As I develop my MPhil thesis on Søren Kierkegaard’s theology of prayer into a publishable manuscript, I’m going through the rigorous process of what should stay and what should go. I want to reproduce this section of my thesis as a Substack post, as I think it will be of interest and use to others. I focus on the two main groups of translators of Kierkegaard here; for those looking for a more detailed list of all English translators of Kierkegaard, I’ve compiled an (imperfect) list (see list #7). The text here has been edited and reshaped a little, so that it might read comfortably as a stand-alone piece.

I am indebted to Kierkegaard scholars C. Stephen Evans and M. G. Piety for much of this section.

                                                                      ~~~

Howard and Edna Hong’s translations of Kierkegaard, published by Princeton University Press, remain the customary and standard resources for contemporary Kierkegaardian scholarship to cite from. There are a number of reasons for this, one of which is the Hongs’ reputation as precise translators who were driven by an attention to word-for-word accuracy in Kierkegaard’s Danish. Their approach was motivated in part by a desire to provide a consistent philosophical vocabulary for Kierkegaard. Yet, Kierkegaard’s love of the Danish language and his talent as a poet and master of genre make him resistant to a too-regimented treatment in translation.1 Unfortunately, the motivation to provide a precise and internal philosophical vocabulary for Kierkegaard has gone on to have a direct effect on both scholarly and lay interpretations of Kierkegaard. For example, the Hongs often lack a sensitivity to Kierkegaard’s subtle Scriptural allusions, and fail to reproduce them in translation, something that is often preserved in Walter Lowrie’s and husband-wife team David and Lillian Swenson’s translations.2 This has, in turn, obfuscated just how saturated Kierkegaard was in Scripture, and just how much it inspired and shaped his thinking and philosophy. The subject of prayer has also been inadvertently obscured in the Hongs’ translations of Kierkegaard’s writing, which I will illuminate here with just two examples.

In the opening pages of Kierkegaard’s 1845 discourse On the Occasion of a Confession, the Hongs translate the following:

“To be sure, a poet has rightly said that a sigh to God without words is the best worship [Tilbedelse]; then one could also believe that the infrequent visit to the sacred place, when one comes from far away, would be the best worship, because both contribute to the illusion.”3

Swensons’ translation, however, reads differently:

“A poet has indeed said that a sigh without words ascending Godward, is the best prayer [Tilbedelse], and so one might also believe that the rarest of visits to the sacred place, when one comes from afar, is the best worship, because both help to create an illusion.”4

There is a different choice of word here; the Hongs translate Tilbedelse as “worship” whereas Swenson translates it as “prayer.”5 According to Ferrall-Repp’s 1845 Danish-English dictionary, the word Tilbede carries two meanings: first, “to adore, worship” and second, “to obtain, procure by prayer.”6 It appears at first, then, that the Hongs provide the most accurate translation, as “worship” is listed as the first and primary definition. However, identifying the poet Kierkegaard is referring as Gotthold Ephraim Lessing and considering the broader context of both Kierkegaard’s purpose and Lessing’s point challenges this word choice.

Kierkegaard remarks in his journal:

“If I remember correctly it is in [the play] Minna von Barnhelm that Lessing has one of the characters say that a sigh without words is the best way to pray to God. That sounds fine but actually means that one does not really dare or does not want to get involved with the religious but merely wants now and then to gaze out upon it as upon the boundaries of existence...”7

Though it is true the first definition of Tilbede listed by Ferrall-Repp is “to worship,” given Kierkegaard’s reference to Lessing’s play and his criticism of Lessing’s sentiment that sighing is a type of prayer, it is clear that Tilbede should be rendered as “prayer” in the English text. Though the Hongs are more accurate with regards to the word’s literal meaning, Swensons’ is more accurate to Kierkegaard’s meaning. In reading Swensons’ translation of this passage, then, one gains insight into Kierkegaard’s thought on prayer, whereas the reader of the Hongs’ misses out and does not.

The next example comes from Kierkegaard’s prayer discourse One Who Prays Aright Struggles in Prayer and Is Victorious—In That God is Victorious. Though this section of text is lengthy, both versions of this one sentence are presented in full for the sake of comparison, with the more notable differences being bold type-faced. This not only highlights the differences in word choice or phrase, but also shows a couple of interpretive differences that present competing meanings to Kierkegaard’s original. The reading experience is also notably different.

The Hongs’ translation reads:

If someone objects that then one might just as well be silent if there is no probability of winning others, he thereby has merely shown that although his life very likely thrived and prospered in probability and every one of his undertakings in the service of probability went forward, he has never really ventured and consequently has never had or given himself the opportunity to consider that probability is an illusion, but to venture the truth is what gives human life and the human situation pith and meaning, to venture is the fountainhead of inspiration, whereas probability is the sworn enemy of enthusiasm, the mirage whereby the sensate person drags out time and keeps the eternal away, whereby he cheats God, himself, and his generation: cheats God of the honor, himself of liberating annihilation, and his generation of the equality of conditions.8

Swensons’ reads:

If someone were to object that then one might as well keep silent, since there is no probability of winning others, then he only proves that while his own life has supposedly thrived and flourished in probabilities, so that every enterprise of his in the service of the probable has had success, he has never dared to venture, and so has never had or given himself opportunity to consider that probability is an illusion, while to venture is the truth which gives human life and human relations content and meaning. To venture is the well-spring of enthusiasm, while probability is its sworn enemy, the illusion with which the worldly man fills out the time and keeps the eternal at a distance, by which he defrauds God and himself and the race: God of the honor, himself of the salvation that lies in annihilation, and the race of the equality of the conditions.9

Between these two translations Swensons’ renders “the worldly man” while the Hongs’ render “the sensate person,” and Swensons’ provides “the salvation that lies in annihilation” while the Hongs’ provide “liberating annihilation.” It is notable that the translation choices of salvation and worldliness carry theological connotations, while liberation and sensation carry a broader, more neutral meaning—which is truer to Kierkegaard’s meaning in this case is a separate matter, but these sublties of difference are nevertheless important to highlight, as the reader’s experience is influenced either way.

Of greatest note is the difference between Swensons’ “to venture is the truth” and the Hongs’ “to venture the truth is.” Here there is a clear difference of meaning: either Kierkegaard means that the very act of venturing is to be in accordance with the truth, or he means that one must venture correctly and in line with the truth in order to accord with the truth. In the wider context of the discourse, Swensons’ translation is more appropriate, as it is by the very act of struggling in prayer that the individual realizes her own victory through God’s victory. It is not, in other words, by praying in just the right way that the ontological reality of God’s victory for the individual comes to bear upon her.10 Similarly, “supposedly” thriving (Swensons’ rendering) is quite different to “very likely” thriving (the Hongs’ rendering). To say that one has very likely thrived is to give more credence to that individual’s actually thriving, rather than the more appropriate “supposedly” thriving, which insinuates an individual may think she is thriving when in fact she is not.

The overall point of Kierkegaard’s thought in this passage is that an individual proves she has never genuinely striven beyond thinking in probabilities when she endorses keeping silent before others instead of persuading them to struggle in prayer.11 The individual living in probabilities concludes that it is futile to try to persuade others that prayer has benefit and appeal, while the individual with experience in prayer knows she can be hopeful to the contrary despite it being the case that mere words are not enough to turn another person into a strive-er in prayer. Swensons’ translation gets you to this understanding, while the Hongs’ translation makes it a little more difficult, and a little less obvious.

“We find Kierkegaard, with (so to speak) the New Testament in his hand, declaring that this is the book his contemporaries have forgotten or misinterpreted, and that this is the book he wants to lead them back to…we may be sure there is a vital connexion between his philosophy and the Bible…” — T.H. Croxall, 1948

One of the most exciting discoveries I made while researching Kierkegaard’s theology of prayer was how Kierkegaard would read the New Testament against itself, much in the same way the Hebrew Bible (i.e. The Old Testament) is designed to be read.1 Kierkegaard does not just borrow biblical imagery or phraseology as an allusionist, nor does he exegete a text as biblical scholarship under the guidance of the historical critical method does. Rather, Kierkegaard takes both his methods and his message from Scripture’s methods and message, resulting in deep, penetrating insights.

Back in thesis days I had made note of certain characteristics I recognized in Kierkegaard’s use of Scripture, and I thought they’d be worth reproducing here. I have two aims in mind, beyond just sheer interest. One is to raise an overall awareness of how Scriptural Kierkegaard is, and to debunk any self-propagating myths that Kierkegaard only sounded Christian because he was a man stuck in his own times. The other is to inform and encourage all of us that Kierkegaard is a friend, an inspiration or example, for any who are working to infuse Scripture into their lives as the prayerful meeting place between Adoni and the human person.

                                  ~~~

Some of Kierkegaard’s Hermeneutical Moves with Scripture:

1. Kierkegaard so frequently blends James the epistle with Matthew’s gospel, that it’s almost best practice to look for the other when you encounter the one in his writing. A great example is in Works of Love, where the presence of both is felt heavily while rarely being explicitly referenced. Mercy is a key emphasis Kierkegaard takes from these texts, along with an outworking of what it means that God is a Father that is Good and Gives. I cannot prove it, but I’ve often been tempted to say that Kierkegaard was ahead of his contemporaries by discovering what is now taken for granted, that James was basing his epistle off of Jesus’ teachings in the Sermon on the Mount.

2. Kierkegaard also loved to pair 1 Peter with his readings of James and Matthew, with representations of this at both the beginning and end of his career as an author. In his Upbuilding Discourses of 1843-1844 he places a James discourse next to two 1 Peter texts (‘keep loving one another earnestly, for love covers a multitude of sins’), while in his posthumous Judge For Yourself! he consecutively pairs 1 Peter’s “be sober minded for the sake of your prayers“ with Matthew 6’s “no one can serve two masters.” By doing this, Kierkegaard develops and maintains an understanding of God as an unchanging Father who unconditionally loves, who images for human beings not only how it is that love covers over sin, but how it is possible for human beings to live and do likewise. (Notably, Kierkegaard also pairs Luke’s “her sins are forgiven, for she loved much” with 1 Peter towards the end of his writing career too, further elucidating his theme on love covering over a multitude of sins—‘he who is forgiven little, loves little,’ while ‘love covers a multitude of sins.’ See #3 just below).

3. On the Gospels — Kierkegaard heavily utilizes Matthew and Luke in his work, with John having a profound (but smaller) presence as well. In one interesting case, Kierkegaard utilizes the difference between Matthew’s and Luke’s account of Jesus’ teaching on approaching the Father in prayer as a climactic literary device. Throughout this discourse, Kierkegaard produces Matthew’s version: “if you then who are evil know how to give good gifts, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him?” Yet, at the very end, Luke’s “how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?” appears, noticeably impacting the reader and showing rather than telling her the greatest gift God is capable of giving is His own self.

4. On Paul: Kierkegaard wrote discourses and chapters off of 1 & 2 Corinthians, 1 & 2 Timothy, Romans, Ephesians, and Galatians, with his favorite spots landing in 1 Corinthians 13 and Romans 8 & 13, all of which highlight love. You’ll find the bulk of Kierkegaard’s writings on Paul in his Eighteen Upbuilding Discourses and in Works of Love, with many also appearing in Christian Discourses. For an easier way to navigate to specific writings of Kierkegaard’s on specific passages of Paul, this list I complied a few years ago might be helpful. It would be very worthwhile to track how Kierkegaard utilizes Paul within his Upbuilding Discourses of 1843-1844, watching to what extent he handles Paul like he does the other epistles against the gospels. (Internet Archive now has free access to the older (better) translation of Kierkegaard’s earlier discourses of 1843-1844, hurray!). Just as Kierkegaard’s theological understanding of God as an unchanging Father who always gives good gifts is begun and established there, so too Kierkegaard’s notions of apostleship, authority, and perseverance with suffering all begin in his ruminations on Paul. I’d even go as far as to say that Kierkegaard would be a helpful ally for the ongoing efforts to reinterpret (regain? reclaim?) Paul’s gospel message in modern scholarship.

                                   ~~~

For those interested in further reading on Kierkegaard’s scriptural hermenutics, I first direct you to Hugh Pyper’s 2010 collection of essays, The Joy of Kierkegaard, which explores this topic in many of the essays there (including an essay on Paul). Timothy Polk’s The Biblical Kierkegaard is considered a classic text on this subject, while Kevin Storer’s recent 2022 monograph Reading Scripture with Kierkegaard looks promising, and is filling a hole that has been sitting too long in modern Kierkegaard scholarship (note, though, that his study focuses on a bulk selection of Kierkegaard’s edifying discourses, and excludes other key parts of Kierkegaard’s corpus). For shorter academic treatments that focus on Kierkegaard’s overall approach to Scripture and its use, look at Paul Martens’ “Kierkegaard and the Bible,” Joel Rasmussen’s “Kierkegaard the Reader of Scripture,” and Andrew Torrance’s “A Kierkegaardian Guide to Reading Scipture.” (And for those who find and wonder about Joseph Rosas III’s 1996 Scripture in the Thought of Søren Kierkegaard, I highly recommend Stephen Dunning’s astute book review of that work).

This is the promised follow-up piece, long overdue, to my first Substack posting “Proof of Kierkegaard in 19^th century America.” This has been a fun, but much more involved piece than I had originally anticipated. The piece itself will likely show why…

I wish to offer thanks to my local public library and Gustavus Adolphus College, whose efforts through InterLibrary Loans brought to hand what are otherwise difficult resources to get ahold of (being obscure and expensive). I remain so tickled, as my grandmother would say, that two private Midwestern colleges would be willing to send their books all the way to a small public library in semi-rural California (my apologies too, for not noting down the name of the second college before it was too late). Thanks also to the Zip Books program funded by the California State Library. I am grateful as well for Internet Archive and Google Books, both of which we all use in both our serious and for-fun internet ramblings. Through them I’ve been able to access primary and secondary texts that would have been very difficult, if not impossible, to track down.

In May 1849, well known and well regarded Swedish novelist Fredrika Bremer sent a note of introduction to Søren Kierkegaard’s place of residence. She wished to meet this curious figure, whom she has heard much about in her conversations with ‘the good people of Denmark’ during her six month visit to Copenhagen. After a period of silence and a follow up note, Bremer received a written denial for an interview. Perturbed but not dissuaded, Bremer went on to put Kierkegaard in the travel book she was writing on Denmark anyway, mentioning him with two others as one of Denmark’s key philosophers…which was much to Kierkegaard’s annoyance, when he encountered what Bremer wrote of him.

This brief exchange between Bremer and Kierkegaard would be historically ancillary, if it were not for the significance of Bremer’s influence on her contemporaries, and for Kierkegaard’s alarming accusations made against her character in his private journals. Their written impressions of one another carry implications that bear upon how Kierkegaard was received and interpreted by English readers in the mid to late 19th century. Their remarks also contribute further evidence to account for in the complicated question of Kierkegaard’s view of women. Though Kierkegaard’s opinion of Bremer is largely affected by his feelings towards his nemesis Hans Lassen Martensen, of whom Bremer espoused great admiration, Kierkegaard also levies judgements against Bremer that, while impossible to prove either way, are important to account for.

In what follows, I will present Bremer and Kierkegard’s brief letter exchange during the former’s visit to Copenhagen. After presenting some thoughts and speculation on this exchange, I will then present in loose chronological order Bremer’s public and Kierkegaard’s private thoughts on the other person. Normally it would be best to summarize the bulk of this primary material and present the reader with key excerpts, yet circumstances are unique enough to warrant the full presentation of Bremer’s and Kierkegaard’s writing in full. This way, all of the primary material is in one place and at the disposal of the reader (as it is difficult to locate; see footnote 16 below). I will then conclude with some analysis and speculation on Bremer’s and Kierkegaard’s relationship. Watching the unfolding of Fredrika Bremer on Søren Kierkegaard, and Søren Kierkegaard on Fredrika Bremer, demonstrates just how difficult it can be to truly see and understand another person well.

I. The Exchange of Letters  

Towards the end of her stay in Copenhagen, Fredrika Bremer sent a playful note of introduction to Kierkegaard, asking him to pay her a visit. She addresses the letter to one of Kierkegaard’s cast of pseudonyms, Victor Eremita, and describes her wish to discuss his book Stages on Life’s Way.

To Victor Eremita:
A recluse, like you (even though she lives in the midst of society), sincerely wishes to meet you before she leaves this country—partly to thank you for the heavenly manna in your writings and partly to speak with you about Stages of Life, the metamorphoses of life, a subject that at present is more profoundly interesting than ever to her. She cannot call on you. You will easily understand why. Would you be willing to call on her? I know it is a lot to ask. But the excellent men of Denmark have made me reckless. They have given me grounds to believe that one cannot desire too much of them nor hope for more than they can give.—I shall be at home on Thursday, Ascension Day, after church and again in the afternoon from 4 p.m. until evening if I may hope to expect you. If I may do so, if you would come for a while, how kind you would be to the most sincerely grateful

Frederika Bremer1

Kierkegaard apparently does not respond to Bremer, as after the passage of a few days (with no specific date on the letter), she sends a shorter follow-up note, this time directly addressed to Kierkegaard:

You will, I am sure, have the kindness to give my messenger a word as to whether I may expect you to call on Thursday or some other day, or, if you are not at home when this arrives, to send a message to my home!--

FR. B.

Tuesday evening.

Bachelor of Divinity Mr. Søren Kierkegaard.

Gammel Torv.2

This note does elicit a response, of which we have a draft left in unpolished paragraphs and sentences:

It is my hope that I shall not be misunderstood, for it would grieve me deeply were I to be misunderstood, but even if that were so, I still cannot accept this invitation. Unaccustomed as I am to being understood, I am all the more accustomed to having to endure being misunderstood. The sole difference consists in this, that sometimes it is easy for me to endure being misunderstood, and sometimes I find it a heavy burden—as I would in this case, if I were misunderstood.

[Deleted: Permit me a straightforward and forthright word: I really feel it to be a punishment for my singular way of life that through my fault a lady is brought so unjustly into an awkward situation.]

From Sweden's authoress, famous throughout Europe, as though I did not know how to value and appreciate such a distinguished lady's benevolent attention.

Just one more word: you refer to your invitation almost as if it had been ventured recklessly. Indeed that is almost to mock me. No, I am better versed with respect to recklessness—and I appeal most recklessly to your own judgment. I venture the utmost in recklessness, I who decline the invitation, I the unworthy; I venture to ask you to accept, as completely and fully as it is intended, my most sincere thanks for the invitation. Indeed, I venture the very utmost in recklessness, I venture to believe that you will do so, as I now most sincerely beg you to do; and this I do—I who will not come, I remain sincerely in a debt of gratitude.

[In margin: And yet, yet this is after all not so reckless, because I do have some idea of your exalted character.—]3

Why does Kierkegaard ignore Bremer’s first note? Why does Kierkegaard decline Bremer’s request for a visit? More can be surmised about this after reading their later reflections on each other, but at present a few things can be noted directly from their letters. Primarily, that Bremer speaks of being unable to call on Kierkegaard herself, that she chooses Victor Eremita to address Kierkegaard, and that Stages on Life’s Way is her book of choice for discussion.

It is a little peculiar that Bremer cannot call on Kierkegaard herself. At this time Bremer was growing ever more into an outspoken proponent of women’s emancipation, which had first begun through the demonstration of her actions—she made her own travel plans, did not travel with a chaperone, and was unashamedly yet politely willing to introduce herself to new acquaintances. She was not shy about visiting other gentlemen in Copenhagen, including unmarried men like Hans Christian Andersen. Decorum could therefore not have been the reason for Bremer’s calling on Kierkegaard. Private or domestic reasons are equally out of the question, as Bremer writes that Kierkegaard will “easily understand why” she cannot call. It is possible that Bremer is being playful, knowing she is addressing a pseudonym (Victor Eremita), who is of course impossible to meet with in a literal sense. Alternatively Bremer could be attempting delicacy, not for her sake but for Kierkegaard’s, given her joint identification with him as being a “recluse,” and given that recluses don’t appreciate unknown callers. Neither of these possibilities are entirely satisfactory, though, which leave Bremer’s inability to call upon Kierkegaard herself a mystery.

There are certain aspects to Bremer’s note that likely acted as irritants, though, and would have furnished Kierkegaard reasons to deny a visit. Primarily, there is Bremer’s choice to address Kierkegaard with his pseudonym Victor Eremita in relation to the book Stages on Life’s Way. As we will see soon, choosing Victor Eremita signaled to Kierkegaard a lack of original or serious familiarity with his authorship to date, which at the time of Bremer’s correspondence totaled at 15 published books, five of which had been published since Stages appeared in 1845.4

Victor Eremita does indeed play a small role amidst the cast of characters in Stages on Life’s Way. Present with him in the first section of Stages are Constantin Constantius of the book Repetition, Johannes the Seducer of Either/Or, and a new character by the name of William Afham. These all gather to participate in a conversation reminiscent of Plato’s dialogue the Symposium.5 Yet, given the wider array of pseudonyms that feature more prominently in Stages, such as Judge William, Hilarius Bookbinder, and Frater Taciturnus, Bremer could have made a more intuitive choice of address. Judge William takes up more space in Stages (composing all of the larger second part), and even has comments on marriage and emancipation, which were among Bremer’s many interests as an engaged modernist. Hilarius Bookbinder, on the other hand, would have been a direct (if less playful) choice of address, given that he is the pseudonymous publisher of Stages.

Victor Eremita’s attractiveness as a pseudonymous addressee for Bremer must have been because “Eremita” means “hermit,” serving as a nod to Bremer’s identifying Kierkegaard as a recluse. No other obvious reason presents itself, as a close reader of Stages would be unlikely to choose him as the means of eliciting an extensive in-person interview about the book. It therefore seems that Bremer was at best a skimmer of Stages, and more likely someone who judged it a fair representative of Kierkegaard’s philosophy from its title and reputation alone.

This does not, of course, invalidate the sincerity of Bremer’s interest in Kierkegaard’s thought, but Kierkegaard can be forgiven for holding skepticism around Bremer’s motives. How, for example, did Bremer come to the conclusion that Kierkegaard was a recluse before even meeting him?

Though the title Stages on Life’s Way suggests an easy in for discussing theories about modernity, Bremer was mistaken if she thought Stages was popular as a book itself (which sold less than half of the copies initially printed at publication). Instead, Stages was well known because it was the lightning rod to what Kierkegaard’s translators have dubbed “the most famous literary controversy in Danish history.”6 A public scandal between Kierkegaard and a few popular satirical newspapers of the day, the chief of which was The Corsair, began when Peder Ludvig Møller wrote a flippant, provocative review of Stages in late 1845. Møller went as far as to breach the etiquette of respecting an author’s pseudonymity, eliciting a response from Kierkegaard through Stages’s pseudonym Frater Taciturnus. Kierkegaard eventually went on to say things damning enough to damage Møller’s reputation (resulting in Møller’s leaving Copenhagen), yet Kierkegaard’s public image suffered too. Kierkegaard’s personality and physical appearance were comically cast by the newspapers for years after the initial incident, with the teasing climaxing between January 9, 1846 to January 7, 1848, with nine issues of The Corsair containing 1-3 satirical bits on Kierkegaard a piece.7

Though it is unlikely Bremer was even partially motivated to hold an interview with Kierkegaard owing to a fascination around the Corsair scandal, it is almost certain she received her information about Kierkegaard’s supposed reclusivness from the resulting public aftermath of the scandal. For Kierkegaard’s part, a clearly superficial reader of Stages who calls him a recluse would have signaled Bremer was nothing more than an insincere gawker. Add to this Kierkegaard’s already short patience with anyone unwilling to earnestly engage in subject matters for themselves, and one could see how Kierkegaard would be uninterested in going out of his way to visit Bremer. We will later see that Kierkegaard’s view of propriety in women was also likely at play in his reason for a denial.

We will now turn and consider how Bremer’s public remarks on Kierkegaard, and later Kierkegaard’s private remarks on Bremer, further illuminate how their different perspectives and particular personalities drive not only their choices, but also tragically exacerbate the difficulty of recognizing genuinely complimentary viewpoints. Such a misunderstanding results in missing out on what could otherwise have been a mutually beneficial engagement.

II. Bremer on Kierkegaard: Liv i Norden

Bremer’s travelogue, entitled Liv i Norden (Life in the North) was published in Denmark and Sweden soon after she left for London and the United States.8 Its purpose was to give an overarching sense of the culture and ways of modern Danish life to her international readership, but was perhaps even more so to serve as both an act and model of women’s emancipation.9 Bremer’s comments on intellectual modern life in Copenhagen are sandwiched between protracted praise of the social efforts of women, and subtle nudges of encouragement on Denmark’s movements towards the emancipation of their own “subjected classes.”

Liv i Norden begins with praise of the recent developments Danish women were making with underprivileged children, and then begins patterned reflections on Copenhagen’s intellectuals. These often start with laudatory descriptions of the field in question before going on to list a few leading figures in each category.10 Bremer starts with Copenhagen’s theater life, and then proceeds to consider church life, the poets playwrights and “literati” of Copenhagen, painters and musicians, naturalists and scientists, and, finally, Denmark’s philosophers. Bremer then concludes her short book by explicitly considering Denmark’s movements towards emancipation. “We look up on the great rising middle-class, which daily grows in the North, by additions from the aristocratic order, as well as from the artisan-classes, who make labor their honor, and the noblest humanity the object of their education. We behold an emancipation in the best sense of the word, which elevates more and more the subjected classes, and levels the separating barriers of rank and fashion.”11 

Bremer’s analysis of Copenhagen’s philosophers begins with remarks on one of Kierkegaard’s old philosophy teachers at the University of Copenhagen, Frederick Charles Sibbern (1785-1872). Sibbern receives the lengthiest attention from Bremer before she turns to Hans Lassen Martensen with praise and then, lastly, to Kierkegaard:

While Martensen, with his wealth of genius, casts from his central position light upon every sphere of existence, upon all the phenomena of life, Søren Kierkegaard stands like another Simon Stylites upon his solitary column, with his eye unchangeably fixed upon one point. Upon this he places his microscope and examines its minutest atoms, scrutinizes its most fleeing movements, its innermost changes; upon this he lectures; upon this he writes again and again, infinite volumes. Everything exists for him in this one point—the human heart; and as he ever reflects this changing heart in the eternal, unchangeable, in Him “who became flesh and dwelt among us,” and as, amidst his wearisome, logical wanderings, he often says divine things, he has found in the gay, vivacious Copenhagen not a mean public, and principally of ladies. The philosophy of the heart must be interesting to them. About the philosopher who writes on this subject, people say good and bad, and—wonderful things. Solitary lives he who wrote for “That Individual,” inaccessible, and in fact known to none. During the day he may be seen passing up and down in the throng of the most crowded streets of Copenhagen; by night, lights are seen to shine from his solitary house. Rich, but regardless of wealth, he appears to be rather of a jaundiced and irritable temper which finds occasion of displeasure even against the sun if it shine otherwise than he wishes. For the rest, in him is seen something of that metamorphosis of which he likes to write, which he has experienced in himself, and which has led him from a skeptical waverer, through “sorrow and trembling,” to the hill of light, whence he now talks with inexhaustible power of “the Gospel of Suffering,” of “deeds of love,” and the “inner mysteries of life.” Sören Kierkegaard belongs to those few profoundly introverted characters which have been met with from the most ancient times in the North, though oftener in Sweden than in Denmark, and it is to his kindred spirits that he talks about the sphinx in the human breast; that silent enigmatical, above all, mighty heart.12

Since all available evidence indicates that Bremer never met or interviewed Kierkegaard, we know that she bases these judgements of him off reports and second hand news, admitting as much herself claiming people say “good and bad” of him. In doing so, Bremer played a hand in perpetuating myths about Kierkegaard, which include establishing Kierkegaard as a solitary reclusive, a temperamental and poorly natured person, and as an obsessive who misses the larger picture in his critique of modern thought. Little of the estimations of Kierkegaard’s friends appear in Bremer’s report.

In a letter following Kierkegaard’s death, we have evidence that it was Hans Christian Andersen who first called Kierkegaard a Simon Stylites.13 Jibes from The Corsair are present in Bremer’s assessment too, such as Kierkegaard’s supposed ill and reactionary temper when the sun does not shine. One Corsair bit likens Kierkegaard to a comet, teasing both his appearance and self-importance, dubbing him an eccentric. Another names the sun as revolving around Kierkegaard rather than Kierkegaard revolving around the sun, attributing to Kierkegaard volatile emotions. Still another makes a satire of the church calendar, elevating Kierkegaard and his pseudonyms to days of the week, marking the setting of the sun followed by a day of prayer.14 An additional hint of Møller and The Corsair is present when Bremer suggests that Kierkegaard was writing autobiographically when he wrote Stages on Life’s Way, saying “in [Kierkegaard] is seen something of that metamorphosis of which he likes to write, which he has experienced in himself…”.

The opinions of Kierkegaard’s nemesis Hans Lassen Martensen are also detectable in Bremer’s assessment, which we will soon see Kierkegaard claims himself. It is likely owing to Martensen that Bremer writes Kierkegaard is “unchangeably fixed upon one point,” reducing her own earlier interest in his “metamorphoses of life” into a single “metamorphosis.” Rather than Kierkegaard’s writing on a wide array of subjects spanning suffering, love, and the “inner mysteries of life,” Kierkegaard is instead a singular philosopher of the heart who will consequently be of singular interest to ladies.15 This is all the more interesting when it is considered that earlier in Liv i Norden Bremer observes “the Dane does not willingly talk of his heart…[the Copenhagener] has frequently head at the expense of heart…”. It is a backhanded compliment to Kierkegaard, then, that in Bremer’s estimation he does not fit inside the norm of a typical Copenhagener. Perhaps this is why Kierkegaard stands out to Bremer as more than a mere oddity, and why he sometimes says “divine” and “wonderful” things. Yet, Bremer’s opinion that Kierkegaard’s philosophy stands outside of the all-important “philosophy of life” could not be farther from what reception history has gone on to show of Kierkegaard’s thought. Kierkegaard continues to this day to widely influence philosophers and the thinking public, and is still considered by many to be the father of existentialism, something perhaps not too unlike the “philosophy of life” that Bremer speaks of.

III. Kierkegaard on Bremer: Response to Liv i Norden

In total there are 6 mentions of Fredrika Bremer in Kierkegaard’s journals.16 As stated earlier, the bulk quotes would be kept to a minimum under normal circumstances, but in this case are important to present in their entirety given how difficult and time-consuming it is to locate these entries across different translations and editions of Kierkegaard. It is also important to let Kierkegaard speak for himself, and to dignify the reader by enabling her to do her own analysis of the texts.

On the lengthier entries where Bremer is mentioned amidst a wider conversation, though, I have shortened the entries to help keep the focus on Bremer or matters relating to Bremer. Her name has been highlighted in bold for easy locating, and the entries have been presented in order of relevance to the discussion rather than placed chronologically. I’ve numbered these journal entries too, to further help orient the reader.

Kierkegaard’s first mention of Bremer in his journals is the longest description of her character we get, and also the most accusatory:

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  Naturally one seeks the society and company of everyone who amounts to anything, everyone who concerns himself with pronouncing judgment on literary matters and the like. One also keeps a careful eye on foreigners. It helps, you see.

   It has now pleased Fr. Bremer to bless Denmark with her judgment. Naturally it consists of echoes of what the people concerned have said to her. This can best be seen in the case of Martensen, who has had quite a lot to do with her. She was kind enough to send me a courteous note inviting me to have a conversation with her. Now I almost regret that I did not reply as I had originally thought of doing, with merely these words: “No, many thanks, I do not dance.” But in any case I declined her invitation and did not go. So I get to hear in print that I am “inaccessible.” It is probably owing to Martensen’s influence that Frederikke has made me into a psychologist and nothing else, and has provided me with a significant audience of ladies. It is really ridiculous―how in all the world I can be considered a ladies’ author[?] But it is owing to Martensen. He has surely noticed that his star is in decline at the university. It will certainly be droll for R. Nielsen and those who are truly of the younger generation to read that I am a ladies’ author.

[in the margin] She lived here for quite a while and had physical intercourse with famous people. She wanted to have physical intercourse with me, but I was virtuous.17

According to Kierkegaard, Bremer is a dilettante and a quidnunc—she suspiciously seeks out the company of notable people, believes what she hears from them, and publicly passes judgement on matters that she is superficially familiar with. Kierkegaard takes it a step farther when he indites her for having physical intercourse with famous people, though, and for wishing to do so when she wrote him.

Before we examine this accusation or consider how Kierkegaard’s claim of Bremer’s sexual promiscuity reveals something of his own understanding of women, we must first pause and consider Kierkegaard’s relationship to his contemporary, Hans Lassen Martensen. Not a single journal entry exists on Bremer that does not also levy complaint against Martensen, and we cannot hope to fully understand Kierkegaard’s reaction to Bremer without first understanding something of Kierkegaard’s regard of Martensen.

To put it melodramatically, Hans Lassen Martensen was Kierkegaard’s archenemy.18 From early on they knew each other through the University of Copenhagen, and remained intellectual rivals up to and even passed Kierkegaard’s death in 1855. In earlier days Kierkegaard held a respect of Martensen’s intellect and had an interest in his person, with Martensen personally tutoring him in philosophy in 1834. Kierkegaard is also said to have frequently visited Martensen’s mother to ask after him when he was once away on an extended journey.19 Five years Kierkegaard’s senior, Martensen began as a philosophical-theology lecturer at the University of Copenhagen in 1837 at age 29, with Kierkegaard in attendance. “He was immediately able to captivate the imagination of the young students with his lecture style and his rich knowledge of the current situation of philosophy and theology in Germany and Prussia...[he] created a great sensation among both the students and the professors at the university.”20 Martensen was also part of Kierkegaard’s dissertation committee, and heard Kierkegaard defend his thesis On the Concept of Irony.21

How and why the relationship between these two young men began to sour is not easily identified. Martensen never showed sincere interest in Kierkegaard outside of someone who might be amenable to his own ideas, while Kierkegaard’s disagreements with Martensen appeared early on, but only gave way to personal dislike later into both men’s careers. Of all that we have available to us in print, little Martensen says of Kierkegaard is kind or complimentary. It seems almost reluctant on his part to recognize in Kierkegaard any real talent or insight, yet Martensen grants both more than once, even going so far as to extensively engage with Kierkegaard’s thought in his 1878 Christian Ethics…twenty-three years after Kierkegaard had died.22 On Kierkegaard’s part, Martensen’s trajectory as a professional was a key reason for his disdain, as Martensen’s popularity and success as a professor and later as a churchman strongly conflicted with Kierkegaard’s own views about how someone with power and authority in the name of Christ ought to act.23 That Martensen was too amenable to Hegelian thought was a crucial point of difference between them as well. While Martensen saw the practice and study of systematic theology as a central and even core part to the Church’s work and life, Kierkegaard saw the modern practice of systematics as being a category mistake, a mistaken identity of what a true relationship with God looks like. Kierkegaard kept his disagreements with Martensen veiled to the public eye for most of his life, writing instead copious criticisms in his private journals or disagreeing with Martensen’s philosophy without naming him in his published writings. Kierkegaard’s public criticism of Martensen only came at the very end of his life, when Kierkegaard chose to openly attack the institution of the Danish Lutheran Church.

When Fredrika Bremer visited Copenhagen between the years 1848 and 1849, Martensen was close to finishing what came to be one of his most famous works: Christian Dogmatics: A Compendium of the Doctrines of Christianity. Bremer received an advance look at what Martensen had written during some of her visits to him, and then recorded a glowing forecast of what the public had to look forward to in Liv i Norden:

H. Martensen is, in the highest sense, a man of truth; he is still young, and in the prime of his powers, and through his living words, as well as by his philosophical writings, which are prized as highly in Sweden as in Denmark, he scatters abroad the seed of a new development of the religious life, both in the church and in science, and this through a more profound understanding of its being, thought the explication of the life of faith by the life of reason, through the union of deep feeling with a logical intellect. In his Systematic Exposition of Christian Doctrine, which it is expected will soon be printed, a full statement of his views is looked for. By what is known of these views from the works he has already published, it is hoped that they will lead to a new birth in the life of the church, in great and in small, in the state and in the solitary heart. The extraordinary clearness and distinctness with which this richly gifted mind can set forth in words the most profoundly speculative philosophy, his interesting and genial mode of exposition, make him a popular writer. In his forthcoming volume, we expect to find a work not alone for the learned. It is high time that Theology was made popular. Our Lord made himself so eighteen hundred years ago.24

Bremer’s praise does read as a little too much in unremitting esteem, and with Kierkegaard’s long established relationship of enmity with Martensen we can see how Bremer’s own words on Martensen would shape Kierkegaard’s judgement of her, just as much as her words about him would. Kierkegaard regarded Bremer as an impressionable, uncritical disciple of Martensen’s, which we find reflected in his other journal entries about Bremer:

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Frederikke Bremer will become popular in various circles because of this version of things. I live on here now, having voluntarily exposed myself to and continuing to endure the prolonged and yet perhaps the most bitter of martyrdoms, the martyrdom of ridicule (doubly painful because the context is so limited and because the measure of my endowments and achievements is generally recognized). With frightful mental and spiritual strenuousness I endure by continued writing in the face of constant financial sacrifices—and yet it is well known that I have not dropped one single comment on [this matter]. Frederikke's version is that I am so sickly and irritable that I can become bitter if the sun does not shine when I want it to. You smug spinster, you silly tramp, you have hit it! Various circles that are perhaps not so different will be united by this interpretation. On the one side Martensen, Paulli, Heiberg, etc., on the other, Goldschmidt, P. L. Møller [editors of The Corsair]. It was a wonderful old world—Martensen may witness "for God and his conscience"; did he not become Bishop and swathed in velvet and did not Frederikke run to him every day and read his Dogmatik, of which she got proof sheets (this is a well-known fact). And Goldschmidt may declare: It was a wonderful old world, I always had 3,000 subscribers. All of them together: it was a wonderful world; only Magister Kierkegaard was so sickly and irritable that he could get bitter if the sun did not shine when he wanted it to.25

Kierkegaard’s anger towards Bremer is owing to not just her joining in with others’ opinions of him, but in her gaining additional favor amidst his adversaries by adopting their own negative opinions about him. Kierkegaard’s reading of Bremer’s comments in Life in the North closely coincided with his reading of Martensen’s fresh-off-the-press Dogmatics, detailed in his journal NB12, which only served to exacerbate his irritation towards them both. Kierkegaard thinks Martensen might have him in mind when the Dogmatics says “[the individual] cannot accomplish his sanctification by leading an egotistic, morbid, and isolated life,” and we can see a likeness in the sentiment with what Bremer reports of Kierkegaard.26

Kierkegaard was disappointed, though, that Martensen did not more openly and honestly engage with his own body of work in his Dogmatics, so Kierkegaard writes “A Reply” to Martensen in his journals. There Kierkegaard bemoans again how Bremer’s own praise and popularity lends further credence to Martensen’s work, as if assurances of how good Dogmatics is are necessary in order to convince people that the work is actually one of quality:

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A Reply that I could be tempted to make:

Inasmuch as “the established order” is so strong that Prof. Martensen thinks that he can dismiss the entirety of my writings with two lines in a preface, it surely becomes my duty to take away the damping capacity of jest and the diverting capacity of indirection, which―in order to spare myself and others―I have employed until now in connection with my communications: to take these away and proceed in a direct manner. The established order is certainly strong enough; after all, it has Prof. Martensen, who, as can be seen from his preface, is considerably the stronger.

Thus, directly: the entire proclamation of Christianity as it is now heard really omits what is essential in Christianity. And, to make it entirely direct: Prof. Martensen’s work, in all its foolishness, is actually the betrayal and abolition of Christianity. Granted, this has helped him in his career and in the acquisition of worldly goods, but it is of course not identical with Christianity, which contains no § about providing worldly goods for Prof. M. by transposing Christianity’s message into unchristian forms of communication…it would be a great embarrassment if Prof. Martensen remained silent, for then people would say, Of course, it is indeed a purely worldly existence. But then he speaks―and provides assurances―and [the newspaper] Berlingske Tidende provides assurances that this is Martensen’s conviction, concerning which Miss Bremer and Flyveposten also provide assurances, and many believers who believe Martensen’s assurances assure us that one can quite safely believe them. Should not this be certain, seeing as there are so many assurances[?] And yet, it is suspect. For a life does not need one single assurance―it is of course something one can grasp. Where this is absent, the matter simply becomes more and more suspect the more assurances there are.27

It is not just that Bremer’s praise exacerbates the esteem of Martensen and the disregard of Kierkegaard in Copenhagen (which Kierkegaard ultimately attributes as a reason for why he cannot leave Copenhagen to retire as a country preacher, since leaving would only confirm the rumors).28 What goads Kierkegaard further is that Bremer continued on to the United States with her reputation and opinions in tow. This complaint appears in a journal entry and two essay sketches in Kierkegaard’s papers:

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For example, Martensen, the profound M., who has already found a connoisseur in the no less profound Frederikke Bremer, who profoundly prophesies that Martensen's Dogmatik will regenerate all scientific scholarship in the North, perhaps also in North America, where the forerunner, the traveling Fr. B. has now gone. Not only this, the no less profound [newspaper]—despite its superficial appearance—Berlingske Tidende, or wholesaler [Mendel Levin] Nathanson, who according to his own words (on another occasion) "has bestowed," as one sees, is bestowing, and probably will continue to bestow upon "Danish literature his special attention," says of Martensen's Dogmatik that one feels conviction in every line. Alas, I have now learned otherwise, that the only proof of a conviction is one's life. But are you quite sure, now, Mr. Wholesaler, do you dare say: By God. Think carefully now; you will see for yourself how important taking this oath could be, since this involves nothing less than—as Frederikke B. prophesies—the rebirth of theological scholarship in the North, and to which we add (what modesty no doubt has prevented Frederikke B. from adding) in North America. Do you dare, Mr. Wholesaler, do you dare say: By God. In view of the great importance of taking this oath, you yourself will perceive how important it is to do everything as solemnly as possible before proceeding to take the oath.29

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Recollections from the Lives of the Pseudonyms: A Contribution to the Current Theological Controversy, by S.K.

Preface—The defense for the tone of this little essay is very briefly as follows. In his Dogmatiske Oplysninger Prof. Martensen bluntly declares that [my] pseudonyms are nothing but modes of expression. That does not bother me at all, for such conceit, in part stupid, warrants any tone whatsoever. The reader perhaps will not wonder at my finding it necessary to say this in advance before he has read what follows….

Introduction—Dogmatiske Oplysninger is published! Now this is what can be called clarification. If there is anything it does not clarify, then it must be because it does not appear in the book, and thus the clarification cannot be required to clarify it, at most one could ask that it be included in the clarification. It clarifies not only for us, but I am convinced that Fredrikke Bremer (who is linked by so many sympathetic bonds to Martensen's Dogmatik), as soon as she sees this light, will suspect, without any previous knowledge of it, that it is Martensen's clarification, unless she (who both read the book in advance in proof sheets, reviewed it in advance, declaring that M. would reform scholarship in the whole North, finally rushed off to N. America, presumably to prepare the way for the Dogmatik), unless she also knew in advance that Martensen had in mind the tactic, if attacks should come, of waiting until they were forgotten—and then to publish clarification....30

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Prof. Martensen’s Status

It is now a good ten years since Prof. M. returned from his foreign travels, bringing with him the latest German philosophy and creating a great sensation with this new material―he who has really always been more of a reporter and a correspondent than an original thinker. It was the philosophy of standpoints―and this is what is corrupting in overviews of this sort―that enchanted the young people, opening the prospect of having everything ingested in half a year. He is hugely successful, and at the same time young students take the opportunity to inform the public in print that with Martensen a new era, epoch, epoch and era, etc. is beginning.…

….Then something new happens: Prof. M becomes a court preacher…He is again hugely successful at the Palace Church. He himself almost seems to be infatuated. He does not notice the many illusions: 1) the rumor that Hegelian philosophy had now come down to the cultured classes, to ladies, etc., who thought they had gotten some contact with it, a little taste of it, when he preached for them; 2) that [Bishop] Mynster was his protector; 3) that M. had not become a real priest, “not an ordinary man of the cloth for every Sunday,” but a court preacher for every 6th Sunday….31

Finally we return to scientific scholarship, and now the Christian Dogmatics is published….The earlier tradition of the speculative is exploited, while at the same time advancing the new opinion that―wonder of wonders!―it has now become so popular that every ordinary cultured person can read it and grasp it….In order that Christian Dogmatics does not lack for a forerunner, a lady novelist takes upon herself this honorable office: Miss Frederikke Bremer. She has—oh, God save us, she, too, is to be a judge!—with the consent of the author she has in advance accented herself with Christian Dogmatics. She announces in advance something that she of course can and will vouch for, both in advance and afterward: that this will be the rebirth of scholarship in Scandinavia. She implies that Martensen is Christ—and thereupon travels to North America, presumably to prepare him room and prepare the way.—As with the forerunner, so with all the rest of the entourage. [In the margin: absit risus ate scurrilitas! (now, no laughter and improper merriment!)]….32

Bremer is Martensen’s prophet, his “forerunner” and “judge,” who “sees the light,” wherefore Bremer “implies that Martensen is Christ” himself. On this last exaggeration Kierkegaard inverts the meaning of John 4:2-3 and Hebrews 6:20 to make a theological point: Fredrika Bremer is doing as she ought to in a profoundly misguided way by elevating Martensen as her prototype rather than placing that devotion directly in Christ.33 That Martensen encourages Bremer as he does, flattering her with his attention because of her eagerness, is as bad as intentionally leading her astray for his own ego, according to Kierkegaard. In this Julia Watkin agrees, seeing in Martensen’s own recounting of Bremer’s visits that Martensen does not think highly of Bremer for her own sake: “Martinsen seems to have regarded Bremmer's interest in his Dogmatics as a useful test of the ability of his work to attract not only theologians and other scholars, but also ‘cultured members of the community.’ His tone towards her in his autobiography is decidedly condescending, not least about her attempts to work out her own theological position…”34 Whatever we think of Kierkegaard’s extreme dislike of Bremer, we have to see in it his even greater dislike of Martensen.

IV. Kierkegaard’s Accusation, and His View of Women

We can now return to Kierkegaard’s accusation against Bremer, that not only did she have sex with multiple famous people, but that she also wanted to add Kierkegaard to her list. This is of course impossible to prove either way, but findings of similar accusations against Bremer are not easy to find. Indeed, almost all who knew Bremer spoke highly of her character.35 Plus, Bremer was not as radical as George Sand’s endorsement of “free love;” rather Bremer believed the emancipation of women was a good that brought a higher degree of economic and political independence to women that was complimentary to the values of the traditional family. She believed that women should be able to choose to marry, just as men might choose to marry, and that should a woman not choose to marry she might comfortably pursue her own interests through education and industry. Bremer and Kierkegaard both held marriage to be a virtuous institution that plays an important role in the happiness and health of society, and both Bremer and Kierkegaard themselves never entered into that institution, in light of their calling to be writers.36 Kierkegaard’s accusation of Bremer wishing to have sex with him, and his claim of her promiscuity with others such as Martensen (“who has had quite a lot to do with her”), seems to say far more about Kierkegaard’s view of propriety than it does about Bremer’s actual person.37

It is helpful to briefly consider Kierkegaard’s view of women in society at this point, though it is beyond the scope of this essay to fully explore.

Kierkegaard held men and women as equals before God. Yet, he considered this equality to be spiritual rather than temporal.38 Unlike some of his contemporaries, Kierkegaard did not believe women were inferior in their mental capacities, but he did believe there were ontological differences between the male and female gender. From Kierkegaard’s perspective, this is how men and women balance each other out and also model for the other areas they need to develop more into. Men ought to be more sensitive and pious as women are, while women ought to be more discerning and thoughtful as men are.

This view affects Kierkegaard’s thoughts on the subject of women’s emancipation. Since the spiritual ought to overcome and animate the temporal, men and women ought to be more concerned with accepting the placements and roles they find themselves in, serving one another in sacrificial love of neighbor rather than concerning themselves with changing the social order. To be concerned with changing their station in life would be to misunderstand God’s revelation and power through suffering.39 Sylvia Walsh’s summation of Kierkegaard’s view of women is astute and helpful here:

Coming into manhood at the beginning of the Victorian age, Kierkegaard shared the Victorian ideology of separate spheres for women and men. Nowhere is this more apparent in his authorship than in Part Two of Upbuilding Discourses in Various Spirits, where he distinguishes between "woman's work," which consists in staying at home, keeping house, and being chiefly occupied with self-adornment, and "man's work," which involves going out into the world and earning a living. But this division of labor, even though based on what were believed to be natural differences between the sexes, does not appear to be rigid in his thought inasmuch as he recognized legitimate public professions for women, such as writing and acting. Like American fundamentalists, however, Kierkegaard and his pseudonyms consistently opposed the emancipation of women, regarding it variously as a male plot to corrupt and exploit women and as "an invention of the devil.” Although Kierkegaard just as consistently affirmed the spiritual equality of man and woman, in his view that is not equivalent to social equality or equal rights, nor is the latter something Christianity has "required or desired" to establish in the temporal realm. Rather, "[t]he man is to be the woman's master and she subservient to him.”40

It is important to note, though, that part of what drove Kierkegaard’s criticism of emancipation was his broader view that modern society was destructive to men, who as a matter of necessity are forced to integrate into it. He writes in his journal:

There really is something to the view that one ultimately finds a bit more self-sacrifice among women, which is no doubt because they live quieter and more withdrawn lives and thus a little closer to ideality; they don’t as easily acquire the market-place measures used by men, who get right to the business of life. What saves women is the distance from life that is granted them for so long (which is why even among women one sometimes sees traces of and expressions of individuality, the boldness to grasp a single idea and hold on to it). This quieter life means that women are sometimes more loyal to themselves than men are, since men are demoralized from boyhood by the demand to be like the others, and become completely demoralized as youths, not to mention as men, by being taught all about the way things are in practical life, in reality. It is this very competence that is ruinous. If girls are brought up in the same way, one can say goodnight to the whole human race. And women’s emancipation, which tends toward this very sort of education, is no doubt the invention of the devil.41

The logic is easy to follow, if this estimation is true—why apply oneself to support the cause of bringing women into modern life when it is detrimental to one’s individuality? For Kierkegaard, the thought appears to conclude that men simply have to accept this “ruinous” suffering for themselves, just as women have to accept whatever inconveniences come from their reliance upon men. It seems it was too idealistic for Kierkegaard to contend that change to the structures of “practical life in reality” itself needed to happen for the sake of men and women alike. Kierkegaard’s answer to the issue of a subjugated, “demoralized” soul was not to try and change society’s structures, but to instead emphasize the deeper reality of one’s spiritual equality with another before God. By emphasizing one’s need of the other in the present, and becoming willfully dependent upon God while waiting for Christ to draw all things unto himself, a good life could be realized. For Kierkegaard, men and women’s need of each other, and their giftings to that effect, were to be showcased in how modern society was found to be, rather than in how society ought to be.

Kierkegaard saw how many aspects to the structure of modern society inherently alienated a person from his or herself, and that this was in large part owing to the struggle to out-perform one another, which modern society rewards and encourages. It is all the more a shame, then, that Kierkegaard did not see the uniqueness of women as offering the potential to positively effect change upon these very structures of society. His concern, instead, was that emancipation would merely suck women into the pre-existing problems of modernity.

V. Bremer on Kierkegaard Again: Hertha

Kierkegaard did not live to see himself feature once again in Bremer’s writing, this time in Bremer’s seminal novel Hertha (1856). Bremer considered Hertha to be her literary masterpiece, and took a calculated risk by openly stressing the need for women to self-determine their lives.42 Kierkegaard appears midway through Hertha, when the protagonist Hertha Falk is traveling in her native Sweden. While traveling by steamboat, a friendly stranger sees that Hertha is morose, and goes below deck in order to retrieve a pamphlet for her:

[S]he sat with her eyes riveted upon the tract which she held in her hand. By degrees some words attracted her eye, and she read as follows, in Danish:

‘To be agonized as I am, and still may be, is certainly what no one, humanly speaking, can call desirable; nevertheless, it may be that which, in a much higher state, I may thank God for as the greatest benefit. To be agonized and brought low, even for a noble cause, is, I can very well understand, something which one, humanly speaking, cannot desire, something which one would wish to avoid at almost any price, if, by experience, one were not exalted by the thought, that in a far higher point of view, this extreme of suffering may be regarded as the greatest benefit.’

Hertha turned the page and continued to read:

‘April 11: In torments which a human being has seldom survived; in agonies of mind of eight days’ endurance, which were enough to deprive the mind of reason, I am yet sufficiently ——

‘My wishes have often been for death, my longings for the grave! my desire that my wishes and my longings might be fulfilled. Yes, O God! if thou wert not Almighty; if thou couldst not all-powerfully compel; if thou wert not love which could move irresistibly; on no other condition, at no other price could I be induced to choose the life which is mine, again to be embittered by its unavoidable consequences, the effect which mankind produces upon me.

‘Yet thy love, O God! prompts the thought of daring to love thee, inspires me under the possibility of being all-powerfully compelled—joyfully and gratefully to desire to become that which is the consequence of being loved by thee and of loving thee; a sacrifice offered for a race to whom the ideal is a foolishness, a nothing, to whom the earthly, the temporal, are the only real.’

Hertha did not inquire by whom this heart-rending confession was made [asterisked below: “S. Kierkegaard, in his last “Moment”]; but she felt that a combating and suffering heart throbbed here in unison with her own, embittered, bleeding, loving, and still, though as in the midst of the flames, seeking to lay hold upon God; and she felt less solitary in the world.43

Hertha decides to allow the company she is with to continue on their river cruise without her, while she stays behind to think in solitude.

When the steamer burst forward through the locks of Trollhätta on its way into the beautiful river, Hertha was sitting along on Gull, or Gold Island, with the thundering falls roaring around her, and the words of Kierkegaard in her hand. The deafening thunder of the fall seemed to her a lullaby which would hush to sleep the wild combat in her breast, and for the moment it did so. When evening came, and with it darkness, she went to the Inn, and ordered and obtained for herself a room.

She passed a sleepless night. With the first flush of dawn she went out…[and she recommenced] her wandering immediately, from the necessity of allaying the torture of the soul by the weakness of the body, and to gain a moment’s forgetfulness of life and suffering—a moment’s sleep. But all the more seemed darkness and the horrors of darkness to encompass her soul. Energetic natures are able to suffer a great deal without being crushed or subdued; nevertheless, there is a state in which they have great difficulty in sustaining themselves….Suffering, in its extremest form, causes to us the loss of our higher consciousness, our light and our strength. If any one had asked the restless wanderer by the fall of Trollhätta, at this time, what she was seeking for, she might have replied—“Myself!”

The words of Kierkegaard no longer consoled her. The spirit which spoke to her in them was too much absorbed by the combat, had not yet passed victoriously through it. In the dark tumultuous state of mind in which she then was, she threw the printed tract into the foaming waters. It whirled round for a moment, sank, and vanished from sight. How beautiful to sink thus, to vanish in the cool depths, and forget, and rest;—the thundering, whirling waters would be heard there no longer!44

It is interesting that Bremer did not wholly write Kierkegaard off after his refusal to meet with her in 1849. It seems out of a sense of fascination, hope, and then genuine disappointment that Bremer continues to track with Kierkegaard’s output and incorporate his thought into her novel on women’s emancipation. She may not have read Stages on Life’s Way, but it seems she did read some or all of Kierkegaard’s magazine articles under the title “The Moment,” which first saw publication in 1854. This could perhaps be seen as a recognition of respect, followed by a scolding for still missing the picture after understanding so much. Kierkegaard saw in his time a critical moment, yet either wouldn’t or couldn’t recognize the frustrations of women in that moment.45 For Bremer, this was a great failure and oversight.46

VI. Concluding Thoughts

While researching and writing this piece, the idiom “like ships passing in the night” kept coming to mind. In judgement of Kierkegaard and of Bremer I find fault with both of them, much sympathy with each, and something like a sadness of heart that all too often in our encounters with each other we do not see or understand the another. Both had important missions to accomplish: Bremer’s was to bring lasting change into the lives of women, Kierkegaard’s was to foster in others a submissive life of friendship with the living Jesus Christ. Both too hoped that their messages would bring a change for the better upon the lives of the individuals making up their societies. Both were also frustrated by a lack of recognition and understanding from those wider societies (Bremer at least being so through Hertha).

Taking everything together then, Kierkegaard’s dislike of Bremer is almost exclusively owing to her great admiration of Martensen. It has less to do with her gender, and more to do with her impressionable embrace of Martensen’s philosophy, of which her published endorsement served to uphold and further Martensen’s public image while simultaneously damaging Kierkegaard’s. One gets the sense from Kierkegaard’s manner of expression that Bremer’s gender does subtly come into why she is impressionable, but that would be more owing to her lacking university-honed skills rather than it being something fundamental to her being a woman. Bremer’s friendliness with Martensen is even a likely reason why Kierkegaard did not wish to meet with her—Copenhagen being a small city at the time, Kierkegaard indicates in his journal that he had known of Bremer’s presence in Copenhagen, and it is notable Bremer only asked to meet with Kierkegaard after months of already having been in Copenhagen. With her note indicating only a loose familiarity with Stages on Life’s Way, Kierkegaard was not unreasonable to suspect that Bremer was approaching him with a pre-established opinion.

Where Kierkegaard’s personal view of women seems to most clearly to bear upon his view of Bremer is in his accusations of her sexual promiscuity. One can detect a chiding in his draft refusal to Bremer’s request for a visit, indicating a suspicion that she is flirting with him. Outside readers can largely agree that Bremer was not intending to flirt with or alarm Kierkegaard, but one can also see how Kierkegaard could misunderstand her, when he held an ulterior respect for women who were more modest in their manners and addresses. Bremer’s actions and still-developing reputation as a suffragette possibly played a role in Kierkegaard’s decision not to call on her, but if it did it was far from being the sole or primary reason.

In the end, both Bremer and Kierkegaard are at least unified by this—that the only proof of a conviction is how one lives one’s life.

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Bibliography and Suggested Further Reading

Primary Sources

1.      “Does a Human Being Have the Right to Let Himself Be Put to Death for the Truth?” in Two Ethical-Religious Essays in Without Authority, Princeton, 1997.

2.     Kierkegaard’s Letters and Documents, Princeton University Press, 1979.

3.     Kierkegaard’s Journals and Notebooks, Princeton University Press, 2007-2020.

4.     Søren Kierkegaard’s Journals and Papers, Indianna University Press, 1967-1978.

5.     The Corsair Affair and Articles Related to the Writings, Princeton University Press, 1982.

6.     The Concept of Irony: With Continual Reference to Socrates, Princeton University Press, 1990.

7.     The Moment and Other Late Writings, Princeton University Press, 1998.   

8.     An Easter Offering, Fredrika Bremer (trans. Mary Howit), 1850.

9.     Hertha, Fredrika Bremer (trans. Mary Howit), 1856.

10.     Christian Dogmatics, Hans Lassen Martensen (trans. Rev. William Urwick), 1874.

11.     Christian Ethics, Hans Lassen Martensen (trans. C. Spence), 1882.

Secondary Sources

1.     “H. L. Martensen” by Bruce Kirmmse in Kierkegaard in Golden Age Denmark, Indiana University Press, 1990.

2.     Hans Lassen Martensen: Theologian, Philosopher, and Social Critic, edited by Jon Stewart, University of Chicago Press, 2012.

3.     “Hans Lassen Martensen: A Speculative Theologian Determining the Agenda of the Day“ in Kierkegaard and His Danish Contemporaries, Tome II: Theology, Ashgate Publishing, 2009.

4.     Kierkegaard: A Biography, Alistair Hannay, Cambridge University Press, 2001.

5.     Kierkegaard on Woman, Gender, and Love, Sylvia Walsh, Mercer University Press, 2022.

6.     “Mathilde Fibiger: Kierkegaard and the Emancipation of Women” by Katalin Nunn in Kierkegaard and His Danish Contemporaries: Tome III, Literature, Drama, and Aesthetics, Ashgate Publishing, 2009.

7.     “Rasmus Nielsen: From the Object of ‘Prodigious Concern’ to a ‘Windbag’” in Kierkegaard and His Danish Contemporaries Tome I: Philosophy, Politics, and Social Theory, Ashgate Publishing, 2009.

8.     “’Serious Jest?’ Kierkegaard as Young Polemicist in ‘Defense’ of Women,” by Julia Watkin in The International Kierkegaard Commentary: Early Polemical Writings, edited by Robert Perkins, Mercer University Press, 1999.

9.     “The 'Emancipated Ladies' of America in the Travel Writing of Fredrika Bremer and Alexandra Gripenberg,” Sirpa Salenius, Journal of International Women's Studies Vol. 14 Is. 1, 2013.

10.  “Victoria Benedictsson: A Female Perspective on Ethics,” Camilla Brudin Borg in Volume 12, Tome III: Kierkegaard's Influence on Literature, Criticism and Art Sweden and Norway, Routledge, 2013.

Online Resources:

Søren Kierkegaard and the Corsair Affair: Public Shaming and the Assertion of the Individual

Proof of Kierkegaard in 19^th Century America

Fredrika Bremer

Kierkegaard on Women

 The Myth of Kierkegaard’s Misogyny

Footnotes:

For those who want to skip this explanation and just get to the prayers, please feel free to scroll down and start! For the rest of you…

I’ve written elsewhere about Kierkegaard’s missing 1846 Berlin prayers from the English translation of the SKS (Søren Kierkegaards Skrifter), which is called the KJN (Kierkegaard’s Journals and Notebooks, 2007-2020)—you can read it here if you are interested.

I have just discovered that there are three additional prayers KJN fails to present in their translation, and this matters because KJN claims to be the complete translation of the SKS, and therefore the complete English translation of Kierkegaard’s published and unpublished writings. Anyone coming to this latest translation of Kierkegaard’s journals, papers, and notebooks will assume that they have before them an English translation of everything Kierkegaard ever wrote and left behind…and they would be wrong.

For a quick background, there have been in total three published collections of Kierkegaard’s papers in Danish. The first was collected, organized, and published by Hans Peter Barfod, who was commissioned to do so by Kierkegaard’s elder brother, Peter Christian. Barfod published his 9 volumes between 1869-1881 under the title Af Søren Kierkegaards Efterladte Papirer [From Søren Kierkegaard’s Posthumous Papers]. Its sigla is either EP or Papir, depending on the resource you are working with. The second collection came in two different editions, called Søren Kierkegaards Papirer [The Papers of Søren Kierkegaard]. Its sigla, Pap, is commonly seen, in part because Howard and Edna Hongs’ translation for Princeton University Press used this collection to make their scholarly English editions. The first edition of the Pap was in 11 volumes, published beginning in 1909, while the second was published in 16 volumes from 1948-1978. The third collection of Kierkegaard’s journals and papers is the SKS, Søren Kierkegaards Skrifter [Søren Kierkegaard's Writings], compiled in 27 volumes between 1997-2012. The Hongs completed the first total English translation of Kierkegaard’s journals and papers in the mid 20th century, based off of the Pap (and before then, English readers mainly relied upon Alexander Dru’s selected translation). KJN is the latest and only the second time that Kierkegaard’s journals and papers have been completely translated into English, being translated off of the third collection of Kierkegaard’s Danish papers, the SKS.

In order to help researchers navigate between older and newer versions of Kierkegaard’s papers, The University of Copenhagen’s Søren Kierkegaard Research Center provides a cross-reference document between the Pap and SKS on their website. It is an invaluable resource, lining up every labeled entry of Kierkegaard’s journals and papers.

This is where my discovery is all the more important—not only are these prayers of Kierkegaard’s not to be found in the KJN, as has been the case with others. But two of these three prayers aren’t even listed as existing on the Pap-SKS cross-reference sheet. If it were not for the physical evidence to the contrary, both in the Hongs’ Søren Kierkegaard’s Journals and Papers (JP) and Perry LeFevre’s 1956 collection (The Prayers of Kierkegaard), no one would know these entries, these prayers, had ever existed.1 I wonder how these errors came to be on such an important resource? It shows just how pivotal older editions and translations of Kierkegaard remain, especially with concern to his journals. It is because of the omission from both KJN and the Pap-SKS cross-reference sheet that these prayers are considered “forgotten.” They are only present in older editions and translations of Kierkegaard.2

It’s worth mentioning, though, that the Hongs’ JP has its own faults—for one, it is organized by subject rather than chronology, so a reader is dependent upon the translators’ editorial and organizational choices in order to navigate and read Kierkegaard’s entries. In the case of Kierkegaard’s prayers, and thoughts on prayer, their organization and labeling omits many examples, such as the many embedded prayers Kierkegaard wrote in his long journal entries, where he would spill in and out of prayer as he wrote. KJN, on the other hand, presents Kierkegaard’s journals as he ordered them, giving a reader a much easier and more enjoyable time as he or she navigates Kierkegaard’s life and train of thought.

For those interested, I’ve provided links at the bottom of this post to the SKS cross-reference sheet, along with a few others.

Three “Forgotten” Prayers of Kierkegaard’s

1. Pap IV B 175 / JP 3:3395 (1842-1844) / LeFevre #56 [p. 68] — (see page 19 of the SKS cross-reference list, where IV B 171 is followed by IV C 1).

“Merciful God! We do know that all good gifts and all perfect gifts come from you—but you did not send us empty-handed into the world—let not our hands be closed, our hearts be hardened—but add your blessing so that our gift may be a gift from you above, good and perfect.” (Hongs’ translation)

“God of compassion! We know that every good gift and every perfect gift comes down from Thee, but Thou hast not sent us into the world empty–handed: grant that our hand might not be closed, our heart not hardened but add Thou Thyself the blessing so that our gift might come from on high, from Thee, good, and perfect." (LeFevre’s translation)

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2. Pap VI B 164 / JP 3:3402 (1844-1845) / LeFevre #44 [p. 54] — (see page 24 of the SKS cross-reference list, where VI B 157 is followed by VI B 184).

“Father in heaven, we turn our minds and our thoughts to you, because it is you who raise up, and it is you who cast down. Even though we were honored in the world and highly trusted among people, what would all such glory be compared to the unblessedness if you, O righteous God, were not pleased with our own effort, our achievement, our longing, our hope in the world. If we were weighed down, demolished, unappreciated, abandoned, alone with our care in the world, and yet your eye, which sees in secret, rested approvingly on our effort, our achievement, our longing, our hope in the world—what would these adversities be compared to such blessedness! And if we were humiliated and crushed by the thought of our own guilt, if our sins had alienated us from people so that no word of consolation came to our ears, and yet our repentance found the way to your throne, O merciful God, and found grace in your sight—what would these sufferings be compared to such blessedness. Yes, Lord, we turn our minds and our thoughts to you, because it is you who raise up and it is you who cast down, to you Lord, Father, our Father, you who are in heaven.” (Hongs’ translation)

“Father in Heaven! We would turn our soul and our thoughts toward Thee, for Thou art the one who lifts up and casts down. Though we are honored in the world; though we are responsible for important things among men, our effort, our conduct, our aspiration, our hope in this world have not found acceptance before Thine eyes, Thou just God: Oh what then is such human glory compared with this misery! Though cast down, annihilated, misunderstood, abandoned—alone with our care in this world—yet, Thy glance sees in secret and is delighted to question us about our effort, our conduct, our desire, our hope in this world. Oh what then are these adversities as compared with this happiness! Humiliated and broken by the thought of our fault; strangers before men through our sins with no word of consolation; yet our repentance has found a way to Thy throne, Thou merciful God, and has found grace in Thine ears. Oh what then are these sufferings as compared with this happiness! Yes, Lord, we would turn our thoughts and our soul toward Thy will, for Thou art the one who raises up and casts down—toward Thee, our Father which art in Heaven. (LeFevre’s translation)

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3. Pap X^6 B 239 / Papir 427 / JP 3:3442 / LeFevre #79 [p. 94]

“You who came into the world to suffer, you endured the hardest suffering of all: to be fully conscious of it in advance, you whose suffering was increased by the voluntariness of your suffering, by having it within your power at all times to prevent the suffering—you who suffered throughout your entire life until your ignominious death—we thank you for sanctifying suffering, for blessedly illuminating by your holy life and career something that to the natural man is utter darkness—what it is to suffer. We thank you for this, and [we pray] that no sufferer may ever forget the consolation which is able to strengthen and illuminate above all else, and that no sufferer may ever arrogantly forget the humbling distinction: that you suffered innocently for the guilty, the distinction which again is the supreme consolation—that your death was atoning death.” (Hongs’ translation)

“Thou who didst come into the world in order to suffer, and who hast borne the heaviest of all sufferings, intensified still more in the heaviest of all pain, the measure in which it was freely accepted: the suffering of knowing in advance, from the first moment of Thy life, Thy constant power of avoiding it; Thou who hast suffered all Thy life and finally suffered an ignominious death—thanks be to Thee for having sanctified suffering, for having by Thy life and by Thy holy actions clarified for our happiness the meaning of that suffering which remains for natural man an eternal darkness. Thanks be to Thee, that the man who suffers shall never forget the great blessing which consoles and abundantly strengthens and brings the heavenly light of its explanation, but may he not have the presumption to forget the difference which gives humility, to forget that Thou hast suffered innocently for the guilty, or to forget this difference, which still consoles beyond all measure, that Thy death was our redemption.” (LeFevre’s translation)

SKS Danish: “Du der kom til Verden for at lide, saa Du bar den tungeste af alle Lidelser: fra Dit Livs første Øieblik at bære Bevidstheden forud – forøget i den tungeste af alle Smerter, forsaavidt Du leed frivilligt, hver Øieblik at have det i Din Magt at forhindre Lidelsen: Du som saa leed hele Dit Liv igjennem, til sidst den forsmædelige Død: hav Tak, at Du har helliget det at lide, at Du ved Dit hellige Liv og Levnet har saligt forklaret hvad der er det naturlige Msk. som idel Mørke: det at lide. Hav Tak derfor; at aldrig en Lidende maatte glemme dette, der over al Maade kan trøste og styrke og forklare; men at hell. ingen Lidende formasteligt maatte glemme Forskjellen der ydmyger: at Du leed, den Uskyldige for de Skyldige, denne Forskjel, som dog atter trøster over al Maade, at Din Død var Forsoningens.”

Links

This is the link to the online SKS cross-reference sheet — https://teol.ku.dk/skc/sks/research-files/papirerkonkordans.pdf

This is a link to Kierkegaard’s writings in SKS, all online and free (you have to scroll almost all the way to the bottom in order to get to the journals) — https://teol.ku.dk/skc/sks/

This is a link to the PDF list I made of Kierkegaard’s “forgotten” 1846 Berlin prayers — https://pietyonkierkegaard.files.wordpress.com/2022/10/those-missing-pages.pdf

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It is always a pleasure when I am asked for direction on good books about Kierkegaard, or how to break in and start reading Kierkegaard for one’s self. It is also difficult to give the right kind of guidance. No surprise, much depends on both a person’s background and his or her reason for interest in the dear Dane. Add to this a long and glorious tradition of rampantly divergent interpretations of Kierkegaard, which stem as far back as when the author was himself alive (1813-1855; Kierkegaard often bemoans in his personal journals how misunderstood he felt by his contemporaries), and you can see how an advisor might pause.

For reasons of simplicity, I have followed a ‘5 titles only’ rule (when applicable) for these advisory lists. This helps hone the advise, too—what are truly the best books to prioritize, given the limited time most of us have? I have placed the lists under the headings “Books on Kierkegaard” and “Reading Kierkegaard” to help the advise-seeker quickly find what they need. And I have not agonized over how to “fairly” represent Kierkegaard in my recommendations—the books under “Books on Kierkegaard” are shamelessly my personal opinion on who presents Kierkegaard best.

I realize that some of these titles or editions are harder to get than others, and can also be expensive. It is my hope that between your local library’s participation in InterLibrary loans, the Internet Archive (many of Kierkegaard’s works appear there for free), Google Books, Abebooks and BookFinder dot com, you will be able to find what you are looking for.

I consider this post a “living” one, and will edit, add, and make changes as time goes by. For a downloadable PDF version of this post as it originally appeared (and for much cleaner formatting), click here.

                                                                            ~~~

The List of Lists—What You Will Find Below

Books on Kierkegaard:

1. Best Entry Level Introductions to Kierkegaard’s Life and Thought

2. Best Intermediate-Advanced Introductions to Kierkegaard’s Life and Thought

Reading Kierkegaard:

3. Kierkegaard’s Core Theological Writings

4. Kierkegaard’s Core Philosophical Writings

5. Interpreting Kierkegaard, According to Kierkegaard

6. Kierkegaard’s Main Publications and Notable Writings in Chronological Order

7. Translations of Kierkegaard in English

                                                                            ~~~

Books on Kierkegaard

The definitive biography on Kierkegaard has yet to be written, which is owing mainly to a biographer’s own guiding reasons for approaching Kierkegaard. Kierkegaard’s relationship with Christendom and his sometimes contested Christian faith automatically divides biographers. Myths about Kierkegaard, some of which were started by contemporary enemies of Kierkegaard’s, have also been slow and difficult for biographers to recognize, in part due to the limited number of scholars who command 19th century Danish.

Though numbered, these two lists are not presented in a descending order of recommendation; they are merely “top 5” lists.

1. Best Entry Level Introductions to Kierkegaard’s Life and Thought:

1. Kierkegaard: A Single Life, by Stephen Backhouse (Zondervan, 2016)

2. Kierkegaard: An Introduction, by C. Stephen Evans (Cambridge UP, 2009)

3. A Short Life of Kierkegaard, by Walter Lowrie (reprinted by Princeton Univerity Press, 2013; original published in 1942, based off of Lowrie’s original Kierkegaard (Oxford 1938), which contained long excerpts from Kierkegaard’s writing).

4. Kierkegaard and the Crisis of Faith, by George Pattison (Wipf & Stock, 2013. medium difficulty, rather than true beginner)

5. the introductions to translations of Kierkegaard’s work, especially Alistair Hannay’s, Howard and Edna Hong’s, Sylvia Walsh’s, and M.G. Piety’s translations of Kierkegaard

2. Best Intermediate-Advanced Introductions to Kierkegaard’s Life and Thought:

1. The Joy of Kierkegaard, by Hugh Pyper (Equinox, 2011)

2. The Freedom to Become a Christian, by Andrew B. Torrance (T&T Clark, 2016)

3. Kierkegaard on the Truth, by Paul L. Holmer (Wipf & Stock, 2012)

4. Søren Kierkegaard: Subjectivity, Irony, and the Crisis of Modernity, by Jon Stewart (Oxford University Press, 2015)

5. Meditations from Kierkegaard, ed by T.H. Croxall (Plimpton Press, 1955 — this is on the advanced list because it is an obscure, out-of-print book. But Croxall is little remembered, and I think was one of the first to strike the right balance with Kierkegaard in the English speaking world—as both a Christian and a philosopher who wished to bring Christianity to Christians)

Reading Kierkegaard

3. Kierkegaard’s Core Theological Writings

For Kierkegaard’s most explicit theological and religious works, read:

1. Works of Love (medium difficulty)

2. Practice in Christianity (medium/easy level of difficulty)

3. Sickness Unto Death (high level of difficulty)

4. Christian Discourses (medium/easy level of difficulty)

5. For Self-Examination and Judge for Yourself! (easier level of difficulty. Both were written and completed around the same time, though Kierkegaard only published FSE; JFY! was posthumously published)

(*also of theological import):

⁃ Eighteen Upbuilding Discourses

⁃ The Unchangeableness of God (delivered as a sermon in 1851; published in 1855)

⁃ Discourses at the Communion on Fridays (all of Kierkegaard’s discourses and sermons for Eucharist services found in one binding, by translator Sylvia Walsh)

For Kierkegaard’s philosophical theology, read:

1. Philosophical Fragments (medium difficulty)

2. Concluding Unscientific Postscript to Philosophical Fragments (high level of difficulty)

3. Fear and Trembling (medium difficulty)

4. Two Ethical-Religious Essays (easy/medium level of difficulty)

5. Sickness Unto Death (high level of difficulty)

4. Kierkegaard’s Core Philosophical Writings

This list’s title is in truth a trick statement, as all of Kierkegaard’s writings cover philosophical subjects, and most engage in some form of philosophy themselves. Yet oftentimes when speaking of Kierkegaard’s “philosophical” writings, many think of the books he wrote towards the beginning of his writing career (1843-1846), half of which are called “the pseudonymous works” in Kierkegaard scholarship.

The pseudonymous works were, you guessed it, written by creatively named pseudonyms whose names were designed to contribute to the interpretation of each book. The pseudonymous works are therefore perhaps the most layered (and most fun?) of all of Kierkegaard’s writing, while also being some of the most challenging.

Kierkegaard, quite idealistically, desired that people would read his books in relationship to one other, and this is important to remember when reading him, even if you don’t follow suit. This design is called “dialectics,” and Kierkegaard utilized dialectics with the hope of presenting his readers with experiences that would induce personal reflection, rather than present isolated treatises that make it easier to leave the reading experience unchallenged or unchanged. Kierkegaard’s pseudonyms are pitted against himself, yet also share some core agreements with him and amongst themselves.

I have presented Kierkegaard’s pseudonymous works, popularly recognized as his most philosophical writings, with the correlating books he would have wished his readers to be aware of (called his “signed” writings because Kierkegaard published them under his own name). Philosophical subjects present in this list include ontology, anthropology, ethics, aesthetics, divine revelation, and epistemology.

1. Either/Or vs Two Upbuilding Discourses (1843)

2. Fear and Trembling vs Three Upbuilding Discourses (1843)

3. The Concept of Anxiety vs Three and Four Upbuilding Discourses (1844)

4. Stages on Life’s Way vs Three Discourses on Imagined Occasions (1845)

5. Philosophical Fragments and/or Concluding Unscientific Postscript (PF can pair with Two and Three Upbuilding Discourses (1844); CUP was published in early 1846, and is the capstone to the entire authorship at the time. Subsequently, it can be read as a stand-alone work, even though it is designed as a postscript to PF.)

5. Interpreting Kierkegaard, According to Kierkegaard

Kierkegaard provided explanations and clarification to his writing over the course of his life, which I thought would be helpful to list here. While nothing should discourage someone from picking up Kierkegaard and just reading him, these resources might help clarify what Kierkegaard is getting on about. They do stand as material that scholars must contend with, acting as delineations between “what Kierkegaard thinks” and what is “Kierkegaardian.”

1. read the front matter Kierkegaard provides to his books, especially the prefaces, introductions, and prayers.

2. read On My Work as an Author, which is Kierkegaard’s most succinct and clear stand-alone explanation as to why he writes, and how he writes (found most easily in Princeton’s comprehensive edition, The Point of View).

3. read Kierkegaard’s “First and Last Explanation” found at the end of Concluding Unscientific Postscript. This is an earlier, and shorter, account of how Kierkegaard regards his authorship taken as a whole.

4. read Kierkegaard’s finished but unpublished The Point of View for My Work as an Author, which is the longest accounting Kierkegaard wrote of himself, and therefore provides the most detail (also found in Princeton’s The Point of View).

6. Kierkegaard’s Main Publications and Notable Writings in Chronological Order

1. Either/Or, by the pseudonym Victor Eremita (February 20, 1843)

2. Two Upbuilding Discourses (May 16, 1843) — first published as is, and then within Eighteen Upbuilding Discourses (remaindered by P.G. Philipson in 1845)

3. Repetition, by the pseudonym Constantin Constantius (October 16, 1843)

4. Fear and Trembling, by the pseudonym Johannes de silentio (October 16, 1843)

5. Three Upbuilding Discourses (October 16, 1843) — first published as is, and then within Eighteen Upbuilding Discourses (remaindered by P.G. Philipson in 1845)

6. Four Upbuilding Discourses (December 6, 1843) — first published as is, and then within Eighteen Upbuilding Discourses (remaindered by P.G. Philipson in 1845)

7. Two Upbuilding Discourses (March 5, 1844) — first published as is, and then within Eighteen Upbuilding Discourses (remaindered by P.G. Philipson in 1845)

8. Philosophical Fragments, by the pseudonym Johannes Climacus (June 13, 1844)

9. Three Upbuilding Discourses (June 8, 1844) — first published as is, and then within Eighteen Upbuilding Discourses (remaindered by P.G. Philipson in 1845)

10. The Concept of Anxiety, by the pseudonym Vigilius Haufniensis (June 17, 1844)

11. Prefaces, by the pseudonym Nicolaus Notabene (June 17, 1844)

12. Four Upbuilding Discourses (August 31, 1844) — first published as is, and then within Eighteen Upbuilding Discourses (remaindered by P.G. Philipson in 1845)

13. Three Discourses on Imagined Occasions (April 29, 1845)

14. Stages on Life’s Way, published by the pseudonym Hilarius Bookbinder (April 30, 1845)

15. Concluding Unscientific Postscript, by the pseudonym Johannes Climacus (February 28, 1846)

16. Two Ages: A Literary Review (March 30, 1846)

17. Upbuilding Discourses in Various Spirits (March 13, 1847)

18. Works of Love (September 29, 1847)

19. Christian Discourses (April 26, 1848)

20. The Lily in the Field and the Bird of the Air (May 14, 1849)

21. Two Ethical-Religious Essays, by the pseudonym H.H. (May 19, 1849)

22. The Sickness Unto Death, by the pseudonym Anti-Climacus (July 30, 1849)

23. Three Discourses at the Communion on Fridays: “The High Priest,” “The Tax Collector,” “The Woman Who Was a Sinner” (November 14, 1849)

24. Practice in Christianity, by the pseudonym Anti-Climacus (September 25, 1850)

25. An Upbuilding Discourse (December 20, 1850)

26. Two Discourses at the Communion on Fridays (August 7, 1851)

27. On My Work as An Author (August 7, 1851)

28. For Self-Examination (September 10, 1851)

29. The Unchangeableness of God (September 3, 1855)

30. The Point of View for My Work as an Author (published posthumously in 1859, written primarily in 1848)

31. The Book on Adler (published posthumously in 1872)

32. Judge for Yourself! published posthumously in 1876)

7. Translations of Kierkegaard in English

Just as there is no definitive biography of Kierkegaard, there is no definitive translation of him either, even though scholars almost exclusively use the Hongs’ translation of Kierkegaard’s complete works, published by Princeton University Press. For “the best” translation of Kierkegaard, much depends upon the work in question and the motivations that drove the translator. For example, the Hongs prioritized literal word accuracy for Kierkegaard’s Danish, while the Swensons prioritized Kierkegaard’s flow and syntax; the Hongs approached Kierkegaard as a genius philosopher, while the Swensons approached Kierkegaard as a literary master with devotional aims.

For a reader who wishes to simply enjoy Kierkegaard, any of these translations will serve as a start. For the more motivated reader of Kierkegaard, I recommend having at least two translations on hand to compare against—oftentimes an obscure passage in one rendering will be clearer, or at least different enough, to help make out Kierkegaard’s meaning. For the budding Kierkegaard scholar, I recommend and direct you to M.G. Piety’s blog and resource page for untangling translations.

This list has been broken into three parts: the first effort to translate Kierkegaard into English in the early to mid 20th century, Princeton University’s presentation of Kierkegaard’s total works from the mid to late 20th century, and translations of Kierkegaard that have appeared since Princeton’s translations in the 21st century. If anything is missing or needs to be added, please let me know!

Kierkegaard’s first appearance into English became a collected effort between many publishers, partially interrupted by WWII, from 1937-1958. You will notice a few repeat titles, and that is not an error—a few of Kierkegaard’s books were translated more than once, sometimes because translators weren’t aware of others’ efforts (Kierkegaard’s “Purity of Heart is to Will One Thing,” extracted out of Upbuilding Discourses in Various Spirits, is one such example). Find some of these titles digitalized and free on Internet Archive, or keep an eye out for used copies through BookFinder (or your local used book shop!).

1. Oxford University Press (translators Alexander Dru, Robert Payne, Walter Lowrie)

1. The Journals of Søren Kierkegaard (Selections)

2. Fear and Trembling

3. The Concept of Dread

4. in one volume, The Present Age and Two Minor Ethico-Religious Treatises

5. in one volume: Christian Discourses, Three Discourses at the Communion on Fridays, and Discourses about the Lilies and the Birds

6. The Point of View for My Work as an Author

7. in one volume: Training in Christianity and An Edifying Discourse

8. in one volume: For Self-Examination, Two Discourses at the Communion on Fridays, Judge for Yourself!, and The Unchangeableness of God

2. Augsburg Publishing House (translators David and Lillian Swenson, Howard and Edna Hong)

1. Edifying Discourses, Vols I-IV

2. Three Discourses on Imagined Occasions

3. The Gospel of Suffering and The Lilies of the Field (Parts III and II of Upbuilding Discourses in Various Spirits)

4. For Self-Examination

3. The American Scandinavian Society (translators David and Lillian Swenson, Walter Lowrie)

1. Philosophical Fragments

2. Concluding Unscientific Postscript

4. Princeton University Press (translators Walter Lowrie, David and Lillian Swenson)

1. Either/Or, Volume I

2. Either/Or, Volume II

3. Repetition

4. Fear and Trembling

5. Stages on Life’s Way

6. Sickness Unto Death

5. Harper Torchbooks (translators Douglas V. Steere, Howard and Edna Hong)

1. Purity of Heart is to Will One Thing (Part I of Upbuilding Discourses in Various Spirits)

2. Works of Love

6. Stanford University Press (translator T.H. Croxall)

1. Johannes Climacus: De Omnibus Dubitandum Est and A Sermon

7. The C. W. Daniel Company, London (translators A.S. Aldworth and W.S. Ferrie)

1. Purify Your Hearts!: A Discourse for a Special Occasion, the first of three parts in Edifying Discourses in a Different Vein

2. Consider the Lilies, the second part in Edifying Discourses in a Different Vein

3. The Gospel of Sufferings, the third part in Edifying Discourses in a Different Vein

*Earlier fragmentary translations of Kierkegaard into English:

1. Selections From the Writings of Kierkeggard, trans. L. M. Hollander (University of Texas Bulletin, No. 2326: July 8, 1923).

Kierkegaard’s second appearance into English was completed by Princeton University Press, contributed to by the translators Howard and Edna Hong, Julia Watkin, Todd Nichol, Reidar Thomte, Albert Anderson, and Henrik Rosenmeier. The project was overseen by Howard and Edna Hong. You can find them all here.

Other translations of Kierkegaard into English, published during or after the publication of Princeton’s editions:

1. Penguin Classics (all translated by Alistair Hannay):

1. Either/Or

2. Fear and Trembling

3. Two Ages: A Literary Review

4. Sickness Unto Death

5. Papers and Journals: A Selection

2. Cambridge Texts in the History of Philosophy:

1. Concluding Unscientific Postscript, translated by Alistair Hannay

2. Fear and Trembling, translated by C. Stephen Evans and Sylvia Walsh

3. Oxford World Classics:

1. Repetition and Philosophical Crumbs, translated by M.G. Piety

4. Liveright Publishing:

1. Fear and Trembling, translated by Bruce H. Kirmmse

2. The Sickness Unto Death, translated by Bruce H. Kirmmse

3. Works of Love, translated by Bruce H. Kirmmse (coming July 15, 2025)

4. The Concept of Anxiety, translated by Alistair Hannay

5. Princeton University Press:

1. The Lily of the Field and the Bird of the Air: Three Godly Discourses, translated by Bruce H. Kirmmse

6. Indiana University Press:

1. Discourses at the Communion on Fridays, translated by Sylvia Walsh

Includes: first part of Christian Discourses, Three Discourses at the Communion on Fridays (1849), No. III from the third part of Practice in Christianity, and Two Discourses at the Communion on Fridays (1851).

7. Harper Press:

1. Spiritual Writings: Gift, Creation, Love—Selections from the Upbuilding Discourses, translated and selected by George Pattison

Pattison presents six discourses from Eighteen Upbuilding Discourses, two discourses from Christian Discourses, all of the second part of Upbuilding Discourses in Various Spirits, all three parts of The Lily of the Field and the Bird of the Air (1849), one communion discourse from Three Discourses at the Communion on Fridays (1849), An Upbuilding Discourse (1850), and the entirety of Two Discourses at the Communion on Fridays (1851).

8. Paulist Press:

1. Søren Kierkegaard: Discourses and Writings on Spirituality, translated and selected by Christopher Barnett

Barnett presents the sermon pseudonym Judge William appends to his letters in Either/Or (entitled “The Upbuilding That Lies in the Thought That Compared to God We are Always in the Wrong”), the upbuilding discourse “Every Good and Perfect Gift is from Above” from Two Upbuilding Discourses (1843), The Unchangeableness of God (1855), the upbuilding discourse “To Need God is The Human Being’s Highest Perfection” from Four Upbuilding Discourses (1844), “What We Learn from the Lilies in the Field and from the Birds of the Air” from Upbuilding Discourses in Various Spirits, “But Love Upbuilds” from the beginning of Works of Love, a portion from Sickness Unto Death, the beginning of The Gospel of Sufferings in Upbuilding Discourses in Various Spirits, a part of the first and second sections of Practice in Christianity, “What Christ Judges of Official Christianity” from Kierkegaard’s later essays published in The Moment, “Watch Your Step When You Go to the House of the Lord” from the third part of Christian Discourses, and a portion from the third part of Practice in Christianity.

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This is a continuation of a series on Kierkegaard’s (unfortunate) reputation as the progenitor and promoter of “the leap of faith.”

The word “leap” is peppered throughout many of Kierkegaard’s pseudonymous writings, and makes two appearances of significance in his signed upbuilding discourses. Given Kierkegaard’s purposes and the type of writer he was, it will come as no surprise that his usage of “leap” is wide, varied, and multi-purposed. What I want to show moving forward, is that Kierkegaard never personally uses the term “leap” to endorse a picture of faith, and that his pseudonyms are ambivalent at best when it comes to their own opinions about the leap as a movement of any kind, including a leap to faith. For the pseudonyms, they are far more interested in the project of getting a person to think differently, and to give up on any kind of ‘system building’ that would keep a person safe from self-reflection. They are not in the business of endorsing or recommending any positive philosophies, leaps or otherwise.[1]

First, I will relay some important background on Gotthold Ephraim Lessing and his famous meeting with Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi, as well as give a short summary of Lessing’s famous ‘leap over the ugly broad ditch’ essay. This will then animate a select section each from Fear and Trembling and Concluding Unscientific Postscript that illustrate how the pseudonyms Johannes de silentio and Johannes Climacus choose to use the terminology of leaps and leaping largely because of the familiarity of the imagery within the intellectual circles of Kierkegaard’s day. In talking about leaps and leaping, Kierkegaard’s pseudonyms are both engaging in conversations already begun in the Enlightenment (with Jacobi and Lessing as key figures), while also adding their own philosophical ruminations to them.[2] The few passages we will focus on are all passages that Kierkegaard meant as either direct references to Lessing’s and Jacobi’s use of the leap, or as allusions to that reference. The pseudonyms’ own wider discussion of leaps and leaping will be left out of this conversation for the sake of brevity, as to do an exhaustive study would require a book-length treatment![3] After looking at Fear and Trembling and Concluding Unscientific Postscript, I will turn to Kierkegaard’s signed writings and look at the only two major instances of “leap” within them, and show how neither of them present a positive picture of faith. When “leap” in Kierkegaard’s discourses are read, the pseudonyms and Lessing come to mind, and Kierkegaard’s contradistinction takes on an even clearer picture of what Kierkegaard thinks faith does and does not entail. In the upbuilding discourses, “leap” is talking about movements individuals simply choose to make in their lives—it is an observation, not an endorsement.

There are a two key writings by Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (1729-1781) that Kierkegaard engages with in his 1843-1846 pseudonymous writings, along with a separate written account of Lessing by another Enlightenment philosopher, Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi (1743-1819). Two of these three references involve the concept of leaps and leaping.

In Recollections of Conversations with Lessing in July and August 1780, Jacobi recounts how he traveled to the town of Wolfenbüttel in order to have a discussion with this foremost intellectual of the century, being himself a developing philosopher with an already widespread correspondence with Germany and Prussia’s intellectual elite. Jacobi relays how, during the course of their conversation, he becomes alarmed that Lessing describes himself as a Spinozist, and that Lessing believes “there is no other philosophy than that of Spinoza.”[4] At that time, to endorse Spinoza was commonly considered an equivalent to endorsing atheism and revolutionary political thinking.[5] Jacobi therefore recommended Lessing subscribe to his own philosophy of the “mortal leap” (salto mortale), which Jacobi believed allowed one to avoid mediation between objective and subjective reality. For Jacobi, truth is appropriated in spite of, rather than by, rational thinking, since “the greatest merit of the researcher is to uncover and to reveal existence” rather than see explanations as “an ultimate goal” in themselves.[6] One therefore must make a salto mortale, a leap, in order to gain the truth of life and existence. But Lessing, who by now had already written his famous 1777 essay, On the Proof of the Spirit and of Power, where he talks about failed attempts to leap across ‘the ugly broad ditch’ of accidental truths to necessary truths, responds playfully to Jacobi. “I can see how a thinking head might perform this kind of headstand just to get out of the bit. Take me with you, if you can!” To which Jacobi seriously replies, “If you will just step on the spring board which lifts me off, the rest will take care of itself.” Lessing then quips, “But even that would mean a leap which I can no longer impose on my old legs and heavy head.”[7] Though these men and their philosophical tête-à-tête is almost entirely forgotten today, in Kierkegaard’s day this exchange was well remembered, and fodder for Kierkegaard to reference while dialoguing with his contemporaries.

The other instance of import for understanding Kierkegaard and his pseudonyms on ‘the leap’ is the essay just mentioned, Lessing’s 1777 essay On the Proof of the Spirit and of Power [Beweis des Geistes und der Kraft]. It was originally written in response to orthodox Lutheran Johann Daniel Schumann’s defense of the infallibility of Scripture. In his essay, Lessing makes reference to Aristotle’s notion of a category jump, and during his argument writes one of his most well-remembered lines—“accidental truths of history can never become the proof for necessary truths of reason…[therefore] this is the ugly broad ditch which I cannot get across, however often and however earnestly I have tried to make the leap. If anyone can help me over it, let him do it, I beg him, I adjure him. He will deserve a divine reward from me.”[8]

These, then, are the “leaping” texts that Kierkegaard’s pseudonyms Johannes de silentio and Johannes Climacus have in mind, sometimes explicitly and sometimes implicitly, when they write about leaps. Let me now introduce their characters better. Johannes de silentio is the author of Fear and Trembling (October 16, 1843), and Johannes Climacus is the author of both Philosophical Fragments (June 13, 1844) and Concluding Unscientific Postscript (February 28, 1846). Johannes de silentio translates from Latin as “John of silence,” and is a reference to the pseudonym’s philosophical bent rather than being a proper last name (and therefore it is not meant to be capitalized, as some do). Johannes Climacus is the Latin version of the canonized saint John Climacus’ name, who the Church also refers to as “Saint John of the Ladder” because of his spiritual treatise The Ladder of Divine Ascent. Kierkegaard likely chose the name Johannes Climacus as a joke about theologians who build speculative systems of knowledge and advancement in the name of Christianity.

Johannes de silentio and Johannes Climacus each has his own separate project in mind when he writes, but they both share in common their inability to be Christians themselves. Johannes de silentio is in a quandary of what to do, given that Abraham in Genesis 22 almost sacrifices his son Isaac, and yet Scripture also says that Abraham is the paradigm of faith (such as in Hebrews 11). Does this mean faith requires not questioning God, no matter what? Does faith mean doing whatever the voice of God tells you to do, no matter what your sensibilities say (moral or otherwise)? How is one to understand Abraham, let alone emulate him? de silentio admires faith, but does not find it himself by the end of his only book, Fear and Trembling. His musings peter into silence, no conclusions to his problems found.[9] Johannes Climacus, on the other hand, is a self-proclaimed satirist who has found his calling by making life difficult for people, in much the same way as Socrates did in ancient Athens—by asking pestering questions and not letting people get away with easy answers. He, like de silentio, recognizes the value and desirability of faith, but unlike de silentio has no wish to try and procure faith for himself. Climacus is contented, much like Lessing was, to remain a sceptic and a humorist, while de silentio admires faith and merely wishes to be intellectually honest in his procurement of faith.

With these introductions to the pseudonyms, let us now proceed to look at examples of “leap” in the works they wrote. I will begin with Fear and Trembling, and I will use Christopher Watkin’s recently published Biblical Critical Theory as my dialogue partner, as Watkin misrepresents Kierkegaard in the classic way we have already heard about, ascribing the “leap of faith” to him. It is because Watkin’s book will have reach and influence in Christian evangelical circles, being fresh off of the press, endorsed by Rev. Timothy Keller (of blessed memory), and designed to be a modern City of God for today’s Christians, that it is a good dialogue partner for the purpose of correcting on the leap of faith. It bears mentioning that I will pass over the rest of what Watkin says of Kierkegaard to stay on the task at hand, but that there is very little Watkin gets right about Kierkegaard, and it is a grievous thing that many will be dissuaded from further engaging with Kierkegaard because of Watkins’ criticism.  

To textually base his claim that Kierkegaard subscribes to a leap of faith, Watkin says the following: “The difference between the tragic hero and the knight of faith is that, whereas both renounce all they have, only the knight of faith makes the leap of faith, ‘the great leap whereby I pass into infinity.’”[10] Watkin then goes on to say that though “it is unclear in precisely what this leap consists,” he thinks Fear and Trembling makes it clear that passion is essential to faith, and that passion is antithetical to (is “divorced from”) reason and reflection. He supports this interpretation by presenting the only other passage in the book that talks about ‘leaps into the infinite,’ where the reader finds Johannes de silentio ruminating on an unnamed poet’s willingness to ‘leap into eternity.’[11] For de silentio this leap into eternity implies death and a willingness to die, and de silentio observes that this poet’s willingness to die is a passion that is absent from his own present day (from what I’ve found, the identity of this poet has not been ascertained, but it could easily be Goethe, Schiller, or Schlegel [see footnote 2]). Citing these two passages, Watkin concludes that Fear and Trembling is presenting a leap of passion as the means by which one exercises their faith. “…Johannes repeats a number of times that faith requires passion, and that passion is divorced from reflection…[thus] to exercise faith requires a leap that is not based on reflection but on passion.”[12] In this way Watkin sees Kierkegaard formulate and endorse a “leap of faith” out of Genesis 22 (which is then “profoundly at variance with the biblical account [of faith]”).[13]

Already with this presentation we have seen that Watkin’s quotes out of Fear and Trembling say “leap” instead of “leap of faith,” and further that Watkin has preceded his direct quote about ‘the great leap into infinity’ with his claim about its being a leap of faith. But! Perhaps the wider context of that first passage merits this? Setting aside the second passage about the unnamed poet, and the observation that Watkin conflates the knight of faith with that second passage about passion and death, perhaps the wider context of his first quote merits his interpretation of its being a leap of faith.

It, however, does not. The knight of faith is not present on the page or in the discussion de silentio is having, with the wider key passage reading as follows:

“The dialectic of faith is the finest and most remarkable of all; it possesses an elevation, of which indeed I can form a conception, but nothing more. I am able to make from the springboard the great leap whereby I pass into infinity, my back is like that of a tight-rope dancer, having been twisted in childhood, hence I find it easy; with a one-two-three! I can walk about existence on my head; but the next thing I cannot do, for I cannot perform the miraculous, but can only be astonished by it.”[14]

What is notable about this mention of the leap is its evocative imagery of the springboard. A university-educated contemporary of Kierkegaard’s would have immediately recognized the intentional reference to Jacobi and his philosophy, and that Johannes de silentio is making a playful jab at Jacobi’s endorsement of philosophical leaps. But even those of us who have never heard of Jacobi or know what his main philosophical thinking sounded like (which is most of us!), we can still hear the tone of sarcasm and see the exaggerations and layers de silentio is implementing to draw out his point.

Layer one is the joke about leaping, being meant to be read as a joke because of hints like “twisted spine,” “one two three!,” and even “I can form a conception” (indicating that one can imagine all kinds of movements and decisions, but that this does not then grant that one has actually made such a movement or a decision. One’s conceptions do not equate to one’s actions). de silentio is saying,  ‘Look at me, I can just count one two three and jump off of this elevated springboard, it’s easy even with my twisted spine because I’ve been practicing since childhood! Here I go!” This picture is silly, it is meant to be seen as silly, and the follow-up imagery of ‘walking about existence on one’s head’ is the assurance to the reader that de silentio is indeed exaggerating and teasing (‘walking on one’s head’ is distantly reminiscent of Lessing’s reply to Jacobi about making a headstand, too. But right now we’re disregarding references to Lessing or Jacobi). The second layer then relies upon the first—while de silentio can supposedly make Jacobi’s leap, de silentio still cannot perform “the miraculous;” he cannot understand Abraham and he therefore cannot understand faith. In other words, de silentio might be able to perform the ludicrous by imagining he has taken the leap into infinity (and by imagining it, he actually has, right?), but the miraculous is above the ludicrous—de silentio will just as soon be able to make leaps into the infinite with his twisted spine, than he will be able to obtain faith the Abrahamic way.

It bears mentioning briefly, since the knight of faith figures in Watkin’s discussion of Fear and Trembling, that the knight of faith does not himself make the leap of faith. There are a great many movements that the knight of faith does make, but leaping isn’t one of them. There is even a case to be made that the knight cannot leap because leaping indicates a leaving behind, and the knight refuses to leave any part of himself behind on the journey to acquire faith (see pp. 88-96, Lowrie trans).

Now, it is true that Kierkegaard is often challenging to read (and he’s impossible to skim read). Is it then possible for the motivated, non-professional reader of Kierkegaard to make sense of his books? I truly believe so, as Kierkegaard offers a key to his reader in the prefaces he writes. Unlike most prefaces today, which function as ancillary material bearing only curious relevance to the book, Kierkegaard’s prefaces are artfully, carefully crafted, and are designed to be read as an important function of the book. In them Kierkegaard provides hints to the tone and reason for being of the pages that follow.[15] In the case of Fear and Trembling, de silentio explains that he is trying to elevate the worthiness and desirability of faith, while at the same time dissuading and even destroying the attempts one might commonly make to obtain it (which, in de silentio’s case, ends with him not finding faith by the end of the book). This main aim of the book is not antithetical or threatening to the Bible’s presentation of faith (as Watkin fears). On the contrary! “Not just in commerce but in the world of ideas too our age is putting on a veritable clearance sale,”  de silentio begins in his preface.

“Everything can be had so dirt cheap that one begins to wonder whether in the end anyone will want to make a bid. Every speculative score-keeper who conscientiously marks up the momentous march of modern philosophy, every lecturer, crammer, student, everyone on the outskirts of philosophy or at its center is unwilling to stop with doubting everything. They all go further. It would perhaps be malapropos to inquire where they think they are going, though surely we may in all politeness and respect take it for granted that they have indeed doubted everything, otherwise it would be odd to talk of going further…

…In those old days it was different. For then faith was a task for a whole lifetime, not a skill thought to be acquired in either days or weeks. When the old campaigner [the apostle Paul] approached the end, had fought the good fight [2 Timothy 4:7], and kept his faith, his heart was still young enough not to have forgotten the fear and trembling [Philippians 2:12] that disciplined his youth and which, although the grown man mastered it, no man altogether outgrows—unless he somehow manages at the earliest possible opportunity to go further…”[16]

“…The present author is no philosopher, he has not understood the System, nor does he know if there really is one, or if it has been completed. As far as his own weak head is concerned, the thought of what huge heads everyone must have in order to have such huge thoughts is already enough. Even if one were able to render the whole of the content of faith into conceptual form, it would not follow that one has grasped faith, grasped how one came to it, or how it came to one. The present author is no philosopher, he is poetice et eleganter [poetically and elegantly] a freelancer, who neither writes the System, nor makes any promises about it, who pledges neither anything about the System, nor himself to it. He writes because for him doing so is a luxury, the more agreeable and conspicuous the fewer who buy and read what he writes. In an age where passion has been done away with for the sake of science, he easily foresees his fate – in an age when an author who wants readers must be careful to write in a way that he can be comfortably leafed through during the after-dinner nap…he [the present author] foresees his fate will be to be completely ignored; has a dreadful foreboding that the scourge of zealous criticism will more than once make it still felt; and shutters at what terrifies him even more, that some enterprising recorder…will slice him into sections, as ruthlessly as the man who, at the service of the science of punctuation, divided up his speech by counting the words and putting a period after every fifty and a semi-colon after every thirty-five. No, I prostrate myself before any systematic bag-searcher; this [present work] is not the System...”[17]

de silentio is probably speaking at his plainest when he says, before his reader has even embarked on the experience of engaging with Fear and Trembling, that “even if one were able to render the whole of the content of faith into conceptual form, it would not follow that one has grasped faith, grasped how one came to it, or how it came to one.” The purpose of Fear and Trembling is to demonstrate this statement through a series of philosophical puzzles and ruminations, aiming to elevate the desirability yet difficulty of faith. de silentio knows faith is something that is lived and experienced rather than being a thing that can then be described, dissected, explained, or waxed lyrical upon. It’s just that, in taking the Bible seriously, de silentio quickly encounters a quandary in Abraham.

The preface to Fear and Trembling also complains of simple readers wishing for simple books. “[A]n author who wants readers must be careful to write in a way that he can be comfortably leafed through during the after-dinner nap…” de silentio “shutters at what terrifies him even more, that some enterprising recorder…will slice him into sections…” After 180 years this has turned out to be all too true of Fear and Trembling, (having also what Alistair Hannay calls an “ever-thickening prism of textual commentary and explanation” to accompany it).[18] Watkin, then, is in good company in terms of his dipping into Fear and Trembling and pulling away from it common misconceptions about Kierkegaard as a writer, philosopher, and biblical theologian via ‘slicing him into sections.’ But what is so disappointing about his treatment of Kierkegaard is his failure to recognize that Kierkegaard’s project and content and style have all come from, and been informed by, the very book that Watkin wishes to elevate as an authoritative, dynamic, living text. Kierkegaard and his complicated thoughts on faith are not an enemy to knowing God and benefiting from Scripture, but are instead an ally. We see this in Fear and Trembling’s preface as well, when de silentio upholds the Apostle Paul as the better image of what faith is like. de silentio upholds Paul and juxtaposes him against those who would believe that faith is intellectually subscribing to dogmas within a matter of “either days or weeks.” For Kierkegaard, the Bible as the word of God is God’s challenge to a person, full of dilemmas that are meant to drive a person into prayerful dialogue with the living God.[19] Under no circumstances does Kierkegaard deserve Watkin’s criticisms that he presents pictures of faith “profoundly at variance with the biblical account.”[20]

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[1] This is not to suggest the pseudonyms aren’t worth reading, or that they don’t have a great deal to teach—they are and they do! It is also not to suggest that one cannot come to the pseudonyms and walk away inspired to take the imagery or philosophy the pseudonyms write about, such as the leap, and appropriate it for one’s own purposes—of course one is free to do this. The issue only lies in making appeals of authority to persons, fictitious or otherwise, who do not indeed hold the views and opinions being held to them.

[2] Other prominent German philosopher-poets, such as Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832), Friedrich Schiller (1759-1805), and Fredrich Schlegel (1772-1829) used leap terminology and imagery in their writings, all of which were influential on German philosophical and theological development (and thus, by some extension, European philosophical and theological development). Kierkegaard was well read in all three of these figures.

[3] For example, ‘leaps into the infinite’ are present in Either/Or, a book in part compiled by the pseudonym A and in part written by the pseudonym Judge William, all of which is edited by the pseudonym Victor Eremita (yes, it’s quite a layered affair!). Sylvia Walsh points out how, according to the character John the Seducer, there is a difference between a feminine and masculine leap into the infinite. “Whereas man’s leaping is dialectical in nature, requiring many advance preparations and calculations, several practice tries, and a running start, for woman the leap is no more than a hop in which she glides effortlessly to the other side, arriving there ‘more beautiful, more soulful than ever’ (EO, I: 391f).” p. 11, Kierkegaard on Woman, Gender, and Love (2022). It’s by these theories that the Seducer works out his horrible goal of seducing an innocent girl, Cordelia, and of which Victor Eremita is troubled by, only willing to present an account of the Seducer because Judge William’s thoughts are also presented as counter-arguments.

[4] pp. 88-89, “Lessing: Appropriating the Testimony of a Theological Naturalist” in Kierkegaard and the Renaissance and Modern Traditions. Tome I Philosophy, ed. by Jon Stewart.  Baruch Spinoza (1632-1677) was one of the 17^th century’s most original and influential philosophers, and whose metaphysics expresses a system of panentheism considered one of the finest today (panentheism is the belief that nothing exists except God, and that therefore everything in existence is essentially just God. This is different to pantheism, which does not recognize a single God, and holds merely that everything in existence is God).

[5] pp. 33-34, “Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi: Two Theories of the Leap” in Kierkegaard and the Renaissance and Modern Traditions. Tome I Philosophy, ed. by Jon Stewart.

[6] p. 34, “Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi: Two Theories of the Leap” in Kierkegaard and the Renaissance and Modern Traditions. Tome I Philosophy, ed. by Jon Stewart.

[7] pp. 88-89, “Lessing: Appropriating the Testimony of a Theological Naturalist” in Kierkegaard and the Renaissance and Modern Traditions. Tome I Philosophy, ed. by Jon Stewart. For an excellent summary and introduction to Jacobi’s philosophy, see the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy’s online entry -- https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/friedrich-jacobi/. There is no SEP page for Lessing, but Britannica’s entry is good for a start, in terms of free internet resources (it does not, however, mention Lessing’s deep involvement with Free Masonry, or his reading of Spinoza) -- https://www.britannica.com/biography/Gotthold-Ephraim-Lessing

[8] p. 87, Lessing: Philosophical and Theological Writings, ed. by Nisbet.

[9] This was first pointed out to me in a seminar with Murray Rae (author of Kierkegaard’s Vision of the Incarnation and Kierkegaard and Theology)—a very good insight!

[10] p. 257, Biblical Critical Theory: How the Bible’s Unfolding Story Makes Sense of Modern Life and Culture, Christopher Watkin (2022).

[11] All other instances of “leap” in Fear and Trembling are references to other kinds of movement, such as the leap a dancer makes into a certain posture.

[12] Ibid.

[13] p. 258, Biblical Critical Theory, Christopher Watkin.

[14] p.77, Fear and Trembling, Lowrie translation.

[15] Indeed, Kierkegaard was so enamored by the power of the preface as a literary device that he even produced a small volume solely of prefaces. See Prefaces by Nicolaus Notabene, originally published June 17^th 1844.

[16] For an excellent treatment of Kierkegaard and his reading of Paul, see Hugh Pyper’s “How Edifying is the Upbuilding? Paul and Kierkegaard in Dialogue” in The Joy of Kierkegaard: Essays on Kierkegaard as a Biblical Reader.

[17] All quotations of Fear and Trembling’s preface come from Alistair Hannay’s translation for Penguin Classics.

[18] p. ix-x, A Short Life of Kierkegaard.   Fear and Trembling is possibly Kierkegaard’s most popular book today, and is certainly the most-translated title of Kierkegaard’s into English; I am currently aware of 6 different translations. Robert Payne (1939, [a rare find today!]), Walter Lowrie (1941), Howard and Edna Hong (1983), Alastair Hannay (1986), C. Stephen Evans & Sylvia Walsh (2006), and Bruce Kirmmse (2021).

[19] For Kierkegaard’s most explicit discussion of what Scripture is I direct a reader to For Self-Examination, where Kierkegaard at one point likens engaging with Scripture to reading a letter from one’s beloved.

[20] p. 258, Biblical Critical Theory, Watkin.  In the same breath Watkin insinuates that Kierkegaard is not ‘a careful biblical exegete,’ so I’ll take the opportunity to mention that Kierkegaard was fluent in both written and spoken Latin, proficient in Greek and Hebrew (not to mention other non-biblical languages, such as German), and left pages and pages of Scriptural translations out of the original languages in his journals.

Interior Light, Carl Holsøe

This essay began as a small response to a book I was recently lent. I meant to write a short reply for the lender’s use, but in wishing for my comments to be as informative and helpful as possible, kept finding this piece expanding farther and farther out—to the point where it would take far more than 10 or even 15 minutes to read the whole thing! I’ve therefore chunked it out and will run it as a small series. I’ll post the essay in its entirety at a later date (probably on Academia.edu), and I’ll include a link to it at the end of the last post of this series here. Thank you for reading!

If one wishes to take the punchline and leave the rest behind, it is this: though popularly attributed to Kierkegaard, the exact phrase “leap of faith” does not occur in any of Kierkegaard’s writings, nor does Kierkegaard’s personal philosophy endorse leaping into faith. That Kierkegaard’s pseudonyms pen the word “leap,” and use the term in various contexts, is true enough. Kierkegaard also occasionally uses the word in his upbuilding discourses. But neither Kierkegaard nor his pseudonyms endorse the metaphor, the experience, or the mental movement of leaping into faith as a positive picture of what faith is. For Kierkegaard, faith is a far more complex, dynamic, and difficult endeavor than any simple leap can accomplish. For Kierkegaard’s pseudonyms, they’re collectively disinterested in straightforwardly telling a person how to get faith. Rather, Kierkegaard and his pseudonyms alike use different literary tactics for the common goal of calling into question systematic philosophy and theology, of which faith is a topic of interest. It is precisely because of what faith is that it belies any neat or systematic treatment (including leaps). To assign an originator to the concept of a leap of faith (but again, not the exact phrase), one is better off looking to the German Enlightenment philosopher Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi, who endorsed making a “mortal leap” out of rationalism and into pietistic empiricism.

And now, the argument…

~~~

Though popularly attributed to Kierkegaard, the exact phrase “leap of faith” does not occur in any of Kierkegaard’s writings. This includes his pseudonymous writings, where most people go when they wish to textually attribute “leap of faith” to Kierkegaard. Instead the phrase’s attribution to Kierkegaard is likely owing to many of Kierkegaard’s early to mid-century interpreters. These are the scholars who regarded Kierkegaard as a fideist—someone who believes faith and reason stand in opposition to one another (“irrationalism” and “subjectivism” are complimentary, related philosophies also attributed to Kierkegaard in this vein). For example, the famous French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre wrote in 1964 that Kierkegaard was the “knight of subjectivity,” a “poet of faith,” and that while “[Immanuel] Kant put himself in the realm of knowledge to test the validity of our understandings… Kierkegaard steals language from knowledge to use it against knowledge.” [1] Sartre continues, “If we come to him, as we are constrained to do, across the realm of knowledge, our words meet his and are disqualified in disqualifying them. Our use of the word and his are heterogeneous. Thus the message of this dead man is scandalous by itself, since we cannot consider this residue of a life as a determination of knowledge.” At the end of his essay, Sartre criticizes Kierkegaard for “forgetting that the world we know is the one we make,” and that he missed this by ‘denaturing knowledge’ and ‘neglecting the praxis that is rationality’ in his authorship.[2] There is a certain irony in this, that in reading Kierkegaard as a fidiest Sartre finds Kierkegaard too much of an irrationalist for his tastes, and subsequently wishes that Kierkegaard would see some good in rational thought and positive inquiry!

Yet thankfully, thorough the efforts of Kierkegaard scholars such as Paul Holmer, Merold Westphal, Jon Stewart, Lee Barrett, Robert L. Perkins and many others, Kierkegaard has almost entirely shaken his fideistic “irrationalist” reputation in academic circles today. Indeed, along with her ground-breaking monograph on Kierkegaard’s epistemology, Kierkegaard scholar M.G. Piety has gone on to argue convincingly that Kierkegaard’s philosophy of knowledge shares a striking similarity to the early church fathers Irenaeus and Clement of Alexandria.[3] Prominent Kierkegaard scholar C. Stephen Evans’ work on Kierkegaard has also demonstrably refuted the reputation of ‘Kierkegaard the fidest.’

When hearing the phrase “leap of faith” attributed to Kierkegaard, it is good to keep in mind that the speaker can mean a variety of things by it. Evans sees many interpreting Kierkegaard as endorsing a leap from rational belief in God into an irrational decision to simply believe in God. He writes:

“…there is a widespread view that Kierkegaard does not think God's existence can be known at all. Belief in God is supposed to require a “leap of faith,” since the traditional proofs of God's existence all fail. This widespread view is simply mistaken. Kierkegaard never describes belief in God as the result of a “leap of faith.” It is true that Kierkegaard does not think one can prove God's existence, but he also thinks that one needs no proof of God's existence. The leap of faith has nothing to do with believing in God; it has solely to do with belief in Jesus of Nazareth as the God-man. It is the idea that God became incarnate that is for Kierkegaard “the absolute paradox,” which poses a huge difficulty for human reason. Kierkegaard believes that there is a natural knowledge of God, an awareness of God that does not depend on the Christian revelation.”[4]

A little later on, Evans names Albert Camus and Francis Schaffer as two promulgators of the myth that Kierkegaard endorses a leap of faith:

“This myth has been popularized in books like Albert Camus's The Myth of Sisyphus, where Camus says that Kierkegaard recognized the absurdity of human existence but could not live with this absurdity and had to take recourse in a “leap.” This myth about Kierkegaard is doubly wrong. First, Kierkegaard never thinks of belief in God as irrational, though he often claims that it is irrational for people who claim to believe in God to live as if God did not exist. Second, Kierkegaard does not think this kind of faith in God requires anything like a “leap”—the leap specifically refers to faith that God became incarnate in Jesus of Nazareth.”[5]

and,

“Oddly, even some Christian writers have embraced Camus's view of Kierkegaard. Francis Schaeffer, for example, in his comprehensive story of the intellectual history of Western culture, credits Kierkegaard with the invention of a “two-story universe,” with upper and lower spheres separated by “the line of despair.” On this view, Kierkegaard saw that the universe as understood by modern thinkers was meaningless, and so he postulated an irrational “upper story” of religious truth to provide meaning and purpose. [But] this popular conception of Kierkegaard as an existentialist who gave up on reason because reason offers us only a meaningless and hopeless world is completely false. Kierkegaard is suspicious of what modernity calls “reason” not because it leads to a meaningless and absurd view of life. Rather, “reason” is suspect because, for Kierkegaard, it is closely tied to a kind of worldly shrewdness that makes humans all too content with a life that is shallow and meaningless. This kind of “reason” has no difficulty with belief in God per se. The problem is that all too often it produces a belief in a God who is perfectly suited to rationalize a life of middle-class conformity that undermines a person's spiritual dignity…Kierkegaard thinks that God's reality is or should be obvious to every human person. He is opposed to proofs of God's existence primarily because they make something that could be known by anyone appear to be doubtful. On his view, a person who attempts to prove God's existence is actually working against himself. He is like a man who announces he wishes to give the other people in his village a large sum of money, but first offers them an elaborate argument that he is doing a good thing. Their natural reaction will be suspicion, both of his argument and of his offer.”[6]

Aye, but herein lies the rub. Kierkegaard scholars universally acknowledge that the phrase “leap of faith” is absent in Kierkegaard’s writing. But many of them go on to say that parts of Kierkegaard’s overall philosophy do align with the concept of leaping. Evans, we have just seen, interprets Kierkegaard as rejecting all views about leaping except when it comes to belief in Jesus Christ’s Incarnation as fully God and fully human—what Kierkegaard terms in his pseudonymous writings “the absolute paradox.” For Evans, this is where Kierkegaard thinks a leap is involved, and here I don’t agree with Evans. I wholeheartedly agree with him that Kierkegaard does not think one should, or even can, base their faith upon rational arguments for God’s existence (and I’ll say here too that I’m not only indebted to Evans’ scholarship on Kierkegaard, but I was extremely fortunate to have him as a secondary supervisor during my MPhil. Our agreements far outweigh our disagreements). But while Evans thinks Kierkegaard describes the Incarnation as a rational leap for the confessing believer, I think that even there it is unhelpful and confusing to call Kierkegaard’s treatment of the Incarnation as an endorsement to make a leap of faith.

If we take Kierkegaard seriously when he (later on) tells his readers that all of the writings he produced between 1843-1846 are meant to be read against each other as a grand dialectical argument made between himself and a series of characters, called pseudonyms, we find a very interesting language and pattern emerge. We find that Kierkegaard’s pseudonyms, who all find themselves at various degrees of non-confession, and all of whom do not consider themselves Christians, are aware of “Magister Kierkegaard’s” writings, and that they think “Magister Kierkegaard” is often wrong about various interpretations of philosophy and theology. They’ll sometimes have praise for Kierkegaard’s efforts as an author, but are usually more interested in what the others are writing about (this is seen primarily in  1845’s Stages on Life’s Way and in a chapter called “A Glance at a Contemporary Effort in Danish Literature” in the final publication of Kierkegaard’s first series of writings, Concluding Unscientific Postscript). These pseudonyms often share a certain vocabulary (in which “absolute paradox” and “leap” feature), while Kierkegaard’s language in his signed writings (all called “discourses” rather than “sermons”) is markedly distinctive. Since all of these books are designed to be read as a collective, 8 of which are by the pseudonymous non-Christian authors and 7 of which are the discourse collections by Kierkegaard (15 books published in three years!), the reader of Kierkegaard must be sensitive to the larger picture while reading these individual books. This is not to say that Kierkegaard’s books cannot be read individually, or that they do not have a point to make in and of themselves. It is to say that part of Kierkegaard’s genius was presenting a diverse set of books, boasting a wide variety of literary styles and subject matters, all while integrating them into a singular project designed to elicit an experience for the reader; an experience in which at minimum the reader questions and reconsiders her own presuppositions and tendencies, and at maximum loses her previous over-confidence in how she thought her mind and her being were ordered. In other words, Kierkegaard’s dialectical authorship of 1843-1846 is designed to help the reader start doubting in a new way. Kierkegaard’s greatest hope of all is that by reading his books an individual might encounter the living Jesus Christ as he is, rather than as she expects him to be, and this in a daily way.

Now, Evans would agree with all of what I have just said. But here he and a few other Kierkegaard scholars would likely raise the point that Kierkegaard does share a lot of viewpoints with his pseudonyms. This is true (and how one goes about deciding what Kierkegaard and his pseudonyms do and do not agree on, is a large subject for another time). However, in collapsing the language of “leap” between Kierkegaard and his pseudonyms, we lose the distinction between Kierkegaard and his pseudonyms. In his signed discourses (which I will unpack later in this writing) Kierkegaard describes actions people make rather than actions people should make when he infrequently uses the word “leap,” and he does this while intentionally gesturing to the pseudonyms’ debates and viewpoints on the “leap.” By using the term “leap’ to talk about what people are apt to do in their lives, Kierkegaard links their actions and self-conceptions to the pseudonyms’ self-conceptions, and thereby invites the reader to wonder if there is a difference way to go about engaging God in his or her life. In this way, then, we see Kierkegaard intentionally distancing himself from the concept of the leap in order to make a clear distinction between himself and his pseudonyms’ philosophical projects, which include entanglements with the philosophies of G.E. Lessing and F. H. Jacobi. For this reason alone scholars writing about Kierkegaard’s complex and dynamic concept of faith should not use the imagery and language of leaping—it only serves to collapse subtleties of difference in Kierkegaard’s thinking, and confuse the wider public.

Andrew B. Torrance (who was my primary supervisor for the MPhil) has put Kierkegaard’s view of belief in the Incarnation (and thus, by an extension, faith in the Incarnation), in a rich and helpful way. It is worth reading in full:

“When the absurd ceases to be the absurd, this is not because a person suddenly receives an intellectual capacity to work out the rationale of the Incarnation. Nor is it because a person humbly and fideistically resolves, in and of herself, to embrace the absolute paradox [of the incarnation] as a paradox that she cannot comprehend. Rather, it is because God draws her into a 'friendship' in which she finds the 'courage' and 'enthusiasm’ to embrace that which she would otherwise have perceived to be an absurdity, given her preconceived notion of what God can and cannot do. In this friendship, a person becomes so consumed by a love for God that she becomes 'blind' to any apparent intellectual difficulties that are involved in recognising the possibility of a relationship between ‘two qualities so unlike as God and man’—a relationship, moreover, that is mediated by the God-man [Jesus Christ]. This does not mean that she becomes blind to the truth. Rather she is awakened by the truth to the truth. As the one who is the truth, the God-human [Jesus Christ] makes sense of her existence despite the fact that she cannot unravel the mystery of the Incarnation. As this happens, the reality of Jesus Christ calls into question any brazen concern for intellectual mastery. In sum, Jesus Christ does not encounter persons as a puzzle to be solved. But neither does he encounter persons as an abstract reality to be blindly embraced. Rather, he confronts persons as the one who calls them to discipleship. Jesus offers an invitation for persons to come to love and follow him. And he does this as the light of the world who bestows truth upon human knowing. When a person stands before God, awakened by his truth, he subordinates himself not simply to a paradox that immediately seems unfathomable but to the living God who, by establishing kinship with humanity in time, lovingly draws him to himself and into the truth that he is in himself.   In view of this interpretation of Kierkegaard's Christian vision, I contend that Kierkegaard's Christian thought needs to be associated with a Christian realism: a realism that prioritises the reality of the living God who personally involves himself with creation, in history, and does so over against any independent human ideas of God.”[7]

The individual’s relationship to the God-man, Jesus Christ, is at the center of Kierkegaard’s motivations for writing, and as Torrance says so well, it is God and not the human being who establishes a relationship with her. Faith, then, is not reliant upon an individual’s beliefs, even if an individual’s beliefs are at play within the space of faith. There is no leap involved in coming into relationship with God, and there is no leap required to start loving and receiving from God.

Thus far, then, we have established that Kierkegaard never wrote the term “leap of faith” in any of his writings, that the phrase is likely associated with him because of prominent interpreters like Jean-Paul Sartre, Albert Camus, and Francis Schaffer reading Kierkegaard as a fiedist, and that Kierkegaard scholars are themselves divided on when to attribute the concept of leaping to Kierkegaard’s own understanding of faith. It is this last point that deserves more exploration because, as has been said, it is true that Kierkegaard did present the term “leap” in some of his corpus….

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[1] pp. 231, 240, 242, 243-244, “The Singular Universal” by Jean-Paul Sartre in Kierkegaard: A Collection of Critical Essays ed. by Josiah Thompson.

[2]  p. 264, “The Singular Universal,” Sartre

[3] See Ways of Knowing: Kierkegaard’s Pluralist Epistemology (2010), and “Kierkegaard and the Early Church on Christian Knowledge and Its Existential Implications” by M.G. Piety. Additionally, consult “Kierkegaard” in The Oxford Handbook of the Epistemology of Theology (2017), or visit Piety’s blog and read “Kierkegaard and the Ante-Nicene Fathers on the Knowledge that Comes from Faith” (Nov 13, 2011) and “Irenaeus and Kierkegaard on Christian Knowledge” (July 18, 2016).

[4] p. 41-42, Kierkegaard and Spirituality: Accountability as the Meaning of Human Existence, C. Stephen Evans.

[5] p. 44, Kierkegaard and Spirituality, Evans.

[6] p. 49-50, Kierkegaard and Spirituality, Evans.

[7] p. 98, The Freedom to Become a Christian: A Kierkegaardian Account of Human Transformation in Relationship with God, Andrew Torrance.

The story of Kierkegaard’s reception into the English-speaking world has been well established for some time. With the aid of Charles Williams at Oxford University, expatriate American Walter Lowrie took it upon himself to translate all of Kierkegaard’s works into English in the decade leading up to, and spilling into, the Second World War. Lowrie had first learned of Kierkegaard through his reading of Miguel de Unamuno and Karl Barth, and saw that in Germany especially he “could hardly pick up a serious book without finding [Kierkegaard’s] name in it,” and that “every writer who claimed to be abreast of modern thought had to say something about him…Søren Kierkegaard had already taken the place of Nietzsche as the literary vogue in higher circles.”1 Lowrie considered Kierkegaard a talented ally who could help bring what Lowrie deemed to be a receding of the American Christian intellect into a more “insular mind,” away from the maturity of European Christianity. Lowrie believed too that his published lecture series Our Concern with the Theology of Crisis was “the first shot” to begin the process of introducing Kierkegaard to the English speaking world, until he learned that philosophy professor David Swenson of the University of Minnesota had begun a quieter campaign to introduce Kierkegaard to American intellectuals some years earlier.

Swenson had discovered a Danish copy of Kierkegaard’s Concluding Unscientific Postscript in a public library as a young graduate student in 1898. He recounts reading the book within 24 hours and leaving the experience profoundly changed, having found in Kierkegaard the guide he had always wished for in his intellectual and spiritual life.2 In 1916 Swenson published “The Anti-Intellectualism of Kierkegaard” in Philosophical Review, widely considered today to be the first engagement with Kierkegaard’s thought in the English language. Swenson saturated his lectures with Kierkegaard’s influence as first instructor and then as tenured philosophy professor at the University of Minnesota (1901-1940). He privately translated some of Kierkegaard’s Postscript into English, and with the coming of Walter Lowrie to the United States in the mid 1930s, almost completed its translation after first beginning and completing a translation of the much shorter Philosophical Fragments in 1936. Swenson died before he could complete the final pages of his translation of Postscript, and Lowrie stepped in to see the work completed by 1941.

Much of this story is recounted by Lowrie in his essay “How Kierkegaard Got Into English,” which includes a list of the earliest English translations of Kierkegaard. Listed there is Selections From the Writings of Kierkeggard, translated by L. M. Hollander in 1923, “The Seducer’s Diary” (excerpted out of Either/Or) translated by Knud Fick in 1932, Philosophical Fragments translated by David Swenson in 1936, The Journals of Søren Kierkegaard translated by Alexander Dru in 1938, and two translations of “Purity of Heart is to Will One Thing” (excerpted out of Upbuilding Discourses in Various Spirits) translated by Douglas V. Steere in the US and Mrs Aldworth and Rev. Mr. Ferrie in London, both in 1938.3 With the enthusiastic efforts of Lowrie (who learned Danish in order to translate Kierkegaard himself), most of Kierkegaard’s writings came into English by 1941, with four main publishers and seven different translators all having had a hand in the effort.

                                  ~~~

This is the story of how Kierkegaard got into English and became known to the English speaking world. And this is why my recent discovery of Swedish suffragette and novelist Fredrika Bremer’s (1801-1865) valuation of Kierkegaard’s philosophy is so exciting to me.

I have found two separate printings of the same piece of writing — Liv i Norden [Life in the North] that appeared in the United States in 1850, well before Kierkegaard’s death in 1855. It is likely too, with Fredrika Bremer’s established popularity with Americans, and her having a dedicated translator in Mary Howitt of London, that Bremer’s book on life in Denmark was read by more than just a handful of people. She was a “lionized celebrity” who experiencing a “raging high” in American popularity, being as The Minnesota Pioneer claimed “one of those individuals whom all lands love to claim, and whose birth place is soon forgotten, because her presence is felt everywhere. Her manners are natural and her expressions candid…she makes no display, and loves not to talk about her own productions, but desires to place herself, in the attitude of a learner."4 On her arrival in New York, coming from Britain and Denmark, the local press described Bemer as “the author ‘of a new style of literature’ who ‘probably, at the present moment, has more readers than any other female writer on the globe.’”5 “I do not like her, I love her,” the Amerian poet James Russell Lowell remarked in one of his letters, after Bremer’s stay with Lowell and his wife. “She is one of the most beautiful persons I have ever known—so clear, so simple, so right-minded and -hearted, and so full of judgement.”6

I plan to write separately on Fredrika Bremer’s brief personal correspondence with Kierkegaard, and how he later reacted to her published assessment of him (he was not pleased). For the present, I will provide a little background on who Fredrika Bremer and her devoted translator, Mary Howitt, were. I will then offer final remarks on how this shifts the story of how Kierkegaard came into the English speaking world.

Fredrika Bremer’s name belongs with what we now call the growing feminist movement of the 19th century. She eventually rose to an international fame for her poignant writing style and keen observations of modern life, presenting her thoughts in both novels and published journalistic observations of different nations (such as Sweden, Norway, Denmark, the United States, and even Greece and Palestine). She was born in Finland in 1801 but was raised in Sweden by her wealthy and strict father (little seems to be known of her mother, from what I can find). She began her writing career in 1828 with the first installment of her well-received Sketches of Everyday Life (Tekningar utur hvardagslifvet), and three years after the last installment of Sketches she published a book that dealt with the subject of women’s emancipation (Nina, 1835), beginning a theme that would remain a central driving force for the rest of her life. Bremer went on to be a well-traveled and dedicated contributor to the changing social and political spheres of the 19th century, including the emancipation of slavery.

Mary Howitt, just two years Bremer’s senior, came to be Bremer’s devoted and enthusiastic English translator, translating all of her works into English between 1842-1863 in eighteen volumes. Howitt relates in her autobiography how she and Bremer came to correspond with each other after translations of Bremer’s more popular novels met with great acclaim in England and ran “like wildfire” through the United States. Howitt writes:

The very first of many letters which I received from Fredrika Bremer expresses her pleasure at the English publication of “The Neighbors,” and is dated Stockholm, February 21, 1843. She speaks modestly in it of her productions, and is surprised that her commonplace delineations of every-day life should suit the fastidious taste of England. Nevertheless, she hopes still to write more worthily of the life of her native land, saying in conclusion, ‘Sweden is a poor but noble country, England is a rich and glorious one; in spirit they are sisters, and should know each other as such. Let us, dear Mrs. Howitt, contribute to that end.’ To the best of my ability I united with her in so doing.7

Howitt later recalls that Bremer stayed with her and her family in London in September 1849, with Bremer on her way to tour the United States and Cuba. It is during this stay, which followed Bremer’s six month stay in Copenhagen (between autumn 1848—May 1849), that Bremer almost certainly shared her copy of Life in the North with Howitt, who published an English translation under the title An Easter Offering through Harper and Brothers of New York around March 31st, 1850. Life in the North is Bremer’s assessment of modern life in Denmark and Copenhagen, and it is there that she singles out Kierkegaard, along with Hans Lassen Martensen and Frederik Christian Sibbern, as the chief representatives of Copenhagen’s philosophical thought. This particular section of the book was then reprinted a few months later in the American periodical The Western Literary Messenger, June 1850, under the title “Living Philosophers in Denmark.”

Here, then, we have not only Søren Kierkegaard’s name but also a succinct assessment of his philosophy and thought presented to the English reading public by a popular and well-regarded author of the time. In a small but nevertheless very present way, Kierkegaard was put before the 19th century American and British reading public. Given too, that Bremer’s assessment of Kierkegaard is on the whole regretful of his eccentricities and what she deems his hyper-selective focus on the inner life of the individual, it is easy to see how a sympathetic reader of Bremer’s could walk away satisfied that Kierkegaard was not worth seeking to read for themselves. Mary Howitt’s preface to An Easter Offering/Life in the North only serves to further this regard of Bremer (and therefore Kierkegaard, respectively):

Miss Bremer has long been known among us as the interpreter of Northern domestic life and feeling. In the little work which is now presented to the public she appears in a somewhat more exalted character—as the interpreter of the life and feelings of a nation, and that at a most interesting and critical point of its existence. She was a witness of what she describes, and as such her picture of Denmark can not but excite the deepest sympathy and admiration…in this little sketch, independently of its immediate and general interest, will be found a more lively and complete view of the literature and philosophy of Denmark than we are yet possessed of. Surely, after this, the sympathies of our land will be with this noble and brave people.8

George Pattison credits Andrew Hamilton’s Sixteen Months in the Danish Isles (1852), and Bremer’s later novel Hertha (1856) as the earliest English-language examples of engagement with Kierkegaard, while Adolf Hult mentions the English translation of Hans Lassen Martensen’s Christian Ethics (1883) and a translation of Georg Brande’s Main Currents in Nineteenth Century Literature (1906) as other early engagements (before going on to claim himself as the first to present Kierkegaard to the American public, writing in 1905).9 All of these sources are examples of an engagement with Kierkegaard’s thought in the English language that pre-dates David Swenson’s 1916 article in Philosophical Review.

While, then, the generally established history of Kierkegaard’s American reception remains relatively unaltered, given that that no full writings of Kierkegaard’s appeared into English until Swenson, Lowrie, and Dru appeared on the scene in the mid 1930s, and mainstream interest in Kierkegaard’s thought did not appear in strength until about the same time, it is still of no small significance that Kierkegaard’s name and thought was presented to the English speaking public while Kierkegaard was himself alive. Through the presentation of others, one could see how Kierkegaard would not be a figure of serious philosophical and theological interest until more people could read him for themselves, being painted a ‘philosopher of the human heart’ with a strong ‘one-sidedness’ that leaves much to be desired (à la Bremer, Hamilton, and Martensen). We should be aware of, and take into account, the influence of Fredrika Bremer upon Kierkegaard’s reception in the United States.10

Follow these links to read Fredrika Bremer’s assessment of Kierkegaard in 1850:

Bremer and Howitt, An Easter Offering (see pages 21-22 for the section on Sibbern, Martensen, and Kierkegaard): https://archive.org/details/easteroffering00brem/page/12/mode/2up

The Western Literary Messenger (see pages 507-508 of the PDF, or pages 182-183 of Volume XIV No. 4, for the section on Sibbern, Martensen, and Kierkegaard): https://www.google.com/books/edition/_/yvXVAAAAMAAJ?hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi9rNqNzICDAxXsPEQIHe2hBKcQ8fIDegQIARAc