12/10/21

SOBERING! "Instead of coming [modern man's] help, his milieu forms around him a negative intellectual opposition...which...deceives him in the end by pointing to a brilliant way out of the difficulty--by showing him that the shrewdest thing of all is to do nothing" (4). ( )

I loved the first essay, “the present age”

The present age is a rant on the change of times and the ideas in it matter even more today. Kierkegaard here talks about the loss of passion. loss of passion leading to indolence and the lack of action. Loss of individuality and the rise of mob mentality.

It is an age of advertisement, an age of publicity. Nothing happens but there is instant publicity about it.

The second essay, “the difference between a genius and an apostle” deals with the topic of authority.

The genius is what he is by himself and apostle is what he is by divine authority. The genius has immanent teleology and the apostle has absolute teleology.

Authority is a specific quality that enters from somewhere else and qualitatively asserts itself precisely when the content of the statement or the act is made a matter of indifference aesthetically.

( )

The Present Age is an impressionistic diatribe against various aspects of the "present age" that Kierkegaard finds objectionable. I'm not sure how to read it yet. Overall it feels mostly like a screed, with occasional hints of insight, curious moments of self-contradiction, and a bit too much barely concealed self-aggrandizement for my taste. A hopefully not-too-distorted gloss on the central theme would be: Kierkegaard is concerned to diagnose the social ills presented by the overwhelming modern tendency towards social leveling, while nevertheless (apparently) recognizing the way in which this leveling and the concomitant overemphasis on reflection and lack of enthusiasm somehow prepares the way for a deeper mode of religious life and insight.

I found the second, shorter essay, "On the Difference between a Genius and an Apostle," much more enjoyable. More tightly argued (as much as Kierkegaard may be said to argue anything), it is compact, precise, persuasive. Kierkegaard contends that to present religion (particularly, e.g., the words of the Apostles and Christ) as legitimated by anything other than their God-given authority is to wholly miss their specific nature and bastardize them into sayings that can be evaluated for their aesthetic qualities, their profundity, or even their rationality alongside any other instance of human communication. ( )

If you're gonna read Kierkegaard, don't read this book first. I never had the impression that the book delivers a comprehensive view of any subject in particular. It rather reads as a collection of pet peeves. And I don't think that Kierkegaard's observations pertain specifically to the "present age," which he seems to define as the age after Antiquity. His remarks on "talkativeness" or "the public" have been valid, I think, ever since men were men.
The second essay in the book ("Of the difference between a genius and an apostle") is more focused. ( )