Mike, I think you have misunderstood the exchange between Merv, KLW, Mark and me, which is not only a summary of what I understand SK to have said in his description of Hegel’s concept of the universal and Johannes de silentio’s understanding of Abraham’s relationship to it and to God in the context of faith, but also a discussion of how Marx understood and applied Hegel’s ideas in his own work, and how those played out in an actual marxist and nazistic states, as well as an exploration of the idea of the universal to an Anabaptist concept of community. None of us was suggesting that an individual relates to the absolute by means of the state. Kierkegaard does not do that either, nor did Hegel or Marx.
Mark has already been exposed to a good deal of this discussion earlier in a private thread where some good folks endure my lamentations and meager efforts at this book. So, he was already a bit familiar with what I had said in my public post.
Some time ago I sketched this relationship out (The Teleological Suspension of the Ethical) in my notes on F&T to help myself pull all the bits and pieces together from Problema I, where he first goes into detail on the idea. Maybe it will help you, too.
Here are the notes that I had written to help explain the drawing and what else I had worked on understanding.
This sketch reflects the first 6 paragraphs of Problema 1, where SK describes the Universal/Ethical as the telos of all. The universal/ethical is the highest telos of all. Everything goes into it and remains; nothing is supposed to come out.
Once in the universal, [C] an individual’s ethical task consists in annulling his individuality in order to become the universal. This is essential, because Hegel defines the human being in his particular state, as a “form of moral evil” which is to be annulled in the teleology of the ethical life. If an individual [A] asserts his particularity/individuality vis-a-vis the universal, this is sin or spiritual trial, and must be acknowledged in order to reconcile to the universal. This requires [B] penitent surrender to the universal again. Note that sin/spiritual trial take place within the universal.
Because the ethical is the highest telos in human existence, it has the same character as eternal salvation. There is nothing higher.
Faith is a paradox, because, as with Abraham [D], the single individual, who has been in the universal, annulled his individuality, now acts as a single individual again to isolate himself higher than the universal, that is, now higher than the highest telos of mankind.
Not only that, faith is a paradox, because the singularity of the individual, a moral evil, is now above/superior to what is highest, the ethical/social morality, and is justified over against (gegenüber) the universal (NOT within it).
Being outside the universal/ethical/social morality, this individual, Abraham, is in absolute* relation with the absolute [E], where no mediation is possible between the individual and the absolute (perhaps God), OR between the individual and the rest of society. Mediation is only possible within the universal and would take the form of speech, which Hegel describes as a function of the universal.
*Absolute: unconditioned reality which is either the spiritual ground of all being or the whole of things considered as a spiritual unity (see Schelling & Hegel). Ficte: an absolute self which lives its life through all finite persons.
Because the individual is asserting himself as a particular, the paradox of faith can easily be mistaken for a spiritual trial. However, spiritual trial can only take place within the universal. Because Abraham functions above the universal, he is not in a state of spiritual trial, and cannot speak of it as such, or he would reenter the universal.
An additional paradox is that Abraham’s duty to God is in direct conflict with the ethical. A temptation is something that would restrain a person from doing his duty. In this case, however, the temptation is the ethical demand that “The father should love his son” (and not kill him). If Abraham follows the ethical, he is in conflict with God’s command.
Abraham is different from a tragic hero, in spite of the superficial similarity, that he is willing to kill his son.
Do not mistake my description of what understand as an endorsement. I was trying to figure it out.
I look forward to reading some of Smith’s work. Maybe you can provide some quotes from his work you think would add to the discussion here.