Do
Your
Best
尽你所能
Jǐn nǐ suǒ néng
がんばってね
Ganbatte ne
ps139
Festina
Listen to hear.
Hear to steer clear
of too much fear.
Your body is a temple.
It helps you to build upon the level.
You have been separated to be crowned.
The savior will add to your health, wealth and renown.
Reason requires context in time for meaning.
Meaning is the gleaning of conceptual healing.
Higher powers are competing for control.
They rig each poll to tax the whole.
It feels right to appeal to the highest power.
The flower for the hour looks above the tower.
This invokes transcendent self.
The twelfth elf stands on the shelf.
Transcendence can detach from the will to work.
Ego can't shirk the will to exact an act or the clerk will irk the kirk.
Perspective on perception works an immediate bent
to accomplish what is necessary in the present
or the descent of dissent will be lent to ill intent.
The sense of imminent presence
provides comfort with confidence.
Presence, intelligence and creativity
are enhanced with faith in ingenuity
to avoid superfluity.
You have heard my plea.
You have searched me.
You know when I sit or stand.
I don't let things get out of hand.
You discerned my thought.
I have not been taught to damage the tot.
You observe my work and rest.
I do my best to bless those who need to be blessed.
You are acquainted with my ways.
I raise praise to avoid the dazed haze of brazen plays.
There was not a word on my lips as a token
that you did not know before it was spoken.
That which was spoken is a token of the unbroken.
Your presence guides me to the future
to avoid the shot from the shooter
to block the boot from the booter
or to lock the lock against the looter.
This is the rule of protection from the fool as ruler.
Your reach is felt into the past.
I was urged to learn from what crashed,
smashed, trashed or was slashed.
This is the craft
from the ark of the past.
He who was formerly useless
has become useful to those who knew this.
Your transcendence is heaven sent.
It lies beyond the wonderment of the thunderous.
It is so high that I feel overwhelmed.
That which was overwhelmed is compelled
to excel.
Can I escape Spirit?
The farthest reach doesn't steer it,
but the will to reach is always near it.
Can I run from presence?
It is the essence of the present.
If I climb to heaven, you are there.
This leaven shows you care.
If I make my bed a grave, you are there also.
No hollow follows the bravo of Apollo.
If I were to take a flight
in the morning light
and stop
the hop
at the farthest reaches of the sea
even there, the essence of your presence will be with me.
Your security will hold me fast.
Your courage will make me last.
If I say, "The darkness will cover me."
I will not be seen by those not near enough to see.
The light around me will turn to night.
I will be kept out of sight.
The darkness is not dark to you.
The queue is not too new to be true.
The night is as bright as day.
Even the fray has something to say.
Darkness and light are both alike in a way.
The fringe of the fray shows the rate of decay.
Search me.
I am free.
Know my heart.
It provides a recurring start.
Settle my restless thoughts.
I only need that which keeps my mind taut.
Look for wrong.
It won't stay long.
Lead me in the way that is true.
It will keep me from feeling blue.
Who does not estimate the cost for a project
to see if he has enough to afford the concept?
The shape of the clay was destroyed in the potter's hands.
The clay was reshaped into a vessel that would hold water or grain from the land.
The reduction of the group to the individual body
is the same as the elevation of the mythical to the godly.
There is a distortion of proportion in the elevation
that loses ethical verity in the moral revelation.
While neither the slave nor serf is free,
there is a right to serve to earn a fee.
-----------------------
Psalm 139
Domine, probasti
The Latent probe
To the leader. Of David. A Psalm.
1 O Lord, you have searched me and known me.
2 You know when I sit down and when I rise up;
you discern my thoughts from far away.
3 You search out my path and my lying down,
and are acquainted with all my ways.
4 Even before a word is on my tongue,
O Lord, you know it completely.
5 You hem me in, behind and before,
and lay your hand upon me.
6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;
it is so high that I cannot attain it.
7 Where can I go from your spirit?
Or where can I flee from your presence?
8 If I ascend to heaven, you are there;
if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there.
9 If I take the wings of the morning
and settle at the farthest limits of the sea,
10 even there your hand shall lead me,
and your right hand shall hold me fast.
11 If I say, ‘Surely the darkness shall cover me,
and the light around me become night’,
23 Search me, O God, and know my heart;
test me and know my thoughts.
24 See if there is any wicked* way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting.
---------------------
Jeremiah 18:4
The vessel the potter was making of clay was spoiled in his hands. He reworked it into another vessel as seemed good to him.
---------------------
The shape of the clay was destroyed in the potter's hands.
He reshaped a vessel that would hold water or grain from the land.
================
Onesimus- useful
Philemon 1:11
He was useless to you formerly. Now he is useful to both you and me.
---------------------
He who was formerly useless
has become useful to those who knew this.
================
Luke 14:27
Which of you intending to build a tower does not sit down and estimate the cost to see whether or not he has enough to complete it?
---------------------
Who does not estimate the cost for a project
to see if he has enough to afford the concept?
================
There are passages in the bible that warn against favor for the rich or the poor.
Some would say that capitalism favors the rich and socialism the poor.
Kierkegaard is an example of someone who was rich who favored the poor. He displayed a remarkable capacity for empathy in his writing, but he struggled with depression. His writing was existentialist and Christian, but the end result was an advocacy for Christian socialism.
I don't agree that capitalism favors the rich. It uses incentive to organize the production of a product or service.
Socialism uses the threat of violence or the constant criticism of capitalism to push for the increase in government spending.
Fooled
Soren Kierkegaard
b. 5.5.1813 Copenhagen, Denmark
d. 11.11.1855 Copenhagen, Denmark
Soren Kierkegaard was a Danish philosopher, theologian, poet, social critic and religious author. He wrote in the Danish “golden age” of intellectual and artistic activity. He is considered to be the first existentialist.
He wrote critical texts on organized religion, Christendom, morality, ethics, psychology and the philosophy of religion. He displayed a fondness for metaphor, irony and parables. Much of his philosophical work dealt with the issue of how one lives as a "single individual." He highlighted the importance of personal choice and commitment in giving priority to human reality over abstract thought.
He was a Lutheran Protestant. He decided not to become a pastor or a professor because if he had he would have had to write under the authority of the State or the Church. He wrote on Christian ethics, the institution of the Church, the differences between purely objective proofs of Christianity, the infinite qualitative distinction between man and God and the individual's subjective relationship to the God-Man Jesus the Christ which came through faith.
He was critical of the practice of Christianity as a state religion primarily in the Church of Denmark. His psychological work explored the emotions and feelings of individuals when faced with life choices.
He wrote that science and scholarship want to teach that objectivity is the way to live life. He argued that Christianity teaches that the way is to become subjective to become a subject. Scientists learn from the world by observation, but observation could not reveal the inner workings of the world of the spirit.
His key ideas included the concept of "subjective and objective truths", the knight of faith, the recollection and repetition dichotomy, angst, the infinite qualitative distinction, faith as a passion and the three stages on life's way.
His core goal in social criticism was to renew faith within Christendom.
He wrote in Danish. The reception of his work was initially limited to Scandinavia, but by the turn of the 20th century his writings were translated into French, German and other major European languages. His thought exerted a substantial influence on philosophy, theology and Western culture.
He was born in Denmark in the 19th century.
Copenhagen
Copenhagen is located mostly on the eastern shore of the island of Zealand and partly on the island of Amager. The Oresund or the Sound lies to the east. It is the strait of water that separates Denmark from Sweden and connects the North Sea with the Baltic Sea. The Oresund Bridge connects the city to Malmo, Sweden.
Copenhagen is the capital and most populous city of Denmark. It was originally a Viking fishing village established in the 10th century in the vicinity of what is now Gammel Strand in the center of the city. It became the capital of Denmark in the early 15th century. It consolidated its position as a regional center of power with its institutions, defenses and armed forces beginning in the 17th century.
The city underwent a period of redevelopment after the outbreak of a plague and a fire in the 18th century. This included the construction of the prestigious district of Frederiksstaden under Frederick V. The district is regarded as one of the most important Rococo districts in Europe. Cultural institutions as the Royal Theatre and the Royal Academy of Fine Arts were founded during this period.
The British naval officer, Horatio Nelson, attacked the Dano-Norwegian fleet and bombarded the city in the early 19th century. Rebuilding during the Danish Golden Age brought a Neoclassical look to Copenhagen's architecture. Hans Christian Andersen was a leader of the literary movement with his rendition of the modern fairy tale.
Soren Kierkegaard
Kierkegaard was born to an affluent family in Copenhagen. His mother, Ane Sørensdatter Lund, had served as a maid in the household before marrying his father, Michael Pedersen Kierkegaard.
She was quiet, plain and not formally educated, but she protected her sons, Soren and Peter. Peter later said that his brother preserved many of their mother's words in his written work.
His father was a well-to-do wool merchant from Jutland. He was stern, dry and prosaic in appearance, but he concealed an active imagination which he held into his old age. He was interested in philosophy and often hosted intellectuals at his home.
The young Kierkegaard read the philosophy of Christian Wolff. Wolff was the most eminent German philosopher between Leibniz and Kant. His main achievement was a complete commentary on almost every scholarly subject of his time. He displayed and unfolded knowledge according to his demonstrative-deductive, mathematical method. He represented the peak of Enlightenment rationality in Germany.
Kierkegaard led a somewhat uneventful life. He rarely left his hometown of Copenhagen. He traveled abroad only five times. He went to Berlin four times and once to Sweden.
His prime recreational activities were attending the theater, walking the streets to chat with ordinary people and taking brief carriage jaunts into the surrounding countryside.
He was educated at a prestigious boys’ school (Borgerdydskolen), then attended Copenhagen University where he studied philosophy and theology. He refused to define himself as a philosopher.
He felt that he would constrain himself to speculative knowledge. He wanted to live his life by doing something. He declined to become a Lutheran minister. The Church of Denmark was the official state religion. He was critical of official religion.
Church of Denmark
Lutheran Christianity was established as the state religion with the Reformation in Denmark in 1536. When religious wars swept Europe the harsh persecution of other faiths followed for the next century. Exceptions were granted only to foreign diplomats.
Small circles of clandestine Catholicism prevailed for at least a period in the 16th century. Roman Catholic, Reformed and Jewish congregations were allowed in the new town of Fredericia in Denmark from 1683.
Reformed and Jewish congregations were also allowed in Copenhagen. Non-Lutherans were also allowed in Friedrichstadt and on Nordstrand in Slesvig and in Glückstadt in Holstein. Freedom of religion was introduced in Denmark, but Lutheranism remained the state church with the constitution of 1849.
The Church of Denmark recognizes only two sacraments as in other Lutheran churches. Baptism and the Lord's Supper are the sacraments. These are usually included in the Communion Service. Formerly, individual or shared confession was a condition to receive the Lord's Supper. An official confession ritual still exists, but is now used very rarely.
The reigning monarch is the supreme secular authority in the church.
A religious community does not need any state approval in order to enjoy the freedom of religion granted by the constitution. State-approved congregations (godkendte trossamfund) enjoy several privileges.
They may conduct legal weddings, establish cemeteries and get residence permits for foreign priests. They are exempt from corporate and property tax, may apply for means from the state lottery fund and members may tax-deduct membership fees and presents to the congregation.
Career
Kierkegaard became a writer. He published some of his works using pseudonyms. He signed his own name as author for others. Whether being published under pseudonym or not, Kierkegaard's central writings on religion have included Fear and Trembling and Either/Or, the latter of which is considered to be his magnum opus.
Either/Or was published 20 February 1843. It was mostly written during Kierkegaard's stay in Berlin where he took notes on Schelling's Philosophy of Revelation.
Schelling's Natural Philosophy
Schelling had been the roomate to Hegel during their time of instruction at the university at Tubinger Stift. They later became rivals.
Schelling had been a Lutheran, but he shifted to philosophy to address the larger issue of faith as a perspective on the Absolute. He sought to develop the axioms of Spinoza in a manner meaningful to his society. He had written the Philosophy of Mythology prior to that of revelation. It was part of his thought about how the ideal sprang from the real.
He defined nature as visible Spirit and Spirit as invisible nature. History was a progressive gradually self disclosing revelation of the Absolute. Freedom is in the revelation of evolution as a process.
The Absolute separates itself into conscious and unconscious for the sake of appearance in consciousness. It dwells in the inaccessible light as Eternal Identity for the harmony between the states of mind.
It is interesting speculatively, but there is an aversion to the application of the thought to reality.
Reality is simply the ground for the revelation of the ideal. The power of the individual could be placed over the state or religion for immoral ends. Schelling wasn't as bad as Hegel, but there was at least an indirect connection to the promotion of revolution to obtain political change.
Kierkegaard's Either/Or includes essays of literary and music criticism. There is a set of romantic-like-aphorisms as part of his larger theme of examining the reflective and philosophical structure of faith.
The book was edited by "Victor Eremita." It contained the papers of an unknown "A" and "B" which the pseudonymous author claimed to have discovered in a secret drawer of his secretary.
Eremita had a hard time putting the papers of "A" in order because they were not straightforward. "B"'s papers were arranged in an orderly fashion. Both of these characters were trying to become religious individuals.
Each approached the idea of first love from an esthetic and an ethical point of view. The book is basically an argument about faith and marriage with a short discourse at the end telling them they should stop the argument.
Eremita thinks "B", a judge, makes the most sense. Was "A" code for Schelling and "B" for Fichte? Fichte was the more abstract and intellectual of the two.
The inner and the outer work at odds to conceal the secret joy of why things make sense in the consideration of what the purpose for life is.
Kierkegaard stressed the "how" of Christianity as well as the "how" of book reading in his works rather than the "what". He sought to make philosophy a practical application for the perspective of the individual.
He published three more books about love and faith and several more discourses on 16 October 1843. Fear and Trembling was published under the pseudonym Johannes de Silentio. It was an examination of the anxiety of Abraham with respect for the sacrifice of Isaac.
Repetition is about a Young Man (Søren Kierkegaard) who has anxiety and depression because he feels he has to sacrifice his love for a girl (Regine Olsen) to God. He tries to see if the new science of psychology can help him understand himself. Constantin Constantius, who is the pseudonymous author of that book, is the psychologist.
He published Three Upbuilding Discourses, 1843 under his own name. This dealt specifically with how love can be used to hide things from yourself or others. His writing was an expression of his method for indirect communication.
He questioned whether an individual can know if something is a good gift from God or not. It does not depend upon what one sees, but what one sees depends upon how one sees it. Observation is not just a receiving, a discovering, but also a bringing forth. How the observer is constituted is decisive. God's love is imparted indirectly just as our own.
Finding faith in Christ and putting the understanding to use stops speculation. It is then that one begins to exist in an ethical way that can be defined as religious. The Church should not try to prove Christianity or even defend it. It should help the individual to make a leap of faith. Faith has a place for the person in the love of God.
Kierkegaard's final years were taken up with a sustained attack on the Church of Denmark by means of newspaper articles published in The Fatherland (Fædrelandet) and a series of self-published pamphlets called The Moment (Øjeblikket).
These were also translated as "The Instant". These pamphlets are now included in Kierkegaard's Attack Upon Christendom. The Instant, was translated into German as well as other European languages in 1861 and again in 1896.
He collapsed on the street before the 10th issue ofhis periodical The Moment could be published. He stayed in the hospital for over a month and refused communion. He regarded pastors as mere political officials at the time. They were a niche in society who were clearly not representative of the divine.
He died in Copenhagen in 1855 at 42 years of age. He had been in Frederik's Hospital for over a month. It was thought that complications from a fall he had taken from a tree in his youth may have manifested in illness. It has been suggested by some professors that he died from Pott disease, a form of tuberculosis.
He had thought that the congregation kept the individual from taking responsibility for his or her own relation to God. He defined Christianity as the individual. He felt that the state's control of the Church gave it the mission to increase membership with more power for clergy. This he believed was a corruption of the ideal.
He had felt that Christianity's true purpose was to stress the importance of the individual, not the whole group. The state-church political structure was offensive and detrimental to individuals. Anyone could become a Christian without knowing the meaning of what it was to be Christian.
Unbelieving believers formed a herd mentality in the population without respect for conscience.
His existentialism served as a basis in the formation of Chrisitan socialism. It's a degenerative societal position.
Soren Kierkegaard
S. 索伦柯克亚尔
T. 索倫柯克亞爾
索 Suo cable 索 saku cord So そ ソ So 소 small
伦 lun order 倫 rin ethics ren れん レン len 렌 wren
柯 Ke stem 柯 ka handle Ki き キ Ki 키 key
克 ke to restrain 克 koku overcome ru る ル eo 어 uh
亚 qu send away 亞 a rank ke け ケ ke 케 ke
尔 er you 爾 ji you go ご- ゴ- ga 가 end
ru る ル deu 드 de
--------------------------
The reduction of the group to the individual body
is the same as the elevation of the mythical to the godly.
There is a distortion of proportion in the elevation
that loses ethical verity in the moral revelation.
===================
Lectionary: Soren Kierkegaard
wiki Soren Kierkegaard
IEP SK
SEP SK
Theology of SK
wiki Copenhagen
Text for Either/Or
