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Knud Ejler Løgstrup’s The Ethical Demand is the most original influential Danish contribution to moral philosophy in this century. This is the first time that the complete text has been available in English translation. Originally published in 1956, it has again become the subject of widespread interest in Europe, now read in the context of the whole of Løgstrup’s work. The Ethical Demand marks a break not only with utilitarianism and with Kantianism but also with Kierkegaard’s Christian existentialism and with all forms of subjectivism. Yet Løgstrup’s project is not destructive. Rather, it is a presentation of an alternative understanding of interpersonal life. The ethical demand presupposes that all interaction between human beings involves a basic trust. Its content cannot be derived from any rule. For Løgstrup, there is not Christian morality and secular morality. There is only human morality.
“This collection of essays by the late Danish philosopher and theologian Løgstrup presents his theory of using phenomenology in understanding our ethical decisions. According to Løgstrup, phenomenology not only provides an understanding of human existence but also of ethics, through examination of phenomena of ethical concepts. . . . Løgstrup combines detailed writing with an excellent critique of competing ethical theories to explain his own ethical theory, which stresses the moral experience over ethical principals. These essays will be valuable to scholars and students in philosophy and ethics.” —Library Journal
Knud Ejler Løgstrup (1905–1981) was professor of ethics and philosophy of religion at the University of Aarhus until his retirement in 1975. He is the author of numerous books in Danish. English translations of central texts from other ethical works by Løgstrup are available in Beyond the Ethical Demand (University of Notre Dame Press, 2007).
Hans Fink is professor emeritus of philosophy at Aarhus University.
Alasdair MacIntyre is research professor of philosophy at the University of Notre Dame. He is the author of numerous books, including Whose Justice? Which Rationality? (Notre Dame Press, 1988) and Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry: Encyclopaedia, Genealogy, and Tradition (Notre Dame Press, 1990).