Silent Faith and Eternal Hope

In Soren Kierkegaard's Fear and Trembling, the pseudonymous writer Joannes de Silencio weaves between two methods of interpreting Abraham's trial of faith and faith itself. While grappling with the ontological paradox of the tale, he creates various characters which are used to express the feelings associated with his conceptions of the experience of faith. The poetical nature of his writing forms a loose pattern where feelings are associated with ontological concepts such as God, ethics, and infinity. In his exploration of Abraham's paradox, he addresses key emotions that give meaning to much, if not all, of humanity but excludes hope which fits snugly between the lines of this piece. Through a brief examination of Abraham's paradox and the mire of questions that spring forth from it, the implicit framework for the concept of hope is revealed.

It is made abundantly clear in Kierkegaard's Fear and Trembling that Joannes de Silencio is grappling with the paradox of Abraham. As Roy's post explains, if one obeys an absolute, universal, and infinite being, and the divine ethical code that being commands that one shall not murder (especially one's own son), then Abraham is one who's faith drove him to the precipice of committing a most grievous sin yet he is rewarded for precisely that. His faith simultaneously drives him to both obey or disobey God only to be decided which at the last moment. Joannes de Silencio encapsulates the overarching paradox as, “The ethical expression for what Abraham did is that he intended to murder Isaac; the religious expression is that he intended to sacrifice Isaac” (24). After pondering on such a statement, one is then led to extrapolate that ethics are indeed a universal; that by his faith and conviction in God to murder his son thereby breaking away from the universal code of ethics bestowed by God, he is made the absolute example of faith. Silencio addresses the issue between ethical universality and particular divine command in Problem One (46) where he writes, “Faith is exactly this paradox, that the single individual is higher than the universal, but in such a way, mind you, that the movement is repeated, so that after having been in the universal he now as the particular keeps to himself as higher than the universal” (47). He is the great exception to God's divine command through the movement of faith.

But how is Abraham's faith different than those of a ancient tales such as that of Agamemnon (50) who sacrificed his daughter, Iphigenia to appease Artemis so he could conquer Troy? In this case and similar cases de Silencio describes feelings of honor and ethics and faith working in concert for the good of society yet no miracle occurs where Iphigenia is spared at the last moment (50-51). If he had believed, his case was a trial of faith like Abraham's and opted to spare Iphigenia's life after receiving favorable winds, he would breach the universal ethics according to God, his own code of honor, his peoples honor, and his faith in upholding those ethics. In order to make the movement of absolute faith worthy of Abraham, he must first make the movement of infinite resignation where, “there is peace and rest and consolation in the pain, that is, when the movement is made properly” (38). However, even that is not enough by itself. The differentiation between a tragic hero like Agamemnon and a knight of faith is that faith also needs belief in the virtue of the absurd where, “for God everything is possible” (39). The faithful become those that are at peace and rest with every moment of the finite all the while so steadfast in their faith, that whether or not God has blessed them, they find joy and harmonious meaning in their lives through the hope that their life's wish might be realized (42).

Hope fits all the more soundly with the established notions of faith when de Silencio as himself (not as a character) writes that, “to me God's love, both in a direct and inverse sense, is incommensurable with the whole of actuality” (28) and “Faith is a miracle, and yet no human being is excluded from it, for that which unites all human life is passion, and faith is passion” (59). If love is equated with Gods presence and faith is the absolute lifelong commitment to God and faith is passion, then God is also a passion (or perhaps the passion itself) that unites all human life. Hope for the seemingly impossible or the virtue of the absurd appears to serve as the key concept in allowing the harmonious existence of love, honor, ethics, faith, the existence of God as he is in Abraham's paradox and of the paradox itself. The same troubling questions still flow from the paradox and remain unanswered but perhaps, this was one of the inferences Kierkegaard intended to be communicated through Jon the Silent. We shall see.