Learning from Kierkegaard

 

For as the Good is only a single thing, so all ways lead to the Good, even the false ones: when the repentant follows the same way back...Wherever a man may be in the world, whichever road he travels, when he wills one thing, he is on a road that leads him to Thee!
- Søren Kierkegaard

This little paperback book, Purity of Heart, is to will one thing, printed in 1961 is a perfect example of why I love shopping at used bookstores so much (especially in the UK), because I never know what I will find that is no longer in print and I'd never see anywhere else. Some treasure will be tucked in between other books minding their own business when suddenly my eyes will catch the spine that has the familiar and comforting name "Kierkegaard". A favourite author, thinker, philosopher, theologian, writer. I smile and gently pull the small book off the shelf. How long was it sitting there? Was it waiting for me? For a mere £3.00 this unknown title (to me) gets to come home with me.

This time, at the Oxfam Charity Bookshop on St. Giles in Oxford, I found an armful of treasure, this Søren Kierkegaard being one of them. The shop is a stone's throw away from The Eagle and Child pub and just north of the centre of Oxford. I've been in this shop countless times, and I never leave emptyhanded. Downstairs is where I found this treasure. Standing in the same spot I have stood so many times before. Finding different books each time. Each visit filling me with inspiration from these books.

Coming back to Kierkegaard's writing is like coming back to a close friend. One who doesn't let me slip by, getting comfortable in my own pride. A friend who comforts me and then challenges me. I've known him a long time, and have taken comfort in his obedient Christian thinking, he who criticized his culture at the time of being too lackadaisical, making Christianity too easy, watering it down. Kierkegaard recognized that being a true Christian has a cost. It is not easy, and he wrote books about the complexities of being a Christian, and he actually lived it out, making the tougher choices of faithfulness. This little book, however, isn't one of his creative complex debates written in a pseudonym, but rather an edifying discourse that a pastor might present to his congregation. 

This slim work is bringing the attention to remorse, confession, pardon. Seeking to will one thing.

Something has come in between. The separation of sin lies in between. Each day, and day after day something is being placed in between: delay, blockage, interruption, delusion, corruption.

 But life gets in the way. Through distractions and interruptions - oh how Kierkegaard knows us, even from his perspective in the 1840s! Each chapter is a discussion of one of those barriers to willing one thing (great moments, the reward disease, egocentric service of the good, willing out of fear), and then chapters to discuss the price of willing one thing (commitment, loyalty, suffering, listening, living as an "individual", occupation and vocation).

Only the Eternal is constructive. The wisdom of the years is confusing. Only the wisdom of eternity is edifying.

 It all comes down to the individual, as much of his philosophy across all his books stresses this. Kierkegaard wrote a lot about the individual, meaning, the ultimate thing that matters is our one-on-one personal relationship with God and how we portray that in the world with eternal perspective. You can follow the crowd all your years, you can try to hide behind others' thoughts and ideas without forming your own, but in the end God is desiring of you as an individual, no third party is going to speak on your behalf when you come face-to-face with God.

For in the outside world, the crowd is busy making a noise. The one makes a noise because he heads the crowd, the many because they are members of the crowd. But the all-knowing One, who in spite of anyone is able to observe it all, does not desire the crowd. He desires the individual; He will deal only with the individual, quite unconcerned as to whether the individual be high or low station, whether he be distinguished or wretched....Each one shall render account to God as an individual. The King shall render account as an individual; and the most wretched beggar, as an individual. No one may pride himself at being more than an individual, and no one despondently think the he is not an individual, perhaps because here in earth's busyness he had not as much as a name, but was named after a number.

How do we, then, live our lives? Kierkegaard challenges us with questions to probe us - if you throw yourself into the world around you, directing attention outwards, relating yourself as yourself the individual with eternal responsibility? Or do you fold into the crowd, excusing yourself with others, blending in and avoiding any topic that indeed falls into anything about responsibility? Kierkegaard is talking here about eternal responsibility, things that matter, the big questions. Avoiding thinking for yourself by "joining the crowd in its defiance, thinking that you were many" and hiding in the crowd's strength. You are not "many". But in eternity, it will be asked of you whether you may have damaged a good thing, and you, the individual must answer, as eternity strips away the crowd.

Yes, Kierkegaard is challenging. He is complex. I wrote in the margins toward the beginning of the book next to a certain passage - "S.K., always making things more difficult". And it's true. He even wrote about how he makes things more difficult and complex, but he is writing about truth and deep philosophical issues of humanity, and he doesn't shy away from the true cost of being a disciple of Jesus. He was frustrated with Christianity being watered down, to make people feel good and smoothly fit into culture. He saw the danger of this. I think his words feel more important today than they were in his day.