Existential Examination

By John T. Crestwell, Jr.
March 19, 2006

I dedicate this sermon to my friend, Existentialist, and Elder of Davies Church, Richard Hess.

In the book of Genesis, chapter 3, we hear these words…

4 “‘You will not surely die,’ the serpent said to the woman. 5 ‘For God knows that when you eat of the fruit, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil…’”

Later, God announces:

21… ‘The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.’ 23 So the Lord banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken.’”

The 20th Century Jewish Existentialist Martin Buber who wrote many works on the Hebrew Bible and what its myths mean to us today. Wrote in 1952 that this ancient story is a mythical narrative, not so much about the fall of human beings, as much as it is about the birth of consciousness—the birth of awareness. Buber wrote in his book GOOD and EVIL (1952) that this is an attempt by the many writers of Genesis to explain the meaning of good and evil. Adam and Eve shared a oneness with God and with all creation. They were living in a world that did not contain opposites and Buber says the story explains simply the birth of the opposites– the good/evil — right/wrong — love/hate — and with this came our ability to contemplate the vastness of the cosmos. We can compare this story to the anthropological story where scientists say over 2.5- million years ago, the Homo Sapiens Sapiens’ brain sized doubled abruptly changing the human evolutionary process... Our forebears after creating tools, then fire, would also, because of this expanded brain capacity, contemplate their existence and begin creating myths to explain their fears in a world with many strange sounds & objects—and they would, as they developed language, begin asking questions to each other and too themselves-- “Who am I? What is my purpose? What is that strange looking blue ceiling above me? Is there something up there? These questions came as they experienced life, struggle, pain and death—the bad things, along side many good and wholesome pleasures life brings... But they wrestled with attempting to make sense of the opposites...

My topic this morning is Existential Examination, and by this, I mean that we look at matters of existence—the meaning of life. I want to do this by looking at a few historical Existentialists and see what they have to say to us today on this issue to see if there is a meaning in life and a purpose for each of us…

I’d like to start the journey with a French speaking gentleman named Albert Camus —1913 to 1960 and in his book THE STRANGER, Camus reveals his existential philosophy. For Camus, like Immanuel Kant, the Universe is benign, indifferent—meaningless and it is up to us to create our own meaning out of this ambiguity. He said the world and cosmos do not care about good and evil and that humans project this onto the universe. He called this level of reasoning absurd saying, “We have a demand on the world and the world does not care!”

For Camus, we find our meaning in life by first accepting (get this) the purposelessness of it all. Camus would say, “Life is the meaning of life.” Or as I’ve heard others say, “Life is what it is.” We find in Camus’s theory that once you let go of holding on to the purpose of life, then you can constructively find your own purpose—and not through contemplation about the gods or God—not by looking at the stars, but through LIVED EXPERIENCE. Camus felt lived experience is where you find your purpose. You’ve heard Descartes say “I think therefore I am”—well Camus would dismiss this notion as irrational and not fully developed. It’s too “heady”. He felt there must be a level of participation in life for us to find meaning. For Camus a rational philosophy for life requires reflection and lived experience. This follows very closely to the ancient Greek idea that we are not fully-alive—fully human without our reason and passion—our thinking along with our lived experience working together in the world.

And you can imagine then that Camus also felt we must be fully responsible for our actions. That when you participate in life, when you create YOUR meaning, you also learn to following or adhere to a social standard, and more importantly you learn to anticipate consequences; you learn that your actions have consequences—and you think your way through life as you actively participate, attempting to make wise choices that add depth and breath to your existence. I know this is a bit abstract because Camus did not really define what “participation” in life really meant… Nonetheless he gives us valuable information about taking personal responsibility for our lives.

Enter into our discourse, Danish Christian Existentialist Soren Kierkegaard--1813-1855, who called his era “The age of reflection and lack of passion.” This was around the mid 40s in Copenhagen, Denmark where Kierkegaard felt the folk in his town were alive– yes—but not really LIVING, particularly when it came to religion. Kierkegaard would redefine what it meant to be a religious person in this era. He said that most of Christianity was a mass of “herd” phenomenon —they didn’t think or feel they just did what they were told to do; felt that most showed no passion for their faith—he said what was needed was a fervent belief; he said most religious leaders were hypocrites content with having members only; and he felt they understood their religion only in terms of doctrines and rituals which he felt lacked vitality. He saw most of the members as asleep at the wheel, so to speak—that they didn’t take risks. And risk for Kierkegaard was the ability to dare; to think and then act. The solution was simple: the “ethically existing individual” he claimed, needed passion—inwardly and outwardly. But he too like Camus is unclear about how we are to express this passion. On one hand he says the passionate person may never be known to be passionate by others but is deeply driven, while on the other hand he called for a sort of radical outward participation in life… But even still, like Camus, he is clear that a person needs a certain fervor and passion in life.

But more than that, there was also the problem with good and evil for Kierkegaard. How could a good God allow evil? This was his existential question… For him, the answer comes, not by trying to answer the question when we attempt to rationalize what he felt were irrational religious truths. He saw Christianity’s tenets as unexplainable. Why God allows evil cannot be explained, because the existence of God cannot be explained… For Kierkegaard, 2+2=4, that can be explained—it is a truth, but religion was more like trying to say that 2+2=5 and then passionately trying to prove to someone you’re right and they’re wrong. So in some ways, Kierkegaard is agnostic here. But he comes back to his Christian roots when he says that a person that is religious must take a leap of faith and believe (PERIOD); as in my example, that 2+2=5 (believe it), which for him was the same as saying God exists–a statement of faith… This led him to his epiphany—that we must find a truth that we can live and die by. Or as Dr. King would say, “If a person has not found something they are not willing to die for they aren’t fit to live.” And the individual truth is found in the religious leap of faith; when we actively participate in religion. Like Camus, Kierkegaard felt you create your meaning and purpose and then you go head first into it—which essentially means you build your own theology for life and then live by that belief, as opposed to taking what others impart on you and accepting it just because that’s what your parents and grandparents did… There is a difference…

On other point on Kierkegaard… You can see, like Camus, his philosophy is very individualistic… In fact, Kierkegaard asked for the words “the Individual” to be inscribed on his tombstone. He believed that beyond the collective consciousness or world spirit, a term made popular by philosopher G.W.F. Hegel, there was more importantly the individual life—the individual spirit that really mattered. Hegel argued that individual purpose was not paramount in the world because history was a collective story about human beings working itself out toward a perfect society. But Kierkegaard rejected this as a dangerous notion because it could cause the human to be looked at as an object instead of subject, which history has proven him to be correct….

And we cannot forget the German Existentialist, Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) who helps me wrap up this message… He lived in a land which many say is the home of Theology (Germany)… He is known for his ideas on nihilism and his most famous phrase, “The Death of God”…

Now, Nietzsche, who many would say was a pessimist, would tell us that “nihilism” indicates a need to do away with the morals of the culture, the things valued, the truths cherished because in reality (pause) no one lives up to them. He felt justice, which could be had for all, was not really wanted in society by the powers that be. In fact he felt minsters and political leaders preferred the lower road of inequality and injustice to maintain their subjective truths as opposed to seeking a higher truth and morality. For Nietzsche in the late 1800’s, the world was morally corrupt and meaningless and until the existing social, political and economic institutions were disempowered, nothing really mattered... Nietzsche said, “We have the highest values devaluing themselves.”

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