A measure of distance
and
therewith again about the peculiar difficulty I have to contend with
My dear reader!
In order to call thy attention to where we are, Christianly, in order to give thee an opportunity to measure the distance from the Christianity of the New Testament and the primitive age, allow me to make use for this purpose of two men who are regarded, each for his own sake but in different ways, as representatives of true Christianity, and who are universally known.
Take first Bishop Mynster. In the opinion of pretty much the whole population he was regarded as true Christian earnestness and wisdom.
However, this is the way things stood with Bishop Mynster. All his earnestness reached no further than the thought: in a humanly allowable and honest way, or indeed in a humanly honorable way also, to get through this life happily and well.
But this view of life is not at all that of the New Testament or of primitive Christianity. Primitive Christianity has such a militant attitude towards the world that its view is: not to want to slip through this world happily and well, but precisely to be on the alert to conflict with this world in dead earnest, so that after having thus fought and suffered, one might be able to face the Judgment, where the Judge (whom, according to the New Testament, one can love only by hating this world and one's own life in this world) will judge whether one has accomplished His will.
So there is a difference as wide as the earth, as wide as heaven, between the Mynsterish life -view (which properly is Epicureanism, enjoyment of life and the lust for life, belonging to this world) and the Christian view, which is that of suffering, of enthusiasm for death, belonging to the other world; yea, there is such a difference between these two life-views that the latter (if it were taken seriously, and not at the very most expressed rarely in a quiet hour) must appear to Bishop Mynster as a kind of madness.
Measure now, and thou wilt see that what under the name of Mynster thou art wont to regard as Christian earnestness and wisdom is, Christianly measured, lukewarmness and indifferentism. For thus indeed it is the difference must be described, as the difference between the will to contend in mortal combat with this world, not to be willing at any price to make friendship with this world (the Christian requirement), and, on the other hand, the will to slip through this world happily and well, at the utmost contending a little bit when this might contribute to slipping through this world happily and well.
Then take Pastor Grundtvig. G. is in fact regarded as a "sort of an Apostle,"38 representing enthusiasm, the courage of faith which fights for a conviction.
Let us now look more closely. The highest thing he has fought for is to get leave for himself and those who want to join him to state what he understands by Christianity. For this cause he would throw off the yoke which the State Church laid upon him. It shocked him that they wanted to use the police power to prevent him from exercising his freedom.
Good. But, if then G., for himself and his party, had attained what he wanted, it also was his notion to let the whole monstrous illusion remain in force, that the State makes itself out to be Christian, the people imagine that they are Christians, in short, that every blessed day an insult is offered to God, the crime of lèse-majesté is committed by falsifying the conception of what Christianity is. To fight on that front surely never occurred to G. No, freedom for himself and whoever might be in agreement with him, freedom to state what he and those with him understood by Christianity, that is the utmost he has willed — and then he would be tranquil, tranquillized in this life, belonging to his family, and in other respects living like those who are essentially at home in this world, and perhaps would call his tranquillity tolerance, tolerance towards the others. ..the other Christians.
Think now what passion there was in primitive Christianity, without which it never would have come into the world; propose to one of those figures the question, "Dare a Christian tranquillize himself in this way?" "Abominable," he would reply, "horrible, that a Christian, if only he might be allowed for himself to live as he would, that a Christian should tranquilly keep silent in the face of the fact that God every day is mocked by people pretending by millions to be Christians and worshiping Him by taking Him for a fool, that in the face of that he should keep silent, and not instantly — for the honor of God — venture sufiferingly in among those millions, gladly suffering for the doctrine!" For let us not forget that whereas in one sense Christianity is doubtless the most tolerant of all religions, inasmuch as most of all it abhors the use of physical power, it is in another sense the most intolerant, inasmuch as its true confessors recognize no limit with respect to compelling others by suffering themselves, compelling others by suffering their illtreatment and persecution.
Measured by this measure, it is easily seen that G. can never properly be said to have fought for Christianity; he really only fought for something earthly, civil freedom for himself and his adherents; and he has never fought with Christian passion. No, in comparison with the passion of primitive Christianity G.'s passion is lukewarmness and indifferentism.
What deceives us with respect both to Mynster and to Grundtvig is that, living in an age which had no notion whatever of primitive Christianity, they have by comparison with such an age attained respectively a reputation for earnestness and wisdom, and for enthusiasm and the courage of faith.
But if it is true that in a given age the two most prominent representatives of Christianity, who are regarded as earnestness and wisdom, enthusiasm and the courage of faith, must when measured by the measure of primitive Christianity be said to be lukewarmness and indifferentism, one gets from this a conception of the whole age and of the peculiar difficulty I have to contend with.
The difficulty consists in the fact that the whole age has sunk into the profoundest indifferentism, has no religion whatever, is not even in a condition for religion.
The misleading thing is that they call themselves "Christians," and that the people are not conscious of what indifferentism properly is, or that this is the most pernicious form of indifferentism.
By indifferentism one commonly understands having no religion at all. But resolutely and definitely to have no religion at all is something passionate, and so is not the most dangerous sort of indifferentism. Hence too it occurs rather rarely.
No, the most dangerous sort of indifferentism and the most common is to have a particular religion, but a religion which is watered down and garbled into mere twaddle, so that one can hold this religion in a perfectly passionateless way. That is the most dangerous sort of indifferentism; for precisely by having this trumpery under the name of religion, a person, so he thinks, is secured, made inaccessible, against the reproach of having no religion.
All religion has to do with passion, with having passion. It will be true therefore of every religion, especially in ages of rationalism or common sense, that it has only very few genuine adherents. On the other hand, there are thousands who take a little something out of that religion, and then dispassionately (i.e. irreligiously, indifferently) have... that religion. That is to say, by having that religion they are (though they are completely indifferent) assured against the reproach of having no religion.
Herein lies the difficulty I have to contend with, a difficulty like that of punting a boat off a shoal where the ground on all sides is quaking bog, so that when the pole is thrust down it gives way and offers no resistance.
What I have before me is indifferentism, the profoundest, the most pernicious and the most dangerous sort of indifferentism. It is a society of which the Apostle Paul would say, "Christians! These men Christians! Why, they have no religion at all, they are not even in a condition to have religion!" A society of which Socrates would say, "They are not men, but inhumanized by being the public."
They all of them arc.the public. This human question, whether in and for itself an opinion is true, does not concern them; what concerns them is, how many hold this opinion. Aha! For number decides whether an opinion has physical might; and that is what concerns them through and through, down to the individual in the nation — ah, there is no individual, every individual is the public.
So in the end it becomes a sort of sensual pleasure, corresponding to the pleasure it must have been to be a spectator of the fights of wild beasts in the Roman circus, it becomes a sort of sensual pleasure to witness in the capacity of "the public" this fight, where a single man who only has strength of spirit and at no price would have any other, is fighting for that religion which is the religion of sacrifice against this gigantic corpus of 1000 tradesmen-priests, who decline with thanks the offer of spirit, but heartily thank the Government for salary, titles, decorations, and the congregation for...their sacrifice, the offering.
And because the situation on the whole is this, namely, the profoundest indifference, it is made in turn all too easy for the individual who is a trifle more advanced to become self-important, as though he were the earnest man, a man of character, etc. — There is a young man — he feels indignant about the general lukewarmness and indifference, he an enthusiast and would also express his enthusiasm, he ventures. ..to express it anonymously. Well-meaning as he doubtless is, and that's the pleasing part about it, it perhaps escapes his notice that this is rather weak, and he lets himself be deluded by the consideration that in comparison with the prevailing lukewarmness this appears to be something. — Or it is an older man, an earnest citizen, he is shocked at the lukewarmness and indifference of many people who would rather hear nothing about religion. He on the contrary reads, procures whatever is published, talks about it, declaims zealously. ..in the parlor; and it perhaps escapes his notice that, Christianly, this is not really earnestness, that it is earnestness only in comparison with that which never ought to be used for comparison if one would go forward; for that forward striving only becomes possible by comparison with what is ahead, the more advanced.
"Yea, O God, if Thou wert not omnipotence which is able omnipotently to compel, and if Thou wert not love which is able irresistibly to move the heart! . . . But Thy love moves me, the thought of daring to love Thee prompts me to accept my lot joyfully and thankfully, to be a sacrifice, sacrificed on behalf of a generation," etc. Cf. "This Has To Be Said" [the last paragraph].
Translator's Footnote
38Has in view an article in the Flyve-Post which spoke of Grundtvig as "a man with a certain Apostolic authority." Cf. the Journal, EP '54-'55, p. 535.