The understanding of the subjective truth

Christianity is the highest truth of existence, for it brings man to an inwardness that is the deeper than his own subjectivity. Subjective truth is very important for Kierkegaard. He regards it as the highest truth available to mankind, and he makes it clear that by subjective truth he does not mean that a belief is true simply because one believes it to be true. Instead, he is referring to the subjective experience of being, or living, within truth of immersing oneself in the subjective, inward activity of experientially exploring and discovering truth of one’s own self in the process of existing, which is the process of becoming, a direct personal involvement in the living moment by moment process of unfolding reality. This is why subjective truth is sometimes called existential truth because it is essentially related to one’s actual existence; ‘the inward deepening in and truth. Constantly, Kierkegaard says, “Judge for yourself.”  This judging or examining one’s life according to the truth can lead the person on the path of self perfection. 

When Kierkegaard speaks of the inwardness of subjectivity, he is in no way referring to introspective reflection on our own mental and emotional states, for this would merely be the mode of detached contemplation. Instead, he is referring to active involvement, manifested by passionate self-commitment to one’s innermost moral or spiritual commitments. Kierkegaard gives absolute precedence to subjective truth for dealing with matters of moral and spiritual or religious truth. The truth about how human should live their lives. The truth can only be truly known and are only of use once they have become inwardly appropriated through subjective experience. 

Kierkegaard believed that ultimately, the highest level of subjective truth available to a human being is faith- a state of consciousness of infinite in which one is no longer confined to the perception of reality imposed by intellectual reasoning.  It is only through a leap to faith that we can commit ourselves totally to a god whose existence is logically and rationally uncertain. Kierkegaard had complete faith that the highest form of selfhood-man’s highest form of self-realization as spirit – is a religious existence defined by passionate self- commitment to the personal Absolute through the sustaining standpoint of faith; for him this meant Christian faith. It is only through the medium of faith that one can accept the paradoxical nature of Christianity and live in the presence of eternal, absolute truth. Kierkegaard sees becoming religious in terms of up building and forming the individual.