ABSTRACT
In all Kierkegaard’s published works the term “Mohammedanism” occurs just twice, as a passing reference, in the Concluding Unscientific Postscript. The first occurrence comes early in the Postscript, where Climacus discusses the objective problem of Christianity’s truth, or rather the historical proof of the truth of Christianity.2 Here Kierkegaard tries to demolish the thesis according to which the proof of the truth of a religion is given by the fact that it continues to exist despite the lapse of time. But if this is how things stand, the dependability of a religion-or better the eighteen centuries of Christianity-is nothing more than a deceit whereby the existing subject “is trapped and he enters the perdition of the parenthesis.”3 However, contrary to the view of Kant and Hegel, to be able to withstand time is not a proof of the truth of something but a mere hypothesis-a hypothesis that may become more probable by being upheld for three thousand years-but never a warranty of some “eternal truth,” decisive for one’s eternal happiness. By the same token, to claim that Mohammedanism must be true because it has lasted for twelve hundred years is to reduce the religion of Mohammed to a mere “hypothesis.”
