking guard leaves us adrift, disconnects us from our You tie up rationality because it says that there is no possible rational decision procedure that can give you reasons to choose what is moral or what is aesthetic.

If you want to say that you have developed some rational theory that shows you that only the rational life is good, you are presupposing what you are trying to prove. If you did not assume that rationality would be our guide, then what would you do? You say nothing, the vast silence of human existence becomes very, very clear as Kierkegaard begins to meditate and think deeply about the choices that human beings must make by virtue of the human condition. What is agonizing, what is terrible about this decision is that you have no basis. to do it and you have to do it and your soul depends on it your happiness depends on it it is the most important choice in human life and you do not have a star to guide you and you never will what a horrible universe it has created for us what confronts us with a series of tremendously difficult problems and he will not accept any compromise or you can see how he disdains the Hegelian synthesis of any kind because Hegel would say: we will get a little of this, we will get a little. a little of that we will get a thesis and an antithesis we will synthesize hegel says without synthesis without commitment this or that decide which if you refuse to decide well you started out as an aesthetician like an aesthetic man to begin with you were born in the state of nature people naturally seek pleasure If you don't want to decide we know what your position is you have already decided so we are stuck with the fundamental theological problem and we have no way of solving it now either Kierkegaard's book or it is notable for its literary virtues it is a wonderful, beautiful book, it is also kind of a heartbreaking and terrifying book, and obviously it is the book, a book produced by a tortured individual, a man who thinks about things like that all the time and who manages to come. dealing with this kind of problems is not a happy person even when he finds god, irony and cynicism, he wrote his doctoral thesis on irony, on Socratic irony, the whole book is an ironic treatment of irony, his supervising professors They found it hugely unpleasant, they said: You're a tremendously impressive guy, but I don't want to read anything like this again.

It's understandable, take a look at it and you'll see what it says. Irony is one of the things that God enjoys so much because he has subjected himself to this harrowing theological situation. From experience, he feels that it is very difficult for him to explain to people what the meaning of ultimate moral theological choice is. feels that people who have not suffered for what they believe have almost no rightTo this end, one earns one's dessert, one earns one's stripes as an intellectual, not only thinking about the problems but also feeling them. Kierkegaard wrote in the first part and middle of the 19th century.

It is one of the great examples of theological romanticism and, of course, that is connected to the whole romantic reaction to the Enlightenment and rationality that exists. central to the illustration romantic thinkers like or romantic thinkers it is almost a contradiction in terms romantic intellectuals like feeling over reason they like big, beautiful emotions they emphasize feeling if you think of charles dickens novels if you think too much in berlioz's music in everything they have no sense of proportion but they have lovely feelings well, kierkegaard has no sense of proportion and has very scary feelings there are horrible feelings but they have a unique appeal so in volume one in the ether presents some very striking images that he writes from the perspective in the first volume of the ether he writes it from the perspective of the aesthetic man and explains to us what it is like to be us as if we did not know and in fact kierkegaard thinks that we do not know, don't you think ?

We do not fully understand the miserable state of purely aesthetic and natural man. I think it's T.s Eliot who once wrote a line describing the hollow man. I think he said they are distracted from distraction by distraction. Well, Kikergaard thinks that's what the life of the aesthetic man is: one distraction after another to prevent you from seeing the emptiness of your existence, to prevent you from looking directly into the void and turning into stone, he says, that's why you seek pleasure and novelty all the time, because the real evil or real misery in the life of aesthetic man is boredom.

Kierkegaard says and I think it's one of the greatest lines in the history of philosophy. It's beautiful and it's terribly true. He says that boredom is the root of all evil. He thinks about that. It is much more dangerous than money to think about the amount of evil that is introduced into the world by people's simple desire for sensation and Kierkegaard, of course, in his inimitable and cruelest, most ironic way, talks about the history of boredom. in a piece called the rotation method. sometimes translated as crop rotation and describes the origins of boredom is beautiful said that god created man because he was bored adam was alone he was bored asked about eve adam and eve were born together they had some children and then they got bored family and then the people multiplied and reproduced and then they got bored in the moss and everywhere boredom took over the world, finally people created the tower of babel, which is as boring an idea as the tower is tall and the reason they did it it's pure boredom that's the only reason people create culture it's boring the world is full of nothing and we fill this nothingness with trivialities like human culture oh you feel the breath of infinite spaces in this guy who lives in a kind of interstellar space of the soul has nothing in it and he says the problem is that you think that about me because I'm a very wicked writer, but in reality everything is true about you and that's what your life amounts to and that's what it means to make the aesthetic choice this leads to two possible things it leads to a sequel where you die on your own with the most impressive timidity on the part of the aesthetic man they choose something a little more elegant a little more tasteful they commit suicide kierkegaard believes that if Someone was really aware of what it means to be an aesthetic man, to be constantly searching for new flavours, new tastes, new sensations, new experiences, I would simply get over it now.

It is so terribly boring that the board would lead you to simply exterminate yourself, that is the active rather than passive form of the aesthetic man now, in addition to this, and it is gloomy before going further, it has a very risky striking image that is worthy of Nietzsche as In fact, there are few people I would be willing to place in the same intellectual league as Nietzsche, but out of simple perversity, out of a simply morbid approach to the world, I would say that the cure for God and Nietzsche are very close, I want say, one believes. in god, the other one doesn't, but they are both really morbid and introspective.

Well, in a portion of the ether called diapsal mata, it gives an image that one would expect from Nietzsche. He said that one night in a theater there was a fire behind the stage and one of the clowns came out on stage and announced to the audience that the theater was on fire. They thought it was a joke and they laughed and he told him, "No, really, the theater is on fire." flames you are in terrible danger and the more I told them that the funnier they thought it was and the more they laughed, this is Kierkegaard's self-conception, he is a joker who is tremendously serious and you laugh at him thinking he is a religious nut. when in reality they are in mortal terror. mortal danger you are going through the dark knight of the soul you are so far from your souls that you do not know what a horrible situation one horror after another all the writings of god go from bad to worse all are entertaining but 'We are all the product of a depraved mind.

This image of the clown is perhaps one of the worst. Now let's try the best alternative. Let's try what it means to be the moral man. Well, if you're going to be the moral man you want. You are going to follow the dictates of conscience, you are going to follow the rules of morality in a Kantian sense, but not for Kantian reasons. You're going to do it because of your lust, your passion for moral virtue, not because you've come up with some kind of logical system that tells you. you that the ci the categorical imperative is really obligatory for all rational agents if you do it for that reason you are really an aesthetic man true because you do it because it pleases your vanity to think that you are such an intelligent guy that's why he thinks that kant that's why it is immoral in the sense that he lacks faith and supports it with rationality, he says if you have the real you have the real and if you have the real then what does it matter if it makes any sense that there is a great father of the church called Tertullian, it is possible that he Whether you knew him or heard about him, you couldn't have known him, he once said, I think because it's absurd, that also has a tremendous perversity, but that's the kind of person who is not willing to make any kind of commitment. between Athens and Jerusalem the biblical belief comes first and excludes all other beliefs the lord your god is a jealous god you will not have strange gods before me the idol of reason is a strange god, that is why the moral man will return to pursue the moral with passion.

This refers us to the romanticism that we find there, not on the basis of any reflection, but because he has made a choice without criteria, he has chosen the or instead of the ether why he did it there is nothing to say this is what he chose this is the best that human life has to offer the simple primary commitment to righteousness independent of pleasure independent of rationality independent of any possible alternative there is a fierceness of fanaticism in this Which, again, is a little frightening if you stop and think What kind of person are we talking about and I will try to convey to you the degree of fanaticism that this entails because, in some aspects, it does formulate a very interesting proposal. system and in fact there seems to be a certain method to this madness there is a certain degree of logic and reason in it it's just that the point here, as in the case of so many romantic writers and artists, is that they want to go beyond reason to some realm transcendent that you have access to or connect to on the basis of some primary intuition rather than any activity of rational analysis, one of the great romantic thinkers in that sense now to convey to you the difference between either and or and to be able to understand the difference between let's say the Enlightenment and Romanticism in order to understand the difference between Kant and Kierkegaard I think we should choose to examine the theology of these two gentlemen Kant and Kierkegaard because they are perfect paradigms of the type of thought that they represent and fortunately for us Kant and Kierkegaard were considered enough for both of them to comment on the same Bible story - at least one of them maybe more than one but there is at least one Bible story that they both talk about that connects the problems of faith and reason in a way that highlights both the advantages as well as disadvantages of either position this is the story of abraham you may have heard of this it is at the beginning of the bible right at the beginning of the book so if you haven't finished it right you may have seen this particular story here there is the deal abraham is a shepherd and god makes a pact with him he chooses abraham and tells him abraham okay you and your descendants will be a chosen people I have a special connection with you and to do you a great favor since you are 100 years old and your wife sarah 90 i'm sending you a son now i don't know how sarah felt about it at 90 maybe i wouldn't have thought of it i consider it a great gift, but abraham is very pleased with the gift and then later in the story, god appears to abraham and god says abraham in his own inscrutable way god says i want you to sacrifice your son no explanation no explanation no justification just god told him to do this now the question is what are we supposed to think about things like that ?

Shall we take it allegorically? Shall we take it literally? What are we supposed to think about a god who gives you things like a family and then who for no obvious reason who in a rather capricious way decides to tell you now kill him he's your only son destroy him as a way to show how much you like him it's a choice horrible now kant has a very interesting read on that and it's in a footnote, maybe the most important footnote in the history of philosophy, it's in a book called religion within the limits of reason alone, which is a typically Kantian idea.

I can almost tell you the title and you can probably make it out. Kant is the kind of person who would write a book like that and what he says in this very important and quite eloquent footnote is that if it were the case that God appeared to us by some miracle, literally speaking, we couldn't just fall. kneel and do what god told us we would have to stop and ask ourselves if this is really god, I mean that's the kind of thing a rationalist does when god appears to me and asks me who you're right, the kind of free rationality and illustrated. characters to illuminate, well I want to know who I'm talking to first, now God is supposed to have never spoken to me so I'm not sure about this, but my feeling is and this is Kierkegaard's feeling that when you see him, you know what you're looking at, I mean, there has to be something special about its properties in a visible sense that lets you know that you're dealing with something unusual, but that's not enough for Kant because he wants rational certainty. so kant says that in order to know if this big thing of light or the burning bush or whatever it is that he's talking to you about is really god, you have to find out if it really has the properties of god and what properties god has. well, he is perfectly rational and he is perfectly free, you can't imagine him being unfree, you can't imagine him being irrational, it's like saying that god lisps, right, he's perfectly free, perfectly rational, perfectly informed, perfectly good, perfectly virtuous, that means which always follows the categorical imperative why because there is only one rule for moral behavior it is true for individual human beings it is true for nations but it is also true for god and angels this goes all the way down the hierarchy to the boss and you know he's god because he's perfectly free and perfectly rational, which means he's perfectly autonomous, he's never heteronomous, he's never been moved by anger or jealousy or anything like that, he's the perfect Kantian, in other words. , you will know you are talking to God when everything He tells you to do is consistent.

With a Categorical Imperative, if some big bright ball of light ever starts talking to you and tells you to do anything that is inconsistent with the Categorical Imperative, you know you are talking to the devil or one of his friends because God never violates the categorical imperative. imperative god cannot do that it is not that he cannot do that it is the wrong way to think about it but that blasphemous expression comes close to being the rationalist conception of god god by virtue of his own nature by his freedom by his knowledge by his goodness always obeys to the categorical imperative in other places you would be saying that it was vicious and unfree, so now let's start and stop and think about this ball of light that tells me to sacrifice my son.

Can I universalize the maxim? What could I wish for? that everyone should sacrifice their child every time all the light speaks to them, no, that means that this is inconsistent with the ci and if it is inconsistent with the categorical imperative it is not god because god always obeys the categorical imperative, so whenever burn bushes or balls of light, whatever it is that starts talking to you, make sure you test it with a categorical imperative which is the supreme rule of morality and can never disappoint you. There is an element of Promethean Greek rationality in the Kantian view that is quite impious.

Who are you? Ask God who you areyou to tell God what the rules are. He is God. There is an element of rationality here, of a limitation of faith that is not consistent with a simple arbitrary subjection to the will of God, which is characteristic of the most vehement religious believers, perhaps the most fanatic, Tertullian. I think it's absurd. Kantwood wins by hearing that kind of belief is that any god worth believing in is the one who will be rational, I mean that's part of what makes him virtuous, think about the content conception of morality and then You think about the content conception of God and you will discover that Kant's god is oppression because God likes moral rules just for having them, he likes rules and obeys them perfectly, which is what a Prussian god would do;

In other words, Kant's god is remarkably similar to Kant with all his vices removed, in other words, he is the super Kant, he always obeys the ci. Now let's look at the other alternative from Kierkegaard's perspective, the romantic approach, okay, and this is in a section of a book called Fear and Trembling, which is the kind of lovely title that Kierkegaard usually gives his books. There's another one called concept of dread, i think you'll like it, it's a real page turner, okay, anxiety, desperation, that kind of thing, you can see how sart is going to pick up the cue to nauseate out of this, i mean, think about something really horrible and write a book about it or tell us that that's the human condition, well that's essentially what Kierkegaard does, he says with fear and trembling it's a long passage about abraham and what a great guy abraham is.

Why do you know? Sit there and ask God questions God tells me to do something, do it, that's it, that's what religious faith means, no compromises, no nonsense, none of this Greek rational stuff, none of this presumptuous business, categorical imperative , God told me to do something. I'm going to do it, that's the good thing about Abraham. Now Kierkegaard says that not only is he great, but he goes on for about 40 pages telling us how tremendous it is to do this and then points out that this is unethical, literally speaking. that killing your child is the kind of thing that most sensible people think is evil and actually God himself does it and this is where he does what could be considered an addendum to his theory, it seems that it is not just a separation of two parts. between the aesthetic and the moral life, it seems that once you enter the moral life, once you make that transition from the ether to the o what you get is the possibility of a greater definitive and complete transcendence, a complete submission to the will of God and that is coming.

From time to time we move from the moral life to the religious life to the life of simple but profound faith that tolerates no obstacles and is not even stopped by considerations of rational calculation, in other words what Kierkegaard says is that Abraham was one of the great men of faith one of the world's great religious figures precisely because what he is doing makes no sense if it made sense it wouldn't be as good can you first see the romantic elements here the rejection of rationality the rejection of reasonable order the rejection of humanism Greek who is integrated into the project of enlightenment what he is saying is on this rock I will build my religious faith I will be the faithful man of God the comparison between Kierkegaard and Job is not joking he is In a modern work, the thinkers of the Enlightenment like Kant have something of a situ or, in some respects, like Job's wife and Job's friends telling him that you should blaspheme if God is not doing what you expect and does not do what you want to do, Kierkegaard, as he says Job. no, there is only one god and he is what he is and I am what I am I am relatively speaking an insect a worm I am not going to tell god how to run the universe so if god appears to me one day I wouldn't do it Hold your breath to that, but if he ever appears to me one day, what I'm going to do is do exactly what he tells me, I'm not going to ask him, is this consistent with a categorical imperative?

I'm not going to question him. I'm not going to ask him. Are you sure that you are managing the world well because he is God and once you make that fundamental decision then you have the true life of faith that you have? He transcended simple ethical orientations towards the world and arrived at the true religious orientation, so abraham is the perfectly religious man, the man of faith, and abraham is the man who has made the decision to choose between one or the other and says, Hey, look, isn't it pretty if you wanted something pretty. if you would like something fun if you would like to enjoy returning to the aesthetic life with you this is agonizing in other words it not only says that abraham has to agonize and go through all kinds of anguish and think about killing his own son who is the pride of his life , he is the source of his happiness, the greatest benefit that God has given him and now apparently for no reason, on some kind of whim and in this case, God never explains to him why he wants him to kill his son.

He says now God inexplicably wants me to kill him I'm going to kill my own son one of the greatest crimes one of the greatest moral transgressions you can imagine this is testimony to the enormous power and terrible majesty of God where does morality come from he doesn't They control it We judge whether things are virtuous or good by virtue of whether they are derived from God or not, anything that is not directly derived from the will of the almighty directly from his authorized revelation is simply incorrect or superfluous faith. By itself it is enough. What does Luther say that only faith will save us? take Luther's idea of ​​faith alone take Luther's idea that we must what does Luther write we must? the believing

christian

must tear out his eyes of reason and god says yes, that's a great idea, by doing that you show how humble you are, you refrain from that promethean pride that says I'm going to be as rational as god, instead From that, you do what you are told because that is your position in the world, that is the true human condition.

What is agonizing about this is that the same god who gave us the ability to reason put us in a circumstance where reasoning will not help us because we have to make an uncritical choice between one and the other. and there is no rational procedure that can allow us to choose between one or the other, so for Kierkegaard we live in a dark and quite macabre world, there is an enormous amount of misery, pain and irony related to the best of human lives, the price to escape the aesthetic life to escape boredom is a life of absolute fidelity to god and that means that you may well be called to do things that are extremely unpleasant, even up to the murder of your own child, says kierkegaard, let's be direct if we judge abraham according to ethical standards, the man who is willing to kill his own son is a criminal if we judge him according to religious standards for the only test of faith in god, there is no better man either he makes the decision and does not mess around rodeos. trying to make it seem like the set of choices we make is going to be easy and he explicitly tells you that it will be unpleasant, maybe it will even be scary and that's the best you can hope for, this is what the human condition is that there is a streak of philosophical melancholy in Kierkegaard, a helplessness, a type of anguish that is very modern, that seems almost part of the 20th century.

The strange religious formulations are out of step with this century, I admit, but the idea that truth is subjectivity is one of Kierkegaard's favorite terms rather than the drive toward objectivity, certainty, and rational proof characteristic of thinkers. of the Enlightenment Kierkegaard says no, like any good romantic truth, subjectivity is subjectivity. I will become a person myself by understanding the choices I face and making them simply based on what he calls a leap of faith. How will we jump over this barrier without criteria? You must take the leap of faith and there is no way to know if you will make the crossing safely. proof there is no certainty there is no final explanation god maybe he has his reasons the man of faith believes that but in fact there is no way to know that we live in a terrifying and horrible world where we are faced with miserable and heartbreaking choices that, ultimately, they amount to a change of direction philosophical currency the emphasis on subjectivity the loss of certainty the loss of orientation the argument that there is essentially no definitive rule or definitive rational algorithm that allows us to discern good from evil that allows us to decide which is the best and most virtuous life Are these extremely modern ideas?

Many of the important ideas adopted by existentialists such as Heidegger, Sartre, Camus and Marcel are all a tribute to Kierkegaard. Kierkegaard, for all his religious madness, has forced us to stop and think about the implications of being rational, autonomous and free subjects. When we enter the era of romanticism and also the era of the 20th century, the era of anxiety, if you want to call it, we are faced with simple subjective choices that do not have any decision procedure, we are forced to make decisions in a or other. This is not about the fundamental meaning of aesthetic or ethical life choice, but that we are faced with choices.

Many choices that we are informed of have no rational basis and that means we are adrift in a realm of whim in an area of ​​opinion of feeling of feeling of taste of feeling which is what Kant described as a miserable anthropology there is no up no there below you do the best you can and live the life you choose this is what kierkegaard offers us a rather bleak perspective of the world perhaps justified by the fact that it makes us think that it increases our own consciousness, I would be very worried about you if you took the same decisions as kierkegaard.

I'm not trying to persuade you to do that, but I am trying to persuade you. you that this is the kind of problem you have to face, it may well be and I have a feeling that it is true that not all important decisions in life offer us a rational decision procedure, many of the important elements of human wisdom they are not derived from any algorithm they are derived from the experience of acting on your hunches perhaps of doing the best you can to navigate a world that is dark, unclear and not perfectly delineated by the light of reason kierkegaard in that sense is a contemporary of ours. understands what it's like to not know up and down understands moral confusion probably better than any of us offers us an alternative that, if not the only alternative we might want to choose, is certainly intriguing and if you don't even like the set of moral alternatives that he lives with us that he offers us with that he offers us so I recommend that you take a look at any or and try any because you are probably an aesthetic person um take a look at any or simply because of his notable literary qualities, there are very few authors who They can project their mind into the consciousness of a hypothetical other person better than Kierkegaard when he writes about what it is to be an aesthetic individual.

A fascinating work. I especially recommend a piece called the seducer's diary which is very much in line with the aesthetic man kierkegaard then one of the great romantic theologians one of the great reactions to hegel one of the few writers of the early 19th century whose work still has considerable influence direct recognized in the philosophical writing world that is characteristic of philosophers alive today.