What is it about?
First, the analysis addresses Levinas’s critique of Kierkegaard, where the Dane is accused of reducing ethics to an isolated subjectivity that sacrifices its relation with the Other in favor of God. Then, the Levinasian reading of Fear and Trembling and of Kierkegaard’s philosophy in general is discussed. Subsequently, in the third section, the ethical and the religious are examined on the basis of the two works chosen for comparison. Finally, the tension between the ways in which both authors conceive ethics and religion is presented, suggesting that the distinctions each makes between these two spheres (ethics and religion) are fraught with ambiguity.
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Why is it important?
It considers whether their proposals share common elements that could serve to bring them conceptually closer.
Perspectives
The emphasis is placed on two seminal works of contemporary thought: Kierkegaard’s Fear and Trembling and Levinas’s Totality and Infinity—with the aim of understanding how these authors formulate such a foundation in two indispensable works of their respective philosophies.
Gabriel Leiva Rubio
Universitat de Barcelona
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: La fundamentación trascendental de lo ético en Kierkegaard y Lévinas: un estudio comparativo a partir de Temor y temblor y Totalidad e infinito., Anales del Seminario de Historia de la Filosofía, September 2025, Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM),
DOI: 10.5209/ashf.98738.
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