I'm sorry, Kierkegaard might be an interesting philosopher

He's a lutheran, not orthodox. Of course his theology is going to differ from yours.

>>2714392
His theology isn't even Luthern.

>>2714404
He's anti-theology. He basically thinks religion is an unreasonable leap into the absurd and that natural theology is a waste of time.

>>2714415
Not all theology is natural theology. Orthodox theology sure isn't, I don't know about Luthern theology.

>>2714415
>He basically thinks religion is an unreasonable leap into the absurd
Also, I feel like this marginalizes God as person and revealed. God calls upon you to know him through prayer and devotion--Abraham was going to sacrifice Isaac because God personally told him to, not out of some abstract, existentialist leap into an absurd belief that God is real. No doubt faith is a struggle, but it is a struggle won by knowing, not through narcissistic affirmation.

>>2714387
>Christianity's very corporate nature
I'm an idiot when it comes to religion, can you explain this to me?

>>2714415
Have you even read Kierkegaard?

>>2714387
Agreed, dear Ivan.

>>2714493
I mean Christianity stresses the experience of the body of the Church ("OUR Father" "give US this day OUR daily bread"). Even faith is a corporate experience: it allows to commune with Christ, whose body is made of the assembly of believers; he prayed that they be one in him, being his own flesh and blood.

>>2714614
I think that he just felt religion was a fundamentally personal experience, rather than something dictated, which is why he didn't like the Church of Denmark.

I tend to agree with the religion being a personal experience that doesn't fit a cookie cutter mould.

>>2714625
Keirkegaard understands religion as an individualist experience, but not a personal one--that is, he does not see it as about an encounter with a person, but about an abstract belief there is such a person. And it is not just religious authority he objects to, but communal religion in general, he is disgusted by communal celebration of baptism.

With Orthodox, the original Christians, it just the opposite: religion is not individualistic, but it IS highly personal.

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>>2714666
>Orthodox
>the original Christians

>>2714684
Oldest.

>>2714711
Copts and Syrians, maybe.
The ethno-cults that make up today's "Orthodoxy"? Not at all.

>>2714789 #
Copts and Syrians are Oriental Orthodox. It's literally the same as Eastern Orthodox except one nature (human and divine) vs two nature (human and divine); this is largely a semantic issue, and intercommunionis quite common.

I'm a convert to Orthodoxy; while there are ethnic expressions, they're less pronounced than Latino distinction in Catholicism, or "Greek Catholic". The largest Orthodox parish in my area has a convert priest, and more than half his flock

>>2714415
this is wrong.

Kierkegaard essentially argues that what Christianity comes down to is an individuals relaition with the divine and he cricitizes the Church of Denmark in particular for creating a beaurocracy that can profit and create power out of this.

Its actually very lutheran as he was essentially saying the CoD had become the catholic church. The church had no power over and individuals relation with God but at the time was pretending to.

He's not really critcizising the idea of communion of believers or anything like that.

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>>2714387
His talk about the nature of faith I think is a good thing, and was a big part of my jumping off into Christianity (I am Orthodox myself, a convert), but I agree he's not fantastic as a Christian thinker. I think the fact that his philosophical descendants, the existentialists, are mostly atheists speaks for itself.