Literally just decades after decades of losing

Having big doomer vibes rn :deeper-sadness:

              • a_blanqui_slate [none/use name, any]
                ·
                4 years ago

                Ole Kierky boy divided people into three stages of development.

                First you have the 'slaves' of the aesthetic realm; these are the people a leftist would describe as steeped in the ideology of capitalist realism and just basically take things at face value for what they.

                Beyond that you have the 'knights of infinite resignation', these are the people that realize that things could and should be different, but are resigned to the fact that they will not be owing to the seeming impossibility of achieving such change.

                Finally, you have the 'knights of faith', those who realize the world can and should be different, and assert axiomatically through faith that it will be different. No matter how seemingly impossible it is to achieve, no matter how much the world around them tries to tell them otherwise.

                Most people live dejectedly in worldly sorrow and joy; they are the ones who sit along the wall and do not join in the dance. The knights of infinit[e resignation] are dancers and possess elevation. They make the movements upward, and fall down again; and this too is no mean pastime, nor ungraceful to behold. But whenever they fall down they are not able at once to assume the posture, they vacillate an instant, and this vacillation shows that after all they are strangers in the world. This is more or less strikingly evident in proportion to the art they possess, but even the most artistic knights cannot altogether conceal this vacillation. One need not look at them when they are up in the air, but only the instant they touch or have touched the ground–then one recognizes them. But to be able to fall down in such a way that the same second it looks as if one were standing and walking, to transform the leap of life into a walk, absolutely to express the sublime in the pedestrian–that only the knight of faith can do–and this is the one and only prodigy.

                  • a_blanqui_slate [none/use name, any]
                    ·
                    4 years ago

                    Ole Kierky boy has you covered.

                    Kierkegaard's Silentio contrasts the knight of faith with the other two, knight of infinite resignation and the aesthetic realm's "slaves." Kierkegaard uses the story of a princess and a man who is madly in love with her, but circumstances are that the man will never be able to realize this love in this world. A person who is in the aesthetic stage would abandon this love, crying out for example, "Such a love is foolishness. The rich brewer's widow is a match fully as good and respectable." A person who is in the ethical stage would not give up on this love, but would be resigned to the fact that they will never be together in this world. The knight of infinite resignation may or may not believe that they may be together in another life or in spirit, but what's important is that the knight of infinite resignation gives up on their being together in this world; in this life.

                    The knight of faith feels what the knight of infinite resignation feels, but with exception that the knight of faith believes that in this world; in this life, they will be together. The knight of faith would say "I believe nevertheless that I shall get her, in virtue, that is, of the absurd, in virtue of the fact that with God all things are possible." This double movement is paradoxical because on the one hand it is humanly impossible that they would be together, but on the other hand the knight of faith is willing to believe that they will be together through divine possibility.

                    The knight of faith does exactly the same as the other knight did, but he makes one more movement, for he says: Nevertheless I have faith that I will get her—that is, by virtue of the absurd, by virtue of the fact that for God all things are possible. The knight of faith can, by virtue of the absurd, get what he desires totally and completely. However, Silentio also comments that "that is over and beyond human powers, that is a marvel."