Repetition: A Transcendent Movement Towards Faith?

Abstract

In the previous two chapters Schelling’s treatment of the notions of human and divine freedom, of time and history, and of repetition and contemporaneity were discussed. In his vivid narration of cosmogony, theogony and anthropogeny, it was possible to explore the interrelation of these concepts and the intermingling of the divine, the human and nature, which arguably enables the development of a strong intimation of the mystic relation that permeates the cosmos as a whole. For Schelling, human beings are active parts of the cosmic becoming; they communicate with cosmic powers and are therefore partly delivered from the pain of loneliness which characterizes the ‘physical universe of modern cosmology’. Pascal describes masterfully the mental-psychological state of a person trapped in the world as represented by modern science, when he admits: ‘Cast into the infinite immensity of spaces of which I am ignorant, and which know me not, I am frightened’ (Jonas, 1992, p. 322; Pascal, 1995, fr. 205, p. 60). Unlike Schelling, Kierkegaard seems indifferent to the development of a holistic philosophical account. Kierkegaard’s infatuation with the single individual prevented him from developing a proper philosophy of nature, as he endorsed and followed a rather far-fetched and one-sided interpretation of Socrates’