Either Christianity accepts the terms of secular reason and argues on these...

Either Christianity accepts the terms of secular reason and argues on these, or it insists on being judged by no criteria but its own. The first alternative leads, as Kierkegaard saw it lead in Hegel’s writings, to the reduction of Christianity to something other than itself; the second leads to Christianity becoming self-enclosed and unintelligible. Theologians who recognize this have sometimes been dismayed by Kierkegaard’s candor.

But Kierkegaard’s type of Christianity is in some ways a natural counterpart to his individualism. For it is only when writing from within a Christian position that Kierkegaard can find any reasons for answering the question, How shall I live? in one way rather than another. One may suspect that the need to be able to answer this question is one of the unavowed sources of his Christianity. The choices made…