Quotation
Last reviewed:
“Infinite resignation is the last stage before faith.”
Søren Kierkegaard · Existentialism (forerunner) · Modern · 1843
What does it mean?
Infinite resignation is the last stage before faith, not faith itself. Silentio's knight of infinite resignation gives up the finite hope and remains there, clear about the loss. The knight of faith makes a further movement, absurd by the thinker's standard, and receives the finite back. A rival reading collapses the two knights into one heroic believer. The book is at pains to keep them apart, and the author of the book says he can imagine resignation and cannot make the movement of faith. Another reading thinks resignation is a failure of nerve.
Did Søren Kierkegaard really say this?
The library’s label is Paraphrase or translation. Hong and Hong, and the older English, open a longer sentence: infinite resignation is the last stage before faith, so that anyone who has not made this movement does not have faith. The card keeps the opening clause. The voice is Johannes de Silentio.
Where it comes from
Fear and Trembling, 'Preliminary Expectoration', in the Hong and Hong tradition
Approximate date: 1843.
How to use it
A person in a hospice family in Sheffield gives up the outcome they wanted and calls the giving up faith. Silentio would call it resignation, which he respects, and he would not let the word faith be used for the peace of having stopped hoping. The distinction can be made without his Christianity. Inside the book, the distinction is the whole point of the preliminary pages.
A mindset reading
Do not skip to the leap. The last stage before faith is still not faith, and he thinks most religious talk has not even got as far as resignation. That insult is in the chapter. It is not a self-help sequence with faith as the final badge.
Understand the philosophy
The Preliminary Expectoration, or 'A Preliminary Outpouring from the Heart', comes before the three problemata. Hong and Hong are the named translators. The longer sentence says that without this movement there is no faith. The card's clause is the hinge, not the whole hinge-sentence.
- ethics
- self
- meaning
FAQ
What does it mean?
Infinite resignation is the last stage before faith, not faith itself. Silentio's knight of infinite resignation gives up the finite hope and remains there, clear about the loss. The knight of faith makes a further movement, absurd by the thinker's standard, and receives the finite back. A rival reading collapses the two knights into one heroic believer. The book is at pains to keep them apart, and the author of the book says he can imagine resignation and cannot make the movement of faith. Another reading thinks resignation is a failure of nerve.
Did Søren Kierkegaard really say this?
Paraphrase or translation. Hong and Hong, and the older English, open a longer sentence: infinite resignation is the last stage before faith, so that anyone who has not made this movement does not have faith. The card keeps the opening clause. The voice is Johannes de Silentio.
Which work is it in?
Fear and Trembling, 'Preliminary Expectoration', in the Hong and Hong tradition Approximate date: 1843.