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CHAPTER 14
THE EXISTENTIALIST: SØREN KIERKEGAARD
INSTRUCTIONS: Select the best answer according to the text.
TRUE/FALSE
1. Søren Kierkegaard was a popular, well-known
philosopher during his lifetime.
2. Kierkegaard compared his breaking up with Regine Olsen
to the biblical story of Job s loss of his family.
3. Kierkegaard saw the fundamental existential issue to be
How am I to exist?
4. According to Kierkegaard, truth is objective.
5. Kierkegaard was impressed by the great progress of the
nineteenth century.
6. Kierkegaard lamented the lack of passion that
accompanies the massing of society.
7. According to Kierkegaard, my life is the proof of what I
believe, not my thoughts (beliefs).
8. According to Kierkegaard, objective truths are not about
us, not present.
9. According to Kierkegaard, our most crucial task is
becoming a subject.
10. According to Kierkegaard, we are in despair whether
we know it or not because we have a double nature.
11. The legendary seducer Don Juan is an exemplar of the
aesthetic stage on life s way.
12. According to Kierkegaard, the ethical life is devoted to
general principles.
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13. According to Kierkegaard, the ethical life is invigorating
and free; the individual escapes the pressures of the will.
14. According to Kierkegaard, Kantian morality exemplifies
the ethical stage.
15. According to Kierkegaard, the ethical life has one virtue: It
satisfies our craving for meaning and stability.
16. The Kierkegaardian leap of faith involves what
Kierkegaard calls the teleological embrace of the ethical.
MULTIPLE CHOICE
17. Existentialism began as a reaction to _____ .
a. capitalism
b. subjective approaches to life
c. loss of respect for the individual
d. increased respect for the individual
18. Kierkegaard s philosophy was profoundly influenced by
.
a. his marriage to Regine Olsen
b. the birth of his son Michael
c. his breakup with Regine Olsen
d. the death of Regine Olsen
19. Kierkegaard claimed that he based his treatment of
Regine Olsen on _____ .
a. the story of Abraham and Isaac in the Bible
b. an old Danish song, Choose Love
c. a direct command from God
d. Hegel s philosophy
20. _____ is a condition that results when the nature and
needs of the individual are sacrificed for institutions,
abstractions, or groups.
a. Forlornness
b. Despair
c. Anxiety
d. Inauthenticity
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21. _____ is the subjective condition of an individual living
honestly and without making excuses.
a. Freedom
b. Joy
c. Authenticity
d. Maturity
22. Kierkegaard thought that _____ is the major existential
issue.
a. How should we live?
b. What am I to do?
c. What do I really believe?
c. Is knowledge possible?
23. Kierkegaard set himself the task of discovering the idea
_____ .
a. that cannot be doubted
b. that must be true
c. for which I can live and die
d. that can explain all other ideas
24. According to Kierkegaard, truth is _____ .
a. objective
b. subjectivity
c. beyond our reach
d. universal and absolute
25. Kierkegaard claimed that no system or theory can
adequately deal with _____ .
a. the individual
b. the group
c. objective truth
d. the mind
26. According to Kierkegaard, claims of objectivity and
disinterest are _____ .
a. always lies
b. desirable but possible only with great effort
c. possible if we only desire them
d. necessary stages leading to eudaimonia
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27. According to Kierkegaard, it is impossible to _____
without passion.
a. live
b. hope
c. be an authentic individual
d. philosophize
28. According to Kierkegaard, reason is _____ .
a. objective faith
b. metaphysically grounded
c. universally binding
d. a mere abstraction
29. Kierkegaard accused the present age of being _____ .
a. hedonistic
b. evil
c. passionless
d. too passionate
30. Kierkegaard insisted that collective identity is _____ .
a. inescapable
b. always somehow false
c. always somehow necessary
d. the glue that binds society
31. Kierkegaard condemned _____ .
a. leveling and abstract theories of equality
b. elitist attempts to rank individuals
c. giving preference to individuals over the group
d. faith as absurd
32. According to Kierkegaard, my _____ is the proof
that I believe.
a. will
b. station in life
c. life
d. religion
33. According to Kierkegaard, objective truths _____.
a. reveal what we believe and who we are
b. describe the individual externally
c. are about us
d. are not about us
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34. At one point, Kierkegaard imagines bringing a passionless
person into a state of passion by _____ .
a. terrifying him with visions of Hell
b. having him drive a wagon pulled by a Pegasus and
a worn-out Jade
c. seducing him with visions of the love of God cast
in terms of Kierkegaard s love of Regine Olsen
d. physically shaking him until he grew angry
35. According to Kierkegaard, in their efforts to instruct us,
objective approaches to philosophy _____ .
a. give us a blueprint for living that we can choose
to accept as is or modify
b. teach us how to exist
c. fail us when it comes to learning how to exist
d. are practical and passionate when properly
understood and applied
36. The Kierkegaardian self wants desperately to do what is
right yet lacks _____.
a. nothing
b. sufficient information upon which to act
c. everything but information
d. a conscience and a good will
37. Kierkegaard identifies _____ stages on life s way.
a. one true and three false
b. four
c. an infinite number of
d. three
38. According to Kierkegaard, existing is possible only
when we have _____ .
a. some sort of God-relation
b. something we can believe in
c. the God-relation
d. faith, hope, and courage
39. Kierkegaard offers _____ arguments for the existence of God.
a. no
b. five
c. causal and ontological
d. existential
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40. According to Kierkegaard, _____.
a. we are only in despair when we try to be what we
are not meant to be
b. despair is a state of mind and as such can be
conquered by will power
c. once we fall into despair, we are lost forever
d. we are in despair whether we know it or not
41. According to Kierkegaard, we have _____.
a. a single, hidden nature composed of the infinite
b. a double nature composed of the infinite and finite
c. a three-fold nature composed of aesthetic, ethical,
and religious impulses
d. no nature until we choose or create one
42. According to Kierkegaard, the _____ stage of life is
characterized by whim and caprice.
a. unreligious
b. ethically free
c. passionate
d. aesthetic
43. According to Kierkegaard, the legendary seducer Don
Juan is an exemplar of the _____ stage of life.
a. seductive
b. aesthetic
c. passionate
d. human, merely human
44. Which of the following is not one of Kierkegaard s
pseudonyms ?
a. A
b. A. B. C. D. E. F. Godthaab
c. Bishop Mynster
d. Hilarius Bookbinder
45. The _____ stage on life s way is where Kierkegaard thinks
most of us spend most of our lives.
a. ethical
b. aesthetic
c. conformist
d. social
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46. According to Kierkegaard, the _____ way of living is
boring.
a. ethical
b. religious
c. aesthetic
d. existential
47. According to Kierkegaard, the _____ way of life involves
making a commitment to the norms, principles, and
customs of society.
a. ethical
b. conformist
c. religious
d. normal
48. According to Kierkegaard, the _____ way of life involves
infinitizing myself by adopting universal principles.
a. religious
b. ethical
c. Godly
d. egalitarian
49. According to Kierkegaard, the ethical stage of life _____ .
a. flows seamlessly from the aesthetic stage
b. reflects God s will in universal principles
c. turns everything upside down by making humanity
the arbiter of good and evil
d. sets everything aright by making humanity the arbiter
of good and evil
50. Kierkegaard believed that Kantian (and Enlightenment)
notions of human autonomy _____ .
a. are good insofar as they go and insofar as they
establish objective evidence of God s good will
b. are necessary predecessors for becoming a subject
and for living authentically
c. are simply more palatable versions of religion for
our secular age
d. result in despair because human judgment is always
subject to doubt
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51. According to Kierkegaard, our most passionate ethical
commitments are to_____ .
a. nothing and no one ethical commitments are never
passionate
b. our culture
c. our kin
d. ourselves
52. According to Kierkegaard, the only way to escape despair
is by _____.
a. finding a meaning or purpose any purpose, so long
as it is heartfelt and passionate
b. committing ourselves to a Christian church
c. a teleological embrace of the ethical
d. a teleological suspension of the ethical
53. According to Kierkegaard, if one is ever to escape the
despair inherent in the crowd life, the aesthetic life, and
the ethical life, it is necessary to _____ .
a. find a way to harmonize the conflicting desires and
demands of modern life into a self-created whole
b. commit oneself to universal principles and then live
up to them
c. avoid the twin traps of boredom and lust
d. leap toward God and the religious way of life
54. According to Kierkegaard, Abraham was only able to
consider sacrificing Isaac because he was _____.
a. courageous and autonomous
b. supremely moral and ethical
c. desperate
d. willing to make a leap of faith that
went beyond reason and beyond the ethical
55. According to Kierkegaard, the whole history of
relationship to God is _____ .
a. one of give and take
b. only apparently absurd; seen correctly, it is
reasonable and clear
c. ethically pristine
d. ethically absurd
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Chapter 14
THE EXISTENTIALIST: SØREN KIERKEGAARD
1. Describe existentialism in your own words. In what sense is it a
reaction against previous philosophy? Explain in detail.
2. Sketch Kierkegaard s critique of false Christianity. What is
false Christianity ?
3. What was Kierkegaard s universal formula? How did it
influence his thinking? What did he learn from the episode with
Regina Olsen in this regard? What can it teach us about the
relationship between universal or general principles and particular
or specific choices? Explain and critique.
4. What did Kierkegaard mean by the crowd, and why was he so
critical of it? Do you agree with his assessment? Why? *
5. Explain what Kierkegaard meant when he said that truth is
subjectivity. Is this the same as truth is relative ? Why or why
not? *
7. What does Kierkegaard mean by becoming a subject ? Why is
becoming a subject so important to his philosophical enterprise?
8. Describe Kierkegaard s stages on life s way, showing how they
are related to one another and to becoming a subject. *
9. What is the leap of faith, and why does Kierkegaard characterize
it as the teleological suspension of the ethical ? *
10. Why did Kierkegaard write under so many pseudonyms? Why
did he write under pseudonyms at all? Explain how this habit
relates to his overall philosophy. Be specific. *
11. Explain what Kierkegaard means by passion and be sure to
refer to his analysis of the present age. Compare our own present
age with Kierkegaard s critique of his age. Do you think
Kierkegaard s basic critique is as insightful today as it was in his
time? Was it insightful then? Why or why not? *
12. Compare Kierkegaard s crowd to Nietzsche s herd
(Chapter 16) and to Heidegger s the they (Chapter 17). Are the
crowd, the herd, and the they the same thing? Explain. *
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CHAPTER 14 ANSWERS