The Examined Life

Recently I helped edit a paper my daughter Ariella wrote about the philosopher Soren Kierkegaard. She is enrolled in a challenging program in Visual and Critical Studies at the Art Institute of Chicago. In an era of declining standards (it seems that possessing a diploma is more important than having the diploma mean something), it is refreshing to see that some students are still required to study the works of those who have shaped our society and our thinking. Students enrolled in the program are required to study philosophy. The text of the paper follows this entry,

Kierkegaard dealt much with the dichotomy between faith and reason, hoping perhaps to establish that they can exist united. Interesting that his very name contains the Scandinavian equivalent for "church". How many of us stop to ponder why we believe, and think, the way we do?

Thanks for reading!

Ariella Scott's essay:

Soren Kierkegaard claims that faith is a paradox and that faith begins where thinking leaves off. This approach to the concept of faith would appear to be false, though, because Kierkegaard is not using a proper definition of faith to make his claims and sees faith as an irrational human passion. However, faith is instead a mechanism in finding inner truth as it is what lies under human projection.

Thinking is a natural human instinct. It is an inevitable action contrived to explain why things happen the way they do, and can be viewed as a component of the dialectic process espoused by Hegel. If this is the case, it would seem, then, that when discussing truth, thinking should not be apparent. Thinking is a distraction from truth. Truth does not need questions or answers because truth is acceptance and stands apparent. Kierkegaard immediately seems not to understand this in his explanation of Abraham following God’s orders to kill his son Isaac. This is because Kierkegaard perhaps does not realize how incomprehensible faith actually is. If Kierkegaard were in communication with the Divine--and the Divine meaning God--then he should logically acquire faith. Anything else would not be an option. After all, it would be a message from God, and acceptance would be the only action conceivable.

Kierkegaard is correct when he implies that this tale has most certainly been misunderstood and driven by faith. The unfortunate thing is that Kierkegaard appears to have no proper recollection of what faith is. To him, faith is a telos or “end” to itself. Instead, faith is neither. Faith simply exists. It is not burdened with queries to prove its nonexistence because faith does not need this. Kierkegaard and most philosophers are living in a physical world of projection. Projections are not real. The only real thing in the world is love and love is faith because neither ask “why?” and this is because neither needs to ask this question. They are pure truth in their divine existence.

In speaking of love as faith it would be appropriate to include an example. The Indian spiritual teacher Osho discusses this in his book Being in Love. In this book he explains how love is not jealous or malicious. Love is infinite. If love is jealous or malicious then it is not real love. It is instead a projection of what love should be. According to Osho, love is real and is truth.

The entire world is made up of projections. Everything we think and feel is projection. Only love is real and love is exactly what faith is. This is exactly why Kierkegaard is wrong in his claim that faith is a paradox. He does not realize that he is deciding what faith is from his own projections so he can make his argument at all. Nothing he is saying is real. The only honest claim he ever could make (and he does) is that faith is irrational and inconceivable. Of course faith is irrational. Anything that drives a human to not think and instead put his/her intuition on the line is of course irrational, but surely if someone is in the presence of God and God tells them to do anything, then he/she would do it. If God is talking to you then you don’t even need to acknowledge faith because the truth is there in front of you. There is no need or desire to explain anything at all because one would know. If a person knows something then it is bonded into their existence. Abraham did not think because he did not need to.

Old-Fashioned Learning?

Today many (but not all) educators disdain the concepts of rote learning and memorization, often proclaiming a greater validity for "critical thinking" and learning how to take advantage of "resources" to access factual knowledge when it is needed. But the result of such de-emphasis of learning facts, dates and literary passages can be graduates who have only a vague awareness of history, spelling, grammar and great works of art.

Virtually no one can complete an education without learning and memorizing a vast array of facts, particularly in the various professions which require a broad factual knowledge, such as medicine and law. Yet it can be argued that we all are learning fewer facts than we used to. For example, how many Americans even realize that Canada, our closest neighbor, is divided into provinces, not states? How many great poets could each of us name--let alone quote? In other words, we are experiencing a deficit of cultural literacy.

Recently I was shocked to learn that it is possible at countless colleges and universities to obtain a degree in English literature without ever taking a course in Shakespeare. Certainly English majors will study many great writers during their academic careers, but they are being denied the insight and sheer joy of becoming acquainted with one of the greatest geniuses of history. This is a tragedy.

We are denying ourselves the stimulation of getting to know the great artists, composers, philosophers and literary giants who illumined the lives of our ancestors. And increasingly, we are denying ourselves a grasp of such universal fundamentals as the basic principles of mathematics and language. Surely our lives are worth more. Is it time to reflect more deeply on the curriculums of our educational institutions?

Thanks for reading,
Gary