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Friederich Nietzsche
Frederich Nietzsche: Irrationalism and The Superman 1. Why did Nietzsche criticize liberal beliefs and Christian morality? 2. What was his vision of the true situation of man in the universe? 3. What did Nietzsche urge humans to explore instead of the intellect? 4. What was Nietzsche’s interpretation of the true value of Greek culture? 5. Who did he blame for the destruction of Greek culture’s vitality? 6. Why did Nietzsche believe that Christian morality’s stress on love, compassion and pity was harmful to man? 7. According to Nietzsche, how could recognition that “God is dead” be helpful to man? 8. Define Nietzsche’s conception of ‘the superman’ who would rescue European culture. 9. Describe Schopenhauer’s understanding of the will, not reason, as the determining force of human nature. 10. How did Nietzsche’s philosophy help create the momentum for revolutionary change among young intellectuals which led to the rise of fascist political movements?
(excerpted from, “Modern Consciousness:
New Views of Nature, Human Nature and Art”, in An Intellectual History of Modern Europe by Marvin Perry, pp.
293-353) - early modern mentality: belief in progress and the
perfectibility of society through reason and science - late modern mentality: new insights into human nature and
the physical universe lead to the questioning of Newtonian mechanics, of the
primacy of reason in the human psyche, and of the rules of aesthetics that
had dominated art since the Renaissance Modern thinkers repudiated the
Enlightenment conception of human rationality, stressing instead the
irrational side of human nature. They saw blind strivings and animal
instincts, not logical consciousness, as the primary fact of human existence.
Some thinkers, recognizing the weakness of reason, still valued it and sought
to preserve it as an essential ingredient of civilized life. Others
concentrated on the creative potential of the irrational, rebelling against
the insistence of scientists and positivists on rational analysis as the only
path to knowledge. Like the Romantics, proponents of the non-rational placed
more emphasis on feeling, spontaneity, instinct and intuition than on reason.
They belittled the intellect’s attempts to comprehend reality, scorned the
liberal-rational tradition, praised outbursts of the irrational and in some
instances lauded violence. There were immense implications for
political life in this new emphasis on the emotional. The popularity of fascist
movements which openly denigrated reason and exalted race, blood, action and
will, demonstrated the naiveté of nineteenth century liberals who believed
that reason had triumphed in human affairs. Friedrich
Neitzsche and Irrationalism The principal figure in the
dethronement of reason and the glorification of the irrational was German
philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900). He attacked the accepted views
and convictions of his day as a hindrance to a fuller and richer existence
for man. He denounced social reform, parliamentary government, universal
suffrage; he ridiculed the vision of progress through science, condemned
Christian morality, and mocked the liberal belief in man’s essential goodness
and rationality. He said that man must understand that life, which abounds in
cruelty, injustice, uncertainty and absurdity, is not governed by rational
principles. There exist no absolute standards of good and evil, no timeless
principles, whose truth can be demonstrated by reflective reason. The higher
world of metaphysics is a myth; so too is the Christian heaven. Nothing is
true. There is only naked man living in a godless, chaotic, meaningless and
absurd world. The strong face this reality; the weak invent fables about a
higher reality and a future life. Critic
of European Values Modern bourgeois society, said
Nietzsche, was decadent and enfeebled-- a victim of the excessive development
of the rational faculties at the expense of the will and instinct. Against
the liberal-rationalist stress on the intellect, Nietzsche urged recognition
if the dark, mysterious world of instinctual desires, the true forces of
life. Smother the will with excessive intellectualizing and you destroy the
spontaneity that sparks cultural creativity and ignites a zest for living.
For man’s potential to be realized, he must forgo relying on the intellect
and nurture again the instinctual roots of human existence. In The
Birth of Tragedy (1872) Nietzsche emphasized the emotional roots of Greek
culture, the Dionysian spirit that springs from the soil of myth and ritual,
passion and frenzy, instinct and intuition, heroism and suffering. This
Dionysian spirit, rooted in the non-rational, was the source of Greek
creativity in art and drama. Greek tragedy declined, said Nietzsche, when
serenity, clarity, order, structure, form, and cold calculation, the
Apollonian spirit, predominated over noble ecstasy and creative intuition.
Greek tragedy was killed by a rationalism which undermined life. Nietzsche attributed to Socrates the
rise of a theoretical outlook, of scientific thought, which seeks to separate
truth from myth, illusion, and error. This scientific outlook had become the
basis of modern culture. Modern westerners value the theoretical man and not
the man of instinct and action; consequently, they do not appreciate the
creative potential of the non-rational side of human nature. During the late
eighteenth century, men were beginning to recognize the limitations of
science and of the cognitive faculty itself. Nietzsche believed that Christianity,
with all its prohibitions and demands for conformity also crushed the human
impulse for life. Christian morality must be obliterated, for it is fit only
for the weak, the slave. The triumph of Christianity in the ancient world, he
said, was a revolution of the lowest elements of society, the meek, the weak,
and the ignoble, nothing less than an attempt of resentful slaves to prevent
superior people from expressing their heroic natures. The meek condemn as
evil the very traits they lack: strength, assertiveness, ability, and a zest
for life. They saddle the strong with guilt if they deviate from the
contemptible, life-negating values of pity, kindness, self-denial, or the
pursuit of heaven. What a clever act of revenge against their superiors! In
reality, these virtues of love, compassion and pity are really only a facade;
they hide the Christians’ true feelings of envy, resentment, hatred, and
revenge against their superiors. Many of the Enlightenment philosophes
had rejected Christian doctrines, but they had largely retained Christian
ethics. Nietzsche, however, did not attack Christianity because it was
contrary to reason, as the philosophes had, but because it was a ‘declaration
of hostility towards life, nature and the will to life.’ By blocking the free
and spontaneous exercise of human instincts and making humility and
abnegation virtues and pride a vice, said Nietzsche, Christianity gave man a
sick soul. “God is dead,” proclaimed Nietzsche.
God is man’s own creation. There are no higher worlds, no transcendental or
metaphysical truths, no higher morality that derives from God or nature. Dead
too are the secular ideals of natural rights, scientific socialism, and faith
in inevitable progress. The death of God and all transcendental truth can
mean the liberation of man. Man can surmount nihilism by creating new values
that further his instincts for life and foster self-mastery. In the process
he can overcome the deadening uniformity and mediocrity of modern civilization;
he can undo democracy and socialism, which have made masters out of the
cattle-like masses, and quash the shopkeeper’s spirit, which has made man
soft and degenerate. The
Superman Europe can only be saved by the
emergence of a higher type of man, the superman or overman, who would not be
held back by the egalitarian rubbish preached by the democrats and
socialists. Europe needs a new breed of rulers, a true aristocracy of
masterful men, a ‘new order of rank.’ The superman is a new kind of man who breaks
with accepted morality, which only negates life, and creates his own values.
He does not repress his instincts but asserts them. Free of Christian guilt,
he proudly affirms his own being; dispensing with the Christian “thou shalt
not,” he instinctively says, “I will.” He dares to be himself. He makes his
own values. He relishes and exudes power. He knows that life is purposeless
but lives it laughingly, adventurously, fully. The superman represents the
highest form of life. The superman exemplifies the ultimate
fact of life, that “the most fearful and fundamental desire in man [is] his
drive for power,” that human beings crave and strive for power ceaselessly
and uncompromisingly. It is perfectly natural for human beings to want to
dominate nature and other human beings, even to inflict pain on them. This
will to power is not a product of rational reflection but flows from the very
essence of human existence. As the motivating force in human behavior, it
governs everyday life and is the determining factor in political life. The
enhancement of power brings supreme enjoyment: “the love of power is the
demon of men. Let them have everything- health, food, a place to live,
entertainment- they are and remain unhappy and low-spirited; for the demon
waits and waits and will be satisfied. Take everything form them and satisfy
this and they are happy- as happy as men and demos can be.” The masses, cowardly and envious, will
condemn the superman as evil; this has always been their way. Thus, Nietsche
castigates democracy, because it “ represents the disbelief in great human
beings and an elite society,” and Christianity, for imposing an unnatural
morality, one that affirms meekness, humanity and compassion. The German philosopher Arthur
Schopenhauer (1788-1860) had declared that beneath the conscious intellect is
the will, a striving, demanding, and imperious force that is the real
determinant of human behavior. In contrast to Hegel, who identified ultimate
reality with reason, Schopenhauer viewed will, an all encompassing force that
pervades even plants and animals, as the essence of reality: “the will is the
thing-in-itself, the inner content, the essence of the world...every man is
what he is through will... for willing is the basis of his inner being.” In
contrast to the philosophes, who saw human beings as fundamentally rational,
Schopenhauer held that the intellect is merely a tool of an illogical and
irrational will. Life is an endless striving to fulfill ceaseless desires.
Schopenhauer anticipated Freud when he declared that dark and blind animal
impulses, not reason, are a human being’s true essence. Nietzsche learned from Schopenhauer to
appreciate the unconscious strivings and impulses that dominate human
behavior. Regarding the will as a source of strength and the wellspring of
human creativity and accomplishment, Nietzsche called for its heroic and
joyful assertion. Affirmation of the will allows us to redeem life from
nothingness. Supermen cast off all established values. Free of all
restrictions, rules and codes of behavior imposed by society, they create
their own values. They burst upon the world propelled by something that urges
people to want , take, strike, create, struggle, seek, dominate. Supermen are
people of restless energy who enjoy living dangerously, scorn meekness and
humility, and dismiss humanitarian sentiments; they are noble warriors, hard
and ruthless. This new elite can save European society from decadence. Nietzsche
in Perspective The influence of Nietzsche’s philosophy
is still a matter of controversy and conjecture. He brilliantly expressed the
spirit of an age in which all areas of thought and culture were pitting life
force and soul against positivism and scientism, intuition and instinct
against reason, daring and adventure against bourgeois conformity, comfort,
and smugness. The release this wild, primitive and merciless energy into the
twentieth century nearly hurled Western civilization back to a state of
barbarism. Nietzsche grasped the essential problem
of modern society and culture- that with the death of God traditional moral
values had lost their authority and blinding power. In a world where nothing
is true, all is permitted. Nietzsche foresaw that the twentieth century would
be an age of nihilism, violent and sordid. Nietzsche is part of a general
nineteenth century trend that sought to affirm the human being and earthly
aspirations rather than God or salvation. There is no God, Nietzsche
declared, values and norms do not derive from a transcendental realm outside
ourselves. We must respond to this crisis of existence, he said, by facing
ourselves and our lives free of illusion, pretense and hypocrisy, by standing
on our own two feet, and forging our way. We do this by rejecting
conventional beliefs and ways of living and choosing our own values- the
values that we can feel and live by without deception or rationalization.
Nietzsche’s rejection of God, metaphysics, and all embracing historical
theories that attempt to impose rational patterns on the past and present is
crucial to the development of existentialism. However, Nieztsche had no constructive
proposal for dealing with the disintegration of rational and Christian
certainties. He offered no constructive guidelines for dealing with the
problems of modern industrial civilization. Nor can we find anything helpful
in his condemnation of equality. His vision of society is merely ‘a
foundation and scaffolding by means of which a select class of beings may be
able to elevate themselves to... a higher existence.” He provides his
followers with a warrant for ruthless domination and exploitation. Many young
European intellectuals saw his philosophy as liberating an internal energy
which would erode the rational foundations of Western civilization. These
young people, attracted to Nietzsche’s thought, welcomed World War I; they
viewed the war as an esthetic experience and believed it would clear a path
to a new heroic age. Nazi theorists tried to make Nietzsche a
forerunner of their movement. They sought form Nietzsche a philosophical
sanction for their own will to power, contempt for the weak, ruthlessness,
and glorification of action, as well as for their cult of the heroic and
their Social Darwinist revulsion for human equality and endorsement of
cruelty. Recasting Nietzsche in their own image, the Nazis viewed themselves
as Nietzsche’s supermen: the new aristocracy, members of a master race who,
by force of will, would conquer all obstacles and reshape the world according
to their self-created values. Nietzsche himself detested German
nationalism and militarism; he scoffed at the notion of German racial
superiority, disdained anti-semitism, and denounced state worship. He would
have abhorred Hitler and been dismayed at the twisting of his idea of the
will to power into a prototype fascist principle. The men that he admired
were passionate but self-possessed individuals, who by mastering their own
chaotic passions, would face life and death courageously, affirmatively,
creatively. Unfortunately, Nietzsche’s extreme and violent denunciation of
Western democratic principles, including equality, his praise of power, his
call for the liberation of all instincts, his elitism, which denigrates and
devalues all human life that is not strong and noble, and his spurning of
humane values provided a breeding ground for violent, anti-rational,
anti-liberal, and inhumane movements. His philosophy is conducive to a
politics that knows no moral limits. For Further Reading: Richard Hooker's Introduction Nietzsche Resources (History Guide) Freiderich Nietzsche: Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy The Perspectives of Nietzsche (Pitt) Nietzsche: Thus Spoke Zarathustra (excerpts)
Beyond
Good and Evil Excerpts. "Whatever is profound loves masks ..." Episteme Links -- best page of links to Nietzsche resources on the Internet
Nietzsche article in Encyclopedia Britannica -- article covering Nietzsche's life, doctrines and influence. (43KB)
Handout on FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE (1844-1900)
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