Soren Kierkegaard
had a unique understanding of human existence in regard to states of being. Kierkegaard wrote of three realms of human
experience, each graduating upon the former. The first realm of existence, as
claimed by the philosopher, is the aesthetic.
This realm is dubbed by Kierkegaard to be the lowest of human experience
due to the weaknesses of those who appear to occupy it. The aesthetic is
concerned with the beauty of an immediate and individual existence. The purely
selfish, narcissistic, and immoral qualities of the aesthetic (and the
resulting decisions made by those who possess them), can be characteristically
found in children, drunks, the impulsive, and common criminals. Those who inhabit the aesthetic gravitate
towards physically pleasurable activities; seeking out what is the most
immediately satisfying.
Kierkegaard’s
second realm of existence is the ethical. This realm deals with ethos as it
relates to customs and norms. To ascend
one’s existence to the ethical, one must develop a concern for the universal
principals that hold to each member of the society. By accepting these
principals, one is allowed to join ‘the public’ and thus becomes a community
member by revering the standards that govern the society. Those who inhabit
this sphere of existence are committed to living by moral and legal codes that
are ordered and rational.
Finally,
Kierkegaard addresses his highest realm of human experience: The religious, or
Faith. Undoubtedly, this is the most difficult sphere to inhabit. Kierkegaard
states that faith "is precisely the
paradox that the single individual as the single individual is higher than the
universal, is justified before it, not inferior to is but as superior…”.[1] In
other words, faith is attained through the abandonment of the universal, a
rejection of ethos through choice. The
faith brought on by the free choice to do such a radical thing, places the
individual in the third realm of experience, as a singular superior above
universal realm he has left. . Kierkegaard explains this concept in terms of
the theological suspension of the ethical. One must make the choice to overcome
ethical norms in the name of God. Within
this choice lies the paradox of Kierkegaard’s faith. In order to reach the
religious sphere of faith, one must reject the ethical, and thus appear as if
he inhabited the aesthetic.
To better explain
his theory, Kierkegaard invokes the biblical father of faith, Abraham, as an
example. Abraham was instructed by God
to sacrifice his only son Isaac (a son who was not only hard to come by, but
who was essential to the creation Abraham’s promised nation). If Abraham had shared this instruction with
his fellow members of the ethical universal, they would have called him crazy,
murderer, criminal, evil, sinner even. The ethical operates by laws and answers
laid out for the community. The sacrifice of a son appears to the ethical
realm, to be a violation of their moral standards. As a result, the universal
would deem Abraham part of the aesthetic. Abraham knew this, and yet still made
the conscious and free choice to reject the universal rationality in favor of
his God’s irrational command. He allows himself to appear as a common criminal
in order to carry out the single largest act of faith in his life (and indeed,
in history). Abraham refuses to take the easy road laid out before him by the
herd. Instead, he accepts the suffering brought on by his dedication to choice
and therefore freedom. According to Kierkegaard, this is what faith is.
The tension
between Kierkegaard’s ethic and faith can be helpful in understanding the
debate between Jesus and the Inquisitor in Dostoyevsky’s The Grand Inquisitor. In
the story, Jesus returns to earth, begins to perform miracles, and the people
of the city gravitate towards him. Seeing this, the inquisitor arrests Jesus
and sentences him to be burned to death the next day. The inquisitor states
“Didst thou forget that…nothing is more seductive for man than his freedom of
conscience, but nothing is a greater cause of suffering”.[2] Here, the inquisitor blames Jesus for granting
the individual freedom to choice, as he believes the anxiety born out of such,
directly inhibits human happiness. He
therefore accuses Jesus as being the source of human suffering. He claims that Jesus is no longer needed
because the Church has found a way to grant the people happiness.
Here Dostoyevsky
personifies the tension between ethic and faith, by paralleling it with the
tensions between Jesus and the Church.
While Jesus represents Kierkegaard’s faith and Dostoyevsky’s freedom,
the Inquisitor represents the ethical standards and the vapid happiness offered
by the Church. The Church offers the
‘happiness’ of ethos. They offer the community a simple way of life, in which
their paths are clearly marked for them. The Church sets the standards of
acceptable ethos and thereby removes all freedom, and thereby choice, and
thereby anxiety, for it’s followers. They allow their community members to
easily merge into the flow of the ethical stream and grant them happiness by masquerading
as Jesus and confirming their ‘faith’ to
them.
But Jesus says, “NO!! It’s not that easy people!” Just
as faith was not easy for Abraham, it is not that easy for you. The freedom offered by Jesus brings
the same suffering to man that Abraham’s freedom brought to him. In the same
way that Jesus was hungry for food in the desert, humans are hungry now for
answers to their anxiety. Dostoyevsky’s Jesus refuses to supply these answers
in order to establish human freedom. Meanwhile, the Church generously supplies
their answers, in order to provide the people with relief from their anxiety,
in an attempt to fulfill their happiness. It may seem easy to accept bread from
the devil, and to sink into the flow of universal ethos, but Jesus says, one
must suffer this hunger, and find one’s own
food, if one hopes for the attainment of faith and freedom. The Church disagrees with such hunger. They
say, “Let us feed you! No need to go hungry! Eat this bread and relinquish your
choice- You’ll be happy, we promise.”
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