                           19971209.00

Udo Doedens writes:

> Dear Kierkegaard-readers,
>
> As you probably know the Danish language has at least two words for
> forgiveness: Tilgivelse and Forladelse. On the whole Tilgivelse is a
> weaker form of forgiveness than Forladelse; it doesn't necessarily
> restore the relationship between the forgiving person and his or her
> offender (see for instance P.E. Mueller, Dansk Synonymik, p. 117f).
>    Now I am not sure if this difference plays an important part
> in Kierkegaard's thinking about forgiveness. At first sight it seems
> as if he considers the words to be synonymous. Of course I could investigate
> the problem myself, but I wonder if there is someone among you that has
> some opinion on this question. Does anyone know of some helpful
> article on this matter?
>    Thanks for your help.
>


     I thank Udo Doedens for his inquiry, which serves, to my
mind at least, to redirect our attention to Kierkegaard's writing
and to Kierkegaard's thought. A computer search of the entire
Samlede Vaerker yields, by the computer's count, 5 instances of
the use of the word Tilgivelse and and 14 instances of the use of
"Forladelse". I shall be pleased to forward a copy of the results
of the computer search (in Danish, of course) to anyone who
requests it. My own review of these texts will take a long time.

     It occurs to me, as a preliminary consideration, to be
unlikely that systematic distinctions such as those for which Udo
Doedens is looking, were in fact made by Kierkegaard. They were
not his style.  I suspect that Kierkegaard's rejection of
systematic philosophies entailed ipse facto a rejection also of
that reification of words which is implicit in the hypothesis
that Tilgivelse and Forladelse have distinct and definable
disparate meanings.  Such reification is a process integral to
the construction of philosophical systems.  If I read him
correctly, Kierkegaard used language not as did Kant, Hegel and
Fichte, attempting to fashion a conceptual model of reality.
Kierkegaard's style is that of a poet. He used language to
express, to reflect, to try to communicate intellectual and
emotional experience: In Kierkegaard's writings it is not the
definition of the word which gives meaning to the context, but on
the contrary: it is the context that imbues the word with its
significance.

     For example: among the first of the citations of Tilgivelse
that my computer search retrieved was the account of the
discovery of the papers of Either Or.  It is in the charming
fantasy with which Kierkegaard illustrates his contention that
the outward is not the inward that the term Tilgivelse occurs. It
is not the forgiveness of God, or of Kierkegaard's father, or
even of Bishop Mynster that Kierkegaard beseeches, but the
forgiveness of a piece of furniture, a desk, to be exact,
referred to in Swenson's translation with unintended
suggestiveness as a secretary; a secretary that was in fact
clobbered with a hatchet.  Whether the term "secretarien" in fact
has the same dual meaning in Danish as does the English,
"secretary", I do not know.  (In German, the desk is referred to
by the masculine "der Sekretaer", while human secretaries are
called der Sekretaer or die Sekretaerin, according to their
gender.) In any event, Victor Eremita's erotic passion for
"secretarien" is made so explicit as to be undeniable.  The
passage strikes me, when I reread it now, as an alarming parody
of marital discord and domestic violence, and Kierkegaard himself
refers to "et Gru vaekkende Hug" (Einen Grauen erweckenden
Schlag), in English: a blow that awakens terror. Not as Swenson
translates, "a blow, shocking to see." For "shock," as we
physicians know, is a somnolent state, while "Gru", if I
translate correctly, is an emotion of intense active anxiety.

     However this may be, the editor of the papers of Either Or,
Victor Eremita, has allegedly espied the secretary in the window
of a pawnshop.  He falls in love with it at first sight.  He
makes detours on his daily intinerary to get a peek at it,
revisits the pawnshop under other pretexts, wishing only the
opportunity of yet another encounter with the object of his
passion.  Finally, having brought it home, he delights in its
presence, and all is well, until one early morning, when he is
about to depart on a journey, when the taxi is already waiting at
the door, the secretary denies him access to the money which he
needs for the trip; the drawer in which he had placed it for
safekeeping will not open.

        Blodet steg mig til Hovedet, jeg blev forbittret.
        Som Xerxes lod Havet pidske, saaledes besluttede jeg
        at tage en forfaerdelig Haevn.  En Haand/oxe blev hentet.
        Med den bibragte jeg Secretairen et Gru vaekkende Hug.

       "The blood rushed to my head, I became angry.
        As Xerxes ordered the sea to be lashed, so I resolved
        to take a terrible revenge. A hatchet was fetched.
        With it I dealt the secretary a shattering blow, shocking to see."

whereupon not the drawer that holds the money, but another secret
drawer disclosing the manuscript of Either Or breaks open.  And
it is in remorse for this act of violence that Victor Eremita
asks Tilgivelse on the part of the secretary.

       "i mit Hjerte bad jeg Secretairen om
        Tilgivelse for den ublide Behandling,
        medens min Tanke fandt sin Tvivl bestyrket,
        at det Udvortes dog ikke er det Indvortes,"

       "In my heart I begged the secretary
        for forgiveness for the harsh treatment,
        while my thought found its doubt strengthened,
        that the external is not the internal,"

     It is not for me, but for a more stalwart defender of
feminism to declare to what extent, if at all, the foregoing
passage is relevant to domestic violence, and if so, whether or
not the secretary should forgive Victor Eremita's assault as he
had begged. And a critic more attuned to the contemporary spirit
than myself must adjudge whether this passage implies that Victor
Eremita was at heart, - since the outside is not the inside, - a
paragon of domestic tranquillity, or whether Regine Olsen can
thank her lucky stars.

     As for Udo Doedens' inquiry, there is obviously much more to
Tilgivelse in Kierkegaard's work than forgiveness for the battery
of a once much admired secretary; but whatever else we find, it
seems to me that to keep Kierkegaard's theology and his poetry in
perspective, we ought not forget this passage in which he
suggested that a piece of furniture might render Tilgivelse for
an assault with a hatchet.  If I am correct that in Kierkegaard's
writing, the meaning of words is defined by their context, then,
in the instance cited, Tilgivelse is a joke.

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