False Morality Of The Individual By Soren Kiierkegaard

Society would see nothing wrong with following a crowd of any type, however, Soren Kierkegaard would disagree otherwise. Because of this, he would be known as a Danish philosopher who fought against the perversion of the individual by the Christendom (83). In this case, Kierkegaard is referring the crowd as Christendom, and the individual as Christianity. Regardless, Kierkegaard argues and believes that there is untruth within the crowd, and truth within an individual. According to Kierkegaard, the untruth is the way how the individual is lost in the crowd. One of the reasons why Kierkegaard believes this is through the instances that the Christendom is creating the untruth by creating the illusion that an individual cannot achieve salvation …show more content…
False courage is towards those individuals who acknowledge the truth but still follow the untruth. Cowardliness is for those individuals who are afraid of not attaining the goal individually, thus they flee towards the crowd. The reasons why Kierkegaard believes that the Christendom creates false courage will be introduced first. To begin, since the crowd is full of individuals who all believe the same idea, the individual who knows the truth will be still follow the untruth because of the power the crowd obtains, for Kierkegaard writes, "...wherever there is a crowd there is untruth, so that even if every individual, each for himself in private, were to be in possession of the truth, yet in case they were all to get together in a crowd...untruth would at once be in evidence. For a 'crowd' is the untruth" (94). As stated earlier, the truth is that an individual can attain the goal, and the untruth the Christendom proclaims is how the individual cannot attain it. Referring back to this, Kierkegaard is claiming that the Christendom and its followers are intimidating the individuals who know the truth, therefore they remain silent and follow them. The reason why Kierkegaard believes this strongly is the example that since the Christendom is the crowd, the individual is seen as weak, for the individual cannot stand up for the truth among those who disagree. The individual does not want to be seen as an outsider, and neither to be judged negatively, for the crowd is convinced the untruth is the truth. Since the individual does not want to be judged for believing in the truth, they retreat back into the untruth, the crowd. However, this also relates to individuals who want to attain the goal, but are afraid of not being able to because of the untruth from the Christendom. Thus, this introduces