KIERKEGAARD’S HERMENEUTIC

Rebecca Skaggs
Patten University

Søren Kierkegaard has been analyzed and written about as a

philosopher, theologian, preacher, and poet, but until recently, few

have looked at him as an interpreter of scripture. This study proposes

that, although he does not present a philosophical theory of

hermeneutics, Kierkegaard, nevertheless, uses a clear hermeneutic in

his treatment of scripture. In contrast to some scholars who identify

him with the poststructuralists, there is evidence that he, in fact, has

contributed strongly to both biblical and philosophical hermeneutics

by influencing scholars such as Gadamer, Heidegger, Bultmann, and

Barth.

The most extensive study of Kierkegaard, in the context of

hermeneutic theory, is that of Jolita Pons, Stealing a Gift:

Kierkegaard’s Pseudonyms and the Bible. Pons, as a starting point,

sets Kierkegaard within hermeneutic theory by analyzing his biblical

quotes.1 She shows Kierkegaard’s contribution of ‘existential

hermeneutics’, which helped to formulate the mainstream

hermeneutics of the 20th century. Although she notes that her study is

not comprehensive, her intention at least to some extent succeeds in

‘filling the gap’ of locating Kierkegaard within hermeneutic theory.2

1
 One of the earliest systematic studies of Kierkegaard’s use of

scripture is Louis Joseph Rosas’, The Function of Scripture in the

Thought of Søren Kierkegaard, a dissertation presented to the

Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, in 1988, and later published

by Broadman and Holman, 1994.3 He carefully analyzes the works of

Kierkegaard and shows that the different pseudonyms reflect different

hermeneutic approaches. Rosas does not, however, consider

Kierkegaard’s hermeneutics in light of modern hermeneutic theory.

Timothy Polk has done a particularly insightful study of

Kierkegaard’s method of reading the scripture within the context of

‘canon’ (The Biblical Kierkegaard: Reading by the Rule of Faith),4

locating the ‘epitome of Kierkegaard’s hermeneutics’ in the Works of

Love. He further explores key elements of subjectivity in the Edifying

Discourses.

Janet Forsythe Fishburn has done a study, ‘Søren Kierkegaard,

Exegete’, but she limits her study by analyzing his use of scripture as

reflecting his own life struggles.5 This perspective is interesting but

fails to take into account the complex issues which Kierkegaard

addresses and the methods he used. Other studies6 show evidence

that Kierkegaard was a critical and competent exegete.

Paul Minear and Paul Morimoto, as early as 1953, in their

introduction to the index of Kierkegaard’s use of scripture references

call him a ‘peculiarly gifted interpreter of the Bible’, and predict that

2
coming generations will increasingly reckon with him as an expositor

of scripture. Minear and Morimoto indicate the possible reason that

biblical scholarship has been apathetic in including him among

biblical critics and expositors, as the ‘existential outlook which

pervades Søren Kierkegaard’s thinking. As in the case of all truth,

what is true in the Bible becomes true for one only when it is

embodied in my action.’7

I suggest that Kierkegaard’s concept of ‘repetition’ is the key to

understanding his hermeneutic; hence, it is relevant to explain it

briefly here. Although the entire book is entitled Repetition, he gives

detailed descriptions of this concept in four main sections: pp. 131-33,

148-9, 184-7, and 300-20. The following is a summary of this concept

of repetition.

In order even to begin to approach what Kierkegaard means by

‘repetition’, we must understand that he does not mean its generally

accepted definition – the repeating of an action. In fact, his little text

begins with the story of a young man’s failed attempt to repeat an

experience. As the reader proceeds, it emerges that Kierkegaard is

actually proposing a new category for existence, which he calls

‘repetition’.8 This is in opposition to the Greek ‘recollection’ and

Hegel’s ‘mediation’. It is based on Aristotle’s explanation of kinesis as

the transition from possibility to actuality.9 Kierkegaard explains that

Aristotle was ‘not speaking about logical possibility but that of

3
freedom, and therefore he properly posits movement.’10 Whereas the

Greek recollection was a backward look, Kierkegaard sees repetition

as a forward motion, a development.11 In fact, ‘repetition and

recollection are the same movement, except in opposite directions for

what is recollected has been, is repeated backwards, whereas genuine

repetition is recollected forward.’12 McCarthy has undertaken to

explore this multifaceted concept and insightfully notes that the book

itself is written in a repetitive style, with themes recurring as they

develop through the text. Some of the themes ‘repeat’ those from

other works that Kierkegaard wrote during this same period.13

McCarthy concludes that the term is certainly complex and confusing.

Although ‘repetition’ remains perplexing, it is fairly clear that the final

meaning of the term as the ‘reestablishment of the prior state’ is

stated forthrightly (Repetition, p. 144).14

In any case, for Kierkegaard, repetition is a religious category.

Indeed, in its highest sense, it is found in the Christian conception of

time: ‘the moment is that ambiguity in which time and eternity touch

each other and with this the concept of temporality is posited,

whereby time constantly intersects eternity and eternity constantly

pervades time.’15 McCarthy explains that this sense of ‘repetition’

includes the restoration of oneself, ‘most perfectly in a religious sense

and therefore in eternity, where all Christian concepts of salvation are

fulfilled’.16

4
 John Caputo explains that for Kierkegaard the Christian eternity

has the futural meaning of Heidegger’s ‘zu-kommen’, Zukunft. It looks

forward, means to produce something, ‘every moment is literally

momentous’, an occasion for choice, whereas in metaphysics ‘time

and motion are an imperfection, an imitation.’17

One must ponder the question, why does Kierkegaard choose to use

this puzzling term in such a way that the reader must constantly

consciously and deliberately strive to ‘correct’ the usual meaning of

the word in order to grasp his meaning? Is he purposely attempting to

mislead or confuse the reader, or is he in fact brilliantly encouraging

(if not forcing) us to dig deeper and to work harder to ascertain his

meaning? In fact, perhaps it is Kierkegaard’s way of engaging us in

‘repetition’ itself, that a mere reading of the text is not enough; indeed

it is necessary to actively struggle with the text. After all, it is not a

simple conclusion Kierkegaard is after, but a process he wants us to

experience, a movement which challenges the reader to a transformed

existence. Again, as McCarthy insightfully puts it, ‘repetition points

beyond itself…it is the movement, the struggle that is important for

Kierkegaard, not the achievement of any certain end’.18

Hence, Kierkegaard uses a term which at first seems to be

familiar but as readers seek to grasp his meaning, they are drawn into

the very movement he is trying to articulate – the engagement with

the text which results in existential transformation. One is reminded

5
of Fichte’s concept that we need to be ‘awakened’ by an obstacle to

our intended goal in order to summon the effort required to reach it.

This is the challenge presented to faith by the scriptures for

Kierkegaard: the reader is challenged to move forward in existence to

new possibilities. Indeed, according to him, the readers have not

understood the scriptures at all unless they have appropriated the

text. Caputo shows that whereas hermeneutics in the early sense

meant searching into the past, Kierkegaard’s ‘repetition’ enables the

individual to press forward, not toward something which is

discontinuous with the past, but ‘into the being which he himself is.

By repetition, the individual becomes himself, circling back on the

being which he has been all along’.19 McCarthy suggests that it has to

do with relationship:

True repetition is a desire for a getting back of the Other, restoration of God-

relationship. It is desire for the transcendent Other but, paradoxically, desire for

restoration of a relationship that one cannot recollect from actuality.20

This concept of repetition, then, is the key to Kierkegaard’s

hermeneutic: the meaning of scripture is grasped when the reader

allows the text to challenge his existence. It is this ontological

perspective which underlies the opposition between recollection and

repetition and provides Kierkegaard’s hermeneutic. 21 He, then, does

not expound mere principles of exegesis nor does he explore a

6
hermeneutical theory of interpretation. He suggests a mode of being,

necessary for the understanding of scripture.

With this concept of repetition in mind, we must look further at

what Kierkegaard says about the interpretation of scripture. In

perhaps the clearest passage, Kierkegaard explains the figure of the

mirror in terms of biblical research, the distinction between ‘reading

and reading’: the difference of translating and working on a text with

lexicons and commentaries from that of reading a text for the

meaning it gives ‘to me’. Kierkegaard makes it clear that he is not

saying that translation, and the like, is wrong or unnecessary, but that

it should be viewed as preliminary to the real reading.22 He cites the

example of a love letter that has to be translated first; only after the

translation de we sit down to actually ‘read’ the letter. He says, ‘He

[the one receiving the love letter] considers all this learned

preliminary work, if you want to call it that, as necessary in order that

he might get to reading his beloved’s letter.’23 Kierkegaard relates this

example to God’s word:

Think now of God’s word. When you read God’s

word learnedly –

we do not disparage learning, no far from it – but be

sure to

remember that when you read God’s word learnedly

with a

dictionary, etc., you are not reading God’s word. If

you are a scholar,

7
 take care in all this learned reading (which is not
reading God’s word)

that you do not ultimately forget to read God’s

word.24

So, for Kierkegaard, appropriation is the important thing in

reading a text, to allow it to call our self into question, disclosing new

possibilities. Kierkegaard (as Heidegger would later) maintains that

understanding is not mere rational comprehension of the structure of

the text; rather, it is a hearing of the questions asked by the text and

the extension of our own world of existence by the realization of our

own possibilities.

Perhaps Kierkegaard actually anticipated Gadamer’s notion of

hermeneutics; that is, that readers must allow the language of the text

to work through them, not vice versa. In fact, Kierkegaard says that

one should begin by meditating on scripture alone; one should allow it

to speak to oneself, call one’s existence into question.25. From this

perspective, neither the author nor the intention of the author is

important (as it is for Schleiermacher).26 Furthermore, the grammar

of the text is only the means by which the meaning is construed; if the

grammar only is analyzed, the text has not been ‘read’.

To some extent, this notion is echoed by Paul Ricoeur’s critique

of the structuralists – that discourse should not be reduced to

structure; that structure is only used by discourse to convey the

meaning.27 Ricouer discusses in greater detail the sentence and its

8
relation to discourse,28 but perhaps the core of the idea reflects

Kierkegaard’s distinction between one kind of reading a text and

another kind of reading of it, that the grammar of a text merely

enables the meaning of the text to be disclosed to the reader.

Kierkegaard, however, is not advocating deconstruction; the point is

that the text, per se, for the reader, must never take precedence over

the meaning.

Kierkegaard includes the notion of God in his hermeneutic, thus

this is not applicable to other texts without some modification. He

explains that, although the interpretation of scripture is for the

purpose of rightly understanding the text, it is all too often used as a

means of defense against letting God’s word get power over us – that

is, looking at the mirror rather than in it.29 As Arbaugh puts it, for

Kierkegaard, ‘what one must seek to behold in the mirror is what

God’s way is and whether one is walking in that way.’30 This is

somewhat different from those who succeed Kierkegaard:

Schleiermacher sees the author through the text; Dilthey sees the text

as disclosing a worldview; Heidegger sees the text as opening new

possibilities for the reader. Gadamer with his kerygmatic model comes

the closest to reflecting Kierkegaard, when he says that the text

discloses new possibilities for the existence of the reader, but these

new possibilities are in relation to the reader before God. In other

words, the text mediates between the reader and God.31 This

9
challenge, when accepted, transforms the reader.32 This is the

hermeneutic of ‘repetition’.

The focus on the self-emphasized by Kierkegaard seems at first

to be encouraging arbitrariness and subjectivity, but actually he was

one of the first to recognize and describe the problem of

presuppositions, i.e., the ‘world’ which the interpreter brings to the

text whether he is a believer or a skeptic. Dilthey and the exponents

of the ‘new hermeneutic’ (Bultmann, Ebeling, and Fuchs) explain and

describe this more fully. Since the interpreters cannot approach a text

without presuppositions, it is important for them to be aware of what

they are and consciously allow themselves to be called into question

by the text. Only in this way are interpreters able to enter the ‘world’

of the author and then to modify their own ‘world’. Kierkegaard

distrusted the ‘objective’ scholar because he observed that to say one

is objective is to be self-deceived. As Minear and Morimoto explain:

By his careful, objective exposition, such an

interpreter (the neutral

objective scholar), however orthodox or skeptical,

reveals his unfaith,

his inner unreadiness to stand where the man of

faith stood, i.e., to

stand alone before God.33

Kierkegaard does not mean that we should approach scripture

with bias; he does see the importance of impartiality. Hong and Hong

explain it like this:

10
 Kierkegaard thinks that anyone who reads the New
Testament

impartially will agree with his conception, but one is

hindered by the

numerous interpretations and commentaries which

usually shade off

the clear message of the New Testament. We have,

he says, ‘locked

up the New Testament with the help of scientific

scholarship.’34

Hence, Kierkegaard avoids the problem of subjectivity in

hermeneutics by assuming an objective text, that the text has a

meaning in itself which can be analyzed in terms of structure and

grammar. The text, however, can only be understood in its

appropriation by the reader, by ‘repetition’. Kierkegaard’s idea here

seems to be similar to that developed by Paul Ricoeur in the

conclusion of Interpretation Theory (pp. 89-95). Ricoeur’s concept is

more developed, but his notion of the dialectic between explanation

and understanding reflects Kierkegaard. Ricouer explains that the

‘main presupposition concerning the objectivity of meaning in

general’, that ‘the semantic autonomy of written discourse and the

self-contained existence of the literary work are ultimately grounded

in the objectivity of meaning of oral discourse itself’ and finally that in

this dialectic between explanation and understanding ‘the existential

concept of distanciation receives an epistemological development. The

11
text…objectified and dehistoricized…becomes the necessary

mediation between writer and reader.’ 35

According to Ricouer, then, it is dialectic between explanation

and understanding which enhances the concept of appropriation.

Indeed, it is appropriation which fulfills the ultimate goal of

hermeneutics to make something ‘foreign’ our own. Ricouer explains,

‘Interpretation in its last stage wants to equalize, to render

contemporaneous, to assimilate in the sense of making similar. This

goal is achieved insofar as interpretation actualizes the meaning of

the text for the present reader.’36 This concept of appropriation,

however, needs a ‘critical counterpart’, an epistemological

complement, without which appropriation risks being misconceived.

This counterpart, according to Ricouer, is ‘the project of a world’; the

text opens up a world in front of it. Hence, it is not the reader who

subjectively appropriates the text; rather, ‘the reader is enlarged in

his capacity of self-projection by receiving a new mode of being from

the text itself.’37 Hence, only the interpretation following the

‘injunction of the text’ is able to initiate a self-understanding.38

Ricouer, then, attempts to resolve the problem of subjectivity by

limiting the disclosure of the world to the text itself, rather than the

individual appropriation of the reader. According to Ricoeur, then, the

polyvalence of the text is limited by the text itself, that is, by the

injunction of the text. The reader is then enriched by receiving a new

12
mode of being from the text itself. Ricouer does not take into account,

however, that different texts open up different worlds, e.g., the world

of Hitler’s Mein Kampf would be drastically different from that of

scripture. Habermas wisely calls for a critique beyond the text and its

appropriation.

Kierkegaard’s idea is somewhat different from Ricoeur’s in that

the text is limited by God himself. In the Journals (e.g., #214, 216)

Kierkegaard states clearly that if the reader correctly reads scripture,

that is, before God, that God ‘will keep me from being led into error

through my reading.’ Kierkegaard is not advocating an individualistic

appropriation; rather he assumes a fixed text which can be easily

understood.39 He also assumes that the reader will distinguish

between the different styles in the Bible, e.g., poetry, figurative

language, parables, in order that, for instance, someone would not

sacrifice his son in following Abraham’s example. Neither does

Kierkegaard see the text as polyvalent, with each interpretation as

valid as another. The text is limited before God but it is appropriated

individually as it opens new possibilities to the existence of each

reader.

Kierkegaard, himself, at times does very careful and precise

analyses of words, phrases, or even historical material (cf., e.g.,

Works of Love, pp. 199-200f, for a discussion of the meaning of special

words). Kierkegaard’s point is that this analysis should never stand in

13
the way, nor take the place of, what the text is saying ‘to me’. It is only

the first step of interpretation. Caputo looks at Kierkegaard’s

subjectivity in terms of repetition as discussed above and comments:

Despite his talk of ‘subjectivity’, what Kierkegaard

has in mind is the

foundering of all human categories, the shattering of

the subjective

and the anthropocentric. In the face of the fury of

the flux, only

faith can move forward. Faith intervenes just where

everything

human and rational, everything ethical and

metaphysical, every form

of humanism, comes to grief.40

When Kierkegaard himself interprets scripture (e.g., Fear and

Trembling), he puts this hermeneutic into practice.41 For example,

Kierkegaard does not discuss the place of Abraham and Isaac in

Israel’s history or even the significance of the event in Abraham’s own

history.42 Neither does he analyze the grammar or style of the

passage. Rather, he uses the hermeneutic he has emphasized – he

concentrates on how that event affects one’s life today: how it should

modify the readers’ understanding of their own world and their

relation to God, and how it should challenge their existence toward

new possibilities. If we correctly appropriate the crisis of Abraham’s

faith into our own lives, according to Kierkegaard, our own world with

14
its presuppositions about God and faith are called into question, and

we are challenged to move forward. Gadamer refers to this notion as

‘contemporaneity’ and he credits Kierkegaard with the idea, that is,

the experience of a past event (as brought to presence in a text) as

present; “to bring two moments together that are not concurrent,

namely one’s own present and the redeeming act of Christ, and yet so

totally to mediate them that the latter is experienced and taken

seriously as present (and not as something in a distant past).”43

Gadamer goes further with the idea of mediation than does

Kierkegaard; in fact, Gadamer says that he uses the term ‘total

mediation’ with the risk of sounding Hegelian, 44

rather than

Kierkegaard’s own term ‘contemporaneity.’ But, Kierkegaard goes

further than Gadamer, with the challenge for new possibilities.

To summarize, Kierkegaard sees interpretation of scripture as

involving the relation of the text to the readers themselves. In order to

interpret scripture, the readers must approach the text with the

presuppositions of their own world. With impartiality, then, they must

openly allow the text to speak to them, to call their presuppositions

and ‘world’ into question before God; they must allow the text to

transform their world, to modify their existence, to open new

possibilities by relating to the eternal. As with Ricoeur, individual

appropriation does not mean an unlimited number of interpretations,

each as valid as the other; appropriation is limited in some way by the

15
text. Like Ricoeur, appropriation is not arbitrarily subjective, yet the

text does not lose its meaning as event for the reader. Ricouer sums it

up and I think that Kierkegaard would readily have agreed:

What has to be appropriated is the meaning of the

text itself,

conceived in a dynamic way as the direction of

thought opened up by

the text. In other words, what has to be

appropriated is nothing

other than the power of disclosing a world that

constitutes the

reference of the text.45

16
 SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

1. Although Kierkegaard does not systematically present a

theory of hermeneutics, he nevertheless discusses his notion of

the interpretation of a text, how it should be read, and the

necessity to appropriate it. He also provides many examples of

interpretations, e.g., Fear and Trembling and Works of Love. In

fact, it appears that later scholars of hermeneutics such as

Gadamer use some of his ideas, including the presuppositions

and the ‘world’ of a text, the notion of contemporaneity, and

appropriation. Heidegger, Gadamer, and Ricouer have

elaborated on Kierkegaard’s notions and expanded them to

relate to general hermeneutic theory.

2. I propose that the reason Kierkegaard is not considered more

significant for philosophical hermeneutics is because, rather

than supplying a theory of interpretation for texts in general,

Kierkegaard primarily discusses the text of scripture.46

Kierkegaard brings in the additional elements of God,

revelation, and inspiration, which make the interpretation of

scripture different from other texts. Hence, Gadamer’s method

had to be developed further in order to be applied to texts in

general.

17
3. Kierkegaard is not included in biblical hermeneutics either,

possibly because, as Minear and Morimoto point out, his

existentialist and subjective emphasis of interpretation is often

misunderstood. It is quite clear, however, that major figures in

biblical hermeneutics, such as Bultmann and Barth, have used

Kierkegaard’s notions and blended them with other hermeneutic

theory such as those of Heidegger and Gadamer.47

4. Kierkegaard does not really resolve the problem of

subjectivity. But since he is one of the earliest to stress the

importance of individual appropriation of the text, he paved the

way for the later more elaborate theories, such as Gadamer’s. In

respect to subjectivity, Kierkegaard, although he appeared to be

quite radical at the time he wrote, now appears rather

moderate, since he apparently assumes an objective text in a

fixed context, while emphasizing individual appropriation of that

text.

5. Although Kierkegaard disagrees with Schleiermacher’s view

of interpretation as the objective analysis of the text (general

hermeneutics) by means of the intentionality of the author

(special hermeneutics), he does not really go much farther. He

does stress the importance of appropriating the text by the

reader, but he still assumes the objectivity of the text itself; he

says that the grammatical and structural analysis should be the

18
 first step to interpretation, but the important thing is the

appropriation by the reader. In fact, he states that scripture

should first be approached by meditation alone. He does not

really specify on what basis the reader should be expected to be

able to understand; he merely says that on careful reading (that

is, reading ‘for me’), the meaning will be clear. The important

thing is that the reader constantly remain open to the challenge

of the text for new possibilities. Kierkegaard does not consider

the text to be polyvalent; rather he assumes that the reader will

know from its context whether to consider a text literally or

figuratively (e.g., as said earlier, he assumes that the reader of

Fear and Trembling will not attempt to sacrifice his son in order

to follow Abraham’s example).

6. There is indeed a difference between a faith-hermeneutic and

a philosophical one48. Kierkegaard’s hermeneutic functions in

regard to scripture primarily because of his view that the

interpretation of the text is limited by God.

7. We maintain that Kierkegaard’s concept of ‘repetition’ can be

seen as the key to his hermeneutic. Repetition involves a

movement forward in existence, and, as such, it enlightens

Kierkegaard’s interpretation of scripture: readers should allow

themselves to be challenged by the text as they read it before

God. From this angle, it is not important who wrote the biblical

19
text or our own exegetical, historical, or cultural conclusions.

The main thing is the appropriation of the text, allowing the

reader to move forward.

NOTES

20
 1
Jolita Pons, Stealing a Gift: Kierkegaard’s Pseudonyms and the Bible (NY: Fordham

University Press, 2004), p. xi.

2
Ibid., p. xii.

3
Louis Joseph Rosas, The Function of Scripture in the Thought of Søren Kierkegaard

(Nashville: Broadman and Holman, 1994). From a dissertation presented to the Southern Baptist

Theological Seminary, 1988. Several reviews of Rosas’ work highlight his contributions and

weaknesses, and indicate directions for further study. For example, see S. Dunning, ‘Scripture in

the Thought of Søren Kierkegaard’ in Faith and Philosophy 13, no.1,a, 1996, pp. 133-9; A.J. Hoover,

‘Scripture in the Thought of Søren Kierkegaard’, Fides et historia 28, no. 1,

Winter.-Spring., 1996, pp. 105-6; and B. Wallet, ‘Scripture in the Thought of Søren Kierkegaard’,

Nederlands Theologisch Tydeschrift 51, no. 1, Jan 1997.

4
Timothy Polk, The Biblical Kierkegaard: Reading by the Rule of Faith (Macon, GA.:
Mercer

University Press, 1997), p. 2.

Janet Fishburn, ‘Søren Kierkegaard, Exegete’ in Interpretation, vol.39, July, 1985, pp.
5

229-245.

6
See Dunstan J. Leslie, ‘The Bible in Either/Or,’ Interpretation, July., 1952, pp. 310-20; and

Bradley Ross Dewey, ‘Kierkegaard and the Blue Testament’, Harvard Review, vol. 60, #4, Oct.

1967, pp. 391-409, for a discussion of Kierkegaard’s notes in his own copy of the New Testament.

Walter Sundberg, ‘The Conflict of Tradition and History,’ in ‘Behind’ the Text (Carlisle, Cumbria:

Paternoster Press, 2003), pp. 311-7 discusses Kierkegaard in light of the tradition and history of

biblical criticism, in particular Kierkegaard’s problem with ‘speculative thought’ and the

scholarly approach to scripture. See also, Timothy Polk. For a view of Kierkegaard within the

literary context of ‘canon’, Andrew Burgess has done an interesting study on the interweaving of

repetition and suffering in ‘Repetition – A Story of Suffering’ in Fear and Trembling – Repetition,

International Kierkegaard Commentary, vol. 6, (Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 2002),

pp.247-62. An excellent study has been done by Elaine Peterson, ‘Kierkegaard’s Exegetical

Methodology’, a paper presented in 1988 at St. Olaf’s College. She shows the effect of the bible

on Kierkegaard’s writings and identifies exegetical principles which apparently reflect the

influence on him of medieval writers.

 7
Paul Minear and Paul Morimoto, Kierkegaard and the Bible: An Index (Princeton, NJ:

Princeton Theological Seminary, 1953), p. 8.

8
Kierkegaard, Repetition, edited and translated by H. and E. Hong (Princeton, NJ:

Princeton University Press, 1983). 148. See also Perkins, ed., International Kierkegaard

Commentary on Repetition (Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 1993).

9
Repetition, p. 322.

10
Repetition, p. 310. See also, McCarthy, ‘Repetition’s Repetitions’ in International

Kierkegaard Commentary on Repetition, p. 280, who explains that repetition is about movement.

11
Repetition, p. 307.

12
Repetition, p. 131. See also Pons, p. 26, who proposes that repetition is at the heart of

the hermeneutical problem in Heidegger’s Being and Time, translated by John Macquarrie and

Edward Robinson (London: SCM Press, 1962).

13
McCarthy, p. 280.
14
Ibid., p. 266.
15
Kierkegaard, Concept of Anxiety, edited and translated by Reidar Thomte and Albert

Anderson. (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1980), p.89.

16
McCarthy, p. 279.

17
J. Caputo, Radical Hermeneutics: Repetition, Deconstruction, and the Hermeneutic

Project (Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press), p. 15.

18
McCarthy, pp. 279-80.
19
Caputo, 12; cf., Kierkegaard, Papers, IV A, 156, edited and translated by H. and E. Hong

(Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1967); Repetition, p. 326. See also Pons, pp. 20-6, for

a discussion of Kierkegaard’s contribution to the ontological shift in hermeneutic theory, the

hermeneutic of existence.
20
McCarthy, p. 282.
21
Caputo, p. 16. See also Pons, pp. 23-6, on the relation of repetition to the hermeneutical

problem.
 22
Kierkegaard, Journals, #2874; Postscript, translated by David Swenson (Princeton, NJ:

Princeton University Press) pp. 25-35.

23
Kierkegaard, For Self-Examination, translated by W. Lowrie (New York: Oxford

University Press, 1941), p. 27. For a discussion of reading critically versus reading for meaning,

as a love letter, see Julie Watkin, ‘The Letter from the Lover: Kierkegaard on the Bible and

Belief’, International Kierkegaard Commentary on Repetition, pp. 287-8.

For Self-Examination, pp. 28-9.

24

Kierkegaard, Attack Upon Christendom, translated by W. Lowrie (Princeton, NJ:

25

Princeton University Press, 1968), pp. 120-1; see also notes on the translation by H. and E. Hong,

Journals #2865, 2872, 2874. For more details on the relation of Kierkegaard and Gadamer, see

Pons, pp. 26-8.

26
For Kierkegaard, the author of the particular book is not important. What is important is

the challenge, for one’s existence. In fact, Kierkegaard gives his opinion regarding the value of

the critical issues of his day, namely higher criticism’s challenge of the authenticity of the Pauline

epistles. Kierkegaard says ‘against the power of the scholarly interpreters upon whose word

believers depend: if they say Paul did not write or indeed did not exist, then one should go before

God in prayer saying ‘How can all this hang together? I cannot cope with all this scholars, but I

stick to Paul’s teaching, and you, my God, will not allow me to live in error, whatever the critics

prove about Paul’s existence. I take what I read here in Paul and this I refer to you, O God, and

then you will keep me from being led into error through my reading.’ (Journals, p. 214; cf., also

Works of Love, translated by H. and E. Hong (New York: Harper and Row Publishers, 1964), pp.

199-200, 25-35. Hence, for Kierkegaard, it is the challenge before God which is crucial rather

that the higher critical, exegetical, or historical issues of the text. See also W. Sundberg, ch. 13,

in ‘Behind’ the Text, 313-4, for the three dangers of scholarship according to Kierkegaard:

looking at the mirror; forgetting that scripture is most importantly talking ‘to me’; and forgetting

to continue to allow scripture to challenge one’s existence. See also Pons, pp. 26-8.

27
Ricouer, Interpretation Theory: Discourse and the Surplus of Meaning (Fort Worth:

Texas Christian University Press), pp. 5-7.

 Ibid., pp. 8-9. For much more detail and analysis of Ricoeur’s hermeneutic in relation to
28

Kierkegaard, see Pons, pp. 28-30.

For Self-Examination, p. 37; Journals, #213, 214, 2865, 2872, 2877.

29

G.E. Arbaugh and G.B. Arbaugh, Kierkegaard’s Authorship (Rock Island, Ill.: Augustana
30

College Library, 1967), p. 344. See M. Andic, ‘The Mirror’ in International Kierkegaard

Commentary on Repetition, pp. 337-8, for an extensive explanation of Kierkegaard’s concept of

God as the mirror.

Kierkegaard, Papers, IV A 156; Repetition, p. 326; cf. Caputo, p. 12. For more detail
31

about the relation or hermeneutic theory to Kierkegaard, see Pons, pp. 25-30.

Journals, #214, 216. See an explanation and exploration of appropriation of a text in

32

Appendix, p. 353.

Minear and Morimoto, p. 10. For discussions on the importance of approaching the text
33

of scripture alone, unhindered by interpretations, see Journals, # 2865, 2869, 2872, 2874, 2882.

H. and E. Hong, Journals, p. 833; Kierkegaard, Papers, X3 A 34.

34

Ricouer, p. 91.
35

Ibid., pp.91-2.
36

Ibid., p. 94.
37

Ibid.
38

Kierkegaard, Journals, #2865.

39

Caputo, p. 34.
40

Kierkegaard displays a diversity of models for appropriation in his own use of scripture.
41

Louis J. Rosas has done an excellent study of these approaches, and I would like to summarize his

conclusions here. Rosas shows that the different approaches are reflected by Kierkegaard’s use

of the pseudonyms in the different types of literature: ‘the aesthetic pseudonyms have a

preference for Old Testament characters and illustrations’ (Rosas, 210; cf., also, Dunstan Leslie,

The Bible in Either/Or, pp. 310-320). The later works show a shift and emphasis on the synoptic

gospels and the Gospel of John. The pseudonyms illustrate the ‘false starts’ made with regard to

the appropriation of the gospel message (Rosas, p. 217; see Pons, pp. 34-8 for a different

perspective of the pseudonyms).

 1) In the early works (Either/Or, and Stages), Kierkegaard uses primarily the ‘hermeneutic

of the aesthetic’ (Rosas, p. 212), that is, he uses the Bible as a literary device rather than an

authoritative source or as a proof for an argument. In fact, he assumes a general biblical

knowledge by the reader.

2) In the ethical works (e.g., Judge Williams in Either/Or, vol. 2, and some passages of

Stages), Kierkegaard uses the bible as a source for ‘corroboration of universal law (Rosas, p.

212). This hermeneutic is consistent with religion condemned by Kierkegaard as Christendom.

Here, the bible is not the basis for the ethical point of view but offers support for it (Rosas, p.

213). Fear and Trembling and the Concept of Anxiety constitute the transition to the hermeneutic

of paradox.

3) This third hermeneutic or approach to scripture characterizes the polemical works,

e.g., Philosophical Fragments and Postscript, as well as the later Training in Christianity and

Attack Upon Christendom. In the earlier works, the appeal to scripture (especially the New

Testament) is not as direct as in the later works, the major distinction being the sharp

demarcation between Christendom and New Testament Christianity. In these works, paradox is

the key to the religious understanding of the scripture, but whereas in the earlier works

Kierkegaard is engaged in ‘indirect communication’ he communicates more directly in the later

works (Rosas, pp. 213-4). In all of these works, Kierkegaard uses scripture as the major source

from which he draws two possible responses to the paradox – faith and offense. Faith is not just

another kind of knowledge but ‘involves total commitment to the God-relationship. It is an active

appropriation of the Biblical message’ (Rosas, p. 214).

4) The ‘hermeneutic of exhortation’ characterizes the religious discourses: the Edifying

Discourses communicate Christian truth only in an indirect way, whereas Thoughts on Crucial

Situations are more direct and introduce the transcendent categories of ‘Religion B’. Here the

hermeneutic of paradox is interwoven with exhortation (Rosas, p. 214). The polemical tone is

even more evident in the Works of Love, where a single theme is developed (ibid., p. 215).

Several conclusions can be drawn from Rosas’ study: Kierkegaard sees scripture as fully

authoritative and he assumes the historical accuracy of the text. The Old Testament is used by

Kierkegaard more in the numerous allusions of the aesthetic pseudonyms. The bible is not cited
as authoritative here, however. The Old Testament characters are used as ‘pointers beyond

themselves to the absolute paradox’ (Rosas, p. 215).

Kierkegaard cites the gospels as providing a complete picture of the offense of the

paradox and the demands of the teaching of Jesus (Rosas, p. 216). Here, the paradox is the key

category for Kierkegaard, the “prism through which he viewed the whole of scripture” (Rosas, p.

216). Kierkegaard. himself puts it like this: ‘The Holy Scriptures are the highway signs: Christ is

the way’ (Journals, #208).

Kierkegaard is primarily concerned with the how of Christianity, not the what; that is how

one becomes a Christian in Christendom. Rosas comments, ‘Thus it is the existentially compelling

force of the Gospel message, addressed to the individual who would allow himself or herself to

hear, that comprises its authority’ (Rosas, p. 216).

See ibid.,. pp. 211-2, who elaborates on Kierkegaard’s method of ‘bracketing’ historical
42

and exegetical issues; Kierkegaard subordinates these to his emphasis on application. See also

Edmund Perry, ‘Was Kierkegaard a Biblical Existentialist?’, Journal of Religion, Jan., 1956, pp. 17-

23.

Gadamer, Truth and Method, 2nd edition. (New York: Crossroad Press, 1989), pp. 127-8;
43

see also the ‘Afterword’, pp. 572-3.

See ibid., p. 573, for his explanation of how he uses Kierkegaard’s concept along with his
44

own to ‘formulate his distance from Hegel’.

Ibid., p. 92.
45

See Caputo, p. 12, for a discussion on Kierkegaard’s place in hermeneutics; that actually
46

Heidegger’s hermeneutics is quite dependent on Kierkegaard but he does not always give him

credit.

See Herbert C. Wolf, Kierkegaard and Bultmann (Minneapolis: Augsburg. 1964); John
47

Heyward Thomas, ‘The Relevance of Kierkegaard to the Demythologizing Controversy’, Scottish

Journal of Theology, vol. 10, 1957, pp. 239-252.

See Polk, for an elaboration of the theory of Kierkegaard’s ‘faith reading’.

48
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