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Kierkegaard's Socratic Task

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Kierkegaard's Socratic Task Kierkegaard’s Socratic Task by Paul Muench B.A., Reed College, 1990 B.A., University of Oxford, 1993 M.A., University of Pittsburgh, 1999 Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of the School of Arts and Sciences (Department of Philosophy) in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy University of Pittsburgh 2006 UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH SCHOOL OF ARTS AND SCIENCES This dissertation was presented by Paul Muench It was defended on April 14, 2006 and approved by James Allen, Professor of Philosophy, University of Pittsburgh Tony Edwards, Associate Professor of Religious Studies, University of Pittsburgh Stephen Mulhall, Fellow and Tutor in Philosophy, New College, University of Oxford Dissertation Directors: James Conant, Professor of Philosophy, University of Chicago John McDowell, University Professor of Philosophy, University of Pittsburgh Copyright © 2006 by Paul Muench All rights reserved Kierkegaard’s Socratic Task Paul Muench, Ph.D. University of Pittsburgh, 2006 The Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard (1813-1855) conceived of himself as the Socrates of nineteenth century Copenhagen. Having devoted the bulk of his first major work, The Concept of Irony with Continual Reference to Socrates, to the problem of the historical Socrates, Kierkegaard maintained at the end of his life that it is to Socrates that we must turn if we are to understand his own philosophical undertaking: “The only analogy I have before me is Socrates; my task is a Socratic task.” The overall aim of my dissertation is to examine and critically assess this claim, and ultimately to argue that the Socratic nature of Kierkegaard’s endeavor finds its fullest expression in the activity and writings of one of his best-known literary creations, Johannes Climacus, the pseudonymous author of Philosophical Fragments and Concluding Unscientific Postscript. The first part of my dissertation addresses Kierkegaard’s own status as a Socratic figure. I examine Kierkegaard’s claim that his refusal to call himself a Christian—in a context where it was the social norm to do so—is methodologically analogous to Socrates’ stance of ignorance. I also consider how the use of a pseudonymous manner of writing allows Kierkegaard to employ a Socratic method. In the second part of my dissertation I focus on Kierkegaard’s pseudonym Johannes Climacus and his claim that his contemporaries suffer from a peculiar kind of ethical and religious forgetfulness. I argue that Climacus adopts two Socratic stances in order to address this condition. In Philosophical Fragments he adopts the stance of someone who has intentionally “forgotten” the phenomenon of Christianity, whereas in the Postscript he adopts the stance of someone who openly declares that he is not a Christian. In the process, he develops a conception of philosophy that places a premium on self-restraint and an individual’s ability to employ the first personal “I.” As Climacus emerges as Kierkegaard’s Socratic pseudonym par excellence, we obtain two significant results: a deeper understanding of Kierkegaard’s conception of Socrates and Socratic method, and a compelling conception of philosophy rooted in Greek antiquity. iv Kierkegaard’s Socratic Task For B., and in memory of my mother, Maury Johnston Muench (5/8/41-11/24/03) Περὶ δὲ ψυχήν, ὦ ἄριστε, οὐχ ὁ αὐτὸς τρόπος; ἕως μὲν ἂν πονηρὰ ᾖ, ἀνόητός τε οὖσα καὶ ἀκόλαστος καὶ ἄδικος καὶ ἀνόσιος, εἴργειν αὐτὴν δεῖ τῶν ἐπιθυμιῶν καὶ μὴ ἐπιτρέπειν ἄλλ΄ ἄττα ποιεῖν ἢ ἀφ΄ ὧν βελτίων ἔσται· φῂς ἢ οὔ; (And isn’t it the same way with the soul, my excellent friend? As long as it’s corrupt, in that it’s foolish, intemperate, unjust and impious, we should restrain it from its appetites, and not allow it to do anything else except what will make it better. Do you say so, or not?) —Gorgias, 505B Socrates var en Dagdriver, der hverken brød sig om Verdenshistorien eller Astronomien…, men havde god Tid og Særhed nok til at bekymre sig om det simple Menneskelige, hvilken Bekymring, besynderligt nok, ansees for Særhed hos Mennesker, medens det derimod slet ikke er sært, at have travlt med Verdenshistorien, Astronomien og andet Saadant. (Socrates was a loafer who cared for neither world history nor astronomy….But he had plenty of time and enough eccentricity to be concerned about the merely human, a concern that, strangely enough, is considered an eccentricity among human beings, whereas it is not at all eccentric to be busy with world history, astronomy, and other such matters.) —Concluding Unscientific Postscript (CUP 83; SKS 7, 82-83) Table of Contents Acknowledgements x Abbreviations xii INTRODUCTION 1 Part One: Kierkegaard as Socratic Figure CHAPTER 1: KIERKEGAARD’S SOCRATIC POINT OF VIEW 5 1.1 The Moment, 10: “My Task” 5 1.2 Kierkegaard’s Socratic Stance: “I am not a Christian” 8 1.3 Socratic Ignorance 12 1.4 Kierkegaard as Writer and Thinker 18 CHAPTER 2: KIERKEGAARD’S SOCRATIC METHOD 22 2.1 Kierkegaard’s Authorship 23 2.2 Kierkegaard’s Aesthetic Production 29 2.3 Indirect Communication and the Illusion of “Christendom” 36 2.4 Socratic Midwifery 47 2.5 Kierkegaard’s Incognito and the Role of “Governance” 55 2.6 The Socratic Nature of Kierkegaard’s Pseudonyms 62 Part Two: Kierkegaard’s Socratic Pseudonym (Johannes Climacus) CHAPTER 3: CLIMACUS’ DIAGNOSIS OF WHAT AILS CHRISTENDOM 76 3.1 Climacus’ Authorship 78 3.2 How Climacus Became an Author 84 3.2.1 Climacus Discovers His Task 85 3.2.2 Climacus Makes a Resolution 87 3.3 Climacus’ Diagnosis and the Need for Indirect Communication 92 3.4 The Comic Fulfillment of Climacus’ Resolution 100 viii CHAPTER 4: CLIMACUS’ SOCRATIC ART OF “TAKING AWAY” 111 4.1 The Difficulty of Reading Fragments 111 4.2 Climacus’ Conception of Philosophy 116 4.2.1 The Preface to Fragments 117 4.2.2 “The Moral” of Fragments 126 4.3 Climacus’ Critique of Beck’s Review of Fragments 131 4.3.1 Beck’s Didacticism 132 4.3.2 Climacus’ Reader and the Condition of Knowing Too Much 141 4.3.3 Climacus’ Art of “Taking Away” 148 4.4 Climacus’ Experiment: A Socratic Framework for Reading Fragments 152 4.4.1 Climacus’ Maieutic Incognito in Fragments 153 4.4.2 Climacus’ Exchanges with the Interlocutor 156 4.4.3 Hypothesis, Intentional Forgetting, and the Poetic 160 4.4.4 Absentmindedness and Awareness 163 CHAPTER 5: CLIMACUS’ SECOND SOCRATIC STANCE 166 5.1 Climacus Concludes His Authorship 167 5.2 Climacus’ Experiment in the Postscript 172 5.3 Existence-Issues, Subjective Thinking, and the Simple Wise Person 179 5.4 Humor, Revocation, and Climacus’ “Understanding with the Reader” 187 CONCLUSION 199 ENDNOTES 204 BIBLIOGRAPHY 305 ix Acknowledgements Many people and institutions have supported me and made possible the writing of this dissertation. I am grateful to the Howard V. and Edna H. Hong Kierkegaard Library for two summer research fellowships and to the Fulbright Program for a pre-doctoral fellowship that enabled me to spend the 2001-02 academic year at the Søren Kierkegaard Research Center at the University of Copenhagen. I want to thank personally Gordon Marino and Cynthia Lund at the Hong Kierkegaard Library, and Niels Jørgen Cappelørn, Bjarne Laurberg Olsen, Mette Skakkebæk, Jon Stewart and Pia Søltoft at the Søren Kierkegaard Research Center for welcoming me to their respective institutions and for the many ways that they assisted me with my research. I also want to thank Williams College for providing me with an office in which I was able to write most of this dissertation and my colleagues in the Williams Philosophy Department for all of their support. At the University of Pittsburgh, Kathy Rivet has been extremely helpful, especially during the last few years when I was no longer in residence. I want to thank James Allen, James Conant, Tony Edwards, John McDowell and Stephen Mulhall for agreeing to serve on my committee. Thanks also to Alexander Nehamas for the time he spent as a committee member. Heda Segvic was also originally a member of my committee and served as my director until her sudden and unexpected death in the spring of 2003. She is missed and I am sure that my project would have benefited from her feedback. James Conant and John McDowell kindly agreed to serve as co-directors after she died. In many respects, this project would never have been possible without the involvement of James Conant. I began my study of Kierkegaard with him, and it was his encouragement and philosophical example more than anything else that helped me to see how some of my own concerns might be philosophically investigated. Tony Edwards has also been my teaching mentor and I am grateful to him for our many spirited discussions about the extent to which philosophy can constitute an x art of living and what role this conception of philosophy can or ought to play in the classroom. I am also grateful to Stephen Mulhall for his timely and helpful feedback on some of my work. For many years, David Berger has been my chief conversation partner; a fellow lover of Socrates and a Thoreauvian extraordinaire, his example and his friendship have been invaluable to me. Ben Eggleston’s friendship and his penchant for discussing everything from web page construction to index funds to 10k runs have also truly helped to keep my spirits up. I am grateful to John-Eric Robinson, my stepbrother, for his moral support and his continued interest in the project. More recently, Brian Söderquist has regularly discussed my work with me and Jon Stewart has been unceasing in his support and encouragement. And if it weren’t for Marjorie LaRowe, I am not sure I would have completed this project.
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