Protestant Liberalism;Modern Catholicism

A Short Discussion of Kierkegaard's "Fear and Trembling"


In his essay "Fear and Trembling," Kierkegaard presents his ideas of faith and the individual through the story of Abraham, which is told and explained over and over again.  Kierkegaard believes that man has reached his highes level when he is able to make the leap to faith.  Nature, custom, and reason do not lead a man to this stage, and Kierkegaard admits that he himself has not reached it, but is a victim to resignation.  He mentions that there are other stages, such as the aesthetic stage and the ethical stage, but he regards these as immature, since they do not have to deal with the paradox of faith.  For Kierkegaard, truth is subjectivity, and the individual is superior to the universal.

Kierkegaard's essay is enormously repetitious as he makes his point again and again. Examples of this can be found on pages 66 and 80 when he synthesizes his attitude toward faith and the individual:

        Faith is precisely this paradox, that the
        individual as the particular is higher than
        the universal, is justified over against it,
        is not subordinate but superior--yet in such
        a way, be it observed, that it is the particular
        individual who, after he has been subordinated
        as the particular to the universal, now through
        the universal becomes the individual who as the
        particular is superior to the universal, for the
        fact that the individual as the particular stands
        in an absolute relation to the absolute. (p.66)

Or, if a simpler explanation is preferred:

        The paradox of faith is this, that the individual
        is higher than the universal, that the individual
        (to recall a dogmatic distinction now rather
        seldom heard) determines his relation to the
        universal by his relation to the absolute, not his
        relation to the absolute by his relation to the
        universal. (p.80)

The story of Abraham embodies this paradox.  An aesthetic or ethical interpretation of Abraham cannot explain the significance of his greatness or his position as the father of man's faith.  In fact, Abraham is the only "knight of faith" that Kierkegaard can find; for he knows that he is not one, and he says, "I candidly admit that in my practice I have not found any reliable example of the knight of faith." (p.49)  Kierkegaard's faith in the "knight of faith" remains undaunted by this, however.  The agony he imagines for the leap of faith holds an ecstatic fascination for him.

As to the value of his ideas for the religious life of Christians, I do not think that his ideas are able to influence the generally religious population, although I do think that they can be thought-provoking for individuals.  Once problem is his accessibility.  I do not think that all of the church-going public would understand Kierkegaard, due to both the difficulty of the reading; (Kierkegard has an amazing ability to contort syntax); and the fact that most people would not be able to find a place for his thinking within their religious experience. Since the leap of faith cannot be brough about by any conscious effort, a person who strongly believed his premise and felt that he had not and could not arrive at the leap of faith could be led to despair. There are many Christians who believe they have faith, and Kierkegaard's definition of faith as a paradox, and of the agony of faith, could confuse and perhaps disillusion them.  Would there be a practical, constructive use for his theological ideas?  The essay "Fear and Trembling" does not emphasize Christ; instead Abraham seems to be more important in this treatise as a religious leader and the keeper of the faith.

Kierkegard's essay repeats his ideas and his mind follows those ideas and often repeats them.  When Kierkegaard decides that for him, truth is subjectivity; his conception of faith becomes his ultimate truth.

FOOTNOTE: 
Kierkegaard, Soren, "Fear and Trembling and the Sickness Unto Death" (Doubleday & Company, New York) 1955. ("Fear and Trembling" first published 1843). (paperback edition)


Scheiermacher, Ritschl, Harncak and Protestant Liberalism


The Protestant liberal theologians Schleiermacher, Ritschl, and Harnack felt that the dogmatics of Protestant Scholasticism were too concerned with rationalism at the expense of human feeling.  Schleiermacher laid the groundwork for a new theology by incorporating Kantian thought into Christianity; Ritschl took this a bit further with his reaction against Hegel; and Harnack took it all a step further by boiling Christinity down to its true "essence."

Schleiermacher, the "father of modern theology," agrees with Kant's "Critique of Pure Reason" with the exception that he believes that Kant confuses religion with morality.  Schleiermacher believes that religion comes from man's sense of reality and his consciousness of his small part in it.  His concept of God is the feeling of Absolute Dependence that man is conscious of.  Schleiermacher has no place for traditional dogmatics in his theology; because, to the Scholastics, theology is the transcription of what God is doing; and to Schleiermacher, theology is a transcript of human feeling.  The microscopic concerns of the Scholastics are shrugged over by Schleiermacher as he defines Christ as being the epitome of God-consciousness; and Christianity as the transcript of man's experience in Christ.  Schleiermacher puts the emphasis of Christianity on human experience rather than a collection of doctrines.

Ritschl decided that theology should be separate from philosophy.  Religion is not an intellectual response but a value judgement.  Its truth is that of a practical living experience.  Ritschl believes that theology is to be based on historic fact, and that Christianity is God's historical revelation in Christ.  Christ is divine because of what he does for the mankind that has faith in him.  To Ritschl, the Kingdon of God is an ethical society of brotherly love.  Traditional dogma is too concerned with the intellectual response that Ritschl relegates to scientists and philosophers, and is therefore misguided.

Harnack became even more vague and idealistic when he decided that the essence of Christianity is God as the father and men as brothers.  He believes that the Gospel has been corrupted by the adoption of Greek ideas, style, and culture; and that a return to the essence of Christianity is needed.  To Harnack, Scholastic dogma is based upon this distortion.

Schleiermacher, Ritschel, and Harnack all react against the rationalism of Protestant Scholasticism and hit the other extreme of a theology based on subjective human experience.  The main benefit of such a theology is that its flexibility permits it to withstand the pressures of new scientific discoveries and remain intact.  But the pendulum of human thought reaches its extremes and starts back again, and Protestant Liberalism is one of those extremes.  The extreme, and perhaps naive idealism of the liberals made them too unrealistic to last.


Protestant Liberalism and Catholic Modernism


Protestant Liberalism and Catholic Modernism were both reactions against the limited and rigorous doctrine of the Scholastic period.  Both movements were concerned with the loss of status of theology and the problems of adapting it to the modern world.  And both were too idealistic; Protestant Liberalixm in its morality, and Catholic Modernism in its potential for existence within the Catholic Church.

Protestant Liberalism tended to over-simplify Christianity into broad moral tenets and little else,.  The institutional Church itself, with Harnack, became a distortion of the simple original gospel of brotherly and fatherly love.  The Kingdom of God whs interpreted as a kingdom of love and harmony to be worked for on earrh.  Man was assumed to be a basically good creature whose tendency to sin was merely a reflection of his degree of God-consciousness.  This idealistic view of the world may have been popular in intellectual theory, but it proved to be impractical.  The filtering down of the perspective to the pastors and lay-people was not too successful, because the ideas seems to be on the brink of humnitarianism and not religion as it had come to be understood.  The Protestant tendency to clean house by striking to the skeleton can be seen in Protestant Liberalism.

On the other hand, Catholic Modernism was keeping its tradition of maintaining the continuity of the Catholic Church.  However, it overlooked the tradition of papal conservativeness and contentment with the less radical interpretations of church history.  The Modernists were concerned with returning the prestige of the Catholic Church by making its theology acceptable to the modern world.  Protestant Liberalixm was refuted on the grounds of its simplistic views; and the Catholic Church was shown to be the true unfolding of the Gospel by Loisy.  Tyrrell decided that the life of the Church is revelation, and that theology and dogma are inadequate attempts to rationalize this revelation, and because of this they are succeptable to change and development.  Neither premise seems especially radical in view of Protestant Liberalism, yet they were anathema in the traditionally static Roman Catholic Church because they did not allow for the traditional scholastic teachings.  The Pope was able to eradicate these ideas.  The Catholic Modernists had no real chance of acceptance in the Roman Catholic Church in their time.

Although both Protestant Liberalism and Catholic Modernism met the challenge of making Christianity viable in a turbulent modern world,; both can be faulted for their lack of practicality (although in different ways).  Protestant Liberalism had no place in the established churches unless it was very watered-down due to its radical and simplistic nature.  Catholic Modernism had no place in the Catholic Church due to the conservative nature and central authority of that establishment.  This is a major failing of both movements that allows neither the position of claiming victory or preferability over the other.
 

FOOTNOTE:
The essays are based on class notes and a paperback textbook. (Theology, doctrine, and church history).  I'd recommend the current paperback:
Livingston, James C. "Modern Christian Thought, Volume I, The Enlightenment and the Nineteenth Century"" (First Fortress Press Publication--(Augsburg Press), Minneapolis) 2006. (this volume, a 2nd edition, first copyright 1997) (paperback edition)