Sin is an “unwarranted actuality” (113), which refers to an action that went against some kind of restriction or taboo. Anxiety is a way of trying to negate that action. It is also generated by thoughts of a hypothetical consequence of the sin. However, anxiety wants the “sin to continue […] only to a certain degree” (114). While both forms of anxiety come from the freedom to choose, the anxiety that comes from innocence precedes sin, while the latter “is directed toward the further possibility of sin” (115).

After the sin is committed, the anxiety over sin can become repentance. However, this repentance does not cancel out the sin. Instead, repentance “can only sorrow over it” (115). A “profound” individual may repent of a sin like wrath in a “profound” (116) way. Nonetheless, repentance does not bring freedom. Repentance is also weakened by anxiety over the next time the sin will be repeated. Repentance is an action, so it stands in contradiction to ethics, which is based in ideas. Kierkegaard argues that only faith can overcome the anxiety from sin because “faith is the synthesis of the eternal and every moment possible” (117).

The demonic in the world first appears “only when it is in contact with the good” (119). Kierkegaard gives the example that demons are first written about in the New Testament when they are confronted by Jesus Christ. He adds that in the modern era, individuals who are influenced by the demonic are seen with “sentimental sympathy” (121), with the assumption that demonics suffer because of fate, rather than as an ethical problem that has to be punished. Another way of viewing demoniacs is “medically-therapeutically,” which suggests instead that those who would have been seen as demoniac are viewed as suffering from a “phenomenon” that is “purely physical and somatic” (122).

Kierkegaard defines the demonic as a “state” where an individual has “anxiety about the good” and sees the freedom that comes from the good “as unfreedom” (123). This anxiety emerges upon contact with the good. Kierkegaard goes on to describe several types of the demonic. One is “inclosing reserve […] and the unfreely disclosed” (123). This is when someone shuts themselves off from communication with the good and “closes itself up within itself” (124). Contrariwise, communication with the good or “disclosure is the first expression of salvation” (127), although Kierkegaard explains that in some cases an individual might disclose a little and go back to inclosing reserve.

A second type of the demonic is “the sudden” (129). It is like inclosing reserve in that it is “anxiety about the good.” Kierkegaard describes this as the break in the “continuity” of the self with “the vapid, enervating dissolution of oneself” (130), which represents the opposite of freedom. It can lead to what Kierkegaard terms “boredom” or “extinction,” which is “a continuity in nothingness” (133). 

Furthermore, the demonic is not always totally a demonic, but rather the demonic can be a small part of someone’s being. Even then, “the tiniest part of the demonic is anxiety about the good in the same sense as that which is totally embraced by it” (135).

There are two types of unfreedom that Kierkegaard discusses. The first is freedom lost somantically-psychically. Since the “body is the organ of the psyche and in turn the organ of the spirit,” when “the body revolts” (136) against its connection to the spirit, a person becomes unfree. This is what causes a person to become a demonic. In life, this type of demonic suffers from “hypersensibility and a hyperirritability, neurasthenia, hysteria, hypochondria, etc.—all of these are or could be nuances of it” (136-137). At the “utmost extreme,” such demoniacs completely avoid the good and suffer “extraordinarily swift” anxiety that drives them to “cling to one another” (137).

General Remarks

The second type of unfreedom is freedom lost pneumatically. Kierkegaard defines this “as indolence that postpones thinking, as curiosity that never becomes more than curiosity, as dishonest self-deception, as effeminate weakness that constantly relies on others, as superior negligence, as stupid busyness, etc.” (138). Generally, this means that the demoniac avoids the truth, which can bring them freedom. They also have “anxiety about the content” (139) of truth.

Commenting on his own times, Kierkegaard remarks that people during his lifetime are seeking a “new, exhaustive, and absolutely correct proof […] of the immortality of the soul” while, at the same time, belief or “certitude” (139) is in decline. However, even a devout person can be such a demonic because they rely on a specific kind of knowledge for their faith, demonstrating that they actually also lack certitude and “inwardness” (141).

The Schema for the Exclusion or the Absence of Inwardness

Even if an individual may practice “reflection” (142), they can still lack true inwardness, something that is a form of unfreedom. It can also reveal an anxiety over true inwardness itself. This can begin as “activity of unfreedom” leading into “passivity of unfreedom” (144) or vice versa. Kierkegaard gives examples in the form of several dichotomies: Unbelief (active) and superstition (passive); hypocrisy (active) and offense (passive); and pride (active) and cowardice (passive).

What Is Certitude and Inwardness?

Kierkegaard equates inwardness with “earnestness” (146), which he suggests he cannot adequately define further. However, he does explain that he sees earnestness as a “higher as well as the deepest expression” of “disposition” (148), meaning an inclination or quality. Specifically, it is the “originality of disposition” that is repeated and comes out of “blessedness” (149) and true freedom. Earnestness also reveals a genuine individuality.

Overall, Kierkegaard argues that to understand a demonic “one needs only to observe how the eternal is conceived in the individuality” (151). For example, an individual who denies the eternal is also “in anxiety about the good” (152), something that manifests as an irreverent attitude or keeping occupied with a specific thing. People may also simply view eternity as an abstract, as something for literary or artistic expression, or as a simple spiritual or philosophical concept. Kierkegaard views these expressions as just expressions of anxiety from those “not willing to think eternity earnestly but are anxious about it” (154).