“What I really need is to get clear about what I must do, not…”

“What I really need is to get clear about what I must do, not what I must know, except insofar as knowledge must precede every act. What matters is to find a purpose, to see what it really is that God wills that I shall do; the crucial thing is to find a truth which is truth for me, to find the idea for which I am willing to live and die.”

— Søren Kierkegaard

Verification

Attributed

Recorded by a reliable secondary source; exact wording may differ.

Imported from Wikiquote; not yet checked by QuoteQuest against the original source.

Source

Title: Wikiquote: Søren Kierkegaard
Type: reference · Secondary source
Held by: Wikiquote

View source at Wikiquote

Context

Journal entry, Gilleleie (1 August 1835) Journals 1A; this is considered to be one of the earliest statements of existentialist thought.

Cite this source

Kierkegaard, Søren. (n.d.). Wikiquote: Søren Kierkegaard. Wikiquote. https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Søren_Kierkegaard

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Provenance: Wikiquote (CC BY-SA)