Comparing Kierkegaard's Fear And Trembling

The aim of this essay is to examine Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard’s paradoxical notion of the ‘leap of faith’ as it famously appears in Fear and Trembling. In doing so, it will be necessary to first give a brief exposition of the philosophical background, specifically the Hegelian dialectic, to provide a substance in which Kierkegaard’s views can be contrasted. Then I will focus on the characters of the Young Swain, Abraham, and the Tax Collector to illustrate the (a) the difference between resignation and faith, (b) the ethical implications of a ‘leap of faith’ and (c) de Silentio’s deliberations on how the so-called leap can be achieved. This threefold method will deconstruct Kierkegaard’s ‘leap of faith’ into separate parts that individually

Significantly, the challenge in which Kierkegaard was engaged in writing Fear and Trembling was a critical response philosopher Georg W.F. Hegel’s ‘system’. The basic idea of Hegel’s philosophy was based on the dialectic, a process according to which two opposing concepts - a thesis and an antithesis – can be ‘raised up’ or synthesized into a new thesis. And this new thesis or truth is then once again challenged by an antithesis to form a more ‘truthful’ thesis. Hegel held that through the process of dialectic, truth claims would keep being raised to approach a final truth called the Absolute Mind. Kierkegaard was deeply opposed to this Hegelian concept that saw the world as fundamentally rational and justified in terms that everyone can understand. He argued that no amount of dialectal work could ascertain an absolute truth about faith. Kierkegaard’s claim that human access to truth can never surpass subjectivity is based on his belief that God is the only entity with knowledge of the absolutes. The rejection of Hegel’s system on the basis of God’s omniscience reveals that Kierkegaard presupposes the existence of God in his opinions of existentialism. Thus, the Kierkegaardian method of existentialism is given being and understood by religious belief, implicating a

Soren Kierkegaard was ahead of his time in addressing this fundamental problem. The general, public assumption of 17th century Denmark was that the scientific method is the way to validate truth claims. Kierkegaard had to argue for an audience already enraptured with the scientific modern worldview. Kierkegaard knew that if he wrote a book plainly denouncing the world's misunderstanding of faith, then it would very likely suffer the same fate. His readers might claim to “accept” the teaching, even while blindly ignoring its application to their own lives. The world rejects an idea most strongly not by condemning it, but by accepting it as something other than what it is. Kierkegaard acknowledges this tendency and uses his pseudonym of Di Silentio to ironically pretend to support the impossibility of making the ‘leap of faith’.Kierkegaard can’t give the reader a reason that will underwrite this claim that faith is higher than reason – for the paradox of faith is that it cannot be logically believed. Kierkegaard is showing the internal logic of a non-rational faith based position. Yet, he can’t argue you by reason into this position, he is trying to provoke you into reason by showing you something about how glorious faith can be, by emphasizing how great Abraham is in the “Exordium”. Abraham took a huge risk to bet that sacrificing Isaac was the demand of God and not some