Soren Kierkegaard

possible.Naturally therearewell-known similarities:Bothwere criticalof
theologicalrationalismandofthespeculativephilosophyofoneoranother
German vintage; both had advanced pedagogical views relative to their
times, understanding that the truth is always dialogical and is not a disem-
bodied,monologicalabstraction;bothopposedtheirtimes’easygoingmix-
tureofbourgeoisvirtues,spiritualhumanism,andromanticsensitivity;both
boundthemselves—if inverydifferent fashion—tothecommon man,the
people; both knew that man is not (in Grundtvig’s words) a “sausage en-
dowedwithreason”butrather(inKierkegaard’swords)“passion”;andboth
came to be in an increasingly strained relationship with the State Church
anditsrepresentatives,theCopenhagencliques,notleastMynsterandcom-
pany.Butherethesimilaritiesstop,andtherestwasastonishment,distaste,
andridicule.
NowmakingfunofGrundtvigwasnotKierkegaard’sinvention,butwas
a popular pastime among the clever heads of the day. As early as 1817,
Heiberg had published aNew ABC Book: An Hour’s Instruction to Honor,
Serve, and Amuse Young Grundtvig. A Pedagogical Attempt; it was cordially
nasty and adroitly executed. And the following year Poul Martin Møller
continuedinthesameveinwithhisAttempt at a Letter from Heaven in Grundt-
vig’s New Historical Tone,inwhichhegrandlyimitatedGrundtvigianbom-
bast, at one point famously letting Grundtvig proclaim, “I and Our Lord
have decided.” Kierkegaard holds undisputed first place in the discipline
of Grundtvig abuse, however, and the circumstance that he had known
Grundtvig personally since his days at secondary school and continued to
haveconversationswithhimcertainlydidnothamperthepaceofhisaudac-
ity. Thus the massive, calm, pastoral figure and the nimble, dialectically
agitated magister were said to have strolled Østergade together, and when
theyreachedthegatetheybothraisedtheirhats—indeed,accordingtoone
eyewitness, Kierkegaard did so “with great deference.” In addition to his
personalacquaintance,however,Kierkegaardalsohadaratherfineselection
of Grundtvig’s works in his library, ten titles in all, taken from the entire
gamutofGrundtvig’sgenres—thoughnotincludinghispolemicalpieces—
ranging in time from 1808 to 1850. Kierkegaard’s reading was hardly ex-
haustive;itwassurelybiasedandsporadicaswashiswont,thoughitwasnot
completelysuperficial,asisclear,forexample,fromthefollowingperfectly
executed pastiche that was originally a part of the manuscript ofStages on
Life’s Waybutwasomittedfromfromthefinalversion:“Letthethemebe
the Word of the Church. We go back several centuries. We grope about
in the medieval darkness. Papal power oppresses the conscience with the
intolerable yoke of Rome ... until Martin Luther, the man of the Word,
visibly demonstrated the profundity of the darkness in which the papists