Kierkegaard's Existential Mimesis

16 KIERKEGAARD’S EXISTENTIAL MIMESIS

Wojciech Kaftanski

Introduction

My aim in this chapter is to introduce the reader to the complexity of mimesis in Kierkegaard by both emphasizing important features of the discussion present in the literature and contributing my own position on a particular aspect of the problem. After offering general technical insights into mimesis as a concept, I will present three interpretive lenses that have been used to analyze the phenomenon in question in Kierkegaard’s work. I then argue for a particular conceptualization of mimesis I find in Kierkegaard that I term ‘existential’ and characterize it as indirect, intention-oriented,‘non-comparing,’ and concerned with ends rather than means.

Conceptual and linguistic remarks

Identifying the different philosophical meanings attributed to mimesis is a challenging task. Since its conceptual formulation in the dialogues of Plato, it has carried different connotations depending on the period and context (Gebauer and Wulf 1995: 31; Potolsky 2006: 1–2). Furthermore, individual thinkers do not have one specific understanding of the word. No translation of the term into any vernacular is capable of exhausting its meaning. Mimesis can designate ‘emulation, mimicry, dissimulation, doubling, theatricality, realism, identification, correspondence, depiction, verisimilitude, resemblance’ (Potolsky 2006: 1). It qualifies the distinction between real and unreal, original and copy, true and untrue (Gebauer andWulf 1995: 1–8).

In this chapter I will rely heavily on the conceptualization of mimesis offered in Stephen Halliwell’s (2002) work. Of the five facets of mimesis Halliwell distinguishes, I choose three that are pertinent to the way mimesis is operative in Kierkegaard’s writings.They are imitation, representation,and emulation.This threefold classification of mimesis does not restrict its meaning but rather emphasizes its complexity and broadness. Consequently, when I refer to mimesis in this chapter, I do not simply mean imitation, but rather use the word in a broad sense that encompasses the aforementioned three facets of mimesis.

The Danish language does not offer a direct translation of the Greek mimesis into a noun.The key Danish term in this context is Efterfølgelse, which is a translation of the Latin term imitatio, itself the translation of mimesis Efterfølgelse is used for instance in the title of the Danish editions ofThomas à Kempis’ De imitatione Christi.The famous Danish Dictionary Ordbog over det danske

Sprog (Society for Danish Language and Literature: 1918–1956) situates Efterfølgelse predominantly in the Christian tradition that portrays Christ as the ideal and example for imitation. The term can be literally translated into English as ‘following after.’ Its usage as the equivalent for ‘imitation’ decreased in modern Danish on account of other words such as Efterligne, which would be literally translated into English as ‘likening after.’ Kierkegaard uses both words, but it is Efterfølgelse that is most common in his work.The frequency of his employment of various mimetic terms, with special emphasis on Efterfølgelse, increases considerably in his output from 1848 to 1855. However, Kierkegaard’s mimetic vocabulary is impressive and far wider than has been acknowledged in the literature.1

Scholarly approaches to mimesis

Kierkegaard’s writings

I propose three categories of approaches to mimesis in Kierkegaard in the relevant literature, namely: Kierkegaard’s writings, Kierkegaard’s library, and contemporary debate.To the first category I ascribe Marie Mikulova-Thulstrup (1962), Bradley Rau Dewey (1968), and M. Jamie Ferreira (2001).These scholars, apart from breaking the ground for a systematic consideration of mimesis in Kierkegaard, tacitly established ‘standards’ for future discussion. Typical of their approach is a reading of mimesis as either tantamount to imitation, or of imitation as divorced from mimesis. Second, by focusing their research almost exclusively on Kierkegaard’s production, they appraise the subject ‘from the inside’ as a homogeneous and continuous notion.

Mikulova-Thulstrup’s (1962) reading of imitation in Kierkegaard presupposes a unity of Kierkegaard’s thought, literary production, and personal development. For Mikulova-Thulstrup, on the one hand,Kierkegaard is either not interested in the phenomenon of imitation per se,or is somehow dismissive of it. It is predominantly the necessity of addressing the message embedded in the Gospels that leads Kierkegaard to engage with imitation. On the other hand, imitation, properly understood as the imitation of Christ, is a conceptual response to his consideration of mysticism and asceticism, both linked with the social and religious phenomenon of imitatio Christi. For Mikulova-Thulstrup, the imitation of Christ requires suffering, dying to the world, martyrdom, and grace.Although Christ is presented to us as a salvific figure of the Redeemer and the Pattern for Christian existence, we should ultimately only attempt to imitate the latter. Mikulova-Thulstrup (1962: 272) contests the universality of Christ’s example, indicating that Christ cannot work as the Pattern for everyone, because that would imply merely undertaking ‘external’ imitation of Christ by non-Christians.

Such a complex and contentious approach sets a hermeneutical horizon of problems that subsequent thinkers will have to deal with.Among them are (1) the question whether the imitation of Christ is demanded from all Christians, and only Christians; (2) the problem of the relationship between Christ as the Pattern and Christ as the Redeemer; and (3) the relationship between grace and one’s efforts in being or becoming a genuine Christian represented in selfdenial and spiritual training.

Dewey (1968) holds that true Christian life is ‘the life of imitation’ that integrates the two dimensions of imitation in Kierkegaard: religious and ethical.The imitating self is the subjective and passionate I of the single individual that struggles with the offensiveness and attraction of Christ. Dewey sets imitation in Kierkegaard in contrast with two mistaken types of imitation: slavish and facsimile. On the one hand, genuine imitation defies ‘slavish adherence to one set pattern’ (Dewey 1968: 107) and guards against a facsimile imitation by securing a qualitative difference between Christ and the single individual. On the other, it disagrees with the idea

of the imitating self as being ‘propertyless,’ a misreading of the ideal self Dewey attributes to ascetic imitation cultivated in the Middle Ages. Moreover, he finds the phrase ‘the imitation of Christ’ more pertinent to the medieval take on the problem and misrepresentative of imitation in Kierkegaard, and intentionally chooses ‘following Christ’ by focusing on the etymology of Efterfølgelse. Dewey’s (1968: 145) appraisal of the imitation of Christ is less masochistic than Mikulova-Thulstrup’s, as ‘one is not commanded per se to suffer.’

Ferreira (2001) sees imitation in Kierkegaard primarily as ethical regulation. Both imitation and its object boil down to concrete acts in Kierkegaard. Addressing the relation between the Pattern and the Redeemer, she says that ‘we are called on to . . . follow the example [Christ] set in his human nature.Kierkegaard sees Christ as the prototype in meeting earthly needs’(Ferreira 2001: 82). Ferreira returns to mimesis in her reading of the imitation of Christ, but, for the most part, implicitly. She considers representation, emulation, and performance as important aspects of the imitation of Christ. By performing an ethical act, we make Christ present in the concrete here and now; therefore, what is being brought about is a particular understanding of ethics as loving the other, where the theological dimension of the imitation of Christ is read through the lens of ethics.In stark contrast to Mikulova-Thulstrup,the demand to imitate Christ is universal, and seeking suffering is morally wrong and should be avoided (Ferreira 2001: 36, 237).

Kierkegaard’s library

Sylvia Walsh (1994; 2009), Joel D. S. Rasmussen (2005), and Christopher Barnet (2011) attempt to understand imitation in Kierkegaard by going beyond his oeuvre and considering the body of works found in Kierkegaard’s own library.

Walsh (1994: 236) reads imitation in Kierkegaard in relation to Christ as the prototype, whose life ‘has fully expressed the ideal’ of human selfhood. She expands her initial Platonic understanding of the ideality of Christ (Walsh 1994: 237) by considering two complementary traditions,Christian and philosophical (Walsh 2009:139–41).The former tradition has both biblical and patristic roots,and was especially developed in the Middle Ages by men such as Bernard of Clairvaux, Francis of Assisi,Thomas à Kempis, and Johannes Tauler; it emphasizes obedience, self-giving,and suffering in the Christian life.The philosophical take on the problem stems from the works of Kant and Schleiermacher, where Christ is understood as either a human universal or God-consciousness actualized in human perfection. In that vein, Christ is understood as the prototype for human existence in a more general sense, not as a direct prototype for individual human perfection.The imitation of Christ requires what Walsh calls ‘the dialectic of inversion,’ which is based on the idea that ‘the essentially Christian is always the positive which is recognizable by the negative’ (JP 4, 407/SKS 24, 458), and which emphasizes that our likeness to Christ means in fact our unlikeness. Moreover, the imitation of Christ is in fact unattainable for humans unless constantly aided by grace.Walsh attempts a systematic presentation of several types of suffering in relation to the imitation of Christ: non-Christian and Christian, innocent and guilty, Christ-like and human-like.These distinctions reinforce the conclusion that Christ is not an all-round pattern for imitation – as his experience of suffering is different from ours, and vice versa (Walsh 2009: 134–7).

Rasmussen (2005) locates imitation in Kierkegaard in a context of intellectual debates throughout the history of philosophy, theology, and art. Ultimately, imitation in Kierkegaard is understood as a synthesis of the three readings of mimesis: the classical and neo-classical, the medieval tradition of imitatio Christi, and the Romantic. It is the latter reading that Kierkegaard is most concerned with. On the one hand, Kierkegaard writes of the imitation of Christ in order to criticize the Romantic ideal of ‘originality’ and unconditional autonomy in creativity,

which results in the non-concreteness and abstractness of human existence (aesthetic dimension), as well as contempt for the real world (ethical dimension) (Rasmussen 2005: 109, 122–4, 137–8). On the other hand, Kierkegaard subscribes to the Romantic downplaying of mimesis and criticizes a natural human propensity to imitation.The genuine type of mimesis has both poetic and religious dimensions, which he calls ‘religious poetics,’ and it requires the involvement of imagination in the imitation of Christ. However, genuine imitation is different from mere admiration, as it demands personal involvement and humility; it is also paradoxical and complemented by Christ’s forgiveness.

Barnett (2011) sees imitation in Kierkegaard as both influenced by, and a development of, imitatio Christi. Kierkegaard’s take on the imitation of Christ has its sources in the works of various Pietists, in movements such as Halle Pietism and Brødresocietet, and in Erbauungsliteratur Although Barnett identifies both Christological and Socratic elements in the variety of pietistic resources, it is the kenotic nature of Christ that is the actual object of imitation for Kierkegaard. Although one may will to imitate Christ, the will suffers from human imperfection, and needs to be aided by Christ’s grace.

Contemporary debate

William Schweiker (1990) and Patrick Stokes (2010) read imitation in Kierkegaard in relation to three types of resources: Kierkegaard’s oeuvre, the texts of Kierkegaard’s contemporaries, and the current philosophical debates on human selfhood and agency. Schweiker situates imitation in Kierkegaard in a broad current debate on mimesis. He engages Kierkegaard’s thought in order to address contemporary criticisms of mimesis that render a human being subservient to abstract and ‘totalizing’ notions such as ‘God,’‘ideal,’ and ‘original,’ but also divorce an individual from something greater, and hence leave her feeling lost and abandoned. Mimesis should be understood in accordance with Paul Ricoeur’s concept of‘figuration’that seeks to generate new meanings through interpretation rather than establishing a relation between original and copy. Schweiker (1990: 171; cf. 137) interprets mimesis in Kierkegaard as deeply qualifying human selfhood and ‘a way of authentic existence.’

Explaining the mimetic dimension of human selfhood in Kierkegaard, Schweiker turns to the Bible but goes beyond the imitatio Christi of the New Testament to the imago Dei of the Old Testament. He notices that, on the one hand, the self has a mimetic task of the imitation of Christ; on the other, imago Dei indicates that the human self is already in an imitative relationship to the Ideal.The self is mimetic in Kierkegaard, as it ‘always comes to be relative to another’ (Schweiker 1990: 136), but it also needs to be understood in relation to a set of configurations of human existence, namely the stages of existence. So understood, a self is not a substance, nor a simple given, but a mimetic task of turning ‘prefigured human existence [into] a concrete refiguration of life’ (Schweiker 1990: 159).

Stokes (2010) investigates imitation in Kierkegaard in relation to the role it plays, together with imagination and reflection, in the process of becoming of the human self. Human selfhood is mimetic because it involves creating a vision of oneself in the future, a value-laden image of one’s would-be self,and resembling that image in real life.The‘becoming’of the self is predicated on an individual’s ability to (1) form an alternative self, which is the self one wants to become, and (2) exercise agency over that process of imagination and reflection.To be a genuine self, it has to come back to itself in that reflection from the realm of imagination.Although the formed image of the ideal self is imaginary, the change within the self is not simply imaginative, but is realized in the life of the actual individual. Moreover, imagination goes beyond what is given and actual, but it is limited by what is truly possible for the self and can be imitated in real life.

That act of ‘translat[ing] our imaginative activity into action’ (Stokes 2010: 81) is part of our daily practice and, understood as an obligation, has a moral dimension. It is the fact that we are personally invested in these images, what Stokes (2010: 90) calls ‘being interested in’ them, that makes these images into real possibilities for the self. Being interested in the ideal self, means locating in the vision itself ‘an immediate, decisive phenomenal sense of self-involvement [that Stokes calls] the experience . . . of being directly claimed by the imagined image’ (Stokes 2010: 90).Inability or failure to recognize the demand of the image is assigned to the imitator-admirer who does not wish to be personally involved with the image-ideal. In contrast, the true imitator resembles and, hence, becomes what she admires.

The prototype

Plurality of mimetic models

One important facet of mimesis in Kierkegaard is imitation understood as that which interrelates an imitator and an object of imitation, which he calls a prototype. In that sense, imitation rendered as a movement that occurs between the imitator and the prototype represents what Gebauer and Wulf (1995: 61) characterize as acting according to a model.

Kierkegaard’s understanding of imitation as a movement is dialectical. On the one hand, the imitator tries to conform their life to the prototype, which is the movement from the imitator towards the realm of the prototype. On the other hand, imitation is ‘mak[ing] an attempt to place “the prototype” into actuality,’ which is the movement from the ideal to the actual (JP 2, 335/SKS 24, 14).Accordingly, imitation is then a double-movement that ‘engages’ two spheres: the sphere of the imitator and the sphere of the prototype.

Scholars in the field have rightly pointed to the fact that Christ is the model for imitation in Kierkegaard.This is especially true in the context of Kierkegaard’s deliberation on what it means to be a genuine Christian. However, upon close inspection of Kierkegaard’s thought, we see that the uniqueness of Christ in that regard does not mean his singularity.In fact,the thinker often speaks of more than one prototype. He names particular persons as prototypes such as ‘the tax collector,’‘the woman who was a sinner’ (JP 2, 321/SKS 22, 244), Job (EUD, 109/SKS 5, 115–6), and Socrates (PV, 125/SKS 16, 105; cf. Kaftanski 2017).And he explicitly attributes the predicate of a prototype to entities such as ‘the lily and the bird’ (JFY, 186/SKS 16, 233–4).

I call these imitative models ‘external,’ in the sense they are presented as external to the imitator. If one understands ‘prototype’ in Kierkegaard in a broad sense as an ideal that an individual should internalize, one can also identify in his authorship what I call ‘internal’ imitative models. They are universal structures of the human self. Kierkegaard focuses on the tension between human ideality and actuality. Of Kierkegaard’s internal mimetic models, I consider here ‘the ideal picture of being a Christian.’

‘The lily and the bird’

Kierkegaard’s engagement with the first mimetic model comprises a considerable part of his signed writings. The Lily of the Field and the Bird of the Air discusses ‘what it is to be a human being and what religiously is the requirement for being a human being’ (WA, 3/SKS 11, 10), and suggests that the answer is to be found in ‘the lily and the bird.’To be a genuine self, which in Kierkegaard means to become such a self, we need to learn silence, obedience, and joy.These three characteristics of genuine selfhood we learn from the lily and the bird, Christ’s ‘assistant teachers’ (CD, 9/SKS 10, 21) appointed to that role by the Gospels (JFY, 186/SKS 16, 233–4).

Kierkegaard says:‘Pay attention to the lily and the bird; . . . If you live as the lily and the bird live, then you are a Christian,’ and quickly adds,‘which the lily and the bird neither are nor can become’ (CD, 9/SKS 10, 21).

This is a puzzling statement. First, if the general intention of the teacher is that the student becomes what the teacher is (EUD, 156/SKS 5, 156) and, second, if the lily and the bird are not Christian, and will never be, how can the ‘lily and the bird’ actually teach us how to live a genuine (Christian) life? Seen from another angle, the lily and the bird can teach us silence, as they are ‘the silent teachers,’ obedience, as they are ‘the obedient teachers,’ and joy as they are ‘the joyful teachers of joy;’ but can they teach us how to be Christians, or even human beings for that matter, if neither of these is what they are or can become?

The prototypical role of the lily and the bird in the context of Christian existence – which as such illustrates something important about Christ the prototype – is paradoxical and limited,for two reasons. First, they are not considered as the prototype by Kierkegaard, but as a (derivative) prototype whose role exhausts itself in pointing beyond itself. Second, as Pattison (1989: 385–6) suggests,the lily and the bird do not represent the realm of the human,but of nature;the former is characterized by freedom, while the essence of the latter is its outer form.

The key to understanding their roles of teacher and prototype is that, as was noted, the lily and the bird teach obedience by being ‘obedience’ themselves.This is, however, a peculiar type of obedience, as it is pre-reflective and involuntary. Being part of the natural world, they do not possess spirit, soul, or consciousness.Their obedience is therefore something that is part of their nature from which they cannot deviate.Their willingness to do X seems to be at odds with the human endeavour to will the same; the latter requires freedom.

A close analysis of Kierkegaard’s treatment of the lily and the bird as a prototype of Christian existence exposes us to a certain hidden problem pertinent to his consideration of the imitation of Christ, and possibly to a more general philosophical problem inherent to imitatio Christi.The qualifications and limitations we ascribe to the lily and the bird in the context of their prototypical role for genuine human existence resemble those we ascribe to Christ. Just as the lily and the bird have a different nature from humans, so has Christ. Moreover, neither the lily and the bird, nor Christ, can become or be Christians.What seems to escape scholars who analyze the inherent conundrum of the imitation of Christ, such as what in Christ should be imitated (deeds, intentions, virtues), is the fact that Christ is not a Christian.

‘The ideal picture of being a Christian’

The above-stated problem becomes more palpable if we agree to take imitation to signify representation, which is one of the key facets of mimesis. In that sense representation means both a process and a product of that process. It is valuable to use the example of painting to illustrate these two dimensions of representation. Representational painting is an act through which the painter aims to represent the object they paint.The painting is what we arrive at via the act of painting; it is then an effect or a product of imitation.

In representational painting we assume a correspondence between the painting and the painted object, the model. If a painter paints an object, let’s say a fruit, the painting itself should have an essential reference to that object; this is so, because we assume a certain correspondence between the painting and the fruit. Hence, if the painting presented a person, we would question the effect of the painter’s work. One cannot simply take a fruit as a model and paint a person. Returning to our problem of the imitation of Christ, if Christ is not a human being, let alone a Christian, we cannot presume that the imitation of Christ will make humans or Christians of us.

Kierkegaard identifies this problem in his work and tries to address it. He observes that the nature of Christ is different from the nature of every human being by noting the fact that Christ does not ‘experience’ the existential dimension of human becoming.Akin to the nature of the lily and the bird, his nature is predetermined, and, if that is the case, Christ should not be assumed as the model for Christian existence of becoming. Contrary to Christ who ‘is,’ humans ‘become.’ Kierkegaard attempts to solve this problem by introducing a new type of a prototype in his posthumously published Armed Neutrality, namely ‘the ideal picture of being a Christian,’ which he calls ‘the middle terms’:

Jesus Christ, it is true, is himself the prototype [Forbillede] and will continue to be that, unchanged, until the end. But Christ is also much more than the prototype; he is the object of faith. In Holy Scripture he is presented chiefly as such, and this explains why he is presented more in being than in becoming, or actually is presented only in being, or why all the middle terms are lacking – something that everyone has indeed ascertained who, even though humbly and adoringly, has earnestly sought to order his own life according to his example.

(PV, 131/SKS 16, 113)

The missing link in the equation of imitation is ‘the middle terms,’ which for Kierkegaard represent ‘the ideal picture of being a Christian.’The picture is an internal model for imitation, a type of a prototype that satisfies the complexity of human being and becoming. Kierkegaard regards the picture as the most important part and task of his authorship (PV, 129/SKS 16, 111).

‘The ideal picture of being a Christian’ is presented in Armed Neutrality with the purpose of redefining the relationship ‘between thinking Christianity and being a Christian’ (PV, 130/SKS 16, 113). Its role is to draw attention to what has been abolished in religious reflection on the human condition,which is the decisive dialectic qualification of being a Christian – the fact that a human being never truly is, but is becoming.

The relation between the two,‘the ideal of being a Christian’ and Christ, is complex. One does not exclude or complement the other, but they remain in tension.The ideal we find in Christ is complete and unchangeable, while ‘the picture’ is dynamic and open.‘[T]he ideal picture of being a Christian [rendered] . . . in relation to Christ as the prototype. . . [is] a human interpretation’ (PV, 132/SKS 16, 114). From this we learn important features of the mechanism of imitation in Kierkegaard.‘The picture’is not a theological or exegetical concept derived from the Bible. On the contrary, it is a theoretical construct established by Kierkegaard. ‘The ideal picture of being a Christian’ equips Kierkegaard with means to discuss and communicate the ideal of human becoming; hence, it ‘makes’ becoming a Christian ‘possible.’

Kierkegaard’s novel appraisal of both the imitator – a self in the process of becoming – and his new reading of the model for imitation – the plurality of prototypes – requires a different conceptualization of the relation between the two, which I term existential mimesis.

Existential mimesis

While putting forward the idea of Kierkegaard’s existential mimesis, I am using the term ‘existential’ to qualify his account of genuine human existence as essentially influenced by mimesis. Kierkegaard explores a variety of interrelated mimetic concepts.His interest in that regard is not solely in imitation understood as a form of a distinctive similarity between an imitator and a model. For instance, while speaking of the imitation of Christ, Kierkegaard claims that it means to represent Christ in two senses: in one’s daily life through ‘works of love,’ but also by ‘putting

on Christ’ in a sense akin to dressing in borrowed clothes, something we do not own (JP 2, 322/SKS 22, 391). In both senses, we are talking about a performative dimension of the life of a genuine Christian. Moreover, as indicated in the previous section, the customary reading of the imitation of Christ is very problematic; it cannot really mean imitation understood as (a degree of) similarity.Quite the reverse,Christ is absolutely different from human beings,and that difference is, paradoxically, the negative Kierkegaard is looking for in the imitation of Christ.As I will elaborate in the following sections of this chapter, Kierkegaard employs in his writings a conceptualization of mimesis that has four features: it is indirect, intention-driven,‘non-comparing,’ and concerned with ends rather than means.

Indirect and intention-driven mimesis

To understand the indirectness of mimesis that is implied here, it is important to see a certain underlying way of asking and answering questions about the imitation of Christ in Kierkegaard that has plagued the scholarship. Asking ‘Can we imitate Christ?’ which is typically followed by distinguishing what in Christ can or cannot, should or should not, be imitated, presupposes a direct type of imitation in both the question and the answer. Some scholars look for a sense of similarity between Christ and humans while identifying Christ’s human nature as the actual object of imitation. In that sense every human can imitate Christ’s deeds, as they result from his human nature. Others point to the inseparability of the two natures in Christ to suggest a reading of Christ as the Pattern in a more general sense, for example, as a model of suffering.

Kierkegaard envisages a different dynamic that governs the relation between the imitator and its model(s). His conceptualization of mimesis is not about correspondence and similarity. Moreover, although tangible and concrete ethical acts are at stake in the imitation of Christ, for instance, it is the performer’s intentions behind them that are the real object of imitation, not the acts themselves. In my argumentation for the indirect and intention-driven imitation, I first return to the problem of the prototypes and show how the puzzle forces us to think differently about mimesis; I then refer to a distinction between the imitation of means and ends and show how it addresses the puzzle of mimesis.

Kierkegaard presents imitative models dialectically linking imitation and obligation. On the one hand, he exposes us to a plurality of imitative models that do not correspond to us directly or isometrically, and then he emphasizes the obligation of imitation.As I have shown, the lily and the bird and Christ, who are not Christians and are not in one-to-one relations to us, cannot be considered direct objects of imitation.Yet we are not relieved from the obligation to imitate them. On the other hand, Kierkegaard considers some potential candidates for direct imitation, such as the apostles, martyrs, Church Fathers, or Doctors of the Church, but then he clearly guards against imitating them (JP 3, 185/SKS 22, 57).This dialectical conundrum, I suggest, indicates that we should look for a different type of relationship with the imitative models.

I claim that what Kierkegaard has in mind is a type of mimesis that is indirect in the sense that it is more concerned with the understanding of the purpose, environment, and meaning of the imitated action or object than merely with their exhaustive capturing and representing. I find it useful to refer to the discernment between imitation of means and intentions (goals and ends) in human behaviour in empirical psychology.2 The former is concerned with the detailed representation of elements of perceived behaviour; it is considered to be of a lower order than the imitation of intentions, as it often misses the actual reason for the performed action, inhibits innovation, and restricts agency.

Existential mimesis in Kierkegaard is closer to the imitation of intentions, often called ‘goal emulation’ in the relevant literature. Hence indirect and intention-driven mimesis in Kierkegaard is not about copying the means, or even the results in some cases, but it is rather about grasping the intentions behind the imitated objects or actions, and representing them through (often) completely different means. Let’s take obedience to illustrate that dynamic. If obedience is that which needs to be imitated by a genuine Christian, we should consider the fact that Christ’s obedience to the Father, and the lily’s obedience towards its creator, are achieved by different means – they can also be understood as different objects, such as different types of obedience. On the one hand, we should be like the lily and the bird – ‘naturally’ obedient to Christ. On the other hand, that obedience must be expressed through our will.

Existential mimesis confronts and accommodates the two spheres of human existence, the immediate – which represents the ideal of nature – and the reflective – which represents the human capacity to imagine and will. Pure reflection does not satisfy indirect mimesis, as one can simply entertain an idea of following after Christ. Indirect mimesis requires immediacy after reflection, which is, among other things, represented in one’s ‘decision to choose’ (UDVS, 219/SKS 8, 321) to be oneself and follow Christ, and which allows for a certain openness and inventiveness in the realization of that undertaking.

That openness and inventiveness of indirect mimesis is contained in Kierkegaard’s allegorical presentation of faith as a pilgrimage from‘The Gospel of Suffering.’He reinforces this metaphor by juxtaposing it with other mimetic images of followers as strangers and pilgrims.Answering the eponymous question of the text,‘What Meaning. . . [Is] There . . . in the Thought of Following Christ[?],’ Kierkegaard points out (in an invocative prayer) that Christ ‘[himself] once walked the earth and left footprints that we should follow’ (UDVS, 217/SKS 8, 319).What it means to imitate Him is not clearly defined; we are left with an allegorical image of a track on the ground. A path, a track, or a pattern cannot be directly followed or imitated for the very reason of what it is. It is not a prescription (or suggestion on the other hand), but ‘guidance’ (UDVS, 217/SKS 8, 319).

Existential mimesis takes place in the absence of the one followed, although it starts with a vision of the prototype. Analogously, the Disciples of Christ only started following Him after his death.To follow Christ is, for Kierkegaard,‘to walk by oneself and to walk alone’ (UDVS, 220/SKS 8, 322). Such mimesis is radically different from a direct type of imitation where the model is at hand.

Comparison

Kierkegaard offers a paradoxical account of authentic Christian existence. On the one hand, a Christian seeks likeness with Christ, despite the fact that human nature is absolutely different from the nature of Christ. On the other hand, an authentic Christian existence requires seeking dissimilarity from other human beings despite their shared human nature.This is succinctly articulated in a journal entry from 1852:‘What must be emphasized is the following of Christ – and I must remain as I am in my unlikeness to others’ (SKS 25, 22).That unlikeness or heterogeneity (Ueensartethed) refers to a negative type of imitation based on the phenomenon of comparison (the root of the Danish word for comparison, Sammenligning, is ligne which means to liken oneself) that is one of Kierkegaard’s main interests in mimesis.

Kierkegaard introduces his conceptualization of comparison to explain what he means by ‘not being like others.’ In one of his concluding works, The Moment, he redefines spirituality through the lens of difference:‘Spirit is precisely:not to be like the others’(TM,344/SKS 13,408). Here being like others entails comparison because to know what others are and whether one is

indeed like others, we have to engage our ability to reason and recognize in order to eventually find correspondence between the others and ourselves.There is also an important link between comparison and the theological-spiritual realm shared between human beings and God. At stake here is the fact that comparison is not a value-neutral notion, but one that represents a negatively valued imitative practice or inclination. By imitating others, who likewise imitate others, we compromise our individuality. On the other hand, we also redirect our attention from the inner of our being to the outer.We become what we are not, or rather, we become someone else.

Our mimetic relation with God does not have the same dimension of comparison for Kierkegaard. Because God is in His nature absolutely different from anything there is but God, our relation to God does not make us into a God (although at stake is a form of human divinization), but rather instructs us to secure our difference. Consequently, drawing upon the fact that we are both created in the image of God and that we are becoming that image, our task is to become ourselves; this will occur by upholding that spiritual realm in us, namely difference.

However, comparison has to be comprehended in a dialectical manner, because not being like others may be in fact motivated by what it tries to avoid, namely, mimeticism. In ‘The Tax Collector,’ Kierkegaard discusses two levels of harmful or negative imitation. In that work we have the tax collector whom God justifies and the Pharisee who leaves the temple accused by God. Interestingly, the latter is the one who claims that he is not like the tax collector, but it is he who is ‘the hypocrite who deceives himself and wants to deceive God’ (WA, 127/SKS 11, 263).The Pharisee’s claim of being different from another is in fact based on his adhering to‘the criterion of human comparison’ (WA, 129/SKS 11, 265). It is so because he uses other people as his point of reference in evaluating his spiritual condition. In contrast, the tax collector casts his gaze down, and does not look either towards the sky, or to the sides; being before God, he is too humble to look up, and not interested in looking sideways.Abstaining from a horizontal gaze, he secures the intimacy of ‘standing by himself’; looking downwards and ‘staying far away,’ the tax collector admits his sin and relies on God’s mercy.

The second type of comparing imitation is the one performed or acted out by shrewd readers of the story.Although they ‘have chosen the tax collector as their prototype, [they] resemble the Pharisee’ (WA, 127/SKS 11, 263).This is to say that in their choice to be like the tax collector, they imitate the attitude of the Pharisee; they become contaminated with comparison and ‘sanctimoniously say,“God, I thank you that I am not like this Pharisee”’ (WA, 127/SKS 11, 263).These readers of the biblical story are also guilty of making their faith into a meaningless performance; with exaggerated gestures they mimic the behaviour of one they condemn, the Pharisee, and in fact condemn themselves.

Conclusion

In their respective approaches to mimesis, whether limited to Kierkegaard’s authorship, or seeking points of reference among his contemporaries and beyond, scholars have focused on imitation as the main understanding of mimesis.I have demonstrated that it is useful to read imitation in Kierkegaard in the context of its mother concept, mimesis, because such a reading discloses the complexity of Kierkegaard’s affair with the phenomenon in question. Kierkegaard is aware of the intrinsic problems of the imitation of Christ, such as the issue of the suitability and compatibility between prototypes and imitators. I have highlighted his attempts to resolve these issues via novel approaches to mimesis that define it as indirect and intention-driven.According to Kierkegaard, authentic existence can be both threatened and enhanced by mimesis in

our daily lives; we need to be aware of, and guard against, our propensity to imitate others and instead seek non-comparing difference from them in order to secure genuine existence.

Related topics

‘Kierkegaard on nature and natural beauty,’Anthony Rudd;‘Beyond worry? on learning humility from the lilies and the birds,’ John Lippitt.

Notes

1 He uses a variety of terms to refer to the broad mimetic sphere in his corpus, such as Ligne (likeness, and to liken, to resemble), Lighed (compare), Sammenligning (comparison), Eftergjøre (going and doing after), Efterabelse (aping or parroting), mimisk (mimic or mimical), but also Fordoblelse (redoubling), Reduplikation (reduplication), Dobbelt-Reflexion (double-reflection), Dobbelthed (doubleness or duplexity), DobbeltBevœgelse (double-movement), Billede (image or picture), and Forbillede (prototype, model, type, pattern). For an example where several mimetic terms are used in a short passage, see JP 2, 335/SKS 24, 14.

2 It is difficult to ultimately settle differences between imitation, emulation, mimicry, copying, and so forth. Donald (2005) distinguishes between mimicry, imitation, and mimesis. Mimicry is directed to the means of reduplicated action; imitation is concerned with the ends and purpose of the imitated action. Mimesis, builds upon the other two, engages the reflective faculty of the performer (‘it is reflective and potentially self-supervisory’ [Donald 2005: 288]), and takes the audience into account.We find a more nuanced distinction between mimicry and imitation in Tomasello and Carpenter (2005), who distinguish between an imitation of means and an imitation of intentions (in ends) behind performed actions in relation to the phenomenon of imitative learning.

References

Barnett, C. B. (2011) Kierkegaard, pietism and holiness, Farnham:Ashgate.

Dewey, B. R. (1968) The new obedience: Kierkegaard on imitating Christ, Cleveland, OH: Corpus Book.

Donald, M. (2005) ‘Imitation and mimesis,’ in S. Hurley and N. Chater (eds), Perspectives on Imitation: From Neuroscience to Social Science, vol. 2 (Imitation, Human Development, and Culture), Cambridge, MA: Massachusetts Institute of Technology Press.

Ferreira, M. J. (2001) Love’s grateful striving: A commentary on Kierkegaard’s Works of Love, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Gebauer, G. and Wulf, C. (1995) Mimesis, D. Reneau (trans), Los Angeles: University of California Press.

Halliwell, S. (2002) Mimesis and the history of aesthetics, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Kaftanski,W.(2017)‘The Socratic dimension of Kierkegaard’s imitation,’Heythrop Journal,58,no.4:599–611. Mikulova-Thulstrup, M. (1962) ‘Kierkegaard’s dialectic of imitation,’ in H. A. Johnson and N. Thulstrup (eds), H. R. Harcourt (trans), A Kierkegaard Critique, NewYork: Harper & Brothers.

Pattison, G. (1989) ‘Eternal loneliness: Art and religion in Kierkegaard and Zen,’ Religious Studies, 25, no. 3: 379–92.

Potolsky, M. (2006) Mimesis, London: Routledge.

Rasmussen, J. D. S. (2005) Between irony and witness: Kierkegaard’s poetics of faith, hope, and love, New York: T. & T. Clark.

Schweiker,W. (1990) Mimetic reflections:A study in hermeneutics, theology and ethics, NewYork: Fordham University Press.

Society for Danish Language and Literature (1918–1956) Ordbog over det danske Sprog, vols. 1–28, Copenhagen: Gyldendal.

Stokes, P. (2010) Kierkegaard’s mirrors: Interest, self, and moral vision, London: Palgrave Macmillan.

Tomasello, M. and Carpenter, M. (2005) ‘Intention reading and imitative learning,’ in S. Hurley and N. Chater (eds), Perspectives on Imitation: From Neuroscience to Social Science, vol. 2 (Imitation, Human Development, and Culture), Cambridge, MA: Massachusetts Institute of Technology Press.

Walsh, S. (2009) Thinking Christianly in an existential mode, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Walsh, S. (1994) Living poetically: Kierkegaard’s existential aesthetics, University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press.

Further reading

Abrams, M. H. (1958) The mirror and the lamp: Romantic theory and the critical tradition, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

This book provides readers with important conceptualizations of mimesis in the arts, literature, theology, and philosophy that Kierkegaard converses with.

Kaftanski,W. (2014) ‘Kierkegaard’s aesthetics and the aesthetic of imitation,’ in H. Schulz, J. Stewart, and K. Verstrynge (eds), Kierkegaard StudiesYearbook 2014, Berlin:Walter de Gruyter.

This article complements the religious reading of imitation in Kierkegaard by accounting for its aesthetic dimension in Kierkegaard’s corpus.

Stan, L. (2014) ‘Imitation,’ in S. Emmanuel,W. McDonald, and J. Stewart (eds), Kierkegaard Research: Sources, Reception and Resources, vol. 15 (Kierkegaard’s Concepts), tome 3, Farnham:Ashgate.

This entry presents imitation in Kierkegaard in relation to the imitation Christi and addresses the various ways that imitation appears predominantly in his signed writings.