The Concept of Anxiety: A Simple Psychologically Oriented Deliberation in View of the Dogmatic Problem of Hereditary Sin

The story of the first human, Adam, has been used in Christianity to explain both the dogmas of the first sin and hereditary sin. Adam’s sin is both something that took place in the past and remains present in the form of a hereditary sin passed on throughout human history. The idea of Adam’s sin and hereditary sin are not understood through reason, but through “pious feeling” (26). Early Christian theologians like Tertullian and Augustine combined the two ideas of first and hereditary sin by describing Adam’s sin as “original sin” (27).

Kierkegaard argues against the traditional Christian concept of Adam as the special progenitor of humanity whose sin caused the supernatural fall of humanity. Nevertheless, Kierkegaard agrees with traditional doctrines that the idea of Adam is essential to make sense of the idea of hereditary sin. This is because Adam is both an individual and yet represents all of humanity, meaning “the whole race participates in the individual and the individual in the whole race” (28). Elaborating on this, Kierkegaard argues that each individual shares their entire history with their race. Adam’s importance for Kierkegaard is not that he is the father or the head of humanity, but the fact that Adam “is himself and the rest” (29).