Critique of the Official Christianity in Late Writings of Søren Kierkegaard Cover Image

Krytyka oficjalnego chrześcijaństwa w późnych pismach Sørena Kierkegaarda
Critique of the Official Christianity in Late Writings of Søren Kierkegaard

Author(s): Maksymilian Roszyk
Subject(s): Philosophy, History of Philosophy, Special Branches of Philosophy, 19th Century Philosophy, Philosophy of Religion
Published by: Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL & Katolicki Uniwersytet Lubelski Jana Pawła II
Keywords: Kierkegaard; Christianity; critique of Christianity

Summary/Abstract: The paper aims at presenting a synthetic reconstruction of Kierkegaard’s late critique of what he called “official Christianity,” that is that which in the world counts as Christianity but which, according to Kierkegaard, has nothing to do with real Christianity. The paper begins with a short presentation of what according to Kierkegaard the essence of real Christianity is, with special emphasis on his idea of imitating Christ. Then his main reproaches follow: (1) leading a pagan life and calling it Christian, (2) rejection of imitation of Christ and putting some verbal activities instead, and (3) rejection of imitation of Christ and worshiping him instead. Those three points are supplemented by Kierkegaardian (4) critique of clergy. In the final section it is argued that Kierkegaard’s critique is universal in scope, i.e. it concerns all major Christian denominations.

  • Issue Year: 67/2019
  • Issue No: 2
  • Page Range: 77-101
  • Page Count: 26
  • Language: Polish