Transcendencja w immanencji: mit zachodniego indywidualizmu
Transcendence in immanence: the myth of Western individualism

Summary/Abstract: In this article, I show that contemporary individualism is strongly rooted in Christian thinking about the person (divine and human). I endeavour to demonstrate the gradual aspiration to the utmost individualisation and separation of the human subject, beginning with the first definitions of the person. I outline the process of self-authorisation, whereby moral and cognitive powers formerly ascribed to God are transferred to the human subject. That process ultimately leads to (divine) transcendence becoming fixed in (human) immanence, and so to the full individualisation of the subject. In this article, I focus in particular on St Thomas Aquinas, generally seen as a precursor of personalism, and on Søren Kierkegaard, as a thinker in whom one can observe almost first-hand the emergence of self-authorisation and its various consequences. I end by looking at individualism and singularity in terms of mythology and the myth of Western culture, yet grounded on real existential foundations.

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