Hegel defines irony as the highest form by which the subject constructs and captures itself.Historically,it begins with Socrates and matures in German Romanticism.In the former,irony is a character of dialogue,which shapes negativity through the inversion between the spoken and the speaking.In the latter,irony is developed into an existential style,which ab-stracts itself from substantial value and ends in nihilism.In his On the Concept ofIrony,Kierkegaard inherits Hegel's dialectics but he takes Socrates as the highest prototype of irony.He suggests that Socratic irony belongs to his philosophical methodology, which is a dialectics characterized as dichotomy.It introduces into thought contingency through the questioning moment,which endorses infinite possibility to the thought.Therefore,the negativity of irony is generative.Further,Kierkegaard explores irony through its second meaning,namely camouflaged ignorance,by which he connects irony to Socrates' methodology in exploring human's ultimate ignorance of the ground of values.The ignorance is Kantian.It sets a limit to speculation while leaving space to ethical belief,which shapes a passionate commitment to morality.In this way,Socrates'irony becomes an existential style,in which the finite subjectivity is negated so that Sophists' conspiracy to substitute logos with individual will is destroyed.There-fore,Socrates' irony does not lead to nihilism but protects the absoluteness of ethics.With Socrates as the prototype, Kierkegaard's concept of irony is an existential concept of ethical dimension.%黑格尔把反讽理解为主体藉以建构与把握自身的最高形式，它的历史起点为苏格拉底，但在浪漫派达到顶峰。在前者，反讽是一种对话的特征，通过言说与所说的颠倒呈现出否定性。在后者，反讽拓展为一种生存风格，它抽象自一切实体性的价值以至于沦为虚无主义。克尔凯郭尔的《反讽概念》秉持了黑格尔的辩证法，但是他却以苏格拉底为反讽的最高原型。他指出，苏格拉底在对话中呈现的反讽是一种以二分法为特征的辩证法，通过引入对答之偶然性，为意义的生成赋予了无限的可能性。由此反讽之无是生成性的。不仅如此，克尔凯郭尔引入了反讽的另一重含义，即“伪装的无知”，以此关联于苏格拉底式有学识的无知。这种无知是康德式的对理性之于超验论题的限制，并由此为基于伦理信念的意志决断留出位置。由此，反讽成为一种弃绝有限主体性的生存态度，它蕴含着向死而生的激情，并且以此抗衡智者以私欲替代逻各斯的僭越。在此，苏格拉底的反讽非但不是虚无主义的，而恰是以无捍卫伦理的绝对性。在此基础上，克尔凯郭尔把反讽定义为：以激情为手段，实现对伦理之内在矛盾和解。由此，克尔凯郭尔的反讽是一种有伦理维度的存在论概念。
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