A Critical Explanation of the Relationship between Thinking about Death and the Meaning of Life in Kierkegaard’s Philosophy

Søren Aabye Kierkegaard is one of the founders of the Existentialism school. He criticizes on the one hand the existing approach to Christianity and on the other hand the application of rational method to religious studies, and eagerly looks for a ardent sense of life. In his view, the meaningful life is deeply interwoven with the religious life, i.e. the life and death of the human are in the celestial sphere of faith. It is precisely through this lens that he is considered an avid explorer of the original and meaningful theme of life in a new manner, one which finally leads him to the attainment of a zealous belief in God. Embarking upon a religious reflection and floating in a profound thought which revolves about “death”, he addresses the three domains of preference, ethics, and religion so as to achieve the celestial sphere of religious faith through a dialectic path. On that sphere, the human only interacts with the Absolute Being – or as he puts it, in a “one to one” life – at the highest point of meaningful life (which is the true/existential life) in the safe beach of the religious faith, where he achieves peace like his great hero Ibrahim (a). This article aims at explaining and critically analyzing this Danish theosophist’s thoughts about the relationship between the two foregoing substances, and to specify this foundational point that the only outcome of the human’s “thinking about death” can only be the creation of the possibility and capacity for him to achieve the religious domain. In fact, only attaining and gripping of the divine values and innate disposition (which are entrusted to the human in his essence) can present Kierkegaard with the original themes he intends. Another interesting point is that his tendency to “the generation of meaning” rather than “discovering the meaning” in the specification of the meaning of life can bring about a domineering approach for the contemporary human, as the domineering history of the modern human is a proof for this claim.