Andersen: What was he like? by Elias Bredsdorff Nr.7a. Primitive and undogmatic religion

  Andersen in 1865, photographed by C. Weller.  Kilde: Det Kongelige Bibliotek.

Andersen : What was he like ? by Elias Bredsdorff Nr.7 a.  Primitive and undogmatic religion

Unlike his father, who was an atheist, Andersen was a deeply religious person, whose religious beliefs may be summed up by saying that he believed in the existence of a god, in the importance of behaving decently, and in the immortality of the soul.

” It wasn’t fair of the Lord to let me be so unlucky in Latin”‘

This famous triad of God, Virtue and Immortality, which is the basis of theological rationalism, was also the basis of Andersen’s religious belief. He firmly believed in some kind of divine providence and was so convinced that God had definite plans for him that at times he would even argue with God; in his schooldays he once wrote in his diary: “It wasn’t fair of the Lord to let me be so unlucky in Latin ” , and in moments of joy he felt a desire to “press God to my heart”.

Andersen’s religion was a primitive and undogmatic one, in which he saw Christ as the great teacher and model to mankind, and Nature as God’s universal church. He very rarely went to church, and the contrasting religious philosophies of Grundtvig and Kierkegaard, his two great contemporaries, left him cold. One of his favourite quotations from the Bible was, “Except ye become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven”; this, of course, is the ultimate message of “The Snow Queen”.

Once, when staying at Holsteinborg Castle, Andersen read two of his tales to a dying invalid, and in taking leave of her he said: “We’ll meet again.” “Yes,” she replied, “up there.” “Perhaps,” Andersen said, “and if you get there before me, then please remember me to my friends; I have several of them up there.” “You have indeed,” she said.
Occasionally Andersen was taken to task by people with strong feelings about religious dogma. With Edvard Collin’s sister, Ingeborg Drewsen, for instance, he quarrelled about the resurrection of the body -“she believes in it, I don’t”. After Andersen had read Søren Kierkegaard’s The Concept of Fear he became involved in a theological discussion with young Jonas Collin, Edvard’s son, who told him categorically that “God and Christianity are two different things”. Andersen’s diary continues: “I said that God was the almighty one, he was the sole power. -‘That isn’t Christianity: the Jews also believe in a god, but not in Christ!’ -So here I was told unambiguously of the expulsion of God from Christianity by the new god Christ.”

Andersen: What was he like? by Elias Bredsdorff Nr.7 b. Primitive and undogmatic religion