Absolute Choice and the Eternal Validity of the Self

Kierkegaard further explicates this theory of self-choice by stating that the choice is “an absolute choice, for only by choosing absolutely can one choose the ethical.”⁴⁴¹ Despite whatever philosophical and religious connotations are associated with notions of absoluteness, Kierkegaard understands the absolute choice merely to be the affirmation of one’s person as an unconditioned value, to which all else is subordinated. Kierkegaard’s position is that an absolute choice is central for ethical existence, since it is in this choice that one recognizes and affirms one’s inherent dignity as a person. Kierkegaard understands the self-choice to be absolute in a twofold manner, which he explains in the following manner:

But what is it, then, that I choose – is it this or that? No, for I choose absolutely, and I choose absolutely precisely by having chosen not to choose this or that. I choose the absolute, and what is the absolute? It is myself in my eternal validity.⁴⁴² First, the choice of self is absolute in the sense that one is not choosing oneself in a determinate manner, but rather, on a more fundamental level, one is choosing to be a freely and responsibly acting self; the self-choice is absolute because it is not limited to choosing the particularity of the self, but involves the person choosing simply to affirm its validity as an agent, whereby particular choices become significant for that person. The ethical pseudonym explains: “The Either/Or I have advanced is, therefore, in a certain sense

440 Ibid, 176.

441 Ibid, 177.

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absolute, for it is between choosing and not choosing.”⁴⁴³ Second, the choice is described as absolute because its object is absolute. In this context, Kierkegaard explicitly and repeatedly identifies the self that one chooses as the absolute: “I myself am the absolute; I posit the absolute, and I myself am the absolute.”⁴⁴⁴ What is chosen in the choice is the self, albeit in a specific sense – as absolute. John Elrod summarizes this notion of an absolute choice well in the following:

One merely chooses to choose. That is to say, the individual does not choose himself as something in particular, e.g., a teacher, husband, politician, musician, revolutionary, or whatever, but he chooses himself in the much more abstract sense of being a finite being who is faced by an absolute and infinite ethical requirement.

[…] It is the acceptance of oneself as radically free and responsible for oneself […].⁴⁴⁵

In the self-choice, personality does not choose itself in a purely finite way, but instead chooses itself as absolute.

This notion of an absolute self as the object of an absolute choice is clarified by Kierkegaard’s connecting absoluteness with his conception of inner teleology: “The personality appears as the absolute that has its teleology in itself.”⁴⁴⁶ In explanation of this latter concept, Kierkegaard says the following:

Now, when I say that the individual has his teleology within himself, this may not be misinterpreted to mean that the individual is central or that the individual in the abstract sense is supposed to be sufficient unto himself […]. The individual has his teleology within himself, has inner teleology, is himself his teleology; his self is then the goal toward which he strives.⁴⁴⁷

443 Ibid, 177.

444 Ibid, 212; cf. ibid, 219, 224, 263, 265.

445 Elrod, John, Being and Existence in Kierkegaard’s Pseudonymous Works (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1975), 133.

446 Kierkegaard, Either/Or II, 263.

447 Ibid, 274.

One has inner teleology and is thereby absolute when being oneself is one’s ultimate goal – when being oneself is taken as the unconditional task of one’s existence. Personality is absolute when it “is its own objective.”⁴⁴⁸ This “autotelic” self, as Harries calls it, is described as being absolute because striving to be oneself is a value that is not determined relative to anything beyond itself.⁴⁴⁹ Kierkegaard’s designation of the self as absolute in this context just means that it is viewed as an end-in-itself. While a person can be used as a means for particular ends, from the ethical standpoint, it nonetheless retains an intrinsic and inexhaustible dignity.

Being such an end-in-itself imbues the self with what Kierkegaard variously calls the “absolute” or “eternal validity of the personality.”⁴⁵⁰ This validity is absolute, because it is not conditioned by anything. It is eternal, because one strives to be oneself perpetually, which is to say that this validity is not limited by or to any temporal condition; when one chooses oneself, “he then has himself as his task under an eternal responsibility.”⁴⁵¹ While the use of this terminology may sound as if this self-choice has religious significance, in this context, Kierkegaard speaks of this eternality in a non-religious manner. The ethical personality views itself as having eternal validity, in the sense that one’s identity has a worth that is not limited or determined by one’s temporal existence (either in whole or in part).

Accordingly, this conception of eternal validity is introduced as another way to distinguish the ethical and aesthetic evaluations of life. Edward Mooney explains the concept in the following way:

448 Ibid, 265.

449 Harries, 127.

450 Kierkegaard, Either/Or II, 219, 214. Cf., ibid, 189, 190, 206, 209, 210, 211, 213, 266.

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This validity does not vary with time and place and so is deemed ‘eternal.’ The moral values animating everyday practices, and the moral self that they underwrite, will have a depth and duration greater than the instant to instant transitoriness or whimsy of ‘merely’ immediate, aesthetic experience.⁴⁵²

With his conception of an absolute self possessing an inner teleology, Kierkegaard is distinguishing two ways of orienting one’s life toward its fundamental goals. In the case of ethical personality, one takes oneself as having absolute value, such that one’s worth is not determined by anything that is accidental or transient: “there is something within him that in relation to everything else is absolute […].”⁴⁵³ The aesthetic life-view serves as the foil to the foregoing conception of the intrinsic dignity of personality. The aesthetic person has an external teleology or is heterotelic, to the extent that its ultimate value and goal reside in something other than the self; the self for the aesthete is only extrinsically dignified, and the aesthete does not perceive or affirm its personal worth as absolute, instead viewing its life as only being conditional valued. In general, personality is not posited as absolute when anything other than being oneself is taken as the fundamental goal or as determining the value of one’s being. Such is the case of all aesthetic ways of life, and, in his analysis of various forms of living aesthetically, Kierkegaard presents a variety of ends to which the value of personality tends to be subordinated, including health, physical beauty, wealth, honors, nobility, the development of a given talent, the satisfaction of desire, contentment, and amusement. In each of these cases, wherein something other than the self to taken to have absolute value, one wills to be oneself only on the condition that one of these other goals can be realized, such that personality is valued relative to

452 Edward Mooney, “Kierkegaard on Self-Choice and Self-Reception: Judge William’s Admonition,” from:

International Kierkegaard Commentary: Either/Or II, ed. Robert L. Perkins (Macon: Mercer University Press, 1995), 11.

453 Kierkegaard, Either/Or II, 214.

something else. For instance, in one of the lower forms of aestheticism, one wills to be oneself so long as one is wealthy, and when that wealth is lost, so too is the person’s perception of self-worth and willingness to be oneself; this aesthetic individual does not choose to be itself, but instead chooses only to be a wealthy self. In the aesthetic form of personality, the self has dignity conditionally – only to the extent that the self possesses certain qualities, such as wealth. When the aesthete no longer has these qualities, it no longer considers itself to have dignity, and it despairs. In such instances, the aesthete treats its own self as a mere means for some external goal; it exists, for example, only to be wealthy. The aesthete does not recognize itself as having eternal validity, precisely because it determines its value in relation to something transient – in relation to “something whose nature is that it can pass away.”⁴⁵⁴ In contrast, that the personality is taken to be absolute in the ethical choice entails that personality is not conditioned by anything; for the ethical personality, being a person is an end in itself and not an end for anything else. Should the ethical person lose its wealth or anything else, it nonetheless wills to be itself. The ethical person has an identity that transcends empirical determinations, and it perceives itself as valuable, even if it is not healthy, beautiful, wealthy, talented, contented, or amused. Even if the ethicist is dissatisfied by a loss of wealth, for instance, and wishes to rectify this loss, it does not thereby devalue itself. The ethical personality views itself as eternally valid – as having a value uncorrelated to any temporal status or possession.

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