Faith, the self, and the neighbour

Kierkegaard’s Ethic:
The Other by Faith

Does standing alone before God separate us from everyone else?

Martin Buber thought Kierkegaard’s faith excluded human relationships. This thesis argues that faith makes responsibility to the neighbour possible.

An interactive guide to Keith E. Dow’s 2009 MA thesis
Dominican University College · Philosophy

Explore the argument ↓
Portrait of Søren Kierkegaard
Søren KierkegaardThe individual before God
Erich Büttner’s 1916 portrait of Martin Buber
Martin BuberThe question of the other

One question. Two accounts of human relationship.

Portrait sources & credits ↗

The opening question · Thesis pp. 1–7

What cuts us off from one another?

Start with Macbeth’s loss of meaning, then follow Buber’s objection and the thesis’s reply.

Henry Fuseli, Lady Macbeth Seizing the Daggers (1812). An illustration of Act II, scene 2, preceding the scene quoted here. Source

1 · Macbeth’s sin

“For, from this instant, there’s nothing serious in mortality; / All is but toys, renown and grace is dead.”

— Shakespeare, Macbeth Act II, Scene 3 (Quoted by Anti-Climacus in SUD, 110; Thesis p. 1)
Read the explanation & original wording

„Von jetzt giebt es nicht Ernstes mehr im Leben; / Alles ist Tand, gestorben Ruhm und Gnade.“

From the instant Macbeth murders the king, life’s seriousness vanishes. As Anti-Climacus observes, 'By sin, that is, by despairing over his sin, he has lost all relation to grace — and also to himself' (SUD, 110). Once the self forfeits its grounding in grace, both self-relation and meaningful human relations ('renown') collapse into mere toys (Thesis p. 1).

01 Chapter I · pp. 8–52

First, ask who is speaking.

A pseudonym has a standpoint. The thesis begins by distinguishing the voices that Buber’s critique brings together.

Kierkegaard’s manuscript of Sygdommen til Døden (1849). Source

Christian ideality

Anti-Climacus

The Sickness Unto Death (1849) & Training in Christianity (1850)

The thesis reads Anti-Climacus as a voice of demanding Christian ideality, distinguished from Kierkegaard’s own claim to be striving.

Higher Pseudonym • Christian Ideality at its Maximum (Thesis p. 12–14)

“Johannes Climacus and Anti-Climacus have several things in common; but the difference is that whereas Johannes Climacus places himself so low that he even says that he himself is not a Christian, one seems to be able to detect in Anti-Climacus that he considers himself to be a Christian on an extraordinarily high level... I would place myself higher than Johannes Climacus, lower than Anti-Climacus.”

— Søren Kierkegaard, Journals and Papers, 2:174 (Thesis p. 13)
Follow this voice through the thesis

As translators Howard and Edna Hong note, 'Anti-' here is a form of the Latin 'ante' (before/above in rank), not 'against' (SUD, xxii; Thesis p. 12). Anti-Climacus stands above Johannes Climacus ('John the Climber') and above Kierkegaard himself—not because Kierkegaard disagrees with his thought, but because Kierkegaard humbled himself as 'one who is striving' whose personal life did not match so lofty an ideal (PVWA, 142; JP 6:181; Thesis p. 13–14).

Role in the argument

Because Kierkegaard explicitly affirms that Anti-Climacus’s 'portrayal of ideality can be absolutely sound, and I bow to it' (JP 2:175; p. 13), the thesis treats Anti-Climacus’s psychological and theological equations on the self, despair, sin, and faith as fully representative of Kierkegaard’s philosophical architecture.

The thesis’s response to its critics

Critics who ignore Anti-Climacus miss his decisive claim that 'as the "I" fell out, so also the "thou" was done away with' (TIC, 214; Thesis p. 77, 152)—proving that losing the authentic self in sin or the crowd simultaneously destroys the human Thou.

Chapter introduction & references

Why, on this reading, do Martin Buber (Eclipse of God, 116) and Emmanuel Levinas ("A propos of 'Kierkegaard vivant'", 114) misread Kierkegaard’s ethic? Because they equate the early pseudonyms directly with Kierkegaard himself (p. 15–16). Following William Booth’s concept of the "implied author" (p. 10), Chapter I maps the exact existential rank of each voice and shows why disengaging from the numerical "crowd" is the prerequisite for ethical responsibility.

The crowd and the individual Thesis pp. 34–50

1. Fractional Responsibility: “The Crowd Has No Hands” (Thesis p. 34–41)

In 'The Individual' (PVWA, 110–115), Kierkegaard affirms that in temporal, worldly matters the crowd may have decisive competency (PVWA, 110 fn.; p. 35–36). Yet ethico-religiously, 'the crowd is untruth' because it reduces personal conscience to a numerical fraction. As Kierkegaard illustrates with Christ’s trial: no single human being in a solitary place would ever have had the insolence to walk up to Christ alone and spit upon Him—only the abstraction of the crowd makes such ethical cowardice possible (PVWA, 113; Thesis p. 40).

“A crowd in its very concept is the untruth, by reason of the fact that it renders the individual completely impenitent and irresponsible, or at least weakens his sense of responsibility by reducing it to a fraction.” — PVWA, 112 (Thesis p. 34)

02 Chapter II · pp. 53–82

How can a self lose itself?

For Anti-Climacus, despair concerns how a self relates to itself and to the power that established it. Choose a state to see the difference.

Explore the relation Choose a state

Unconscious despair: the relation is unacknowledged. The dotted line marks an awareness that is missing, not an absent God.

The line shows the acknowledged relation, not whether God exists.

State 01: Unconscious Despair ('Cloned Christianity')

Spiritlessness & The First Isolation of Egoism

“Surrounded by hordes of men, absorbed in all sorts of secular matters... such a person forgets himself, forgets his name divinely understood, does not dare to believe in himself, finds it too hazardous to be himself and far easier and safer to be like the others, to become a copy, a number, a mass man.”

— Anti-Climacus, The Sickness Unto Death, 33–34 (Thesis p. 33)
Read the account & supporting passages

A human being is a synthesis of the infinite and the finite, the temporal and the eternal, freedom and necessity (SUD, 13; p. 55). Yet considered merely as a synthesis, a human being is still not a self. In 'Christendom,' the mass man 'learns to copy others, how they manage their lives... goes to church every Sunday... the pastor ushers him into eternity for ten rix-dollars — but a self he was not' (SUD, 52; p. 33). Paradoxically, 'to be unaware of being defined as spirit is precisely what despair is' (SUD, 25; p. 65).

Why Despair Proves the Eternal in Humanity

Borrowing from Socrates’ proof of the soul’s immortality (that sickness of the soul does not consume it as bodily sickness consumes the body), Anti-Climacus shows that despair’s inability to destroy the self proves the eternal within human nature: 'If there were nothing eternal in a man, he could not despair' (SUD, 20–21; Thesis p. 64–65).

“...a self he was not and a self he did not become.” (SUD, 52; Thesis p. 33)

Kierkegaard’s manuscript of Sygdommen til Døden (1849). Source

In Kierkegaard’s own hand

The self as a relation

This manuscript of The Sickness Unto Death brings the abstract discussion back to the page. Open the image to look more closely.

Chapter introduction & references

"A human being is spirit. But what is spirit? Spirit is the self. But what is the self? The self is a relation that relates itself to itself..." (SUD, 13; Thesis p. 55). Toggle the four existential states below to see how Anti-Climacus defines the human synthesis, why radical evil (sin before God) is the true isolator that brings the individual outside Hegel’s universal (Sittlichkeit), and how the Formula of Faith gives the self back.

03 Chapter III · pp. 83–136

Giving up. Receiving back.

Infinite resignation gives up the finite. Faith receives it back. The difference matters because the finite includes the people we love.

Rembrandt, Abraham and Isaac (1645). The Met, 29.107.26. H. O. Havemeyer Collection, Bequest of Mrs. H. O. Havemeyer, 1929. Source

Abraham and Isaac

The person who is given back

The thesis reads Fear and Trembling through the difference between renouncing Isaac and receiving him back by faith.

1 ResignationGiving up the finite2 FaithReceiving the finite back
Frygt og Bœven, first-edition title page (1843). Notice the name Johannes de Silentio. Source
Read the two accounts together Choose an aspect

Comparing: The whole contrast. Resignation comes first, followed by faith.

1 · Giving up

Johannes de Silentio (Infinite Resignation)

The Negative Movement of Infinity • Philosophical Self-Reliance (Thesis p. 98–105)

1. Doctrine vs. Actuality

Faithless Christianity: Convinced in thought that 'God is love,' yet for Johannes God’s love is 'incommensurable with the whole of actuality' (FT, 28; p. 99). Surrenders the finite world to gain 'eternal consciousness' (FT, 41; p. 100).

2. Self-Sufficiency

Exhausted Human Strength: 'Whoever has resigned infinitely is self-sufficient' (FT, 37; p. 102). Whenever finitude slips beyond control, he 'starves himself' into resignation—exerting control over the finite precisely by renouncing it (p. 100–101).

3. Despair vs. Joy

Keeping Isaac Only with Pain: Had Johannes been summoned to Moriah, he would have resigned Isaac the instant he mounted the horse—and therefore 'only keeps Isaac with pain' (FT, 29; p. 104).

“By resignation I renounce everything; this movement I make by myself... By my own strength I cannot get the least bit of what belongs to finitude, for I continually use my strength to resign everything.” — FT, 41–42 (Thesis p. 97, 103)

2 · Receiving back

Abraham (The Knight of Faith)

The Positive Movement of Finitude • Receiving Back by Faith (Thesis p. 105–124)

1. Doctrine vs. Actuality

Believing for This Life: Abraham 'believed and believed for this life' (FT, 17; p. 110)—genuine religion 'right in the middle of actual life and weekdays' (JP 2:471; p. 110). Belongs so wholly to the finite world that externally he resembles 'bourgeois philistinism' (FT, 33; p. 111–112).

2. Vulnerability & Dependence

The Mystery of Receiving: Recognizes 'the great mystery that it is far more difficult to receive than to give' (FT, 91; p. 115–116). Gives up his own strength to depend on the miraculous intervention of the Giver ('God himself will provide the lamb,' FT, 102; p. 114).

3. Unhesitating Joy

Receiving Isaac More Joyfully: Needed 'no preparation, no time to collect himself in finitude and its joy' (FT, 30; p. 116). By the double-movement, he received Isaac back more joyfully than the first time (FT, 29; p. 119).

“By faith I do not renounce anything; on the contrary, by faith I receive everything... By faith Abraham did not renounce Isaac, but by faith Abraham received Isaac.” — FT, 41 (Thesis p. 105, 108)

Chapter introduction & references

Buber claims that Kierkegaard’s renunciation of Regina Olsen—"representing woman and the world"—is "the great theme" of his works (BMM, 47, 204; Thesis p. 83), and even accuses Kierkegaard of "contradicting his master" Christ (BMM, 59; p. 125). Chapter III argues from 1843’s Fear and Trembling that renunciation (Infinite Resignation) and Faith are inverse movements. Select an aspect below to compare Johannes de Silentio with Abraham.

04 Chapter IV · pp. 137–155

Where does the neighbour stand?

These three diagrams trace the contrast developed in the thesis. Follow the arrows: each selection changes the route, not just the colour.

Three accounts of relationship Choose a reading

The thesis’s reply: I → God → neighbour. God as middle term returns the self to the other in equality, rather than leaving the other outside.

Arrows indicate the order of relation in this interpretation. They are not a ranking of people.

Works of Love, 44–60, 271, 373 • Thesis p. 141–155, 165–166

The thesis’s account of neighbour love

“The beloved and the friend are the immediate and direct objects of immediate love, the choice of passion and of inclination. And what is the ugly? It is the neighbor, whom one shall love... He is your neighbor on the basis of equality with you before God, but unconditionally every person has this equality and has it unconditionally.” — Works of Love, 373, 60 (Thesis p. 149, 154)

Read the interpretation & references

Topology C: Kierkegaard’s Neighbour Love (God as Middle Term)

For Kierkegaard, 'in love for the neighbor, God is the middle term' (WL, 58; p. 142, 165). By relating first to God in faith and self-denial, preference is dethroned. Only through God as the Third Factor can I love 'the ugly other'—the un-lovable object, the stranger, the enemy (WL, 373; p. 149)—and recognize the neighbour in 'eternal equality before God' (WL, 60; p. 153–154). True dialogue requires distinct 'yes and no' (JP 1:315; p. 151–152), where the neighbour finally appears as 'the first you' (WL, 57; p. 152).

Chapter introduction & references

In Chapter IV, the thesis reverses the critique: why does Martin Buber’s I and Thou fail to secure genuine otherness? Because for Buber, "Every particular Thou is a glimpse through to the eternal Thou" (IT, 75; p. 71, 140), lacking the qualitative distance of being coram Deo. Without God as the constraining Third Factor, human love collapses into preferential self-love ("the other I"). Select a relationship below to explore Works of Love and Appendix B.

How can God be first, second, and third? Appendix B · pp. 165–166
Appendix B Clarifier • Thesis p. 165–166 How God is Simultaneously 1st, 2nd & 3rd
1. First Priority

In teleological rank, love for God "must be chosen first" (JP 2:66; p. 129) so that finite preferential drives are dethroned.

2. Second Term

In relational sequence (I–God–Thou), "God is the middle term" (WL, 58; p. 165), whereas Buber places God third (I–Thou–Eternal Thou).

3. Third Factor

In relation to the two human beings, God enters as the transcendent Third Factor that transforms self-love into eternal equality (p. 135, 165).

Read the passages

Keep the words in view.

Selected quotations with their source and thesis page references. Choose a chapter or search to open the passages.

12 passages across four chapters

Conclusion & Appendix A · pp. 155–164

Beyond the first objection

How does selfishness finally break? In Works of Love (361; Thesis p. 159), Kierkegaard shows that true inward self-deepening humbles the ego upon its own Establishing Power. And once the priority of loving the unseen God is established, God defers directly to the visible human neighbour—opening a rich post-faith dialogue with Emmanuel Levinas and Jacques Derrida.

1. Neighbours & Kierkegaardian Community
Appendix A.a • Thesis p. 161

While Kierkegaard fiercely critiques "the crowd," he tells the "impatient politician" in The Point of View (107; p. 161) that the religious is "the transfigured rendering of that which the politician has thought of in his happiest moment, if so be that he truly loves what it is to be a man." True congregation (Menighed) lies on the far side of the Single Individual, where citizens are ethically bound as neighbours rather than numerically bundled.

“It is only religion that can, with the help of eternity, carry human equality to the utmost limit — the godly, the essential, the non-worldly, the true, the only possible human equality.” — PVWA, 108 (Thesis p. 154–155)
2. Emmanuel Levinas & Divine Deferral
Appendix A.b • Thesis p. 162–164

Drawing on Merold Westphal’s Levinas and Kierkegaard in Dialogue (2008), the thesis shows how Levinas’s asymmetrical obligation to "the stranger, the widow, and the orphan" (Totality and Infinity, 215) fits into Kierkegaard’s post-faith movement. Because "God cannot be an object for man, since God is subject" (JP 2:99; p. 162), God asks nothing for Himself—deferring love directly to the visible human neighbour.

“If you want to love me, then love the people you see; what you do for them, you do for me. God does not ask for anything for himself...” — Works of Love, 160–161 (Thesis p. 163)
3. Jacques Derrida: Tout Autre Est Tout Autre
Appendix A.b • Thesis p. 57, 164

In The Gift of Death (82ff.), Derrida formulates "Tout autre est tout autre" ("every other [one] is every [bit] other"). While a pre-faith collapse of the Absolute Other into the human other risks losing the Third Factor, Kierkegaard’s post-faith account of omnipotence making itself "so light" that creation receives genuine independence (JP 2:62–63) grounds every human spirit as an irreducible, derivative "absolute other" (p. 164).

“To have distinctiveness is to believe in the distinctiveness of everyone else, because distinctiveness is not mine but is God’s gift by which he gives being to me, and he indeed gives to all...” — Works of Love, 271 (Thesis p. 152–153)
About the images Sources, creators & reuse

Historical title pages, manuscripts, portraits, and artworks accompany the argument. Illustrations are visual context, not evidence that Kierkegaard discussed these particular artworks. All image files are hosted on this site.

Søren Kierkegaard (Reproduced in 1923). Royal Library, Denmark (source credit). Public domain. Existing site asset: background removed; resized.

Portrait of Martin Buber (1916). Erich Büttner (1889–1936). Public domain · PD-Art. None. Full image displayed.

Lady Macbeth Seizing the Daggers (1812). Henry Fuseli (1741–1825). Public domain · PD-Art. None. Full image displayed.

Abraham and Isaac (1645). Rembrandt van Rijn (1606–1669). Public domain · The Met Open Access. None. Full image displayed.

Fear and Trembling: first-edition title page (1843). Søren Kierkegaard, as Johannes de Silentio. Public domain · PD-scan. Existing site asset; no new modifications.

Manuscript of The Sickness Unto Death (1849). Søren Kierkegaard. Public domain. Existing site asset; source is a manuscript detail. No new cropping.

Philosophical Fragments: first-edition title page (1844). Søren Kierkegaard, as Johannes Climacus. Public domain · historical title page. Existing site asset; no new modifications.

The thesis

Kierkegaard’s Ethic: the Other by Faith

Keith E. Dow • MA Thesis in Philosophy • Dominican University College, Ottawa, Canada (2009) • 169 pp.

Abstract · Printed page i

In four chapters, this thesis examines the authorship of Søren Kierkegaard and the role of faith in establishing ethical responsibility to the human other. It explores the critique made of Kierkegaard by Martin Buber in his work Between Man and Man, demonstrating that Buber fails to acknowledge the distinctions in Kierkegaard’s texts that enable essential relations to the human other. This thesis primarily draws on four of Kierkegaard’s texts from his early pseudonymous authorship to his later non-pseudonymous works: The Point of View for my Work as an Author, The Sickness Unto Death, Fear and Trembling, and Works of Love. Focusing on the concepts of self, despair, sin, faith, neighbour love and preferential love as articulated by Kierkegaard, this thesis demonstrates that Kierkegaard’s authorship posits a faith-based ethics missed by Buber’s critique, due to Buber’s inability to make necessary distinctions between Kierkegaard’s philosophical movements.

Chapters I & II

  • • Intro & Point of Contention (p. 1–7)
  • • Ch. I: The Pseudonyms & Religious Authorship (p. 8)
  • - Sickness Unto Death & Fear and Trembling (p. 12–20)
  • - Objective/Subjective Truth & Third Factor (p. 23–31)
  • - Christendom & "The Crowd is Untruth" (p. 32–41)
  • - Why Buber? Body Politic vs. Menighed (p. 42–52)
  • • Ch. II: Grounding of the Self in the Absolute Other (p. 53)
  • - Essence of the Self as Positive Third (p. 54–57)
  • - Despair, Pride & The First Isolation (p. 58–66)
  • - Before God: Radical Evil & Sin in FT (p. 67–75)
  • - The Formula of Faith & Given-Back Self (p. 75–82)

Chapters III, IV & Appendices

  • • Ch. III: The Other Given-Back by Faith (p. 83)
  • - Johannes de Silentio, Hegel & Sittlichkeit (p. 90–95)
  • - Double-Movement: Infinite Resignation vs. Faith (p. 96–119)
  • - Logic of Giving Up & Receiving Back (p. 119–124)
  • - Establishing the Telos of Love: God as Criterion (p. 124–136)
  • • Ch. IV: The Ethics of Neighbour Love (p. 137)
  • - Kierkegaard’s 'Critique' of Buber’s Eternal Thou (p. 138–143)
  • - Preferential Love vs. Neighbour Love (p. 143–155)
  • - Loving the Ugly Other & Eternal Equality (p. 148–155)
  • • Appendices A & B: Levinas, Derrida & 1st/2nd/3rd (p. 161–166)