Kierkegaardâs philosophy, the iconoclastic mix of anti-rational Christian theology and existentialism, is one in which I have mostly encountered through the primary and secondary works of other philosophers, like Sarte and Heidegger. I thought that it was time to pull together my fragmentary, second (and third) hand understanding into a more complete and holistic picture. And this work, by Patrick Gardner, absolutely fits the bill. Although I am not a fan of the editorial format of the âVery Short Introductionsâ series from Oxford â tiny (Sans Serif!) font, no margins, page reductions through citation omission, etc. â that does nothing to diminish the fantastic scholarship on display here.
Gardener covers everything, including the Kantian and Hegelian precursors, in both the ethical and metaphysical domains, that the bulk of Kierkegaardâs work was a reaction against. Whether itâs Kierkegaardâs contention that Christian faith is a âcrucifixion of the understandingâ, an offense against reason, an âabsolute paradoxâ that requires a âqualitative leapâ into the realm of the intellectually repellant; or whether itâs Kierkegaardâs pioneering exploration of the the human condition as one unbearably rent between the finite and contingent on the one hand and the desperate striving for the transcendent and absolute on the other; or whether itâs Kierkegaardâs ever present return to the theme of personal responsibility and choice, in which every one has to face their life and death and choices alone â Gardiner manages to concisely convey both the breadth and depth of these ideas and their relationship to many seminal thinkers in the Western philosophical tradition, both antecedent to, concurrent with, and subsequent to Kierkegaard.
Bravo Patrick. Highly recommend.