Søren Kierkegaard
1813-1855 · Existentialism · Renowned
Kierkegaard was a Danish writer who spent his life attacking the comfortable Christianity of Copenhagen, where everyone was born a Christian and nobody had to decide anything. Faith is a passionate leap the single person makes alone before God, past the point where reasons run out. He published much of his work under invented names. Later writers made him the father of existentialism.
Signature
The position Kierkegaard is most identified with in the Profiler:
- Ground of Being
- leans Transcendence
- Paradox
- Existential Leap
Positions on the 9 axes the sources answer
- Society
- mildly leans Individualism (67 on a 0–100 scale from Collectivism to Individualism)
- The Divine
- leans Indescribable (75 on a 0–100 scale from Describable to Indescribable)
- Meaning
- leans Inherent (75 on a 0–100 scale from Constructed to Inherent)
- Order
- leans Horizontal (75 on a 0–100 scale from Vertical to Horizontal)
- Nature of Reality
- leans Multiplicity (75 on a 0–100 scale from Unity to Multiplicity)
- Ground of Being
- leans Transcendence (75 on a 0–100 scale from Immanence to Transcendence)
- Truth
- strongly leans Objective (100 on a 0–100 scale from Subjective to Objective)
- Ethics
- leans Means (75 on a 0–100 scale from Ends to Means)
- Conviction
- leans Certain (75 on a 0–100 scale from Uncertain to Certain)
11 of 20 axes are left blank: the sources do not answer them, or Kierkegaard refused the framing. Nothing is imputed; a blank is not a middling score.
Foundational questions
- Theology
- Trinitarian Monotheism
What is your position on the existence and nature of God or gods? - Highest Good
- Union with God
What is the highest good? - Good and Evil
- Moral Realism
What is the fundamental nature of good and evil? - Knowledge
- Grounded in God
What is the ultimate foundation of knowledge? - Ethics Basis
- Divine Command
What is the ultimate basis of ethics? - Agency
- Libertarian Free Will
What is the nature of human agency and freedom? - Beginning of Things
- Creation ex Nihilo
What is the origin of reality? - Time
- Kairotic
What is the fundamental shape of time? - Authority
- Divine Revelation
What is the legitimate source of authority? - Language
- Social Construction
What is the fundamental nature of language? - Paradox
- Existential Leap
What is the status of paradox? - Law
- Divine Law
What is the ultimate source of legitimate law? - Death
- Unconditional Salvation
What happens at death? - Role of Emotion
- Path to the Divine
What is the proper role of emotion? - Human Nature
- Redeemably Corrupted
What is human nature? - Primary Bond
- The Divine
What is your primary bond and loyalty?