Thursday, July 17, 2008

Kierkegaard on Truth as Struggle

"Truth is not something you can appropriate easily and quickly. You certainly cannot sleep or dream yourself into the truth. No, you must be tried, do battle, and suffer if you are to acquire truth for yourself. It is a sheer illusion to think that in relation to truth there is an abridgment, a short cut that dispenses with the necessity of struggling for it." (Kierkegaard, Practice in Christianity, as cited in Provocations, p. 51, Orbis Books, 2002)

Why is it, then, that we seek easy "truth"? Just look at all the bestselling self-help books, even in the Christian market. Is it because we don't want to struggle intellectually - don't want to use our minds? Has thinking become too hard or has life become too easy?

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