Is woman the dream of man?

*This post goes along with the post Are men used by women for children?

To contrast with yesterday's post, I looked up another view on woman and the view comes from the 19th century existentialist philosopher Soren Kierkegaard. Two quotes I want to share with you.

"The man who feels no impulse toward the study of women may, as far as I am concerned, be what he will; one thing he certainly is not, he is no aesthetician." 

"When God created Eve, He let a deep sleep fall over Adam; for woman is the dream of man." 

Both quotes come from his work, Either/Or.

You can see Kierkegaard's view of woman does indeed contrast sharply with that of Nietzsche who said, "Ah, women. They make the highs higher and the lows more frequent," and "Woman's love involves injustice and blindness against everything that she does not love... Woman is not yet capable of friendship: women are still cats and birds. Or at best cows..." 1. However, I still agree with what I wrote I yesterday on how some women to use men as a means for a child. Some women are like that, but just because some women are like that doesn't mean *all* women are only interested in having  a child. There are women who want a long, loving, lasting relationship with a man. Kierkegaard did not condemn all women like Nietzsche apparently did (I haven't read all of Nietzsche's works), rather he held women in a higher regard. 

Consider the first quote how Kierkegaard basically said the man who doesn't study women obviously doesn't care for the beauty. What Kierkegaard is saying here is that woman is "the beautiful" and the man who doesn't seek the woman or appreciate the woman or even put the woman on a pedestal does not care for anything of beauty at all. Woman is the "dream of man," as Kierkegaard put it. 

Good women are worth dying for. I believe that. Good women are to be put on the highest pedestal and the husband should love her more than himself. I agree totally with Martin Luther that, "There is no more lovely, friendly and charming relationship, communion or company than a good marriage." Consider what C.S. Lewis wrote in The Four Loves, "Need-love says of a woman 'I cannot live without her'; Gift-love longs to give her happiness, comfort, protection — if possible, wealth; Appreciative love gazes and holds its breath and is silent, rejoices that such a wonder should exist even if not for him, will not be wholly dejected by losing her, would rather have it so than never to have seen her at all." 

I have not lived long enough myself to give experiential advice on love, women, and man, however I do study and respect, those who are older than me and those who died long ago, their words and wisdom on such things. Pessimistic as he was, Nietzsche was correct in his view on bad women and such women should be avoided because they will only bring you pain (also for my female readers bad men will only bring you pain-it cuts both ways) but Kierkegaard is correct in that woman is the "dream of man," and such a woman should be pursued, studied, and loved sacrificially because she is beautiful and more than worth your time.

Sources

1. Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra - On the Friend