Kierkegaard in translation

In 2013, the Baylor Symposium on Faith and Culture celebrated the 200^th anniversary of Kierkegaard’s birth with a scholarly conference organized around the question “Is Kierkegaard a Christian for our time?” The answers that emerged—many of which can be viewed here—are now compiled in an impressive collection of essays.                                            

Impressive but difficult. One of the endorsements printed on the back cover claims that the book is invaluable to both scholars and “all those interested in Kierkegaard’s profound vision of the Christian faith.” To suggest that the book is accessible to a wide readership of non-academics is . . . well, a leap.

For example, Cyril O’Regan’s essay on Kierkegaard’s notion of “the perforated temporality of the self” begins with this caveat about the “Kierkegaardian objection to prognostication” by academics: