Faith in Fear and Trembling

Description

According to Kierkegaard’s claim in Fear and Trembling, Abraham is either lost or unable to be mediated or he is then a knight of faith. He also stated that Abraham has stepped outside of the universal into the absurd, obliterating any chance of him being fully comprehended. True faith, as stated by Kierkegaard, is linked to the Knight of infinite resignation and the Knight of faith. True faith, he claims, can only be gained through a double movement of abandoning rationality or logic while believing one can understand logically (“Fear and trembling,” n.d.). In this paper, I’ll examine this claim and illustrate why Kierkegaard’s analogy is a good metaphor for the double movement that is required in the quest for faith.

To begin with, the Knight of Faith is thought to be someone who believes in the absurd. He is, after all, the knight who is able to believe in the things that are paradoxical. Furthermore, Kierkegaard’s knight of faith concept centered on a person’s ability to set aside human reason in order to pursue the divine. The two knights described by Kierkegaard are good analogies for the steps a person must go through in order to take a meaningful leap of faith (“Fear and trembling,” n.d.). However, Kierkegaard’s claim is not a false dilemma because, in order to classify Abraham’s story as an action of faith, the circumstance must be viewed as a teleological suspension of the ethical. This is due to Abraham’s understanding that killing Isaac is unethical. Abraham, on the other hand, chooses to disregard the ethical. Abraham proves his confidence in God by prioritizing religious issues over ethical concerns. According to Kierkegaard’s claim, Abraham is never a tragic hero in any sense (“Fear and trembling,” n.d.). From my own point of view, this is possible based on the definition of a tragic hero.