Clare Carlisle on Kierkegaard's Fear and Trembling

Philosophy Bites

Nigel Warburton

Education, Philosophy, Society & Culture

4.6 • 2K Ratings

🗓️ 10 August 2008

⏱️ 13 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Soren Kierkegaard's Fear and Trembling retells and interprets the story of Abraham and Isaac. In Kierkegaard's hands the story becomes a model for the human predicament. In this episode of the Philosophy Bites podcast Clare Carlisle provides an interesting overview of some of Kierkegaard's themes in this book.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is philosophy bites with me David Edmonds and me Nigel Warburton.
0:07.0	Philosophy bites is available at www
0:09.6	philosophy bites.com.
0:11.6	God tells you to kill your son. Should you obey his will?
0:16.5	Soan Kakerguard was a 19th century Danish philosopher and Christian theologian. He had a prolific
0:22.0	but short life.
0:23.4	He died in 1855, aged 42.
0:26.5	In his book Fear and Trembling, written like several of his works under a pseudonym and in different
0:31.0	voices, Kikagard focuses on the biblical story of God's call on Abraham
0:35.8	to sacrifice Isaac, and on the anguish choice Abraham then faces. Fear and trembling is one reason
0:42.0	why Kikagard is credited with being among other things, a father of existentialism.
0:46.3	Claire Carlisle is a Kekigard scholar at Liverpool University.
0:50.3	Claire Karelle, welcome to Philosophy Bites.
0:52.8	Hello.
0:53.8	Now the topic we're considering today is Soron Kieker-Gard's book Fear and Trembling.
0:59.9	That's a book which focuses on a particular biblical story. I wonder if you could say a little bit about that.
1:04.5	Well it focuses on the story of Abraham and Isaac from the Hebrew Bible and basically the story is God commands
1:12.0	Abraham to take his only son Isaac up to Mount
1:15.8	Mariah and to sacrifice him there. Abraham embarks on a three-day journey, takes
1:20.7	Isaac up, prepares the altar.
1:23.0	Isaac's lying there on the altar and Abraham raises his knife and then as he does so,
1:29.0	a voice says, you don't need to sacrifice Isaac as you can sacrifice a ram instead.
	...

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