Die Angst ängstigt - nicht Eine Auseinandersetzung mit Sören Kierkegaard und Nishitani Keiji zur Thematik des Selbst und des Glaubens

In the era of postmodernism, an increasing number of people out of the occidental civilization seem to be suffering from the phenomenon of anxiety, which causes them to feel their lives useless and futile. Numerous professional groups are looking for solutions to conquer that anxiety. Anxiety neuroses, nevertheless, in their different forms and manifestations are wide-spread diseases, affecting modern man.

Up until today, the phenomenon of anxiety has got an inferior status in the countries of East Asia, whereas fear and anxiety are given a high position in the Christian-Western culture. Far-Eastern philosophers rarely selected anxiety as a central theme and they see it and the opposite form – non-anxiety – always as an entity in a permanent process of relationship and com-pletion.

Anxiety as an issue found its way into the world of philosophy with the outstanding text, "The Concept of Anxiety" by Sören Kierkegaard. From then on the phenomenon of anxiety becomes an existential question, pushing the religious concept of the Self into the focus of philosophical consideration.

Continuously swinging on the borderline between religion and science, philosophy encom-passes contradictory points of view, reaching a summit in Western Nihilism. The antithesis of affirmation and negation – driven to an extreme position – can only be resolved when man himself realizes, that the living and mortal moments of his life form the fundamental parts of his existence. This approach of integrating being and non-being, which has to be experienced, is outstandingly set forth in the text of the Zen-philosopher Nishitani Keiji, "What is Relig-ion?"

This work illustrates in depth, anxiety as a reflective action of the human mind. The Self is centre-staged, is related to itself, but develops only through the interaction of anxiety, sin and freedom in relationship to itself.

Based on the personality of a human being, the question is postulated, "If, or how far one"s personhood comprises a transpersonal segment, of which we should become aware?"

My proposition will be supported in the course of my thesis: that in each of us, there lies a private place of faith – where we can encounter ourselves as well as others in a united manner; a place where undivided love is received, which can offer the possibility to overcome the various and numerous problems with their finite nature and variety – so frightening within that world.