Soren Kierkegaard - Tumblr Posts
“I want a truth for which I can live and die” Søren Kierkegaard
Something I asked for when I was about 16-18 [years old], but now at 23 my truth is simply to live.
O vazio que sempre senti, sempre foi, em nome do meu idealismo do amor. Ilusão intragável que me tomou. As noites de ansiedade, os dias tristes e melancólicos, são por conta dessa triste ilusão. Ah! Quem dera eu não fosse um ser faltante.
Desde adolescência eu me lembro das noites solitárias em que sonhei com o tal "amor romântico". Quantas vezes me imaginei desfrutando de sinceros abraços e beijos, de gestos e olhares profundos.
Me vejo como um homem patético, pois o meu tendão de Aquiles, meus vícios, minhas noites solitárias, e em parte a causa da minha ansiedade, é por conta desse ridículo sonho de um amor romântico. Uma mulher, quem sabe, que me ame.
Que triste ilusão! Esperando que o outro cessará a angústia atávica. A angústia é a substância da alma, como dizia Sören Kierkegaard.
Certa feita, a psicanalista Maud Mannoni lançou uma poderosa sentença à condição do ser humano, em nome de Lacan: "O maior desejo do ser humano, é o de ser desejado pelo outro."
Eis a nossa condição miserável, somos seres faltantes, desejantes, e acima de tudo, queremos ser desejados pelo outro. Que espécie infeliz!
E eu, como um animal faltante que sou, carrego a minha miséria. À este mundo, só tenho à oferecer essa miséria. A condição de homem supérfluo. Nada mais.
“The way to make life easy is to make it meaningless.”
— Søren Kierkegaard
“There is not a single human being who does not despair at least a little, in whose innermost being there does not dwell an uneasiness, an unquiet, a discordance, an anxiety in the face of an unknown something.”
— Søren Kierkegaard, The Sickness Unto Death
How Do We Know What We Know?
By Biblical Researcher Eli Kittim
A posteriori Vs A priori Knowledge
Epistemology is a philosophical branch that questions the conditions required for a belief to constitute knowledge. The possible sources of knowledge that could justify a belief are based on perception, memory, reason, and testimony.
Postmodern epistemology is generally skeptical of “a posteriori” knowledge, which is derived by reasoning from observed phenomena (i.e. empirical knowledge). Because this knowledge gradually changes and evolves over time, its so-called “facts” also change and are not therefore necessarily true. This would imply that scientific knowledge is not necessarily true and is therefore incapable of informing us about reality as it truly is!
The only necessary “truths” appear to be contained in what is known as “a priori” knowledge, which is derived by reasoning from self-evident propositions. Since the time of Immanuel Kant this knowledge has been understood as being acquired independently of any particular experiences. Thus, logical and mathematical propositions fall under this category.
If you think about it, science cannot prove the existence of the external world independently of our perceptions or faculties. Kant was one of the first thinkers to suggest the idea of the philosophical gaze turned inward upon the self rather than focused on the external world per se. Rather than concentrating on observed phenomena, he zoomed in on the observer himself. Since then we have sought to find out what constitutes “necessary truth,” as well as its justification. In short, we have become skeptical of reality and have seriously questioned whether our perceptions of it can be trusted or not.
The Phenomenological Perspective of Experience
Along comes Edmund Husserl (1859 – 1938), a German philosopher, who founded the school of Phenomenology, which studies the structures of experience and consciousness. Consciousness at the most fundamental level is simply the awareness of existence, both internal and external. In other words, phenomenology is primarily concerned with how consciousness perceives and relates to phenomena. A phenomenon is defined as an observable event. This is in contrast to a “noumenon,” which, according to Kant, cannot be directly observed. Thus, Husserl is interested in understanding not the external world as it really is but rather how an individual experiences or perceives it subjectively. Husserl influenced many notable 20th century thinkers, such as Gabriel Marcel, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Jean-Paul Sartre, Martin Heidegger, Hans-Georg Gadamer, Emmanuel Levinas, Jacques Derrida, and many others!
What is more, Husserl acknowledged a type of gnosis that is far greater than any knowledge derived from the empirical world of the senses. He called it “authentic intuition,” denoting its capacity to grasp the essence of being (Manfred Frank. What is Neostructuralism? Trans. Sabine Wilke and Richard Gray. [Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 1989], pp. 411-412)! Since “testimony” is acceptable as a source of knowledge in epistemology, the multiple and independent attestations of the born-again experience can be employed as potential sources of knowledge for a justified true belief in the Platonic sense. Søren Kierkegaard, the father of existentialism, would acknowledge its validity, given that the born-again experience (Jn 3.3) cannot be proven empirically but experienced existentially! The great mystics Rumi, Kabir, and John of the Cross would certainly concur with that statement. This is analogous to what Karl Jaspers, the German-Swiss psychiatrist and philosopher, calls a leap of faith, which is a belief in something outside the confines of reason.
From an interdisciplinary perspective, psychological testing can further confirm the existence of radical changes in the personality as a result of such experiences, not unlike those depicted in the Bible. For example, a murderer named Saul was said to be changed into a lover named Paul. Such cases abound in the “conversion-experience” literature. It seems to be a case where a new identity has replaced an older one (cf. Eph. 4.22-24). In the language of psychoanalyst Donald Winnicott, it is the difference between the False self (i.e. pseudo self) and the True self (i.e. authentic self)! Thus, there are many indicators which suggest that the born-again experience is ipso facto a possible source of knowledge (cf. Eph. 2.5).
Why Then Are There Differences Between Various Belief Systems?
The contradictory doctrinal statements of various religious traditions do not invalidate the authenticity of the existential experience precisely because they do not accurately represent the born-again experience itself, but rather the afterthoughts that follow it. Human reason tries to make sense of its experiences, thereby leading to theological diversity. However, at the point of the “mysterium tremendum” itself the experience is ubiquitous. In other words, whether one is reared in a Christian, Muslim, or Buddhist culture is irrelevant because the authentic mystical experience will be the same. The person will primarily experience a new birth, a profound sense of peace, as well as an all - encompassing love. The attempt to categorize it within a specific cultural and spiritual milieu is a secondary process. As Hegel once wrote:
“The owl of Minerva spreads its wings only
with the falling of the dusk.”
In other words, only after the experience is gone does philosophy arrive to try to understand it. In our case, theology arrives too late. It’s the same with the doctrinal variations of the different spiritual traditions!
The Absolute Being of philosophy (i.e. God) is often said to instill revelation upon humankind. There are various theological schools, such as pantheism, deism, theism, and the like, but most historians would agree that the various holy books are testaments of God’s alleged revelations (e.g. the Upanishads, Vedas, Bhagavad Gita, Torah, Quran, New Testament). However, the degree of revelation varies. It is important to note what Paul reveals in 1 Cor. 12.11:
“All these are the work of one and the same
Spirit, and he distributes them to each one,
just as he determines.”
In other words, not all get an equal share of the spiritual pie. Not all receive an equal portion of the truth. Each one gets a small amount of it. Some get more, others less. Thus, some know more, some less. This, then, explains the differences that exist between various belief systems without necessarily refuting their undergirding existential experiences per se! Put differently, they all believe in God, but which God is a question pertaining to different levels and degrees of revelation. So, given that belief systems are disseminated later, after the fact, doctrinal differences are irrelevant in refuting the initial born-again experience as a whole.
Conclusion
The epistemology of existentialism and phenomenology presents “experience” as a potential source of knowledge. Since testimony is considered to be a possible source of knowledge that could justify a belief, the multitudinous number of born-again testimonies down through the ages would present a case for the legitimacy of the existential experience! According to phenomenology, this knowledge may actually surpass that of science given its capacity to grasp the essence of being!
Soren Kierkegaard
Sanırım dünyanın sonu, her şeyin bir şaka olduğunu sananların yükselen alkışları arasında gelecek.
Moliere son yazdığı "Hastalık Hastası" oyununu oynarken sahnede kan kusmaya başlar ve yere yığılır. Herkes bunu oyunun bir parçası sanarak ayakta alkışlar. Gerçek şu ki, Moliere vermeden ölmüştür. Son dakikalarına alkışlar eşliğinde veda etmiştir.
You love the accidental. A smile from a pretty girl in an interesting situation, a stolen glance, that is what you are hunting for, that is a motif for your aimless fantasy. You who always pride yourself on being an observateur must, in return, put up with becoming an object of observation. Ah, you are a strange fellow, one moment a child, the next an old man; one moment you are thinking most earnestly about the most important scholarly problems, how you will devote your life to them, and the next you are a lovesick fool. But you are a long way from marriage.
Søren Kierkegaard, Either/Or: A Fragment of Life
Sally Muir, Dogs
Søren Kierkegaard, Diaries 1813-1855