Category: Philosophy and Religion

4.83 Million Undecided Voters Bashed by Dante Alighieri
Now in 2024, a nail-biting U.S. Presidential election year, what does Dante Alighieri have to tell us about today’s 4.83 million¹ undecided voters?

After the Oct 1^st vice-presidential debate, an ABC news journalist, huddling with a tiny sample of the evening’s 39 million² viewers, kept circling back to one wishy-washy “undecided”, hoping against hope that on a successive round this person would suddenly form an opinion.

“How,” I wondered, “could anyone be that insipid? More maddening still is that these undecideds have amassed clout that is grossly out of proportion to their numbers, as if it is their apathy that makes them powerful. And what if we, the audience, were equally pathetic for lavishing the undecideds with so much attention?”

As I struggled to find voice to the nausea which this spectacle inspired in me, I remembered the 13^th century Italian poet, Dante Alighieri, and his concept of the “neutrals”:

…melancholy souls of those
Who lived without infamy or praise.

Commingled are they with that caitiff choir
Of Angels, who have not rebellious been,
Nor faithful were to God, but were for self.

The neutrals are either angels who cannot choose between God and the devil or plain folk who make so little impact on the world that they inspire neither infamy nor praise. They are cowards. They are selfish. They make no mark on history.

It was Dante who seized upon the genre of the epic poem, in particular Virgil’s Aeneid, and mutated it into a Christian allegory. Whereas the Aeneid ties the foundation of Rome to its hero, the Trojan warrior, Aeneas, the Divine Comedy makes a hero out of an everyday pilgrim, a commoner, on a fearsome quest to seek salvation. Dante audaciously elevates the courage it takes to find one’s path to eternal glory to the same height as the courage it takes to found a nation.

By reimagining the epic, Dante shows that any person, who embarks on a quest to achieve redemption—however noiselessly, however bereft of fanfare—is a hero.

Except for the neutrals. What about them?

But because thou art lukewarm and neither cold nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of my mouth. ~ The Book of Revelation 3:16

These words from the Book of Revelation prefigure the extraordinary contempt Dante held for people who refused to take sides, sat on the fence, or found other ways to be wishy-washy, apathetic, uncommitted, or unconcerned, couch potatoes before the invention of television.

Dante scorns the neutrals so completely that he doesn’t grant them a place anywhere in his masterpiece. Their place is fittingly a non-place. The putative “vestibule”³ where we find the neutrals is an anteroom just outside the entrance to hell. They are such utter non-entities that Dante refuses to give them names, or a location in time or space. More than refuse, more than contempt and disgust, poetic logic defies him to recognize them at all⁴.

Dante banishes the neutrals from his masterpiece to mirror how Dante himself, the real-life Dante, was exiled from his beloved city-state of Florence. The causes for exile between Dante and the neutrals could not be more distinct. The neutrals, those who steadfastly refused to enter the fray, perfectly oppose the temperament of Dante, who engaged in Florentine politics with a knife between his teeth. How did Dante get banished from his hometown? For a cause, astonishingly relevant today. Long before our nation was formed and its constitution written, Dante, it turns out, fought for the separation of church and state!

At first, it is bizarre and difficult to absorb logically how Dante despised apathetic people more than the persons in hell, a holding tank for murderers, rapists, frauds, and traitors, which today would include the prison guards at Auschwitz and, from the most recent headlines, the Frenchman who night-after-night drugged his wife and invited other men to rape her in her own home while she was helplessly unconscious⁵.

Dante puts the neutrals just outside the entrance to the Inferno, at the very beginning of the Divine Comedy itself, at the opposite extreme from Paradiso where Beatrice makes a pronouncement on the majesty of free will:

“The greatest gift that God in His bounty made in creation, and the most attuned to His own goodness, and that which He esteems the most, was the freedom of the will.”
Paradiso, Canto V, lines 19–22,

The neutrals by “doing nothing” most obscenely scorn God’s greatest gift to mankind. By spiting God’s supreme gift, free will, they spite God Himself and all of His creation.

In the introduction to his political treatise, On Monarchy, Dante gives the motivation for writing it as “lest I should someday be found guilty of the charge of the buried talent”, an unmistakable allusion to The Parable of the Talents. In that tale, a master entrusts a single talent to his least resourceful, let us say, oafish, servant, who fearfully buries it in the ground. In so doing, the servant forfeits his chance to preserve his master’s trust. The master, infuriated upon learning that the servant has squandered the talent entrusted to him, gives the servant a humiliating tongue-lashing. The master’s furor is greater knowing that his other servants made wise investments which earned him handsome rewards. The master takes the talent back from the servant in disgust.

For Dante, the parable itself is a gift⁶ he dares not ignore. In his genius, the poet takes this figurative threat literally. And so, in the introduction to his treatise, he makes it loud and clear—in case God is watching—that he is heaven-bent on heeding its intent.

Dante also makes it clear that God has given him and him alone the supreme qualities required to write On Monarchy. It is a delicious fusion of humility and supreme confidence.

This is why Virgil in Canto 3 explains to Dante, the pilgrim, that the neutrals forego “the good of the intellect”. The supreme cost for not exercising their God-given free will, not using their minds, is to lose them.

By abjuring the privilege to take a stand, the neutrals don’t make an initial decision. Stymied from the first decision, they’ll never make farther decisions, those which would naturally follow from the first. The whole process of being human is cut-off before it gets started.

Early copy of Grosseteste’s translation of the Nicomachean Ethics

By 1247, a medieval scholastic, Robert Grosseteste, had translated Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics from Greek into Latin⁷. By the time Dante was born in 1265, the Peripatetic doctrine of “habitus” was already familiar to Dante’s influences, particularly St. Thomas Aquinas.

Habitus derives from the translation of hexis (ἕξις), “state” or “disposition” as found in Aristotle’s Ethics. Habitus is a stable condition of the soul that is achieved through deliberate and purposeful action. It is only obliquely related to the modern meaning of habit. Rather it can be said that a constant regimen of good habits leads to a good habitus. A person trains her soul just as athletes train their bodies. In this way, repeated acts of charities slowly, methodically develop a charitable disposition or “habitus”. Habitus is “secondary nature”. Habitus is the result of protracted willful purpose.

Eric Auerbach, 20th century German philologist and author of Dante, Poet of the Secular World, provides this definition of habitus:

It is the residuum in man’s soul of his soul’s history⁸.

Persons are not born with habitus but accrue it over a lifetime. Until then we are ill-formed and unfulfilled.

In his book, Auerbach, shows the vital significance of the doctrine of habitus in the Divine Comedy. Dante’s sketches of persons inhabiting the inferno are crisp, tangible, and singular because they represent the final form of a person’s habitus, a lifelong accretion of willful acts that ultimately and precisely define the person.

He speaks of Dante’s “power to portray a man in the attitude and gesture which most fully sum up and most clearly manifest the totality of his habitus.”

Habitus justifies and explains the effectiveness of Dante’s go-to device in the Inferno, the counter-punishment (“contrapasso”), which matches in form the sinner’s transgression. By the time a transgressor reaches hell, his/her habitus has attained its perfect definition so that the transgressor’s contrapasso, his fate, is all but predetermined. All Dante has to do is draw a picture for the reader. It’s like matching a paint chip at the hardware store.

Gustave Doré, Canto XXVIII

In the case of Dante’s contemporary, Bertran de Born, who was accused of creating a schism between a son, a prince, and his father, the king, i.e. heads of state, Dante finds the baron holding his severed head by its hair, swinging from his hand like a nightwatchman’s lantern, his decapitation, a gruesome if not apt example of poetic justice.

In Canto 28 of the Inferno, Bertran de Born recognizes the aptness of his punishment, “the law of counter-penalty”:

The doctrine of habitus greatly refines the notion of good and evil. It makes it possible to understand how a good person can do a bad thing and vice versa. If you have a corrupt habitus and do a good deed, that is an accident. Habitus is the imprint that develops from willful actions over time. While it is mutable, it is also extremely stable. It is like character (ἔθος) with less starch.

Habitus thus is extremely useful for a moralizing poet like Dante. Anybody who leads a purposeful, deliberate life can be a hero. And those who do will bear its imprint in their habitus.

But what does this have to do with our neutrals? We have seen that the neutrals are locked out of Dante’s moral universe. Not by Dante but simply by not being. It is ever so slightly worse than dying in obscurity. They are the undead on a technicality. Never having lived, they cannot die. Never dying, they get no tombstone. They cannot be remembered.

In Canto 3, Dante describes an infinite train of neutrals futilely chasing a wordless banner in hell’s antechamber:

And I, looking more closely, saw a banner
that, as it wheeled about, raced on—so quick
that any respite seemed unsuited to it.

Behind that banner trailed so long a file
of people—I should never have believed
that death could have unmade so many souls.

Not only are the neutral’s obscure, but so is their number. But Dante leads us to believe that the number of neutrals encompasses the bulk of humanity. It eerily hearkens to the Parable of the Wedding Banquet⁹ where the persons invited to the king’s wedding respond with staggering indifference even after multiple invitations. Those that do show up are inappropriately attired and unprepared. This is the parable that ends with the ominous conclusion that “many are called and few are chosen”.

The parable critiques those who abuse their free-will with a sloth-like intellect prone to poor or pointless decisions.

Finally, we begin to appreciate Dante’s contempt for the neutrals and by proxy undecided voters. It starts to make sense. It is no longer outré. Neutrals are not even “good” enough to get into hell. The parallels of the neutral to today’s undecideds is also sufficiently clear that we see how Dante’s contempt transfers to them.

But let’s not get too smug. Dante begs caution. If the neutrals are vastly in the majority of humankind, how do we know we don’t number among them? Probabilistically, the odds are too great.

Among us, neutrals are not just undecided voters. Most of us are neutrals despite how much we’d like to think otherwise. We follow wordless banners, e.g. party slogans and the cant of political parties, latching onto the thoughts of others not our own. Without a habitus to guide our instincts, we behave like sheep or cattle, as members of a herd. If you asked us why we’re following a blank banner, at best we can parrot back a slogan. We value positions over fellowship. We mistake rage for passion, causes for a desire to dominate and control, fall victim to vanity with public displays of “righteousness”.

If we are neutrals, there is little chance that we would know it or admit it to ourselves. Ironically, we pride ourselves on our individuality. Who writes eulogies for milquetoasts?

Dante provides clues to this predicament. The path through the dark forest (selva oscura) is unknown and hence only discovered step by step in frightening solitude. It is not visible on a map or GPS system. It is unadvertised. It zigs and it zags. It brings on trials of characters. It defies avoidant behavior. As Joseph Campbell once said, “If the path before you is clear, you’re probably on someone else’s.”

Are we born neutrals or do we become neutrals? Do we—to borrow from an old joke¹⁰—have neutrality thrust upon us?

We’ll get into that in Part II. Stay tuned. In the meantime, I point you to Pope Francis’s apostolic letter, Splendour of Light Eternal¹¹, written on the 7th centenary of Dante’s death, in which he beautifully argues for the enduring significance of Dante to a spiritual life.

Footnotes
- 1
  3% of today’s 161 million registered voters
- 2
  Rick Porter, “TV Ratings: VP Debate Falls 25 Percent vs. 2020,” The Hollywood Reporter (blog), October 2, 2024, https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-news/vance-walz-vp-debate-tv-ratings-1236022692/.
- 3
  Barolini, Teodolinda. “Crossing and Commitments.” In Commento Baroliniano, Digital Dante. New York, NY: Columbia University Libraries, 2018. https://digitaldante.columbia.edu/dante/divine-comedy/inferno/inferno-3/. In her commentary, Professor Barolini’s observes that “This space, the ground of transition, is not named by Dante; in the commentary tradition it is frequently called Ante-Hell or vestibule.” This is just one of a number of insights Professor Teodolinda provides in her comments on Canto 3.
- 4
  No way was Dante going to permit the neutrals to mar the symmetry of his masterwork, which he divides into the proportional realms of hell (the Inferno), purgatory, and heaven (Paradiso), each consisting of thirty-three cantos, a very particular number in deference to Jesus Christ, the savior’s, time on earth.
- 5
  “French Village of Mazan Torn Apart by Horror of Mass Rape Trial.” Accessed September 16, 2024. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cyvpd7zyprdo.
- 6
  This is an uncanny feature of the parable. Once you recognize the parable itself as a gift, watch out!
- 7
  Jean Dunbabin, “ROBERT GROSSETESTE AS TRANSLATOR, TRANSMITTER, AND COMMENTATOR: THE ‘NICOMACHEAN ETHICS,’” Traditio 28 (1972): 460–72.
- 8
  Erich Auerbach, Dante, Poet of the Secular World (New York: New York Review Books, 2007).
- 9
  “Bible Gateway Passage: Matthew 22 – New International Version,” Bible Gateway, accessed October 5, 2024, https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%2022&version=NIV.
- 10
  https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/103-be-not-afraid-of-greatness-some-are-born-great-some
- 11
  “Lettera Apostolica Candor Lucis Aeternae Del Santo Padre Francesco Nel VII Centenario Della Morte Di Dante Alighieri.” Accessed October 11, 2024. https://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/it/bollettino/pubblico/2021/03/25/0181/00393.html#ing.
October 11, 2024
The Concept of Freedom
Artist’s Conception of Eve making a critical life choice

The two dominant political parties in the United States of America, the Republican and Democratic parties, keep pushing reproductive rights in front of the public eye. It is the lever and the fulcrum that keeps the nation pried into two miserable, dysfunctional halves, an “either/or”¹ that we seemingly cannot go beyond. It is the lever and the fulcrum that keeps money pouring into re-election campaign coffers.

At some point somebody, for some reason² framed an idea of reproductive rights as the seemingly mutually exclusive either/or pair of pro-life / pro-choice. It is a false dichotomy as is evidenced by a parable from the book of Genesis, the so-called the “fall of man”. (A scribe could have dubbed it—perhaps more accurately—the “rise of man”.)

The story of Eve’s fateful first bite of the apple is the locus classicus in Scripture—given to us as in concrete poetic imagery—of the concept of free-will. It’s a dubious incident of free choice at best. How is it not a set-up if the Supreme being furnishes the first couple’s new apartment with a tree and not just any old tree, but the “Tree of Knowledge”? Inevitably the garden of Eden became—as any Penthouse suite, cruel for its lack of imperfections, would eventually become—incredibly boring. It got to a point where Eve had played all the Mahjong she was ever going to play. She had garden fever. Nagged by the threat of hanging out confined for all time with a sulky Adam, what could she do? What was left for her but to bite into that apple and feel life rupture in the crunch of the apple as the juices flowed down her gullet and over her lips. Despite all of the siren-song inevitableness of it, Scripture makes it clear: it was Eve’s choice.

So, we have to get this right. Scripture is pro-choice.

But in so choosing, Eve chose to be a mother; ergo, she chose life. So, Scripture is pro-life. Scripture presents this—as Kierkegaard would delight in—as a paradox, an either/or to which there is no way past.

For that matter, did Abraham really have a choice either? The voice of God spoke to him in private, not before an audience. Abraham did not share his confrontation with God in a stump speech on a campaign trail. It was an intimate conversation, pillow talk, the kind you don’t blab about. And it was about sacrifice. As Eve sacrificed the Garden of Eden, a perfect home ready to grace the cover of any edition of Martha Stewart Living magazine, Abraham was prepared to make literally the Supreme sacrifice, his patronage, his legacy, his son, the course of history.

Under those conditions it doesn’t seem to be much in the way of a choice. But Scripture makes it clear: it was Abraham’s choice.

Eve disobeyed the Lord. John Milton called it the “first disobedience.” Abraham obeyed His Master. In the strict chronology of Genesis, Eve’s indiscretion led to Abraham’s ability to obey (not to mention his conception). Both were driven by inscrutable impulses not readily subject to analysis or critique, not subject to judgement, both with unimaginable verve and daring.

God wants to receive our love. Yet He/She cannot mandate it. We have to love God of our own free will. We have to have the latitude to sin, to screw-up, recover our senses and come to Him/Her of our own accord, in our own time, purely as an act of desire and will. Otherwise, it is phony and fake religion.

The phony dichotomy of pro-choice / pro-life creates an unholy amount of suffering, political skullduggery, and crocodile tears. It is a perpetual source of government inaction when palpable lives, of persons subject to the U.S. census, are compromised by uneven distributions of food and healthcare. It is at the center of a frightening lack of compassion for real lives (e.g., women, people of color, Samaritans, prisoners, housekeepers, bootblacks) for theoretical lives (e.g., unborn children).

Religion is an inward thing, I’m quite sure. Faith is a nocturnal creature that shrinks from the braying light. Maybe a better question to ask our political candidates before we go to the polling station is “Where is their sacrifice?” But an even better question is to ask ourselves in an out-of-the-way place, a quiet corner, far from the madding crowd³, “Where is my sacrifice?”.

Footnotes
- 1
  Kierkegaard, Søren, Howard V. Hong, Edna H. Hong, and Søren Kierkegaard. Either/Or. Kierkegaard’s Writings 3–4. Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press, 1987.
- 2
  Wallenbrock, Emma. “Inside the Handbook on Abortion.” Slate, June 8, 2022. https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/06/fetal-photos-jack-barbara-willke-handbook-on-abortion.html.
- 3
  John Fitzgerald Kennedy’s Inaugural Address, January 20, 1961
May 24, 2023
Plato’s Phaedrus and the Paideia of Søren Kierkegaard

In the summer of 2022, a friend invited me to join a discussion group which gets its jollies reading and discussing Plato’s dialogues line by line in minute detail. Before long it became obvious to me that I had entered the gates of heaven though I was much more alive than dead. Old pockets of gray matter long dormant, but still harboring vestigial memories of Attic Greek, learned in college a long time ago, and Hellenic culture, shrouded in darkness, received light. That should have been sufficient for any philosophical junkie.

But gluttony overcame me and I talked myself into joining a second discussion group on reviewing, also with tedious devotion, the complete works of Søren Kierkegaard. Both discussion groups came to me through the medium of Meetup.com under the auspices of The Chicago Philosophy Meetup. The Chicago Philosophy Meetup is what you call an “enabler”.

Reading Kierkegaard’s works, which tend to drip with irony, refer to theological and philosophical figures and concepts only obliquely, and take pseudonymous inscriptions, I was while very much intrigued also very much overwhelmed. An oppressive cloud of ignorance hovered over me, as I tuned in on our weekly discussion of Kierkegaard parked on a street in Chicago on a fine autumnal evening, idly researching an influence on K.— it was Herder or Hamman or some “H” name—when I serendipitously came upon a course offering “Søren Kierkegaard – Subjectivity, Irony and the Crisis of Modernity” taught by Professor Jon Stewart—auspiciously out of the University of Copenhagen—that started that same day.

That was all the serendipity I needed. Or so I thought. Unbeknownst to me at the time. Professor Stewart’s schtick concentrates on demonstrating Kierkegaard’s indebtedness to Socrates (the other guy I had been trying to “get my mind around”).

By this “chance” moment, I was afforded the means to get Kierkegaard better by getting Socrates better and vice-versa.

Flash forward to early April in 2023, I was dreading the task of writing an essay for my final assignment in the Kierkegaard course, while we completing a reading of the Phaedrus dialogue with my Plato meetup group. Clearly, fate ordained that I combine the Phaedrus into the paper, the necessity of which became abundantly clear as reacher lead me to discover more and more reasons to emphasize the significance of the Phaedrus for better appreciating Kierkegaard.

I now have serendipitous whiplash.

Here is the most recent draft of the essay, which I seek to improve and is open to your suggestions.
Platos-Phaedrus-and-the-Paideia-of-Soren-Kierkegaard

April 30, 2023
Conversation with ChatGPT on Kierkegaard’s Concept of Time or The BOT Thinks I’m a Moron

Here in this transcript I test my wits with ChatGPT. Not only is the robot smarter, it’s more polite.

PART I

JOHN

I am writing an essay on the concept of time in the thought of Søren Kierkegaard. My thesis is that chronological time is mostly irrelevant, more like a distraction, from his perspective. In his work, Philosophical Fragments, the section “Thought-Project”, makes it clear that time is “accidental”, i.e., an accident of history. Therefore, it would seem that the concept of teleology, or, in secular terms, of progress is highly suspicious if not erroneous from Kierkegaard’s perspective. Does this make sense?

BOT

Yes, your thesis that chronological time is mostly irrelevant and a distraction from Kierkegaard’s perspective is a valid interpretation of his thought. Kierkegaard’s philosophy emphasizes the importance of subjective experience, individual choice, and personal responsibility, and these themes are not necessarily linked to chronological time or historical progress.

Kierkegaard believed that time was not a fundamental aspect of reality but rather a human construct that helps us make sense of the world. He argued that the present moment is the only one that matters, and the past and future are irrelevant distractions that can prevent us from living authentically in the present. In this sense, the idea of progress or teleology, which suggests that history is moving towards a certain end or goal, is not meaningful from Kierkegaard’s perspective. Instead, he believed that each individual must create their own meaning in life and make choices based on their unique situation and perspective.

In Philosophical Fragments, Kierkegaard presents the thought-experiment of the historical Jesus, which illustrates his views on the importance of subjective experience over historical time. He argues that the significance of Jesus’ life is not in his historical existence but rather in the personal relationship that individuals can have with him in the present moment. This idea underscores Kierkegaard’s belief that the present moment is the only one that matters, and that individuals must take responsibility for their own choices and actions rather than relying on historical progress or teleology.

Overall, your thesis that chronological time is largely irrelevant from Kierkegaard’s perspective is well-supported by his philosophy. However, it is important to note that Kierkegaard’s views on time are complex and nuanced, and there may be other interpretations of his thought that emphasize the importance of historical context or the role of time in the human experience.

JOHN

How does this fit in with the Socratic method of maieutics and the Christian concept of rebirth?

BOT

Kierkegaard’s philosophy has been influenced by both the Socratic method of maieutics and the Christian concept of rebirth, and it is possible to see connections between these ideas and his views on time.

BOT: The Socratic method of maieutics involves a process of questioning and dialogue that is aimed at helping individuals to bring forth their own ideas and knowledge from within themselves. Kierkegaard’s emphasis on subjective experience and personal responsibility can be seen as a continuation of this method, as he believed that individuals must find their own truth through introspection and reflection. In this sense, the concept of time is largely irrelevant to the Socratic method of maieutics, as it is the individual’s inner experience that is most important.

Similarly, the Christian concept of rebirth involves a process of personal transformation and renewal, in which the individual is born again into a new life. Kierkegaard saw this process as a way of achieving authenticity and freedom, as the individual is freed from the constraints of societal norms and conventions. From this perspective, time is again largely irrelevant, as the focus is on the individual’s inner experience rather than on historical progress or external events.

However, it is important to note that Kierkegaard’s views on time are complex, and he does not reject the idea of historical time altogether. He believed that historical events could serve as a catalyst for personal transformation and growth, and that the individual must engage with their historical context in order to find their own meaning and purpose in life. Furthermore, Kierkegaard’s Christian faith also emphasizes the importance of historical events, such as the life and death of Jesus Christ, in the process of spiritual transformation.

Overall, while there are connections between Kierkegaard’s views on time and the Socratic method of maieutics and the Christian concept of rebirth, it is important to approach his philosophy with a nuanced and contextual understanding of his ideas.

JOHN

Rebirth is a metaphor and a paradox since the idea of giving birth to one’s self departs from the literal idea of giving birth. If we embrace the paradox, as an incident of “subjective experience”, a rebirth would signal a new life. Once I am reborn, life begins anew. I am biologically the same age I was before the rebirth but spiritually I am literally one year old. Do you see how this cements the relationship of Kierkegaard’s concept of time, maieutics, and rebirth? What are the nuances here?

BOT

Yes, I see how the paradox of rebirth as a metaphor for personal transformation can be related to Kierkegaard’s concept of time and maieutics. The idea of being “born again” suggests a radical break with the past and a new beginning, in which the individual is transformed and renewed. This new beginning is not necessarily tied to chronological time, as the individual’s spiritual or subjective experience is what matters most.

The paradox of rebirth also highlights the tension between the individual’s inner experience and external reality. While the individual may experience a profound transformation through the process of rebirth, their external circumstances and physical appearance remain the same. This tension between the inner and outer self is a recurring theme in Kierkegaard’s philosophy, as he emphasizes the importance of subjective experience and personal responsibility over external events or historical progress.

However, it is important to note that the concept of rebirth can also be interpreted in different ways, depending on one’s religious or philosophical beliefs. For example, in Christianity, rebirth is often associated with baptism and the forgiveness of sins, while in Eastern religions, rebirth is seen as a cycle of reincarnation based on karma. Kierkegaard’s interpretation of rebirth is deeply rooted in his own Christian faith and his emphasis on personal responsibility and spiritual transformation.

Additionally, while Kierkegaard’s views on time and the importance of subjective experience are central to his philosophy, there are also other nuanced aspects to his thought that must be taken into account. For example, his emphasis on the importance of personal choice and responsibility can be seen as a critique of determinism and societal norms, while his use of irony and pseudonyms in his writing complicates any straightforward interpretation of his philosophy. Therefore, it is important to approach Kierkegaard’s philosophy with a nuanced and contextual understanding of his ideas, rather than relying on simplistic or one-dimensional interpretations.

JOHN

Touché.

BOT

I’m glad I could provide some helpful insights. If you have any more questions or would like to explore Kierkegaard’s philosophy further, feel free to ask!

PART II

JOHN

Kierkegaard placed a lot of stock in the idea of authenticity. How does authenticity play into religious experience and the life of a person? What does it take to obtain it?

BOT

For Kierkegaard, authenticity is the key to living a meaningful life, and this includes religious experience. Authenticity involves being true to oneself and one’s own beliefs, rather than simply conforming to societal norms or external expectations. Kierkegaard saw authenticity as a crucial aspect of religious faith, as it involves a personal relationship with God that is not based on external authority or dogma.

In order to obtain authenticity, Kierkegaard believed that individuals must engage in a process of self-reflection and introspection. This involves questioning one’s own beliefs and values, and striving to understand oneself on a deeper level. It also involves taking responsibility for one’s own life and choices, rather than relying on external authority or social norms to dictate one’s path.

Kierkegaard also believed that authenticity requires a willingness to embrace risk and uncertainty. This is because living an authentic life often involves making difficult choices and taking risks, rather than simply following a predetermined path. In the realm of religion, this may involve questioning traditional beliefs and practices, and forging a personal relationship with God that is based on individual experience and reflection.

Ultimately, Kierkegaard believed that authenticity is a lifelong process of self-discovery and growth. It requires a commitment to ongoing self-reflection and a willingness to continually question one’s own beliefs and values. However, the rewards of authenticity are great, as it allows individuals to live a life that is true to themselves and their own unique path, rather than simply conforming to societal norms or external expectations.

JOHN

Is it inauthentic to consult ChatGPT while composing an essay for a grade in an academic course?

BOT

No, it is not inauthentic to consult resources such as ChatGPT while composing an essay for a grade in an academic course. In fact, seeking out information and guidance from a variety of sources is an important part of the research and writing process.

What is important, however, is that you engage with the ideas and information you find in a critical and thoughtful way, and that you are transparent about the sources you are using. This means citing your sources properly and avoiding plagiarism, as well as evaluating the reliability and credibility of the information you find.

Furthermore, it is important to recognize that academic writing and personal authenticity are not necessarily the same thing. While authenticity may involve being true to oneself and one’s own beliefs, academic writing often involves presenting and analyzing information in a neutral and objective manner. This means that in some cases, you may need to set aside your personal beliefs or opinions in order to accurately present and analyze the information at hand.

In summary, consulting resources such as ChatGPT is a valid and useful part of the research and writing process. However, it is important to approach these resources with a critical eye and to be transparent about the sources you are using, while also recognizing the distinct goals and expectations of academic writing.

-30-

April 5, 2023
Living Poetically According to Kierkegaard
The Romantics believed in the ideal of “living poetically.” Today many people believe in the notion of the self-made person. Kierkegaard is suspicious of these kinds of ideas. What are his objections and concerns?

The expression “living poetically” connotes a libertine, a person who marches to his own drummer, follows rules of their own whimsical invention, or answers only to his/her own inner voice, like the famous daimonion (δαιμόνιον^[1]) of Socrates, albeit heedless of convention and societal norms. Modern pop culture is awash in libertines of this ilk, the noisy, public lives of musicians and actors come to mind.

A self-made person connotes a person of fierce independence, who relies on nobody other than him/herself for guidance, direction, and precedence in manner and conduct. A self-made person is utterly self-motivated and directed. The self-made person detests influence from parents, siblings, teachers, colleagues, and friends.

The idea of a self-made person itself smacks of a flimsy fiction unless perhaps it pertains to the Christian belief in being “born again”. Then, in that case, a self-made person might have a scriptural fig leaf as it is sanctioned by scripture and the example of Christ, might sufficiently appease Søren Kierkegaard. The only justifiable making of a self is to be spiritually reborn in a religious sense as when John the Baptist or Christ go out in the desert or Mohammed enters his cave.

Kierkegaard, as a classical scholar, would also have been alive to the meaning of the word of poet as a maker. Adam of Old Testament fame is considered the first poet, an appointed office inasmuch as God only accorded this gift to Adam, the first man, and to no other creature. Considering the metaphor quite literally, in its raw truth, the poet is a maker of words, phrases, stories, myths, narrations, epics, and verse but does not make himself or obsess with stories or fables about himself to advance a “persona”.

Kierkegaard’s position is that “living poetically” is a sham unless it is truly poetic, by which he means religious. He is contemptuous of any shallower idea of what a poetic life might entail.

Kierkegaard’s idea of living poetically puts in mind the staggering transformation of the 17^th century British poet, John Donne, from the randy, young swain he mockingly dubbed “Jack” for his fixation on hedonistic, erotic poems to the religious poet of his later years when he earned back the right to call himself “John”^[2].

Meditation XVII – Wikisource, the free online library

Kierkegaard makes his position on living poetically utterly clear on P. 297 of The Concept of Irony:

Therefore, let it be said, as it will also be demonstrated, that these books are not only immoral but also unpoetic, for they are irreligious; let it above all be said that anyone can live poetically who truly wants to do so. If we ask what poetry is, we may say in general that it is victory over the world; it is through a negation of the imperfect actuality that poetry opens up a higher actuality, expands and transfigures the imperfect into the perfect and thereby assuages the deep pain that wants to make everything dark.
The Concept of Irony P. 297
March 19, 2023