Existentialism
Kierkegaard—1 Kierkegaard (1813-55) Søren Kierkegaard was born in Copenhagen in 1813 he was the youngest in a large family raised in prosperous middle-class home, strictest devotion to church and religion father a successful merchant and avid reader of theology mother was father’s servant before becoming 2nd wife
Barrett in Irrational Man describes him as a bizarre and eccentric figure who was not well received in his lifetime he had fine eyes, but there the attractive features ended “a spindly figure, a humped back, tousled head of hair made him look like a scarecrow” the hunchback was perhaps the “thorn in his flesh” he often mentions in his writings he accepted his ill-favored body with wry good humor always able to see comedy and pathos together as one human side of religion “Kierkegaard the cripple” a phrase invoked not merely against his body but his spirit psychoanalytic critics have clumsily wielded their scalpels in an effort to cut down his thought much has been made of a decisive event in his life the breaking off of an engagement to Regine Olsen in 1841 Barrett thinks that too much has been made of this event and yet, precisely because he was an existentialist—existence precedes essence that this crucial fact of his existence is not without significance for his thought he suggests that it is a result of this painful event that Kierkegaard could not have been a Hegelian—no philosopher’s balm could remove the pain of loss “The man who has chosen irrevocably, whose choice has once and for all sundered him from a certain possibility for himself and his life, is thereby thrown back on the reality of that self in all its mortality and finitude” (Barrett, 155) Kierkegaard viewed life as governed by a deep melancholy which he self-consciously tried to hide with wit and gaiety his writings are steeped in the philosophy of Hegel the main theme of his writings is a reaction against Hegel and official state Christianity Hegel had turned Christianity into something rational central focus of his thought is the relationship between faith and reason leveled a profound critique of modernity and what Christianity had become in modernity was an advocate of a life of intense religious commitment overriding theme is his defense of what it means to be a Christian his thought thus aims to provide insight into the meaning and fulfillment of human life