Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-jkksz Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-13T01:01:22.179Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Chapter 6 - The existential dimension of faith

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 February 2015

Sharon Krishek
Affiliation:
Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Daniel Conway
Affiliation:
Texas A & M University
Get access

Summary

The universal significant of faith

Our existence is pervaded with sorrow. Loss – the painful absence of what one values – is silently present everywhere. The evident cases of loss – death, harsh diseases, horrors of war – are easy to discern, but all around we also find less conspicuous instances of loss. The hug of a young couple betrays the future challenges threatening their love; a new mother’s gaze reflects the sorrow over her inevitable separation from the grown child; the smile of an elderly man expresses his recollection of years past and his sad acknowledgment of the approaching end. Confronted with loss, then, either evident or unnoticeable, one’s existence may seem like a source of endless pain. Ephemeral, frail, doomed to extinction – can one nevertheless affirm life while suffering loss?

This chapter claims that Kierkegaard’s analysis of Abraham’s faith in Fear and Trembling offers a positive answer to this question. This may sound a little strange. After all, can Abraham’s strikingly unusual and terrifying experience have anything in common with a range of experiences that, at least in their less severe forms, are the lot of every human being? What is the connection between Abraham’s experience on Mount Moriah (that does not seem to bear even the most remote resemblance to one’s ordinary experience) and the intimate and familiar experience of loss? As I shall attempt to show, Kierkegaard’s analysis of faith turns the story of the Binding into a tale of the human condition. Without making God’s demand any less dreadful, and without making Abraham’s response to that demand any less exceptional, Kierkegaard nevertheless retells the story in a manner that makes it relevant to every human being. Abraham’s trial becomes an expression (albeit an exceptional one) of the ‘existential drama’ involved in temporal, ephemeral, and finite human life. Accordingly, Abraham’s faith becomes an inspiring model: a “guiding star that rescues the anguished” (FT 18/SKS 4, 117), a guiding star for all. My claim is that Abraham’s faith manifests a desirable existential position: it exemplifies a unique way of approaching the loss that living in time entails.

Type
Chapter
Information
Kierkegaard's Fear and Trembling
A Critical Guide
, pp. 106 - 121
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2015

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×