In ‘Sickness Unto Death’ Kierkegaard writes:
“So to be sick unto death is, not to be able to die-yet not as though there were hope of life; no, the hopelessness in this case is that even the last hope, death, is not available. When death is the greatest danger, one hopes for life; but when one becomes acquainted with an even more dreadful danger, one hopes for death. So when the danger is so great that death has become one’s hope, despair is the disconsolateness of not being able to die. It is in this last sense that despair is the sickness unto death, this agonizing contradiction, this sickness in the self, everlastingly to die, to die and yet not to die, to die the death. For dying means that it is all over, but dying the death means to live to experience death.”
This theological statement seems to reflect his own personal struggle with his melancholy; it is a theological construct at interpreting one’s existential struggle. What is worth note taking is that perhaps it was not his anxiety alone that affected his theology but the reverse may also be true. Kierkegaard’s first Major Depressive Episode was caused by his theological interpretation of his father’s sin. In 1850, reflecting on his childhood years he wrote:
“The greatest danger is not that his father or tutor should be a free-thinker, not even his being a hypocrite. No, the danger lies in his being a pious, God-fearing man, and in the child being convinced thereof, but that he should nevertheless notice that deep in his soul there lies hidden an unrest which, consequently, not even the fear of God and piety could calm. The danger is that the child in that situation is almost provoked to draw a conclusion about God, that God is not infinite love.”
Commenting on his ‘earthquake experience’ Lowrie writes: “The sudden confirmation of his father’s guilt was the ‘frightful upheaval’ which imposed upon Søren a new infallible rule for interpreting all the ‘phenomena’ which had aroused his suspicion. “It is of no wonder that Kierkegaard sees himself as the ‘object of the fury of the angry gods’. His theology intensifies his interpretation of the events thus causing him great distress which led to his ‘astray’ experience and ultimately to his first Major Depressive Episode.
It is also interesting to note that the turning points in his life started with two theological concepts: the leap of faith which allows one to accept that God forgives and forgets and secondly his acceptance of life as it is. His experience of forgiveness through faith came in 1848 when he described “But belief in the forgiveness of sins means to believe that here in time the sin is forgotten by God, that it is really true that God forgets.” And in 1852 he wrote: “Then came 1848. I was lifted up to a height which I had never before known, and perfectly understood myself in what had gone before, and the past.” In 1852 Kierkegaard came to accept his God given destiny, his heteronomy. He was ‘to be different’, he was called to melancholy. Kierkegaard realized that it was through this given ‘heteronomy’ that he was to serve God. Although the thorn in his flesh never left, it did not bother him but empowered him for his service to God. On June 19, 1852 he wrote: “I feel peaceful and happy, perhaps more definitely so and with a more tranquil confidence than in 1848.”
From the perspective of integration, Kierkegaard’s existential struggled led him ultimately to accept his melancholia as his destiny, the place from which he could contribute to the society. Viewing his theology from an existential perspective (his personal struggle with melancholia and anxiety) helps bring about the awareness that while using theology as a tool to cope, he found peace in the theology that embraces non-being, the negatives in life. It would be reasonable to believe that Kierkegaard found peace when his theology permitted full acceptance of his own heterogeneity.
I’ve never really thought about the connection between theology and therapy, and I think the comparison you draw here is fascinating. Kierkegaard is definitely a case study in theology and depression; do you think there might also be cases of theologians whose theology is intimately tied to, say, bipolar disorder or OCD?
You raise a fascinating question. I believe there are…and not only dealing with theologians but philosophers as well. Wittgenstein, in my assessment, was suffering some form of anxiety and obsessive compulsive behavior. It is perhaps true in the lives of Paul Tillich, Carl Jung, Foucault, William James…to name a few. It will be a really fascinating study to do a biographical study of these individuals in relation to psychological theory and their theology or philosophy.
heh, I can certainly see obsessive compulsive tendancies in Wittgenstein as well… 😉
I think for Kierkegarrd in particular, his biography is of pivotal importance, since it seems like one of his overriding concerns was the seperation of knowledge from life or existence (i.e. his critique of the abstractions of Hegel).
By the way, I noticed you’re researching schizophrenia and spirituality; have you by any chance been to this blog:
http://spiritualemergency.blogspot
The author has gone through a transformative psychological experience that could be categorized either as “schizophrenia”, or else, perhaps, as “spiritual awakening”. It’s also got a wealth of information on psychospiritual experience (much of it from a Campbellian/Jungian perspective). I don’t know how useful you’ll find it, but it’s definitely interesting.
sorry, posted the link wrong: http://spiritualemergency.blogspot.com
thank you very much for suggesting this site. I dropped by to check it and I find it truly fascinating. This is one of the areas that I am very curious about…the spiritual enlightenment in connection to mental health. We in this culture are too eager to diagnose and pathologize and often we overlook what might be that divine calling within that which has the appearance of social aberration. If only we could perceive the transcendence within every life even if that life is way beyond what our culture defines as normative.
On Kierkegaard, that is a great point about the protest against Hegel’s abstraction that eliminates individuality. His life and his struggle with both anxiety and depression seem to be that search for actuality…real and raw.
The Imugi said: do you think there might also be cases of theologians whose theology is intimately tied to, say, bipolar disorder or OCD?
Years ago I read in the New York Times that some suspect that Ellen White, Paul and Moses’ work was the result of a possible bi-polar condition. That article creates a problem for me when I read Old Testament texts that veer one moment from instances of great love and then suddenly plunge into text of total condemnation and disdain for the offending Israelite.
How can the same writer be expressing many thought about God’s tender love one minute and then God’s vengeful justice the next, sometimes without a smooth transition?
:We in this culture are too eager to diagnose and pathologize and often we overlook what might be that divine calling within that which has the appearance of social aberration. If only we could perceive the transcendence within every life even if that life is way beyond what our culture defines as normative:
I quite agree with you (and with spiritual emergency) about this 🙂 I’m glad you found the site to be helpful.
:How can the same writer be expressing many thought about God’s tender love one minute and then God’s vengeful justice the next, sometimes without a smooth transition:
I think that’s an interesting question as well, one worth looking into. Paul’s writings especially seem to exhibit a kind of polarity.
what a great question regarding the opposites in the portrayal of God’s action in the OT. I’m far from the ability to claim the understanding of OT. However I agree with Imugi on the nature of polarity. It seems to me that in a sense deep in each of us is that very strong polarity…the tension between the opposites…and we conveniently project this onto God. And life journey is that path toward the ability to maintain the polarity without yielding to madness on the one hand…and rigidity on the other. I think it takes alot of grace to stand at a place where we can remain in between the two tensions under the mercy of God and say… it is ok for me to be here.
As I read your post, Kierekaard’s book “Purity of Heart” came to mind and how he writes about that solitary individual” in contrast to the crowd. That was him, except that his companion was his misery.
David, can you say more about the contrast between the individual and the crowd in Kierkegaard?
One of the things we see with Kierkegaard is that he was not like the society in which he lived. He was a man who’s best friend was his own despair. In his book, “Purity of Heart” he dedicates this book to that “solitary individual” by which he means “the individual as he would be if he were solitary and alone, face to face with his destiny, with his vocation, with the eternal, with God Himself who had singled him out.” For him the core of the “individual” (the examined life) is the center of one’s choices, and responsibility for every action, the “individual” is the one that protests to everything that is less than ideal.
In contrast, the”crowd” is what lulls the individual to a life that is always less than the ideal. It keeps the “individual” busy with meaningless things and distractions, empty pleasures. The crowd, attempts to numb the individuals sense of experiencing life by sedating the individual, and not allowing space or time for self-examination.
I like these descriptions of the individual and the crowd. That has been one of my struggles…how to remain a self within a community. There are communities that grant you permission to be and there are those communities that do not. I think it is very amazing that Kierkegaard’s philosophical rebel against Hegel’s dialectic is also a very personal struggle to remain authentic in his life.
It is interesting, and this is just an aside. I read somewhere that Kierekaard’s views as found in “Either/Or” of the three stages of life the
(1) aesthetic (2) ethical, and the (3) religious actually correlate to Hegel’s triad.
that is interesting…it seems as if he is bringing the abstract dialectic into the personal (aesthetic, ethics, and religion)…much like what Marx did to economic in his dialectical materialism. Never thought of it this way. Thanks.
Was it really his theology guiding his interpretation of life or his life experiences guiding his development of his theology? He sounds as one moving from onr end of a bipolar spectrum to another and as he moves his theological perspectives change. Sometimes theology needs to be supra (above and beyond) some earthly experiences while other aspects of theology guides earthly earthly experiences. He seems to be forcing his theology to conform to his earthly experiences.