Usefulness and uselessness of history: History, memory and the contemporaneity of faith according to S. Kierkegaard (DOI: 10.2436/20.3000.02.1) Authors Gabriel Amengual i Coll Universitat de les Illes Balears (UIB) Keywords: history, Kierkegaard, Christianity, memory, Socrates, Lessing Abstract According to Kierkegaard, history can be considered in two ways: On the one hand, it is useless in its pure objectivity of data and dates, casual deeds and events; on the other hand, it is essential if we consider the fact that the eternal has become present in it, hence that God has become part of it. Thus, Kierkegaard differs from both Socrates and Lessing by thinking about reason, truth and the eternal as present in history. The instant is the category with which Kierkegaard tries to think about this historical convergence of the historical and the eternal.Key words: History, Kierkegaard, Christianity, memory, Socrates, LessingOriginal source: Comprendre. Revista Catalana de Filosofia, 10(1-2): 103-122 (2008) Downloads Download data is not yet available. Downloads PDF Published 2012-02-17 Issue No. 1 (2012) Section Philosophy License The intellectual property of articles belongs to the respective authors.On publishing articles to the journal Catalan Social Sciences Review (CSSR), authors accept the following terms:Authors assign to Philosophy and Social Sciences Section (a subsidiary of Institut d’Estudis Catalans) the rights of reproduction, communication to the public and distribution of the articles published in Catalan Social Sciences Review (CSSR).Authors are responsible for obtaining permission for the reproduction of all graphic material included in articles.Philosophy and Social Sciences Section declines all liability for the possible infringement of intellectual property rights by authors.The contents published in the journal, unless otherwise stated in the text or in the graphic material, are subject to a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs (by-nc-nd) 3.0 Spain licence, the complete text of which may be found at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/es/deed.en. Consequently, the general public is authorised to reproduce, distribute and communicate the work, provided that its authorship and the body publishing it are acknowledged, and that no commercial use and no derivative works are made of it.Catalan Social Sciences Review (CSSR) is not responsible for the ideas and opinions expressed by the authors of the published articles.