Without Risk there is no Faith
Without risk there is no faith. Faith is precisely the contradiction between the infinite passion of the individual’s inward- ness and the objective uncertainty. If I am capable of grasping God objectively, I do not believe, but precisely because I cannot do this I must believe. … Without risk there is no faith, and the greater the risk, the greater the faith; the more objective security, the less inwardness (for inward- ness is precisely subjectivity), and the less objective security, the more profound the possible inwardness.
In Fear and Trembling (1843), Kierkegaard recalled the biblical account of Abraham preparing to sacri- fice his son at God’s command. The moment that Abraham lifted the knife to kill his son captures what Kierkegaard meant by religious faith. Such faith is a leap into the darkness accompanied by fear, dread, and anguish. It is precisely the discrepancy existing between human understanding and ulti- mate truth that creates a paradox. The paradox is the understanding that there are things we can never know, and the greatest paradox of all (the “absolute paradox”) is God. We know that God exists, and at the same time, we know that we cannot com- prehend him; that is a paradox. Fortunately, God gave humans a way of dealing with such paradoxes, including the absolute paradox, and that was faith. We must have faith in eternal truths because there is no way for us to embrace them objectively. The par- adox that God became a finite being in the person of Christ can never be explained rationally; it must be taken on faith.
