The Two Ethical Sides of Faith as Depicted in Soren Kierkegaard and Sam Harris’ Work

Soren Kierkegaard and Sam Harris place faith at opposing sides of the moral spectrum. Kierkegaard believes that committing to one’s absolute duty to God is the only way to live a meaningful life and that Abraham enters the highest level of morality when he takes the leap of faith by agreeing to kill his son, whereas Sam Harris believes the leap of faith has been the cause of many immoral and heinous acts throughout history and should be done away with. Both of these great thinkers hold a generally unfavorable view of religious moderates but for contrasting reasons.

In Soren Kierkegaard’s “Fear and Trembling”, he dissects the Biblical story of Abraham and his teleological suspension of the ethical. Abraham was commanded by God to kill his long awaited son Isaac. Abraham obliges and begins to carry out the sacrifice of his only son but is stopped by God before the killing can take place. Abraham’s actions would be considered a leap of faith. He had no evidence to make him conclude that things would turn out alright but had faith that God would take care of him. To be a true leap of faith, the test that requires it must be an irrational act like the demand for Abraham to kill his son. It can not be a calculated decision or a “best-bet” scenario. (Martin PPT). This is the case for Abraham because he did not know that God would spare Isaac. The ethical or the “universal”, as Kierkegaard calls it, was Abraham’s temptation. The easy course of action for Abraham would have been to follow the the ethical route and spare Isaac. He underwent a “teleological suspension of the ethical”. Kierkegaard notes that this is a paradox. By ignoring what society might deem moral, Abraham enters into a higher realm of morality. He states that “As the single individual he became higher than the universal” (Kierkegaard 22). Kierkegaard believed that a true Christian subscribes to the highest moral calling of faith and must live a life of anxiety. He favors this over more passive types of Christians who use their religion as a social or ethical tool. Kierkegaard believes that faith only has meaning if it is difficult. This requires a leap of faith which lifts the individual above the universal.

Sam Harris argues that the religious “leap of faith” is a dangerous thing. In the beginning of his book, “The End of Faith”, Harris describes a situation in which a young man blows up a bus filled with innocent people. His family grieves for him but is also full of Pride. Harris then asks the reader to infer what religion the young man comes from. His specific faith is not important. The fact that the young man’s action appear irrational from the outside, shows that this is a prime example of Kierkegaard’s leap of faith. The young man has attempted to transcend the universal and become a Knight of faith. Harris argues for the universal. This situation is used to demonstrate the dangers of the leap of faith from the universal ethical perspective. Harris comes from an ethical school of thought similar to that of William K. Clifford. In his paper, “The Ethics of Belief “, Clifford argues that it is impossible to separate the action from the belief that inspired it. He believed that it is immoral to have beliefs based on insufficient evidence because these beliefs inevitably become actions and could affect other people negatively. This seems to be the case for Harris’ suicide bomber. His actions are based on faith rather than reason. His ill-informed beliefs end up killing innocent people. Harris states that “. . . every religion preaches the truth of propositions for which no evidence is even conceivable. This puts the ‘leap’ in Kierkegaard’s leap of faith”(Harris 23). To Harris, religious martyrdom is a leap of ignorance, or at best, uncertainty. It is immoral for someone to kill innocents for an idea that they have not properly examined. Harris sees this becoming even more of a problem as highly religious countries gain access to nuclear technology. “We can no longer ignore the fact that billions of our neighbors believe in the metaphysics of martyrdom,”(Harris 14). According to Harris, the group who perpetuates this ignorance towards the dangerous beliefs of extremists are religious moderates.

People defend religion saying that it is only a small percentage of religious extremists who act out their beliefs violently but Sam Harris believes that all religious people must hold some responsibility for tolerating and protecting the beliefs of extremists. “I hope to show that the very ideal of religious tolerance–born of the notion that every human being should be free to believe whatever he wants about God–is one of the principal forces driving us toward the abyss.” (Harris 15). Harris believes that moderates, while advocating religious tolerance have become apologists for the religious extremists. They impede rational criticism of religion by advocating acceptance of those who hold irrational beliefs. Harris identifies the two moderate myths that keep faith from rational criticism: “(1) most of us believe that there are good things that people get from religious faith . . . (2) many of us also believe that the terrible things that are sometimes done in the name of religion are the products not of faith per se but of our baser natures. . . “ (Harris 15). Religious people believe that their faith helps them to live an ethical social existence. Harris would say that this is untrue and that religion actually makes you less social and less ethical towards others. Moderates also believe that the people who commit terrible acts in the name of God do it for other hidden reasons like “greed, hatred and fear” not because of their faith. Harris argues that it is, in fact, because of their faith. It is impossible to fully respect people of another faith if you believe that they will inevitably burn in hell. Religion puts up walls between people and then unites them in violence(Harris 12 &15). Moderates cling to these myths because it keeps their own beliefs from scrutiny. Harris’ moral system seems to be based on what will benefit the most people and keep them from harm. Soren Kierkegaard would call this the “universal”. It is the widely accepted social norm of morality. Kierkegaard believed this was the moral existence of the moderates of his time and for that reason he was against them.

Kierkegaard argued that when we try to reduce faith to the “ethical” it means nothing. He noticed that the moderates used faith as a function of social norms and a social construct of belonging. He believed that this was a base level of morality. (Martin PPT). In “Fear and Trembling” Kierkegaard explains that the highest level of being was that of the “knight of faith”. To attain this status one must disregard ethical duties in service of God (Martin PPT). His views seem to align closer to that of the violent extremists that we see today than that of moderates. The man in Harris’ opening bus scene must know that killing innocent people is ethically wrong but he has a higher calling to God. Kierkegaard believed that the Bible should be interpreted literally and that moderates water it down to make it more accessible and make the teachings easier to comply with. He gives an example from Luke 14:26 which explains the absolute duty to God. The literal interpretation says that it requires hating your whole family and even your life. The religious scholars of Kierkegaard’s time took a moderate perspective on this verse by weakening the meaning of “to hate” and translating it to “love less” (Kierkegaard 29-30) Kierkegaard believed that scripture should be translated literally even if it says to hate your whole family because being a faithful christian is supposed to be a continuous and difficult process for the single individual. It does not matter if it negatively affects your relationships because the Knight of Faith must be higher than the “Universal” where the moderates operate.

After close examination we see that Harris and Kierkegaard have polarizing views on the issue of the leap of faith. Harris opposes it for the irrationality that leads one to make this decision and Kierkegaard praises it for the same reason. He argues that this very appearance of irrationality is what made Abraham great by allowing him to transcend the universal as the single individual. We also see that for Harris, moderates are too serious about faith by being ignorant of the unethical acts mandated in scripture and for impeding the rational scrutiny of religion. From Kierkegaard’s perspective, moderates are not serious enough because they use religion as a social and ethical tool by watering down scripture. They do not tremble in fear as he believes true christians should.