X1 A 517). See Letters, KW XXV, Letter 213 (July 1849).

65 See Supplement, pp. 157–61 (Pap. X5 B 15, 16, 18–20).

66 KW XX (SV XI 213–17).

67 See Supplement, pp. 163–65 (Pap. IX A 498–500).

68 See Supplement, p. 163 (Pap. IX A 421).

69 KW XX (SV XII 137 ff.).

THE SICKNESS UNTO DEATH

A CHRISTIAN PSYCHOLOGICAL
EXPOSITION FOR UPBUILDING
AND AWAKENING

by Anti-Climacus

Herr! gieb uns blöde Augen
für Dinge, die nichts taugen,
und Augen voller Klarheit
in alle deine Wahrheit.

[Lord, give us weak eyes
for things of little worth,
and eyes clear-sighted
in all of your truth.]

PREFACE [XI 117]

Many may find the form of this “exposition” strange; it may seem to them too rigorous to be upbuilding and too upbuilding to be rigorously scholarly. As far as the latter is concerned, I have no opinion. As to the former, I beg to differ; if it were true that it is too rigorous to be upbuilding, I would consider it a fault. It is, of course, one thing if it cannot be upbuilding for everyone, because not everyone is qualified to do its bidding; that it has the character of the upbuilding is something else again. From the Christian point of view, everything, indeed everything, ought to serve for upbuilding.1 The kind of scholarliness and scienticity that ultimately does not build up is precisely thereby unchristian. Everything essentially Christian must have in its presentation a resemblance to the way a physician speaks at the sickbed; even if only medical experts understand it, it must never be forgotten that the situation is the bedside of a sick person. It is precisely Christianity’s relation to life (in contrast to a scholarly distance2 from life) or the ethical aspect of Christianity that is upbuilding, and the mode of presentation, however rigorous it may be otherwise, is completely different, qualitatively different, from the kind of scienticity and scholarliness that is “indifferent,” whose lofty heroism is so far, Christianly, from being heroism that, Christianly, it is a kind of inhuman curiosity. It is Christian heroism—a rarity, to be sure—to venture wholly to become oneself, an individual human being, this specific individual human being, alone before God, alone in this prodigious strenuousness and this prodigious responsibility; but it is not Christian heroism to be taken in by the idea of man in the abstract or to play the wonder game with world history.3 All Christian knowing, however rigorous its form, ought to be concerned, but this concern is precisely the upbuilding. Concern constitutes the relation to life, to the actuality of the personality, and therefore earnestness from the Christian point of view; the loftiness of indifferent knowledge is, from the Christian point of view, a long way from being more earnest—Christianly, it is a witticism, an affectation. Earnestness, on the other hand, is the upbuilding.

Therefore, in one sense this little book is such that a college student could write it, in another sense, perhaps such that not every professor could write it. [XI 118]

But that the form of the treatise is what it is4 has at least been considered carefully, and seems to be psychologically correct as well. There is a more formal style that is so formal that it is not very significant and, once it is all too familiar, readily becomes meaningless.

Just one more comment, no doubt unnecessary, but nevertheless I will make it: once and for all may I point out that in the whole book, as the title indeed declares, despair is interpreted as a sickness, not as a cure. Despair is indeed that dialectical. Thus, also in Christian terminology death is indeed the expression for the state of deepest spiritual wretchedness, and yet the cure is simply to die, to die to the world.5

1848

INTRODUCTION [XI 121]

“This sickness is not unto death” (John 11:4). And yet Lazarus did die; when the disciples misunderstood what Christ added later, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I go to awaken him out of sleep” (11:11), he told them flatly “Lazarus is dead” (11:14).6 So Lazarus is dead, and yet this sickness was not unto death; he was dead, and yet this sickness is not unto death. We know that Christ had in mind the miracle that would permit his contemporaries, “if they would believe, to see the glory of God” (11:40), the miracle by which He raised Lazarus from the dead; therefore “this sickness” was not only not unto death, but, as Christ predicted, was “for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified by means of it” (11:4). But even if Christ did not resurrect Lazarus, is it not still true that his sickness, death itself, is not unto death? When Christ approaches the grave and cries out with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out” (11:43), is it not plain that “this” sickness is not unto death? But even if Christ had not said that, does not the mere fact that He who is “the resurrection and the life” (11:25) approaches the grave signify that this sickness is not unto death: the fact that Christ exists, does it not mean that this sickness is not unto death! What good would it have been to Lazarus to be resurrected from the dead if ultimately he had to die anyway—of what good would it have been to Lazarus if He were not He who is the resurrection and the life for everyone who believes in Him! No, it may be said that this sickness is not unto death, not because Lazarus was raised from the dead, but because He exists; therefore this sickness is not unto death. [XI 122] Humanly speaking, death is the last of all, and, humanly speaking, there is hope only as long as there is life. Christianly understood, however, death is by no means the last of all; in fact, it is only a minor event within that which is all, an eternal life, and, Christianly understood, there is infinitely much more hope in death than there is in life—not only when in the merely human sense there is life but this life in consummate health and vitality.

Christianly understood, then, not even death is “the sickness unto death”; even less so is everything that goes under the name of earthly and temporal suffering: need, illness, misery, hardship, adversities, torments, mental sufferings, cares, grief. And even if such things were so hard and painful that we human beings or at least the sufferer, would declare, “This is worse than death”—all those things, which, although not sickness, can be compared with a sickness, are still, Christianly understood, not the sickness unto death.

That is how sublimely Christianity has taught the Christian to think about earthly and worldly matters, death included. It is almost as if the Christian might become haughty because of this proud elevation over everything that men usually call misfortune or the worst of evils. Nevertheless, Christianity has in turn discovered a miserable condition that man as such does not know exists. This miserable condition is the sickness unto death.