Work · Phenomenology & Hermeneutics
The Ethical Demand
Starting from the trust with which people meet each other, the book shows that in every encounter we hold something of the other’s life in our hands; from this follows a radical, unspoken and one-sided demand to take care of it, which no rule can spell out.
Introduction
Løgstrup published “Den etiske fordring” in Copenhagen in 1956; German (1959) and English (1971; new edition 1997) translations followed. The book begins with the trust with which people normally meet each other and shows that, because of this trust, we always hold something of the other person’s life in our hands. From this follows the ethical demand to take care of the other’s life – radical, silent, one-sided and unfulfillable. Løgstrup develops the idea in dialogue with Christian ethics, Kierkegaard and contemporary philosophy and discusses its relation to social norms and to love. In Denmark it is widely regarded as the central work of twentieth-century Danish ethics.
Connections
Taken up in
- A Reckoning with Kierkegaard1968 · K. E. Løgstrup
More works by K. E. Løgstrup
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