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For Self-Examination Judge For Yourself!
By Søren Kierkegaard, Howard V. Hong, Edna H. Hong PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS
Copyright © 1990 Howard V. Hong
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4008-7436-1
CHAPTER 1
James, Chapter I, v. 22 to the end
INTRODUCTORY NOTE
There is a saying that often comes to my mind, a saying by a man to whom I cannot in a Christian sense be said to owe anything—indeed, he was a pagan—but to whom I nevertheless feel personally very indebted, and who also lived in circumstances that in my opinion quite correspond to our situation today: I mean that simple wise man of antiquity. It is told of him that when he was accused before the people an orator came to him and handed him a carefully composed defense speech, with the request that he use it. The simple wise man accepted it, read it. Thereupon he gave it back to the orator and said: It is a beautiful and well-composed speech (hence he did not give it back because it was a poor, injudicious speech). But, he continued, I have now reached the age of seventy years; thus I do not feel it is fitting for me to use an orator's art. What did he mean? In the first place he meant: My life is too earnest to be able to be served by the prop of an orator's technique. I have ventured my life; even if I am not sentenced to death, I nevertheless have ventured my life, and in the service of the god [Guden] I have done my duty. Then do not let me now at the last moment destroy the impression of myself and of my life with the help of artful orators or oratorical arts. In the second place, he meant: The thoughts, ideas, and concepts that I, known by everyone, ridiculed by your comic poets, regarded as an eccentric, daily attacked by "the anonymous" (it is his word), in the course of twenty years (it was that long) have developed in conversation with the first person to come along in the marketplace—these thoughts are my life, have occupied me early and late. And even if they have occupied no one else, they have occupied me endlessly, and when I have sometimes been able to stand a whole day staring into space (something that has attracted your particular attention), it was these thoughts that occupied me—therefore I also believe that if I intend to say anything at all on the day the verdict is pronounced I can say a few words without the help of artful orators and oratorical arts, and the circumstance that I most likely will be sentenced to death makes no difference. What I say will naturally remain the same and about the same and in the same manner as before, and just as I spoke yesterday with a leather tanner in the marketplace, I believe I can surely say a few words without preparation or the assistance of others. Of course, I am not entirely without preparation either, because I have been preparing myself for twenty years, nor am I entirely without assistance, since I rely on the assistance of the god. But, to repeat, the few words. ... well, I do not deny that they can also become more prolix. If I were to have twenty years again, I would just keep on talking about the same things I have been talking about continually; but artful orators and oratorical arts are not something for me. —O you earnest one! Misjudged, you had to empty the poison goblet; you were not understood. Then you died. For over two thousand years you have been admired, "but I wonder if I have been understood?" —That is just it!
And now with regard to preaching! Should it not be just as earnest! The person who is going to preach ought to live in the Christian thoughts and ideas; they ought to be his daily life. If so—this is the view of Christianity—then you, too, will have eloquence enough and precisely that which is needed when you speak extemporaneously without specific preparation. However, it is a fallacious eloquence if someone, without otherwise occupying himself with, without living in these thoughts, once in a while sits down and laboriously collects such thoughts, perhaps in the field of literature, and then works them into a well-composed discourse, which is then committed to memory and delivered superbly, with respect both to voice and diction and to gestures. No, just as in well-equipped houses one need not go downstairs to fetch water but has it up there on tap, under pressure—one merely turns on the faucet—so also is that person an authentic Christian speaker who, because the essentially Christian is his life, at every moment has eloquence present, immediately available, precisely the true eloquence—yet it goes without saying, of course, that it is not the intention here to show babblers to the place of honor, even if it is ever so certain that they babble without any preparation. Moreover, Scripture says: Do not swear at all. Let what you say be simply yes or no; anything more than this comes from evil. Likewise there is also an art of eloquence that comes from evil if it is made out to be the highest, since it is something lower. The sermon must not contentiously confirm [befæste] the distinction between the gifted and the ungifted; in the unity of the Holy Spirit, it must simply and solely fix [fæste] attention upon acting according to what is said. You simple one, even though you are of all people most limited—if your life expresses the little you have understood, you speak more powerfully than all the eloquence of orators. And you, O woman, even if you are quite speechless in charming silence—if your life expresses what you heard, your eloquence is more powerful, more true, more persuasive than all the art of orators.
So it is. But let us beware of reaching too high, since just because it is true it does not follow that we are capable of doing it. And you, my listener, remember that the higher the religious is taken, the more rigorous it becomes, but it does not necessarily follow that you are able to bear it—perhaps it would even be an offense to you and to your ruin. It may even be that you need this lower form of the religious, need a certain art to be used in its presentation in order to make it more appealing to you. As for the rigorously religious individual, his life is essentially action—and his presentation is searching and spare in a way quite different from the more comfortably composed discourse. My listener, if you are of this mind, then take this and read it for up building. It is not on account of my perfection and not on account of your perfection that the discourse is composed in this way—on the contrary, it is, in the godly sense, an imperfection and a weakness. I confess my weakness, and even to you, my reader, do I not? Then you will also confess yours, not to me—no, that is not required—but to yourself and to God. Ah, we who still call ourselves Christians are from the Christian point of view so pampered, so far from being what Christianity does indeed require of those who want to call themselves Christians, dead to the world, that we hardly ever have any idea of that kind of earnestness; we are as yet unable to do without, to give up the artistic and its mitigation, cannot bear the true impact of actuality—well, then let us at least be honest and admit it. If someone perhaps does not immediately understand what I am saying and why I am saying it, may he be slow to judge, may he take his time, for we shall, to be sure, go further into the subject. But whoever you are, have confidence, yield yourself. There can be no question of my using force, I who of all people am the weakest; but no persuasion or craft or cunning or enticement whatever will be used in order to lead you perhaps so far out that you might regret having yielded yourself (which, however, you really ought not to regret and would not if your faith were stronger). Believe me (I say it to my own shame), I, too, am all too pampered.
The Epistle as written in the book of the Apostle James Chapter 1, verse 22 to the end.
But be doers of the Word, and not only hearers of it, whereby you deceive yourselves. If anyone is a hearer of the Word and not a doer of it, he is like a man who observes his bodily face in a mirror, for he would observe himself and go away and at once forget what he was like. But he who looks into the perfect law of freedom and perseveres has not become a forgetful hearer but a doer of a work; he shall be blessed in his work. If anyone among you thinks he is a worshiper of God but does not hold his tongue in check and deceives his own heart, his worship of God is vain. Pure and undefiled worship before God and the Father is this: to visit the fatherless and widows in their distress and to keep oneself undefiled by the world.
PRAYER
Father in heaven! What is a man that you are mindful of him, a child of man that you are concerned for him—and in every way, in every respect! Truly, in nothing do you leave yourself without witness; and finally you gave him your Word. More you could not do. To force him to use it, to read it, or to listen to it, to force him to act according to it—that you could not wish. Ah, and yet you do more. You are not like a human being. He rarely does anything for nothing, but if he does, he at least does not wish to be put to inconvenience by it. You, however, O God, you give your Word as a gift—that you do, Infinitely Sublime One, and we humans have nothing to give in return. And if you find only some willingness in the single individual, you are promptly at hand and are, first of all, the one who with more than human—indeed, with divine—patience sits and spells out the Word with the single individual so that he may understand it aright; and then you are the one who, again with more than human—indeed, with divine—patience takes him by the hand, as it were, and helps him when he strives to act according to it—you, our Father in heaven!
Times are different, and even though the times are often like a human being—he changes completely but nevertheless remains just as foolish, only in a new pattern—it nevertheless is true that times are different and different times have different requirements.
There was a time when the Gospel, grace, was changed into a new Law, more rigorous with people than the old Law. Everything had become rather tortured, laborious, and unpleasant, almost as if, despite the angels' song at the advent of Christianity, there was no joy anymore either in heaven or on earth. Through petty self-torments, they had made God just as petty—in this way it brings its own punishment! They entered the monastery, they stayed there—yes, it is true it was voluntary and yet it was bondage, because it was not truly voluntary, they had not entirely made up their minds, they were not happy to be there, were not free, and yet they did not have the bold confidence to stop or to leave the monastery and become free. Everything had become works. And just like unhealthy growths on trees, so also were these works corrupted by unhealthy growths, thus were often only hypocrisy, the conceitedness of merit, idleness. The error was precisely there and not so much in the works. Let us not go too far; let us not make a previous age's error an excuse for new error. No, take this unhealthiness and falsity away from the works and let us then retain the works in honesty, in humility, in beneficial activity. The approach to these works should indeed be, for example, like that of a militant youth who, in connection with a dangerous undertaking, voluntarily comes and pleads with his leader, saying: May I not be permitted to come along! If in the same way a person were to say to God: "May I not be permitted to give all I own to the poor—not that this should be something meritorious, no, no, I am deeply and humbly aware that if I am ever saved I will be saved by grace, just as the robber on the cross, but may I not be permitted to do this so that I can work solely for the extension of God's kingdom among my fellow beings"—well, yes, if I am to speak as a Lutheran—then this, despite Satan, the newspapers, the most respected public (for the time of the pope is now past), in spite of all the sensible, ecclesiastical, or secular objections of all clever men and women, then this is well pleasing to God. But this is not the way it was in the age we are discussing.
At that time there appeared a man from God and with faith, Martin Luther; with faith (for truly this required faith) or by faith he established faith in its rights. His life expressed works—let us never forget that—but he said: A person is saved by faith alone. The danger was great. I know of no stronger expression of how great it was in Luther's eyes than that he decided that in order to get things straight: the Apostle James must be shoved aside. Imagine Luther's respect for an apostle—and then to have to dare to do this in order to get faith restored to its rights!
But what happened? There is always a secular mentality that no doubt wants to have the name of being Christian but wants to become Christian as cheaply as possible. This secular mentality became aware of Luther. It listened; for safety's sake it listened once again lest it should have heard wrongly; thereupon it said, "Excellent! This is something for us. Luther says: It depends on faith alone. He himself does not say that his life expresses works, and since he is now dead it is no longer an actuality. So we take his words, his doctrine-and we are free from all works-long live Luther! Wer nicht liebt Weiher, Wein, Gesang / Er wird ein Narr sein Leben lang [Who loves not women, wine, and song / He is a fool his whole life long]. This is the meaning of Luther's life, this man of God who, in keeping with the times, reformed Christianity." Even though not everyone took Luther in vain in such a downright secular way—in every human being there is an inclination either to want to be meritorious when it comes to works or, when faith and grace are to be emphasized, also to want to be free from works as far as possible. Indeed, "man," this rational creation of God, certainly does not let himself be fooled; he is not a peasant coming to market, he has his eyes open. "No, it's one or the other," says man. "If it is to be works—fine, but then I must also ask for the legitimate yield I have coming from my works, so that they are meritorious. If it is to be grace—fine, but then I must also ask to be free from works—otherwise it surely is not grace. If it is to be works and nevertheless grace, that is indeed foolishness." Yes, that is indeed foolishness; that would also be true Lutheranism; that would indeed be Christianity. Christianity's requirement is this: your life should express works as strenuously as possible; then one thing more is required—that you humble yourself and confess: But my being saved is nevertheless grace. The error of the Middle Ages, meritoriousness, was abhorred. But when one scrutinizes the matter more deeply, it is easy to see that people had perhaps an even greater notion that works are meritorious than did the Middle Ages, but they applied grace in such a way that they freed themselves from works. Having abolished works, they could not very well be tempted to regard as something meritorious the works they did not do. Luther wished to take "meritoriousness" away from works and apply them somewhat differently—namely, in the direction of witnessing for the truth; the secular mentality, which understood Luther perfectly, took meritoriousness away altogether—including the works.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from For Self-Examination Judge For Yourself! by Søren Kierkegaard, Howard V. Hong, Edna H. Hong. Copyright © 1990 Howard V. Hong. Excerpted by permission of PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS.
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