Kierkegaard's Dialectic of Inwardness: A Structural Analysis of the Theory of Stages
344
Kierkegaard's Dialectic of Inwardness: A Structural Analysis of the Theory of Stages
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| ISBN-13: | 9780691639482 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Princeton University Press |
| Publication date: | 04/19/2016 |
| Series: | Princeton Legacy Library , #418 |
| Pages: | 344 |
| Product dimensions: | 7.00(w) x 10.10(h) x 1.00(d) |
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Kierkegaard's Dialectic of Inwardness
A Structural Analysis of the Theory of Stages
By Stephen Northrup Dunning
PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS
Copyright © 1985 Princeton University PressAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-691-07299-9
CHAPTER 1
Training in Dialectics: The Structure of Kierkegaard's Dissertation
In 1841, Kierkegaard submitted and defended a dissertation entitled The Concept of Irony. There is general agreement that this work has a clear Hegelian structure, at least in part one, although debate continues as to whether those elements are intended seriously or ironically. Those who treat them as ironical suggest that The Concept of Irony is really Kierkegaard's first "pseudonymous" work, for it does not, in their judgment, reflect the views of Kierkegaard himself. I choose to begin with The Concept of Irony for another reason. As a text that embodies a clear dialectical structure, it is evidence of Kierkegaard's early talent for writing (whether in earnest or as parody) in a Hegelian manner. Thus The Concept of Irony provides an excellent opportunity to introduce the sort of dialectical analysis that I shall carry out in relation to the pseudonymous literature and the theory of stages.
The term "dialectical," which is justly notorious for its ambiguity, is used in this study in two ways. One, which is familiar to readers of Kierkegaard and existentialist literature, involves the dialectic between the two distinct poles of consciousness in every individual: inwardness, subjectivity, and selfhood are understood in contradistinction to externality, objectivity, and social relations. The other meaning, which is associated more with Hegel, concerns the attempt to discern a holistic or systematic development within consciousness and experience. For Hegel, such an endeavor is mandated by the conviction that there can be no ultimate dichotomy between the inwardness of thought and the externality of being, that subjectivity and objectivity find their "necessary" unity in consciousness. Kierkegaard ardently disputes that belief. Yet a number of his major works demonstrate the same sort of systematic structure that he deplores.
This analysis of dialectical structures does not, of course, exhaust the varieties of dialectic in Kierkegaard's thought. Perhaps the most obvious omission is "objective" dialectics, that is, the analysis of external reality as objectively dialectical. Although this view is normally associated with the historical evolutionism of Hegel and Marx, it is also evident in Kierkegaard's analyses of the paradoxes of such Christian concepts as the incarnation. But Kierkegaard's primary dialectical concern is with the relation of the subject to the object, not with the essential nature of the object as such. It is this dialectic of inwardness — of concepts developing within consciousness — that I shall examine in this study.
Kierkegaard's use of pseudonyms, which he calls a method of indirect communication (and which is frequently called his "existential dialectic"), is another dialectic that I shall in large part ignore. There are no less than four ways in which this dialectic of pseudonymity has been discussed. Most common is the opinion that Kierkegaard himself expresses in a statement appended to Concluding Unscientific Postscipt, namely, that he hides himself behind the pseudonyms in order to free the reader to deal directly with the possibilities presented in the literature. Significantly, a great many scholars take just the opposite tact, analyzing every shred of the pseudonymous works in order to find allusions and insights into Kierkegaard's personal history, hoping thereby to discern a dialectical relation between his life and works. A third way is to seek a dialectic among the various pseudonyms, which leads into the fourth approach, a focus upon the dialectic within the total authorship between the aesthetic and the religious works. These approaches, although no doubt useful in other studies, will not be employed here. Rather, I shall analyze the dialectical themes and structures within each text as it stands and relate them to one another only in terms of the theory of stages.
Although The Concept of Irony does not shed much light on the dialectic of existence in the theory of stages, it is an excellent place to explore the nature of formal dialectical structures. Such structures involve a series of opposed poles, and the way in which those oppositions are related to one another determines the character of the dialectic. When they simply negate one another, the dialectic is one of contradiction, and any sort of relief from the negative relation is denied. Such oppositions appear in various philosophical and theological dualisms, as well as in the bipolarities of structuralist and semiotic analysis.
A second type of dialectic goes beyond mere contradiction but does not really supersede it. Here there is a third moment in which a reciprocal relation between the opposite poles is affirmed, but in such a way as to preclude further development. An example of a dialectic of reciprocity would be contractual relations, or the Do ut des of Roman religion. In commenting on what it means to ask questions, Kierkegaard mentions the limitations of such reciprocal dialectics. Two people may discuss an object together, each granting the legitimacy of the other's opinion, but without attaining true unity about the object in question: "Although this relationship has reciprocity, it contains no moment of unity (neither the immediate nor the higher). Moreover, the true moment of duality is essentially lacking, since the relationship exhausts itself in mere reciprocity" (CI, 73).
Kierkegaard himself is justly famous for advocating a dialectic of paradox. Here a genuine unity is achieved, but one that accentuates rather than supersedes the contradiction between the two poles. The most famous historical example of such a dialectic is doubtless the Chalcedonian claim that Christ is one person in two distinct natures. Of Kierkegaard's pseudonymous works, Fear and Trembling and Philosophical Fragments both discuss and embody a paradoxical dialectic in a particularly clear and consistent manner.
Hegel's dialectic of mediation offers still another possibility, for it conceives the third moment as more than a reciprocal stalemate or a paradoxical unity of two contradictory poles. Mediation is a union in which a third step takes the opposites up into itself as aspects or moments within a new reality. In this process, each pole loses its negative character in relation to the other and is thereby fulfilled in its true nature as positively related to the other. Most important, the new third can now embark upon its own course, for it is a new entity that will in turn find itself in a new contradiction. Thus a dialectic of mediation never stops, never allows any dichotomy to reign supreme; its unities always lead to new, more complex dualities, until the entire process of a particular idea is complete. Whereas repeated paradoxical dialectics can constitute only a series, a dialectic of mediation will have a progressive, systematic character, for it aims at representing the totality of this process.
Although the three moments of a systematic dialectic are best known as thesis, antithesis, and synthesis (terms favored by Fichte and sometimes used by Kierkegaard), I prefer as a technical shorthand the vocabulary of Hegel (also occasionally employed by Kierkegaard). His term for the first moment is an sich, in-itself, by which he means that first encounter with a concept or object in which it is posited by consciousness as an immediate, simple, abstract phenomenon." It is immediate because there has not yet been any reflection about it, simple because there is as yet no awareness of opposition within it or between it and other phenomena, and abstract because it is at first conceived as a thing in-itself. The essential nature of the phenomenon is not adequately revealed in this first moment; it remains merely "implicit," which is in fact another way of translating an sich.
A presupposition of Hegel's dialectic is that nothing can be understood in-itself — everything becomes intelligible only when fully developed. Thus the first moment, in which an object passively appears to (or is posited by) consciousness as immediate, simple, and abstract, must give way to a second moment in which that object is revealed to be an active subject that is mediated, complex, and concrete. This is the "dialectical" moment par excellence, and it, far more than Hegel's notorious third moment, is actually responsible for much of the confusion that surrounds dialectical analysis. The reason for this confusion is that the subjectivity that emerges in the second moment is a self-consciousness that is both discontinuous and continuous with the consciousness of the first moment. The discontinuous relation is already clear in the new focus upon reflective mediation, complexity, and so forth. The continuity, which is sometimes exploited but more often overlooked in actual dialectical analyses, lies in the fact that the new self-consciousness itself takes responsibility for the inadequacy of the initial consciousness. In short, the moment of self-consciousness is the realization by consciousness that it, and not some external reality, determined that its object is merely immediate, simple, and abstract. The important shift here is that consciousness now has itself for its object, which is precisely the meaning of "self-consciousness." As self-consciousness, the object now appears as actively für sich, for-itself or explicit, and therefore negates the passively in-itself or implicit nature of the first moment.
The almost mystical heart of Hegel's dialectic appears in the third moment, in which there is a "negation of the negation." His term for this, Aufhebung, has no equivalent in English. Translators have used "abrogation," "annulment," "overcoming," "sublation," "transformation," "sublimation," "supersession," "reconciliation," "culmination," and so on. The difficulty lies in the fact that Aufhebung can mean either to perish or to preserve — and Hegel tries to make it mean both perish and preserve at the same time. For him, the truth of the third moment lies in its ability to take up the truth of both of the previous two moments into itself and thereby overcome their previously negative relation to one another. Thus the negation is negated, and the tension between the first two moments is internalized within the third as a distinction that is no longer a contradiction. This is called an und für sich, in-and-for-itself, and it alone, in Hegel's view, deserves to be seen as the truth of the phenomenon.
Other ways of characterizing this in-and-for-itself moment may help to clarify its meaning. As the Aufhebung of the immediate and the mediated, it is a mediated immediacy. Since the first moment is universal and abstract and the second is particular and concrete, their sublation appears as a concrete universal, as an "individual" in the technical Hegelian sense of that which is both universal and particular. When the philosophical issue of the one and the many is in view, the development is from unity to manifold to unity-in-difference. If the accent is on the development of consciousness in relation to a particular concept, that concept is first posited as theoretically or passively "given," then developed as an active, autonomous self-consciousness, and ultimately emerges as an active self-consciousness that is also aware of its own passive givenness. Such a unity of consciousness and self-consciousness can be called the "absolute" consciousness of reason, using "absolute" in Hegel's sense to designate that which embraces otherness or contradiction within itself.
This pattern then repeats itself, and, were it merely a sterile repetition of the pattern for its own sake, it would certainly be a tiresome parade. But it is much more. The dialectical structure of a Hegelian text is not simply the monotonous repetition of triads; it is the systematic development of an idea from a totally in-itself condition to a completed in-and-for-itself state, and each of the three moments includes within itself a further dialectical development according to the same pattern. Thus there are moments within moments, and the fascination of Hegelian dialectics lies in the potential such a system has for expressing complex relations among conceptual positions. For example, within the for-itself moment one will encounter another for-itself moment, and the pitch of negativity represented by that moment can be very intense indeed. This systematic architectonic is frequently criticized for a rigidity that it in fact rarely has in Hegel's own works. Indeed, the opposite complaint, that Hegel is loose almost to the point of arbitrariness with his systematic structure, would be a good deal more justified.
It is obviously confusing to use the term "moment" for each of the many possible levels of such a dialectical structure. Although Hegel does so, and Kierkegaard follows his example both with "moment" and with 'stage," I will do so only in direct quotations. I also wish to avoid the awkwardness of "sub-moments" or "sub-stages." Such devices are fine when used sparingly or in a short essay, but could create much confusion in a work such as this, where so much of the analysis involves working out the various dialectical levels and moments. Therefore I shall adhere to the following (admittedly artificial) distinctions: the highest level of analysis deals with stages, for that is how Kierkegaard's theory is generally known. Within each stage, the next level of analysis is treated as dialectical movements. In the case of texts that do not deal with the stages, the analysis begins at the level of movements. Within each movement, I identify dialectical moments. It is unfortunate to have to confine this characteristically dialectical term to one level, for every in-itself is of course a "moment" in relation to the subsequent for-itself. But I see no way to maintain that flexibility without constantly risking confusion. When a further dialectical development is present within a moment, I characterize it as consisting of phases. On those rare occasions where the triadic pattern reappears at a still lower level, I speak of dialectical points. The structures I shall analyze, therefore, have the diachronic character of progressive triads generally conforming to the pattern of in-itself, for-itself, and in-and-for-itself, and the synchronic character of multiple levels: stages, movements, moments, phases, and points.
This discussion of dialectical structure provides an introduction to the analysis of The Concept of Irony. Although Kierkegaard's dissertation is not by any means his most satisfying text in systematic terms, a careful look at its structure shows that the work possesses a coherence and development that has, to a great extent, eluded previous interpretations.
A. Abstract Subjectivity
The Concept of Irony is divided into two parts, the first of which deals with "The Standpoint of Socrates Conceived as Irony." Here the origin of irony in the life and thought of Socrates is argued. The three chapters in part one bear titles reminiscent of Kant's dialectic of the categories of modality: the conception made possible, the conception made actual, and the conception made necessary.
"The conception made possible" manifests an internal triadic structure that is not found in the other two chapters. It deals with the representations of Socrates in works by Xenophon, Plato, and Aristophanes. Kierkegaard justifies treating Aristophanes last rather than first (The Clouds was written twenty years before Socrates' death, whereas Xenophon and Plato were both students of the master and wrote about him in retrospect) by appeal to their differing relations "to the idea (the plain historical — the ideal — the comical)" (CI, 182n). This means that he considers Aristophanes' comical portrayal of Socrates to be the most adequate of the three in relation to the idea of irony. A closer look at the text will show how this is the case.
Like all commentators, Kierkegaard criticizes the superficiality and inaccuracy of Xenophon's understanding of Socrates. He faults him for "cutting away all that was dangerous in Socrates" (CI, 54) and portraying him as a thinker totally committed to the pragmatic and the useful. The dialectic in Xenophon is one of commensurability rather than irony (in which the external expression is incommensurable with the inner meaning). In "Xenophon's peepshow," Socrates appears as a Sophist rather than an ironist (CI, 63-64).
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Kierkegaard's Dialectic of Inwardness by Stephen Northrup Dunning. Copyright © 1985 Princeton University Press. Excerpted by permission of PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS.
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Table of Contents
- FrontMatter, pg. i
- Contents, pg. vii
- Charts, pg. ix
- Preface, pg. xi
- Acknowledgments, pg. xiii
- Note on Texts, pg. xiv
- Introduction, pg. 1
- ONE. Training in Dialectics: The Structure of Kierkegaard's Dissertation, pg. 6
- TWO. The Dialectic of Aesthetic Contradiction, pg. 32
- THREE. The Ethical as a Stage, pg. 74
- FOUR. Approaches to the Religious Stage, pg. 105
- FIVE. Varieties of Religious Dialectic, pg. 141
- SIX. The Dialectic of Religious Inwardness, pg. 181
- SEVEN. The Dialectical Structure of Consciousness: The Anti-Climacus Writings, pg. 214
- Conclusion, pg. 242
- Notes, pg. 253
- Works Cited, pg. 297
- Index, pg. 307