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Soren Kierkegaard, a Danish philosopher, lived from 1813 to 1855. Constantly afflicted with melancholy, he tended to regard life as a realm of suffering and sin opposed to a place of joy and pleasure. As Kierkegaard grew older he became increasingly concerned with Christianity. From this affliction, he developed the three stages of life. Kierkegaard believed all men, once they have taken control of their own life, would pass through these stages, but not all men could reach the last stage. Aesthetic, ethical, and religious stages were based on the view that only in spiritual life could man hope to find a meaning for life.
Kierkegaard had some very strong points throughout his philosophy. He put the individual back in the center of life. He rebelled against excessive rationalism saying, "man is not being treated fairly or truly if he is merely objectively viewed by the reason, look at from the outside, turned into an object among other objects; he is subjectively very much an individual and has the inalienable right to be himself" (Binkely). He put life above logic and he made it possible to consider man as emotionally alive and free. Kierkegaard overemphasized the subjectivity of man, however, and he neglected objectivity and reason. Moreover, he was so preoccupied with his own existence that he fell victim to making endless attempts to explain his engagement then break with Regina as well as his relationship with his father. These personal explanations coupled with self-contradictions of using reason and logic to substantiate his position is what turned many of the people of his time away from his ideas. This scorn did not seen to affect Kierkegaard, however. He never intended to be a model for all men. He was simply concerned with recalling man to his most important job, learning how he ought to live.
Despite the lack of followers in his own time, he influenced
contemporary existentialism through his deep analysis of the
predicament of man. Jaspers, Heidegger, and Sarte all stress
aspects of his theories that give primacy to subjectivity,
inwardness, and moment-to-moment decisions. Tillich, Barth, and
Brunner, on the other hand, owe more to Kierkegaard's religious
emphasis. Perhaps Kierkegaard's most important contribution to
the twentieth century is best said by Walter Kaufman, "One
can hardly be satisfied with him or pleased; but his greatest
value may well be that he does not allow us to be satisfied or
pleased with ourselves."
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Friedrick Nietzsche lived from 1844 to 1900. During his life he became concerned with the idea of integrity and self-affirmation. He found himself constantly attempting to uncover the value of having a belief. He strove for people to think for themselves. He wanted them to get behind the presuppositions of the age and find out how much of their views of the world and of life were crowded by their own moral prejudices. Nietzsche, in true existentialist fashion, believed that concern with the issue of morality was a personal problem.
Nietzsche influenced many people after his time had passed. Hitler used, or shall we say misused, Nietzsche's ideas to help him justify his cause. Contemporary existentialists often turn to Nietzsche to see the individual thinker that had the courage to question all the presuppositions in a personal struggle to find the meaning of life. Existentialists still take up Nietzsche's challenge--to find a meaning for life in a godless world.
