Soren Kierkegaard — "If I am to love God, I must be able to recognize him; if I am to recognize him, …"
If I am to love God, I must be able to recognize him; if I am to recognize him, then he must be visible; if he is visible, then he is not God.
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More from Soren Kierkegaard
"The most dreadful of all diseases is to be a nonentity."
"The function of prayer is not to influence God, but rather to change the nature of the one who prays."
"The greatest danger, that of losing one's own self, may pass off as quietly as if it were nothing; every other loss, an arm, a leg, five dollars, a wife, etc., is sure to be noticed."
"What a misfortune to be a woman! And yet, the worst misfortune is not to understand what a misfortune it is."
"What if everything in the world were a misunderstanding, what if laughter were really tears?"
About Soren Kierkegaard (1813-1855)
Danish philosopher and theologian considered the founder of existentialism; Either/Or (1843) and Fear and Trembling (1843) explored the leap of faith. Closely associated with Friedrich Nietzsche (his existentialist successor working in the opposite theological direction) and Fyodor Dostoevsky (literary parallel exploring faith-and-despair). For an intellectual contrast, see G.W.F. Hegel, German Idealist of the totalizing system — Kierkegaard called Hegel's system a 'palatial residence' that nobody could actually live in — his entire authorship is structured against Hegelian abstraction in favor of the existing individual's inwardness.
The standard scholarly entry points to Soren Kierkegaard's work: Joakim Garff (University of Copenhagen, Søren Kierkegaard Research Centre) — Søren Kierkegaard: A Biography (2000); Walter Lowrie (Princeton, his major postwar English translator) — A Short Life of Kierkegaard (1942); C. Stephen Evans (Baylor University, philosophy of religion) — Kierkegaard: An Introduction (2009). These are the works graduate seminars cite when teaching Soren Kierkegaard.