Religion and Ethics: a Comparison between Kierkegaard's Approach and the Asharite's Approach

According to Søren Kierkegaard, ethics happens at the religious stage, which is the third stage of life, and its fundamental element is submissiveness to the categorical imperatives of the religion. Moreover, general, common and intellectual values are totally irrelevant in ethics. Further, based on the Asharites’ standpoint, ethics is characterized by the element of good and evil and by the religious, divine and legal duties, as opposed to the good and evil and the inherent and intellectual duties. Hence, neither in Kierkegaard’s standpoint on ethics nor in that of Asharites does intellect play the role of the ethical criterion, ethical knowledge, ethical duty or ethical motivation, and these stages all belong to religion. The present paper aims at reviewing the religious ethics of Kierkegaard as well as that of Asharites and will also explain their differences in their common approach. While the Asharites initially derive the ethical indications and rules from religion, Kierkegaard basically believes in the indication and the rule of intellect; however, the categorical imperative of the religion causes the indication and the rules of intellect to be suspended. Furthermore, contrary to Kierkegaard who derives the valued and necessary concepts of ethics from intellect, the Asharites’ version of ethics is dependent upon religion even in the domains of ethical meanings and concepts.