Fear and Trembling

Introduction

This short book appeared in October 1843 under the pseudonym Johannes de silentio and is subtitled a “dialectical lyric”. It opens by retelling the journey of Abraham to Mount Moriah in several versions. The narrator admires Abraham but says he cannot understand him: if the ethical is the universal, Abraham is either a murderer or a “knight of faith” who stands in an absolute relation to God. Three “problemata” test this against Hegel’s ethics, and the knight of faith is contrasted with the “knight of infinite resignation”, who gives up what he loves without believing he will receive it back. The text is central to debates on faith and morality.

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Connections

Criticizes

• Elements of the Philosophy of Right1820 · Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel

Criticized in

• The Myth of Sisyphus1942 · Albert Camus

More works by Søren Kierkegaard

• 1843Either/Or
• 1844The Concept of Anxiety
• 1846Concluding Unscientific Postscript