What makes Johannes de Silentio sleepless? : An universal prescriptivist reading of Kierkegaard's Fear and Trembling

Abstract

This paper will examine Kierkegaard's concept of teleological suspension of the ethical, and argue that his insistence that Abraham cannot be ethically justified is unsuccessful and resulted from his narrow conception of "the ethical". Next, I argue from the universal prescriptivist perspective in history of ethical theory, that the main purpose of his writing the book was to keep his contemporaries aware of what it means to praise Abraham. Lastly, I will suggest a more relevant alterative of the source of the book title.