Works of Love

First published in 1847, Works of Love is among Sren Kierkegaards most explicitly religious works. Intended to awaken rather than convinceto replicate the stinging, impatient character of a gadfly, as translator Bruce H. Kirmmse writesthe book consists of a series of fifteen deliberations on love. Contrasting romantic love and love for ones friends with the selfless Christian loveagapeof the New Testament, Works of Love contends that the only way to purge self-interest from love is to love ones neighbor, who is indeed unconditionally every person. Though always careful to distinguish his deliberations from clerical sermons, Kierkegaard insisted that in order to grasp the full meaning of the work, one must hear it. Whereas other translations have obscured or disregarded the rhetorical aspect of the text, Kirmmses translation preserves itthus making the same request of its readers that Kierkegaard once made of his: to hear the argument by reading it aloud.