"Faith involves risk, for it is rooted in the conflict between the boundless passion of the believer and the stark wall of objective uncertainty. Faith begins where thought ends. Since the object of faith is an absolute paradox, faith is an offense to the mind, an affront to our yearning for intellectual apprehension. Faith must be an act of the will, the product not of rational demonstration, but of an existential 'leap' toward the unknown. Kierkegaard argues that faith needs room to 'venture,' to make the passionate, nonrational leap whereby the individual comes to believe. This room derives from uncertainty, which, paradoxically, 'tortures forth the passionate certainty of faith' in God. But faith is not a permanent state, a comfortable and sustained place of rest. It is a constant and painful struggle, a battle, the ultimate tension. Faith must be renewed continually, over and over, like the actions of the figures who leap for heaven in the Kotsker's dramatic parable on life."