Abstract

The paper explores the relation between Kierkegaard’s concept of a “life-view,” understood as a certain quality of a person’s character, and his early account of Christian faith. To claim the need for such an exploration is motivated by two observations: First, defining a “life-view” as “an unshakable certainty in oneself won from all experience” (Kierkegaard’s formula in his debut book From the Papers of One Still Living [1838]) essentially conforms with his characterization of faith as an “a priori certainty.” Second, the relation between Kierkegaard’s notion of “life-view” and his concept of faith has been interpreted in different, at times in-compatible ways by Kierkegaard-scholars. Thus, after outlining the overall argument in Kierkegaard’s debut book, I will compare in detail the notions of “life-view” and faith, and this by using as a vantage point and paradigmatic example the opposing accounts of Emanuel Hirsch and Ulrich Klenke.