                           20020107.00

                 TAGD (Through a glass, darkly)

     Recent contributions to this list have pondered the question
whether or not Kierkegaard should be considered a "pluralist" in
matters of religion, and indeed, whether this question is
relevant, inasmuch as Kierkegaard is asserted to have lived in an
environment that had "only one religion", namely the state
sponsored Danish Lutheran Church.

     That thesis seemed to me implausible, and worth looking
into.  From a simple search on the Internet I ascertained that in
1801, the Jewish population of Copenhagen was 1794 of 100975
souls, or 1.776%.  By 1840, the Jewish population of Copenhagen
had grown to 2248. Roman Catholics were also said to be
represented in Denmark in the 19th century but I was unable to
find even an estimate of their numbers. I made no effort to
ascertain the number, if any, of Anglicans, Calvinists, Quakers,
Mennonites, Anabaptists, Greek Orthodox or Moslems.

     As the courageous protection against German genocide which
the Danes of the 20th Century extended to their Jewish
compatriots might suggest, Danish Jews seem to have been accepted
in Copenhagen also in the nineteenth century without overt
harrassment; the only restriction on their freedom being the
legal requirement that the children of mixed marriages be raised
as Lutherans.

     In 1805 the Jewish community in Copenhagen established a
school for boys; a girls' school was started five years later.
Denmark's Jews were granted civil equality on March 29, 1814, by
Royal Decree, and, the King being concerned that no child should
be left behind, he required that Jewish children pass a public
examination before graduation. And that is where the trouble
started.

     The graduation ceremony was politically so successful both
with Jews and with Christians, that weekly semi-secular services
were inaugurated.  Persecution then befell Copenhagen Jewry not
from without, but, significantly, from within.  The issue, - you
guessed it, - was religious pluralism, the absence of orthodoxy
from the newly established assemblies.  "A vicious intracommunal
struggle erupted ... each side sought to win the government to
its position, with devastating results.  Families split; deep
animosities emerged in a community already fragmented religiously
into a dozen prayer groups ... " (Response to Modernity, Michael
A. Meyer (no relation) Oxford University Press ISBN
0-19-506342-2, p. 145)

     As one contemplates Kierkegaard's potential or actual
religious pluralism, or lack thereof, one might do well to
remember that in addition to spiritual truth, as transparency of
the Self before God, there is also historical truth, which
requires to be respected and which has a meaning of its own, even
if it is inadequate sustain the soul's salvation.  It is, I
think, only from the point of view of contemporary marketing
strategy, that the non-Lutheran population of 19th century
Denmark can be considered insignificant. Surely a conscientious
pastor in Copenhagen could not have ignored the presence in his
city of more than 2248 lost souls doomed to perdition, where the
model after whom he patterned himself was distraught by the loss
of only a single one, or one percent of the sheep population.

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