ALittle Explanation
[XIII 416] A LITTLE EXPLANATION48
A fairly widespread and persistent rumor that makes me out to be the author of an earlier published sermon is the inspiring summons that elicits the following little explanation. In the winter of ’41-’42, I studied at the pastoral seminary, and when my turn came—as far as I recall it was in January—I gave a sermon49 on a text prescribed by the reverend superior, namely, Philippians 1:19-25. The theological apprentice scarcely dreamed of what now has utterly astonished him—that among those present there must have been the wide-awake, attentive listener who after fifteen months was able to recognize my sermon instantly in the sermon that concludes a recently published book.50 It is incredible that he could recognize it, since it is not the same, amazing that he could do it instantly, since the two sermons do not have even the most fleeting resemblance. Does the one who first started the rumor perhaps assume with Leucippus51 that a comedy and a tragedy are the same since the letters are the same and only the order in which they appear is different? In that case, he could readily have conceded that in an imperfect and more popular [XIII 417] sense they are different. Yet he seems to believe that empirically, factually, and in an ordinary human sense these two sermons are the same. If that is so, then it certainly is a risky matter to try to explain his statement. But I will take the risk. The inventor of that rumor has neither heard my sermon nor read it in print but knows that I once gave a sermon at the seminary. He probably thought something like this: “In that book (in 868 closely printed pages) there is a sermon (about 14 pages). Candidate Kierkegaard has given a sermon at the seminary—ergo the book is by Kierkegaard, ergo the sermon is by Kierkegaard, ergo it is the same sermon he gave at the seminary—ergo the book is by Kierkegaard, ergo the sermon is obliging rumor does not get wind of my having published two discourses.52 He just might be indefatigable enough to foster a new misunderstanding by presuming to assert, without inspection (this word is used to indicate properly how positive he is about this), that these two discourses are the same single sermon I gave at the seminary. Perhaps, tenax propositi [tenacious of his purpose],53 he would be consistent enough during all these rotations to remain the same, one who always says the same thing, not Socratically about the same thing54 but about things that are different—that they are the same. Well, it all gets to be the same.
S. KIERKEGAARD