Hagi Kenaan Tel-Aviv University

I swear, there is in me no wizardry o f words.I speak to you with silence like a cloud or a tree — Czeslaw Milosz, ‘Dedication’

Kierkegaard and the Language o f Silence

1. Can philosophy make room for silence? And, why should it? Isn’t silence a form of response that is ultimately non-philosophical?

In this paper, I wish to discuss these questions within the framework of the thought of the Danish philosopher, Soren Kierkegaard. It seems to me, that Kierke­gaard’s thinking is particularly enlightening in this context as it opens up the possi­bility of understanding the philosophical significance of silence in a manner that breaks away from the traditional, and still predominant, conception of silence as the limit of philosophical speech. Indeed, in the philosophical tradition, silence typically becomes significant when philosophy encounters what it cannot express in language. That is, silence typically comes forth and presents itself as a possibility in those — relatively uncommon — moments in which philosophy recognizes the limits of its language, in which philosophical language suddenly takes the form of a limitation. But philosophy, it seems, cannot call for the transgression of the boundaries of language without having the rug being pulled from under its own feet. And thus, in embracing silence — e.g., in opening itself to the mystical, the transcendent, the in­effable, etc. — philosophy seems to be declaring that its task has come to an end. Hence, we see that the appearance of the theme of silence in the history of philo­sophy is indeed based on a characteristic picture in which philosophy and silence are mutually exclusive: silence begins where philosophy ends.

2. In Kierkegaard, the problem of silence also arises in the context of the limits of language — and in particular, of abstract or theoretical language. Yet, I shall try to show that Kierkegaard elaborates the relation between silence and philosophical speech in a manner that no longer renders them external to each other, but, which, on the contrary, necessitates their essential intertwining. I shall begin with an explication of Kierkegaard’s attitude toward philosophy’s language, and I shall do this by offering an interpretation of a short aphorism that appears in ‘Diapsalmata’, the opening part of Kierkegaard’s Either/Or. The aphorism, or the parable, to which I wish to dedicate this discussion is the following:1. 1

1 S0ren Kierkegaard, Either/Or, vol. 1, trans. D. Swenson and L.M. Swenson, Princeton University Press,1959, 31.

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What philosophers say about reality is often as disappointing as a sign you see in a shop window, which reads: Pressing Done Here. If you brought your clothes to be pressed, you would be fooled; for the sign is for sale.

This aphorism tells of a disappointment, i.e., the disappointment that awaits for those who trust and follow philosophy. Moreover, this aphorism is based on an im­age whose unpacking should allow us to explain the sense(s) in which for Kierke­gaard, philosophy proves to be disappointing. The basic elements of this picture are quite clear. Philosophy, or philosophical language, is presented — indeed as a lin­guistic medium — as a sign in a shop window; and the reality for which philosophy claims to, but does not, account, is analogous to the interior of the shop; the person who is led astray by the sign is the naive believer in philosophy’s claim for truth. But, the picture is, in fact, more complicated than it seems and it requires that we proceed in measured steps. I shall thus approach the parable through three different successive readings by which I hope to shed light not only on Kierkegaard’s "com­plaint" against philosophy, but also on his understanding of the place of silence in philosophy.

3. A first reading: what primarily captures the eye in Kierkegaard’s picture is the connection between the disappointment of the individual and the false, misleading, or even the deceptive character of philosophy. More specifically, philosophy may be understood as misleading the individual in at least two ways. First, it does not provide for the individual an adequate representation of reality (i.e., of what the facts are inside the shop). And second, in its failure to represent reality in an adequate or true manner, philosophy is unable to practically instruct the individual, or serve as a guide for his everyday conduct. In other words, philosophy is present­ed as dubious not only because of the manner it misleads the individual about the nature of reality, but also because of the manner in which it stands in the way of the individual in realizing his/her human needs, that is, in ultimately preventing the individual from finding his/her way to — what may be understood as — happiness, or the good life. To put this schematically, we may say that philosophy disappoints the individual on both an epistemological and an ethical level, and that the latter kind of disappointment is problematized even further by the disparaging suggestion that the language of philosophy (the sign) is for sale. As we look more closely at this picture, it becomes clear, however, that certain nuances must be revised.

4. A second reading: rethinking the analogy between the language of philosophy and the sign in the window, we see that philosophy cannot simply be understood as framing false representations of reality. Taking this analogy seriously, we need to recognize that what creates the misleading effect of the window-sign is not so much the falsehood of its language as much as it is its false appearance in the guise of a representation; or in other words, that what is presented here as problematic and disappointing is not philosophy’s failure to represent adequately, but rather its

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failure to represent at all. Putting this in a slightly different perspective, we may say that the sign’s only reference is self-reference, that its only representational aspects are those of self-presentation. But, this should lead us to a reformulation of Kierke­gaard’s complaint: in analogy to the window sign, the philosophical form of lan­guage cannot, in principle, make room for the possibility of truth. It is not simply wrong, or untrue, but completely excluded from being in a relation to reality which opens the question of truth (or falsehood). That is, philosophy, according to Kierke­gaard, suffers from a structural failure, a failure that is integral to the philosophical medium, to philosophy’s language and thought. This structural condition prevents philosophy from engaging with those dimensions of reality that matter to the individ­ual. Or in other words, philosophy’s modus operandi is based on a misplacement of those areas of meaning that are crucial for the individual. But here, we have ar­rived at the crux of Kierkegaard’is critique of philosophical language.

5. Kierkegaard’s "complaint" against the workings of philosophical language is a re­curring theme in his writing, and is intrinsically tied to his critique of the manner in which systematic philosophy elides the question of human existence. For Kierke­gaard, "the difficulty that inheres in existence, with which the existing individual is confronted, is one that never really comes to expression in the language of abstract thought".2 That is, the meaningful ness of individual existence not only presents it­self as philosophy’s most crucial question, but it also brings philosophy into a criti­cal confrontation with its most crucial limitation. Existence, in other words, is pre­cisely what abstract thought cannot think, what theoretical language cannot express, and thus what systematic philosophy cannot encounter. The question is why? Or, more specifically, what exactly is the connection between the structure of abstract language and philosophy’s inability to capture, open up to, or come to terms with what Kierkegaard calls ‘existence’? I think that two features of abstract language stand out as primarily relevant here: generality (or universality) and possibility.

6. The character of the basic units of the language of thought — words or concepts — is always general. Words such as ‘chair’ or ‘tree’ or ‘friend’, for example, which we use for speaking about specific objects and people, are not tied, in themselves, to the specificity of that which we speak. Hence, whereas I can use the word ‘tree’ in referring to something very concrete and specific (e.g., the tree I see from my window), the word itself is a general category that necessarily sublates the singular­ity of that of which I speak. Furthermore, even if I try to describe the specificity of the tree — its colors, shades, the shapes of its leaves, etc. — the language that would be available to me is always already comprised of generic categories of signi­fication, e.g., green, elongated, etc. Similarly, as Kierkegaard focuses on the question of the intelligibility of ‘the existing individual’, he underscores the manner

2 Soren Kierkegaard, Concluding Unscientific Postscript, trans. D. Swenson, Princeton University Press,

in which the structure of language effaces the individual’s unique presence. The individual, in other words, becomes meaningful in — or through — language only in the form of general patterns of meaning which are severed from, and cannot in any way contain, his or her singularity.

In Concluding Unscientific Postscript, Kierkegaard points to the unbridgeable gap between existence and abstract language by using the following image: "To exist un­der the guidance of pure thought," he writes, "is like traveling in Denmark with the help of a small map of Europe on which Denmark shows no larger than a steel pen- point, aye, it is still more impossible".3 For Kierkegaard, philosophical language is very much like a useless map. And as in the case of the sign in the window shop, we find here again the analogy between philosophy and a form of representation which is meant to serve the needs of the individual, and yet, which fails to do so in principle. Moreover, like the window sign, the map is a representation which is not, in itself, incorrect or inaccurate, but which is indeed ineffectual in the context of use relevant to the individual. The map represents reality in a manner which is so general that it does not allow the individual to find his place, to locate himself, in regard to what is represented. Or in other words, the map’s scale of representation — its structure — presents reality in a manner which unavoidably fails to make room for the concrete individual and his domain of deliberation and action.

It seems to me, however, that the image of the map serves Kierkegaard’s analogy in yet another way. For Kierkegaard, the map — analogical to "pure thought" — is not only too general to contain the individual’s existence, but it also provides a representation which is completely external to the reality it represents. This is because the perspective which serves as a basis for the representation is not tied in any actual way to the geographical domain that is represented, but is always located at some indefinite point outside it. A map — e.g., of Europe — is a represen­tation that characteristically depends on the generalization of all possible perspecti­ves into an ideal — totally external — point of view from which all the represented points seem equally close (or distant). Another way to put this is to say, that the map, or philosophical thought, represents reality from an ideally constructed per­spective, or even better, that it provides a representation which is intrinsically a- perspectival.

7. The ideality of philosophical language, the inability of the space of thought to make room for actual personal perspectives, is interpreted by Kierkegaard as a fea­ture of a language whose objects are mere possibilities. For him, abstract language construes the realm of meaning on the basis of the possible rather than the actual. And thus, the very gesture of speaking about the existence of the individual is al­ready bound by a regulating structure that not only excludes existence from the do­main of the intelligible, but also leaves no trace of this exclusion. According to

2 5 2 HAGIKENAAN

3 Ibid.

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Kierkegaard, "existence constitutes the highest interest of the existing individual and his interest in his existence constitutes his reality". Yet, "what reality is cannot be expressed in the language of abstraction" because abstract thought operates as a "medium within which the concept [of reality] is thought not in reality but in possi­bility". That is, "all that is said about reality is really said within the sphere of the possible".4

8. As we consider further the sense in which existence is obscured by language, we see that the linguistic structure that Kierkegaard problematizes is not only part of philosophical discourse, but that it is also characteristic of our most ordinary language routines. In other words, language’s inability to encounter and embrace existence is not only a philosophical failure, but a much deeper human predicament: our realm of every — day meaning is structured as a common, essentially public, sphere in which the singular meaning of individual existence is necessarily ob­literated. That is, within our everyday forms of life the possibility of being meaning­ful excludes the possibility of being a genuine individual.

This way of putting things is indeed one possible formulation for what Kierke­gaard understands as the problem of authenticity. To be authentic is, in the literal sense of the word, to be oneself. And, as Kierkegaard shows, the possibility of truly being oneself is, in principle, not part of the public sphere in which the individual’s meaning is determined. In other words, as we become who we are as persons, meaningful in a variety of ways, our individuation is never singular, but is always already dependent on a public condition of meaningfulness. We, as persons, are — in the deep sense of the word — neither the source nor the masters of the ways we become meaningful and this is because our individuation is necessarily tied to forms of meaning which are already there in the public sphere of possibilities. Recognizing the inevitability of this structural condition, Kierkegaard is not led, however, to pessimism, but regards the hegemony of generality as a necessary starting point for challenging the commonly accepted order of meaning.

9. The problem of authenticity surfaces as a response to the apparent difficulty — perhaps even the impossibility — of becoming meaningful as one’s self in the face of a pre-given condition of meaning that is essentially external and general. Can the individual suspend the structure of generality so intrinsic to the phenomenon of meaning? Another way to put this question would be in terms of the relation be­tween existence and facts. Facts are often understood as the basic meaning units that comprise our world, and, as such, they seem to serve as grounds for the way we live our life with meaning. That is, they seem to constitute the basis for the domain of what can intelligibly be said. And thus, the question that concerns us is: can the meaning of the individual be reduced to factual meaning? In what sense does the

4 Ibid.. 279.

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meaning of individual existence transcend factual meaning? Or better, does the lan­guage of facts exhaust the meaning of the individual? How can we speak of the meaningfulness of the individual without submitting our speech to the reign of the factual? For Kiekegaard, these questions do not have a simple answer, and according to him, they ultimately lead to a paradox. The paradox is "that there is an inferiority that is incommensurable with exteriority".5

I shall not attempt to explicate here, however, the Kierkegaardian notion of the paradox with its ramifications in the aesthetic, the ethical, and the religious spheres of existence. But, since I do wish to give a sense of how Kierkegaard opens up the paradoxality of individual meaning, I shall focus on one specific figure that is cen­tral to his discussion: the figure of Abraham.

10. In Fear and Trembling, Kierkegaard approaches the problem of authenticity in a figurative manner. And in light of what has been said of abstract thought, this should not be surprising. Kierkegaard does not wish to posit the possibility of au­thenticity, because a language that posits — a propositional language — cannot, in principle, allow for the disclosure that concerns him. Hence, instead of saying what authenticity is, Kierkegaard attempts a showing of this possibility. And he does so by turning to a central figure in the imagination of the Judaic-Christian tradition. Given Kierkegaard’s preoccupation with the possibility of a radical form of individu­ality, his turn to the generally celebrated figure of Abraham may seem, at least at first sight, peculiar. Contrary to what we might expect, Kierkegaard does not deal with the aberrant, the marginal, or the anomalous which typically represent the pos-

' sibility of an opposition to communal consensus. But instead, focuses on a figure whose story has been completely taken over by the tradition which, cherishing it deeply, has turned Abraham into an exemplary model, a model for the public. This is of course not a coincidence.

For Kierkegaard sees in the renowned story of Abraham an opportunity to sub­vert the traditional understanding of individuality and faith. In particular, Kierke­gaard attempts to break away from the common conception of the greatness of Abra­ham according to which "the great thing was that he loved God in such a way that he was willing to offer him the best".6 For Kierkegaard, the crux of Abraham’s story does not lie in Abraham’s willingness to offer God something that is dear to him, but instead, in the significance of the difficult human situation in which Abraham finds himself: a situation in which he intentionally carries out a difficult and horrifying decision which is, in principle, unjustifiable. In other words, what Kierkegaard emphasizes in this story is neither Abraham’s total largess nordiis abso­lute obedience to God, but rather, his deliberate decision to murder his beloved son.

5 Soren Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling, trans. H.V. Hong and E.H. Hong, Princeton University Press,

H i There are a few aspects of this decision that should be taken into account. First, it is important to notice that Abraham’s loss in giving up his beloved child is not just a loss of a loved part of his world, but a loss of the very form of Abraham’s world. Isaac is not a simple object of love for Abraham, but the actual center of gravitation around which Abraham’s life is organized. Isaac is the fulfillment of the hope of Abraham and Sarah for a child (and in this sense, the justification of many long years of suffering); he is the source of their joy in old age, and is also the promise of a blessed future that extends beyond them. Hence, in giving up Isaac, Abraham is called to revoke the form that holds together the story of his life. But furthermore, what the call — or the decision — to kill Isaac implies is that Abraham must radically turn his back to, that he must deny, the fundamental ethical value of human life. Attempting to take the life of a person who has clearly done him no harm, Abraham indeed finds himself in the paradoxical position of intentionally acting against his most basic beliefs, breaking the primordial commitment that lends his life its human and social form. But, Abraham’s task is even more terrible, as he intends to kill a person — or better, a child — who is not only innocent harmless and helpless, but moreover, a trusting child whose well being is completely dependent on him. In other words, in addition to killing, Abraham is a person who decides to break his fatherly commitment to his son, or more precisely, who decides to betray his son.

12. Emphasizing these features of Abraham’s decision, Kierkegaard opens up the possibility for an alternative reading of Abraham’s story. According to this reading, Abraham exemplifies the possibility of a meaningful existence whose significance cannot be captured in terms of the language of thought. Abraham, in his turn against the human and the communal foundations of his existence, exemplifies a contradic­tion whose presence is meaningful, despite the fact that it makes no sense. To put this differently, we may say that Abraham exemplifies the possibility of a meaning­fulness that, in principle, resists explanation. Abraham, according to Kierkegaard, is a person who takes a radical course of action whose meaning — constituted by an internal contradiction — escapes understanding. The action he takes is directed at destroying what he loves and cares about and feels committed to. And at the same time, it is motivated by neither a practical aim nor a psychological reason. In other words, Abraham is a person whose deeds cannot be mapped onto a rational matrix of reasons, causes, and justifications (psychological, pragmatic, ideological, etc).

Abraham, according to Kierkegaard, is a person whose action is meaningful in a manner that transcends language. Or from a slightly different perspective, the manner in which Abraham differs from what can be said about him is not factual. The meaning of Abraham’s action cannot be captured in the form of a language or a thought because these forms of meaning essentially depend on the structure of facts. More specifically, although Abraham is not a murderer, the facts of the matter do not make him any different from one. Nothing makes Abraham different from a murderer. But we may also say, that what makes Abraham different from a

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murderer is nothing, and that this nothing is precisely where we should look for individual existence. That is, existence is found in a lacuna which, in the space of language, appears in the form of a nothing. Here, however, we are lead back to the question of silence.

13. Unable to communicate the significance of his action, Abraham finds himself in the position of "an emigrant from the sphere of the universal".7 Language is at his service as usual, but he can no longer make use of it, because the structure of language excludes the possibility of saying the one thing that really matters to him. In this sense, "Abraham cannot speak", and as "he cannot say that which would ex­plain everything (that is, so that it is understandable)",8 Abraham turns to silence.

Abraham remains silent — but he cannot speak. Therein lies the distress and Anxiety. Even though I go on day and night without interruption, if I cannot make m yself understood when I speak, than I am not speaking. This is the case with Abraham. He can say everything, but one thing he cannot say, and if he cannot say that — that is, say it in such a way that the other understands it — then he is not speaking. The relief provided by speaking is that it translates me into the universal.9

For Kierkegaard, Abraham’s silence is a manifestation of an authentic disposition toward his exile from the sphere of the intelligible. Abraham is a person who ex­periences and understands the impossibility of translating his existence into lan­guage. And in this respect, his silence is the sign of his intimate knowledge of both the limits of language and the dimensions of meaning that language cannot embrace.

For Abraham, silence is the only manner of embracing the paradox of his indi­vidual existence.

As explained above, the distress and anxiety in the paradox were due in particular to the silence: Abraham cannot speak, unless one wishes him out o f the paradox again, so that he suspends it in the decisive moment and thereby ceases to be Abraham and nullifies all that preceded.10

Yet, Kierkegaard, who tells us the story of Abraham’s silence, does not follow the silence of his hero. Kierkegaard has chosen to speak. That is, regardless of his ex­plicit critique of the manner in which the language of thought effaces the problem of existence, Kierkegaard — a prolific writer — does not seem to be interested in the possibility of leaving language behind. How are we to understand his position bn this matter? How does Abraham’s silence become relevant to the philosopher? And more generally, how does Kierkegaard’s critique of language bear on the possibility of engaging philosophically with the problem of existence? Is existence what we

1 Ibid., 115.8 Ibid.9 Ibid., 113.m Ibid., 118.

should ultimately remain silent about? Is silence the limit of philosophical speech? In order to answer these questions, I suggest we turn back to the parable with which this paper started.

14. Consider Kierkegaard’s aphorism once again:

KIERKEGAARD AND THE LANGUAGE OF SILENCE

What philosophers say about reality is often as disappointing as a sign you see in a shop window, which reads: Pressing Done Here. If you brought your clothes to be pressed, you would be fooled; for the sign is for sale.

I have already suggested that Kierkegaard’s parable about the sign in the window invites us to tie Kierkegaard’s apparent disappointment with philosophy to his cri­tique of philosophical language. According to this critique, philosophical language not only fails, as we have seen, to engage with the problem of existence, but, its failure stems from limitations that seem intrinsic to the linguistic medium. That is, the structure of language does not permit philosophy to open up to the meaningful­ness of existence. Hence, in analogy to the window sign which is essentially incap­able of representing the reality inside the shop, philosophical language too is a source of disappointment for the individual who relies on abstract language as means for coming to terms with his or her individuality. To put this differently, we have explained Kierkegaard frustration with philosophy in terms of the structural limita­tions of philosophy’s language; and furthermore, we have suggested, that for him, the turn to silence is, as in the case of Abraham, the expression of the possibility of overcoming this philosophical disappointment. Given this interpretation, I wish to propose now yet another — third — reading of the parable.

15. A third reading: according the parable, the individual is misled by the sign in the shop, and is thus disappointed. Yet, what or who exactly is the source of his dis­appointment? Where should we locate the error? or even better, how does the ques­tion of responsibility figure in this anecdote? The individual is indeed misguided by the sign, but at the same time, we cannot say that the individual is in any way de­ceived. That is, there is no deceitful intention in placing the sign in the window, and the sign in and of itself is also not deceptive. Why does the individual mistake the meaning of the sign then? The individual misunderstands the sign because his con­ception of language is false or over simplified, because his relation to the sign is governed by an inadequate picture of the workings of language.

To put this simply, the individual misunderstands the sign because he presup­poses, or takes for granted, that language is necessarily representational, that its essence is the depiction of facts. That is, his interpretation of the sign is forgetful of the wide and heterogeneous field of usability within which language operates. He forgets that language makes itself available to us in a variety of modes, and that these language modes are there for us to use and abuse, to make sense, and non­sense, to communicate, sing, surprise, and do things. In this respect, we may say that what lies at the heart of the individual’s disappointment is not so much the un­

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seemliness of the sign as much as the individual’s own blindness in regard to the horizon of the space of language. But this means that Kierkegaard’s expressed dis­appointment with philosophy is also based on an attitude which neglects the richness of the language possibilities open to philosophy. In other words, we should notice that Kierkegaard critique of philosophical language is itself dependent on an under­standing which identifies the language of thought as the language of facts. I think we should not hurry, however, to embrace this understanding which predetermines the limits of philosophy’s language. Instead, we should reopen the question of the relation between philosophy and individuality (or existence) by turning to, or by searching for, philosophical modes of speech whose structure is not fact-depicting. What would such a philosophical language look like? And where would it leave si­lence? I do not think that there is an a priori way to answer these question. That is, one first needs to go searching. Yet, it seems to me, that Kierkegaard’s own writing is one of the a more interesting examples of the search for such a philosophical lan­guage.

Hence, if we have previously underscored the apparent tension between Kierke­gaard’s own commitment to language and his praising understanding of Abraham’s silence, we may now be in a position to see that this tension might be resolvable. Moreover, I think that a first clue for proceeding in this matter can be found in the pseudonym that Kierkegaard uses in narrating his version of the story of Abraham: Johannes de Silentio. That is, for Kierkegaard, the author of Fear and Trembling is someone who clearly operates within the realm of language, yet — as his name indicates — he is, at the same time, someone who comes to language — or whose language comes to him — from silence. De Silentio is a writer whose language is not grounded in factual thinking, but is founded on, and emerges from, silence. In other words, de Silentio is the name, or the mark, of a philosophical attempt — and per­haps, a philosophical possibility — of speaking in the language of silence.

TURUN YLIOPISTON JULKAISUJA ANNALES UNI VERSITATIS TURKUENSIS

SARJA - SER. B OSA - TOM. 246 HUMANIORA

The Language of Silence

vol. I

Edited by Siegfried Jakel & Asko Timonen

TURUN YLIOPISTO TURKU 2001