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- Title
Søren Kierkegaard and the Impossibility of (Un)Forgiveness: Another Look at Love, Mercy, and Reconciliation in Kierkegaard's Theological Ethics.
- Authors
Marcar, G. P.
- Abstract
Discussions of forgiveness within Christian theology have tended to focus on the conditions in which forgiveness may be a moral or divine imperative for believers. With regard to Søren Kierkegaard's theological ethics, this article explicates a radical perspective. For the Kierkegaardian Christian lover, no definitive relational break with the other (however objectionable) can occur. As Kierkegaard emphasizes in Works of Love, in a discourse which bears this sentiment as its title, "love abides." Indeed, I illustrate how in three consecutive discourses in Works of Love—"VI: Love Abideth," "VII: Mercy, a Work of Love," and "VIII: The Victory of the Reconciliation in Love"—Kierkegaard's ethical vision is grounded in Christian love's immutability. For Kierkegaard, if Christian love is present, then forgiveness is redundant, and unforgiveness is impossible.
- Subjects
KIERKEGAARD, Soren, 1813-1855; MERCY; RECONCILIATION; LOVE; ETHICS; THEOLOGY; FORGIVENESS; THEOLOGICAL anthropology
- Publication
Journal of Religious Ethics, 2019, Vol 47, Issue 4, p716
- ISSN
0384-9694
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1111/jore.12288