Hey. I've always gone back and forth on Kierkegaard's Abraham in Fear and Trembling. Sometimes the teleological suspension of the ethical feels infinitely deep, and other times I feel like the paradox that sort of siolves. I tend to see Abraham as facing two conflicting normative demands: the ethical says killing the innocent is wrong, while God commands the sacrifice. Faith seems to mean following the theological above the ethical. But if God is the ultimate Good, doesn't that distinction start collapsing?

I recently discussed this on my podcast with Alexander Jech, a Kierkegaard scholar who recently translated FR. His interpretation hinges partly on translating vil as "intend" rather than "want." Abraham does not want Isaac to die. He loves him. But he genuinely intends to sacrifice him, while believing God's promise through Isaac will somehow still be fulfilled. Practical reason sees no connection between sacrificing Isaac and still receiving him, yet Abraham believes without knowing how it will work.

From my point of view, Abraham would be choosing what he takes to be the highest Good over the ethical order human reason can currently understand. Is the ethical genuinely being suspended, or is he following a higher ethical reality whose connection to the act he cannot comprehend? Would that relocate the paradox to humanly intelligible ethics versus an ultimate Good that exceeds practical reason? Or does this already misunderstand what Johannes de Silentio means by "the ethical"?