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Many scholars have questioned Nietzsche's complex stance toward Judaism and anti-Semitism, and thus his relationship with Nazism. Among contemporary scholars searching for the roots of fascism, this question has become central to their readings of Nietzsche and other Enlightenment-era philosophers, especially those alive during nineteenth-century Germany.
YirmiYahu Yovel, for example, argues that Nietzsche's attacks on ancient priestly Judaism were as fierce and uncompromising as his assault on anti-Semitism. [1] Yovel also wrote, that the anti-Semites accused Jews of having killed Christ, but Nietzsche accused Jews of having begotten Christ. [2] According to Yovel, Nietzsche depicted ancient Judaism as grounded in ressentiment and as responsible for the corruption of Europe through Christianity. [3] While Walter Kaufmann praised Nietzsche as opposed to all Nazi intents and acts, scholars such as Steven Aschheim have placed Nietzsche as "the most acute anti-Semite that ever was", [4] because, he continues, as an example in The Antichrist, Nietzsche illustrated Judaism's role in Europe's spiritual history, namely, as one engendering Christianity itself, making the Jews "the most fateful people of world history." [5] He then further suggests "Nietzsche became a crucial source" for a particular variety of anti-Semitism he refers to as "anti-Christian anti-Semitism" as was "designated by Uriel Tal" in contradistinction to a Christian anti-Semitism. [6]
Inquiries such as these, however, have been known for decades, although in a perhaps different light. That Nietzsche has been marked in the political sphere as one among (or at least claimed as a precursor to these movements) the anarchists, communists, feminists, libertarianists, socialists, nihilists, fascists, anti-Semites, Nazis, etc. is a prevalent reading in the history of scholarship, in large part due to the manner in which Nietzsche was presented and appropriated by the Nazis, and similarly for other political movements, as one of their philosophical inspirators. While the legitimacy of Walter Kaufmann's work is frequently questioned, his intense scholarship during the 1950s onward attempted to dispel such views and present Nietzsche's writings in their appropriate historical framework, going so far to show them as strongly against these particular views. Contemporary scholarship in both North America and Europe and across languages nevertheless continues to plumb the nature of these indications with some in agreement and others in disagreement on Nietzsche's very complex positions on these issues, leaving the matter an unsettled question.
Within the influences section of this page i was rather surprised to find Hume. I am completely unaware of any major influence Hume had on Nietzsche, i would much appreciate it if somebody could state how he influenced Nietzsche, to give a reason for his name being among Nietzsche's influences. I have also made the additions of Dostoevsky, Plato, David Strauss, and Darwin to that section. If anybody disagrees with these additions please say so. Thank you.-- Itafroma 11:48, 17 July 2006 (UTC)itafroma
I have to disagree about all three of the removed influences. I believe that it was David Strauss's 'Life of Jesus' that upon reading at a young age, Nietzsche made the decision to abandoned his faith and theological studies. Nietzsche has famously said about Dostoevsky that he was "the only psychologist from whom i had something to learn." He was very impressed by 'notes from underground' especially, and i would find it hard not to call Dostoevsky a philosophical writer atleast, and if a composer can be an influence i believe a writer can also. Comments about Darwin and Darwinists in Nietzsche's writings may be harsh but this is partly due, in my opinion, to Nietzsches staunch anglophobia, he certainly didn't agree with Darwin's theories absolutely, but his work on struggle and evolution influenced his own work on power (see 'Nietzsche's new Darwinism' by John Richardson). I don't quite understand the influence does not equal criticism comment, as if you mean criticism from Nietzsche, he has harshely criticised nearly all of the individuals on the influences list, most notably , Schopenhauer, Socrates, Spinoza, Wagner and Plato. In fact despite Nietzsche's admiration for Plato and Socrates their epistemology is almost the antithesis of his own.-- Itafroma 13:17, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
"But apart from Goethe and Schopenhauer-- and perhaps Burckhardt-- none of the men chosen by Andler seem as important to Nietzsche's thought as Heraclitus, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics, Spinoza, Kant, Hegel, Heine, Darwin, and Dostoevsky." (p. 306n)
"Even without the still more offensive explicitness of the censored passage-- which reads, "the word idiot"-- it seems plain that Nietzsche conceived of Jesus in the image of Dostoevsky's Idiot. This conception of the Redeemer is the clue both to Nietzsche's reverence for Jesus and to his critique: his whole attitude toward Jesus hinges upon the 'something' he 'learned' from Dostoevsky." (p. 340)
"While Nietzsche never mentions "The Idiot", he freely owns how deeply he was impressed by Dostoevsky after discovering him early in 1887-- and it was in the following year that the word "idiot" assumed a sudden significance in Nietzsche's writings." (p. 340n)
Non-Vandal, on what do you base your contention that the influences section is only for philosophers? — goethean ॐ 14:53, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Simple: we're talking about a philosopher. Sure, Nietzsche had widely divergent sources and effects, but we must limit ourselves to {{INFOBOX_PHILOSOPHER}} to what is most pertinent. If we don't, it will also become a huge mess. If there are other notable influences and those influenced N, then we can state them in the article. The rest are clearly laid out in the INFOBOX itself. Non-vandal 14:59, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Here is another very interesting link: "In every one of his protracted and volatile struggles with historical figures or symbols, with Wagner, Socrates, Goethe, Christ, Schopenhauer, and, I would suggest, Schiller, love and hate can scarcely be disentangled." — goethean ॐ 16:30, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
I just noticed the following note at Template:Infobox_Philosopher:
Based on this guideline, aristotle, dostoevsky and voltaire can be deleted immediately. hegel and socrates are mentioned, but not as influences. they are only compared to N in the main article. — goethean ॐ 17:16, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
The claim that Sigmund Freud gave Nietzsche the highest possible praise isn't verified, and it smacks of POV hyperbole. The writer cited Ernest Jones' scholarly biography, but not the actual page number. I've read Jones, and I don't recall that high praise, only Freud's denial that he owed anything to Nietzsche. Please supply the page number, or remove the claim. Also -- another famous person who claimed Nietzsche as an influence was L. Ron Hubbard, founder of the Church of Scientology. It's right in the frontspiece of his 1952 book, Scientology 8-8008. I added that fact a day ago, and now it's been erased. Why? Petrejo 05:30, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
Interesting qoute which I've posted in the NPOV discussion too,
It is a matter of honor to me to be absolutely clean and unequivocal regarding anti-Semitism, namely opposed, as I am in my writings. Source: Friedrich Nietzsche's Collected Letters, Vol. V, #479 -- NoNo 02:32, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
The opening paragraph already seems to me to broadcast a POV in many ways; among them: (1) the identification of Nietzsche abstractly as a moralist suggests a bourgeois morality while the writer is aware that Antichristianity is the core substance of Nietzsche's moral ideology. It seems like an early whitewash to hide Nietzsche's Antichristian position in the introduction; (2) the phrase, 'astonishingly productive' would suggest that Nietzsche was a prolific writer of great tomes, when in fact the quantity of his lifetime output was less than that of other contemporary philosophers; e.g. Kant, Fichte, Hegel, Schelling, Schopenhauer, Marx, and so on. By 'astonishing' the writer possibly means that Nietzsche's poesy was superb, but that's a subjective impression which, used so early in the article, tends to guide the reader toward a POV; and (3) the writer jumps from 1889 to the second half of the 20th century to portray Nietzsche's significance. This omits the importance of the first half of the 20th century, particularly in Germany, which is vital to an ongoing debate about Nietzsche. To deny that period would seem to take a side in that debate at the start.
I suggest that an NPOV opening paragraph would (a) be unashamed of Nietzsche's Antichristian morality; (b) remove any hint of flattery; and (c) admit Nietzsche's German fame in the first half of the 20th century. I made all three changes last night, and they were erased (nobody has yet said why). I've attempted this morning to add the changes slowly, one at a time, starting with (c). All three changes would help to balance the opening paragraph, in my view. Petrejo 15:00, 22 July 2006 (UTC)
I edited the opening paragraph, rearranging some wording in a way that I hope will make the meaning clearer. Some of the statements still contain POV, and I'm not too comfortable with the distinctly un-Nietzschean duality of "positive" and "negative", although I think the meaning is approximately accurate. As for the "broad and unusual philosophical themes" phrase, I think it may be better to recast the sentence entirely. What defines "unusual"? Certainly Nietzsche's thought can be quite striking; in particular, the notion of the eternal recurrence strikes me as quite odd. Now, this idea is not in fact odd at all - to anyone familiar with Eastern thought. Anyways, just a bit of imperfect clean-up. Matheson 09:00, 2 August 2006 (UTC)
Another edit on the opening paragraph. The phrase "inadequacy of dualistic thinking" is of course Nietzsche's own POV. I am new to this and remain somewhat uncertain of how NPOV is supposed to work. I'll look into it.
Also, N was always highly regarded among certain groups of early 20th-Century English and Parisian intellectuals; I've added this to the introduction. I couldn't find one particular citation, but I feel that his impact on the British and Parisian thinkers listed later should suffice. Again, I'm new here, so maybe verifiability is an issue in this instance. Matheson 09:55, 2 August 2006 (UTC)
The article says "Ultimately, however, Nietzsche claims that, unlike the overman, who embraces life, Jesus denied reality in favor of his 'kingdom of God'." Is it to be taken then that Nietzsche's opposition to Jesus of Nazareth as an approximate kind of Übermensch is not derived from Jesus' apparent elevation and glorification of a truly slavish slave-morality? Does this mean that Nietzsche's concept of slave-morality is subordinate to his concept of Übermensch--or to put it differently, is the Overman accountable to the master-morality in any way at all? (It certainly appears to me that the two are interdependent upon each other, but it still does not preclude one of those apparently nasty contradictions in Nietzsche's thought.) 71.76.135.102 15:15, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
Just in case anyone has seen it, I think the youtube videos [2] [3], which according to users' comments are from a 2001 movie, have been digitally made from still photographs taken by Hans Olde in May 1899. See de:Diskussion:Friedrich Nietzsche#Filmaufnahmen von Nietzsche?. I uploaded the images to Commons, perhaps you might like to use them somewhere. There is no meaning in the numbers, obviously 8/11 and 6/7 would belong together (and, if there really was a film, would show real movement in between).-- Chef aka Pangloss 13:26, 28 July 2006 (UTC) - PS: I am not sure if my translation "The ill Nietzsche" (for Olde's title Der kranke Nietzsche) is fitting; "krank" can also be translated as "sick". If "sick" is better here, please correct this.-- Chef aka Pangloss 16:53, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
It's good to see you are still here. As for Pangloss, I understand he voiced his personal opinion, but he's also making points about what others have said. And these points aren't "emotion". They're significant and need more discussion. There's no reason to be directly confrontational, just focus on content and things will develop where we all want them to be, I assume. Non-vandal 05:37, 12 August 2006 (UTC)
I have heard from somes sources, including about.com [6], that Nietzsche dropped the middle name Wilhelm from his name, but it doesn't seem to be mentioned in this article (I can't find it). Is it true and should it be mentioned? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sirveaux ( talk • contribs) 23:40, 29 July 2006 (UTC)
"According to at least one authority, the Slovenian scholar Anton Strle, Friedrich Nietzsche lost his faith around the time he was reading Leben Jesu." - Taken from the David Strauss article.
"* David Strauss was the famous author of 'the life of jesus'.Thois, Strauss's most notorious book, had a profound effect on the young Nietzsche and contributed greatly to his loss of faith when he was twenty years old (Hayman 1982, 62-63)" - Taken from a note on p32 in 'The Nietzsche Canon a Publication History and Bibliography' by William H Schaberg
Do any other users still object to any inclusion of Strauss in the influences section? Or atleast some text in the article stating a possible influence from Strauss. I was also considering adding Philipp Mainländer to the Influences section, any thoughts?-- Itafroma 11:04, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
After one semester and to the anger of his mother, he stopped his theological studies, and lost his faith. It has been suggested that this may have been partly due to his reading of David Strauss's life of jesus at the time, which had a profound effect on the young Nietzsche.
This is the text i have added to the youth section of the biography. I have tried to make it apparant that the evidence for Strauss's influence is inconclusive. But if anybody disagrees with the addition please say so, and why. I also think that Socrates deserves more text, and should be included in influences.-- Itafroma 14:57, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
...and lost his faith. citation needed It has been suggested that this may have been partly due to his reading of David Strauss's life of jesus at the time, which had a profound effect on the young Nietzsche. citation needed He chose to concentrate....
There is a bias in the above description in the article which trivializes Nietzsche's experience and ignores Nietzsche's own triumphant proclamations of god realization contained in these letters, in favor of the normalizing perspective that it is a breakdown as opposed to Nietzsche's own descriptions of his experience as a breakthrough. I find it quite offensive and disrespectful of Nietzsche to so blatantly ignore his own account of his experience and trivialize it with the word breakdown.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.138.137.6 ( talk • contribs • WHOIS) 10:15, 1 August 2006(UTC)
Presenting Nietzsche AS HE IS amounts to discussing and questioning the ingrained taboos of modernity--who has the courage for that? Apparently to refer to Nietzsche himself is inadmissible, and one must remain in the circle of the interpretations of modern liberal democratic and postmodernist distorters and scholars with an ethnic Judaic agenda (see Kevin B. MacDonald) like Walter Kaufmann, whose strained, cynical efforts to present a humanistic, super-democratized Nietzsche are notorious and laughable.
In case reference to Nietzsche himself is somehow 'unscholarly' (a quite strange position), I will refer to outside scholarly sources.
http://www.filosofia.it/pagine/argomenti/Losurdo/Losurdo_Santi.htm
The Journal of Nietzsche Studies, n. 27, (Spring 2004) Nietzsche, the aristocratic rebel.
Ernst Nolte, Three Faces of Fascism:
"The discovery of the Dionysian background of tragedy, the defense of genius against the masses, the insistence on the necessity of slavery, serve no other purpose than to explicate the elements of genuine culture: its background, relevance, and basis. They are developed along with the indictment of the enemies of culture: science and its logical (Socratic) optimism, mass emancipation and its shallow utilitarian outlook, revolution and it pernicious effects ... For if history amounts to nothing more than the petty and sterile calculation of the last 'squinting' men, who neither obey nor rule and desire to be neither poor nor rich, then the most mighty effort is required to force them back into the state of slavery which is their rightful place ... In fact, Nietzsche's whole thought represents the very antithesis of the Marxist conception, and the idea of destruction is the negative aspect of its core ... Nietzsche is not in any obvious sense the spiritual father of fascism; but he was the first to give voice to that spiritual focal point toward which all fascism must gravitate: the assault on practical and theoretical transcendence, for the sake of a 'more beautiful' from of 'life.' Nietzsche was not concerned with magnificent animality for its own sake, nor was destruction per se Hitler's goal. Their ultimate aim was a 'supreme culture' of the future ... Many decades in advance, Nietzsche provided the political radical anti-Marxism of fascism with its original spiritual image, an image of which even Hitler never quite showed himself the equal ... Nietzsche's thought is not an ideology of the bourgeoisie: on the one hand it is a deeply disturbed protest of the artistic temperament against the general world trend, on the other it is the violent reaction of the feudal element in bourgeois society at being threatened." (p. 441-45) "[Note 57] Nietzsche claimed that miscegenation was responsible for the triumph of democratic ideals (Werke, VIII, 245)." (p. 545)
Rudiger Safranski, Nietzsche: A Philosophical Biography:
"If happiness and freedom of the greatest possible number are given higher priority, Nietzsche claimed, the result is a democratic culture in which mass taste triumphs. The orientation of a democratic state to comprehensive welfare, human dignity, freedom, egalitarian justice, and protection of the weak impedes any prospects for development of great personalities. The 'bright lights' vanish from history and along with them any last vestige of meaning.
"In his quest to defend aesthetic significance in history, Nietzsche assailed democracy as far back as the early 1870s, even before his shrill attacks on the 'complete appeasement of the democratic herd animal' some years later. Nietzsche considered the ancient Greek slaveholder society the paragon of culture for the very reason that it disallowed concessions to the 'democratic herd animal.' He extolled antiquity for being honest enough not to have covered up the terrible foundation from which its blossom grew ... Just as people need brains and brawn, Nietzsche argued, society needs the hardworking hands of laborers for a privileged class, allowing that class 'to engender and fulfill a new world of needs' (The Greek State) ... More recent eras have glorified the world of work, but glorification is self-deception, because even the 'terminological fallacy' of the 'dignity of work' does not alter anything in the fundamental injustice of life, which metes out mechanical work to some and creative activity to the more highly gifted. Slave societies were brutally frank about their inequities, whereas our modern times feign contrition but are unwilling forgo exploitation in the service of culture. Thus, if art justifies our existence aesthetically, it does so on the foundation of 'cruelty' (The Greek State). ...
"Nietzsche feared that if knowledge and learning were to become available to the majority of people, a horrifying, culturally devastating uprising would ensue, because the 'barbaric slave class' would plan revenge 'not only for itself but for all generations' (BT, 18). For him, this awful revenge was a 'calamity slumbering in the womb of theoretical culture'.
"Nietzsche contended that the order of ancient or modern slaveholder societies could be preserved only if everyone accepted the basic tragic constitution of human life as a consequence 'of the natural cruelty of things' (BT, 18). The slaves put up with cruelty, which is one aspect of Dionysian wisdom, and the cultural elite is aware of this cruelty and seeks refuge behind the shield of art, which is its other aspect. ...
"Nietzsche could envision this higher stage of mankind...only as a culmination of culture in its 'peaks of rapture', which is to say in successful individuals and achievements. The will to power unleashes the dynamics of culmination, but it is also the will to power that forms a moral alliance on the side of the weak. This alliance works at cross purposes with the goal of culmination and ultimately, in Nietzsche's view, leads to widespread equalization and degeneration. As a modern version of the 'Christian theory of morality', this alliance forms the backbone of democracy and socialism. Nietzsche therefore adamantly opposed all such movements ... If we are content to regard this highly personal philosophy and these maneuvers of self-configuration with fascination and perhaps even admiration, but are not willing to abandon the idea of democracy and democratic justice, it is likely that Nietzsche would have accused us of feeble compromise, indecisiveness, and epitomizing the ominous 'blinking' of the 'last men'...
"In both Twilight of the Idols and The Antichrist, Nietzsche evaluated a book he had discovered in Turin, namely the Laws of Manu. This book was alleged to be a moral code of the caste system based on the Vedas. Nietzsche was captivated by the chilling consistency with which this corpus of laws divided society into mutually exclusive social milieus according to an ominous requirement of purity. He regarded the fact that members of the various castes could not interact with one another as a clever biopolitics of breeding that would prevent degeneration...
"In his last writings, notably in Twilight of the Idols, Nietzsche employed even more adamant moral and philosophical arguments to advocate anti-Judaism, and introduced on occasional hint of racial biology: 'Christianity, with its roots in Judaism and comprehensible only as a growth from this soil, represents the countermovement to any morality of breeding, of race, or privilege: it is the anti-Aryan religion par excellence' (TI 'Improvers of Mankind' 4)."
Prominent scholar Hubert Cancik, MONGOLS, SEMITES AND THE PURE-BRED GREEKS: Nietzsche's handling of the racial doctrines of his time:
Greece as Model
...Nietzsche thoroughly accepted the biological discourse of his contemporaries: history was supposed to be explained through the "mixing of blood", the "coupling" of heterogeneous elements, "extraction" (in a biological sense) and, finally, "collisions" and "waves" of "immigrants". The genesis of the Greeks in Greece, where they "became Greeks", is the point of his notes on the "original inhabitants". This point owes a debt to a particular biological (see "Nietzsche's Greeks, Jews and Europe" below) and political (see "A higher caste", below) theory of Nietzsche's.
"A higher caste"
Nietzsche's notes jump from the prehistoric "original inhabitants" to the historical period of Greece: from the conquerors came the rulers; from the original inhabitants came the slaves; from the battle of races came the battle of the "castes". Politics built itself upon the previous "racial history". Together, all of these components formed the Greek model that was supposed to mediate between antiquity and the European future. Immediately following upon his racial history of Greece, Nietzsche continued with these words:
If one considers the enormous number of slaves on the mainland, then Greeks were only to be found sporadically. A higher caste of the Idle, the statesman, etc. Their hostilities held them in physical and intellectual tension. They had to ground their superiority upon quality - that was their spell over the masses (UB 118, p. 206 = 5[199]).
Now then, there are "Greeks". The conquerors "had taken into their blood", consumed and digested the Semitic, Mongolian and Thracian components . Something new had come into existence. Yet the "wild energy" through which the conquerors had taken possession of the land and its inhabitants remained preserved up into the earlier perlod of antiquity - or so Nietzsche thought. It was, indeed essential in order to keep the "enormous number of slaves" suppressed. This same energy drove the Greeks both to rivalry with each other and to the highest cultural achievements: "The intellectual culture of Greece [was] an aberration of the tremendous political drive toward distinction" (UB 118, p. 118=5[179]). The highest achievements of culture were necessary; they were not some lovely but superficial decoration. They engendered the cohesion of the higher caste of the "idle" - the political class and the creators of culture: in the musical and the athletlc contests, aggression was channelled and sublimated (cf. e.g. the piece from December 1872 on: "Homer's Wettkampf": KSA vol. 1, pp. 783-92). Moreover, the supreme achievements of culture cast a spell over the "masses", who obviously had to care for each one of those belonging to the "Idle", whose rule, in this manner, was justified aesthetically. Consequently, Nietzsche believed that he had proven through historical methods that the wild power and energy belonging to a conquering people has to be "bred great" (groB gezuchtet), a cultivation process by which such achievements as those the Greeks once produced would also be brought forth in Europe in the future (UB 118, p. 116 and 114 = 5[185] and [188]). Neither peace, luxury, socialism, the ideal political state, welfare, nor short-term educational reform are preconditions for the engendering of genius - whether of a people or of an individual; rather, genius should arise from conditions "as malicious and ruthless" as those in nature itself: "Mistreat people - drive them to their limits" (UB 118, p. 112 = 5j 191] and [194]).
Nietzsche's considerations about race and caste as well as rule and culture for the Greeks were aimed at his present. "The Greeks", he thought, "believed in differences among the races". Nietzsche approvingly recalled Schopenhauer's opinion that slaves were a different species, and in addition, he cited the image of a winged animal in contrast to that of an unmoving shellfish (UB 118, p. 112 = 5[72] and [73]). In such a generalization as this one, the statement is incorrect, and in a more narrowly defined sense, it is racist... Accordingly, the following statements by Nietzsche are to be characterized as racist:
1. "The new problem: whether or not educating[!] a part of humanity to a higher race must come at the cost of the rest. Breeding . . ." (1881 KSA vol. 9, p. 577 12[10])
2. "We would as little choose 'early Christians' as Polish Jews to associate with us: not that one would need to have even a single [i.e., rational] objection to them.... Both of them simply do not smell good." (AC 46)
Nietzsche tested his racial teachings within the framework of classical studies. The aphoristic formulation that he gave to his "Notes" on the original population of Greece in September 1876 forms a connection to the racial teachings of his critical writings ("Die Pflugschar" 143 KSA vol. 8, p. 327; it is proved by the version of "Pflugschar" that the passages numbered 5[198] and [199] in KGW are not separated "tragments" but rather a unity). In his "Plowshare", Nietzsche excluded the Doric migration and avoided the word "caste" as well as such peculiarities as the tree and snake cult, or the Mongolian elements in the Odyssey or the Italians who had become Greeks. Purified of offensive, concrete, verifiable details, a more refined, polished, dashing aphorism emerged, one that suggested, in more pleasing language, the necessary connection of racial differences to the rule of "higher beings" -- thus "the idle, the political class, etc." are now called - and to cultural superiority.
NIETZSCHE'S GREEKS, JEWS AND EUROPE
Inheritance of acquired characteristics
...the "purity" of the race is also a positive, basic concept of biology for Nietzsche. Nietzsche constructed a little racial history of ancient Europe upon concepts he had borrowed from biology (GM 15 1887; note that Nietzsche had read Tocqueville - see his letter to Overbeck, 23 February 1887). "Blood mixing", skull shape and skin and hair color are the main terms of his anthropology. Nietzsche coupled the biological to social characteristics and to moral values: the blond-haired is better than the black-haired, and the short-skulled is worse than the long-skulled. Some fearless etymologies suggested by the erstwhile philologist make this chapter from the Genealogy of Morals into a prize exhibit of philo-Aryan prose (some examples: esthlos/"noble" to einai/"to be", malus/"bad" to melas/"black") because for Nietzsche, the long-skulled blond - the good, noble, pure conqueror - was the Aryan, of course: they were the master race in Europe. Nietzsche's little racial history of ancient Europe aimed at the present. In the social and political movements of the Democrats, the Anarchists and the Socialists of his time, he saw, namely, the instincts of the "pre-Aryan population" breaking through again. Nietzsche related these political programs explicitly to biology. He feared that "the conquering and master race - that of the Aryans - is also being defeated physiologically" (GM I 5). According to Nietzsche, the Jews had begun this slave revolt: they led the slaves - the mob, the herd - to this victory over the aristocracy. This victory meant "blood poisoning", "intoxication" - this pastor's son and classical philologist loved to adorn himself with medical jargon. Nietzsche identified the reason for the poisoning: "It [i.e., the victory] had mingled the races promiscuously" (GM I 9; for the mixture of races considered as an evil, cf. JGB 208, 200). The pre-Aryan population was thus in league with the Jews and against the Italians, the Greeks, the Celts, the Germans - and generally speaking, all Aryans everywhere ... In 1881, Nietzsche published a general draft of his racial ideas under the title "The becoming-pure of a race". What he had previously scattered about in notes concerning classical studies and in various other hints is here summarized in twenty-five lines of print covering five points: 1. The races are not originally pure but, at best, become pure in the course of history. 2. The crossing of races simultaneously means the crossing of cultures: crossing leads to "disharmony" in bodily form, in custom and in morality. 3. The process of purification occurs through "adapting, imbibing, [and] excreting" foreign elements. 4. The result of purification is a stronger and more beautiful organism. 5. The Greeks are "the model of a race and culture that had become pure"... The significance of this text for Nietzsche has been shown by W. Muller Lauter. The "model" for the breeding of a European ruling caste was the Greeks: "it is to be hoped that a pure European race and culture will also one day succeed [in coming into being]" (JGB 25, last sentence & Daybreak IV 272, last sentence). In such a race and culture - as the model prepared by Nietzsche has instructed us - the foreign elements (those bred in) will be imbibed for digestion or excretion...
...Spencer had transferred theorems from biological evolution to the historical process. He complained that a policy of social reform hindered "natural selection". For this reason, Nietzsche advised, one must "eliminate the continuance and effectiveness" of bad, sick and uneducated people (KSA vol. 9, p. 10 (1880); cf. ibid., pp. 27t., 454t). From Sir Francis Galton, one of the original founders of eugenics, he took over the formula of "hereditary genius", which Galton had used in his study of the families of criminals (letter to Strindberg, 8 December 1888.; cf. Ietter to Overbeck, 4 July 1888. Ct. Marie Louise Haase, "Friedrich Nietzsche hest I rancls Galton", Nietzsche-Studien, 18 1889: 633ff)...
Nietzsche's utterances about acquired character, the purity of races, the inheritance of characteristics, the degeneracy of halfbreeds (JCB 208 KSA vol. 5, pp. 138. Cf. JGB 200: "The man belonging to an epoch of dissolution which mixes up the races") and the cultivation of drives over long periods of time could - for this branch - suggest an unorthodox (Neo-)Lamarckianism...
In historical scholarship as well - and even in classical philology - racist teachings had penetrated. Within Nietzsche's racial teachings, Jews and Aryans had a special position. In his first monograph (1872), Nietzsche had already arrayed the "Aryan character" against the Semitic one, Prometheus against Eve, the creative man against the lying woman, the tragic wantonness in battle for higher culture against lascivious sin (The Birth of Tragedy 9; in German, the word Frevel/"wantonness" is masculine in gender; the word Sunde/"sin" is feminine). This argumentative structure is still present in The Antichrist (1888): against the philhellenic Hyperboreans and what Nietzsche called "Aryan humanity" stood denatured Judaism and Judaism "raised to the second power", Christianity (cf. GD The 'correctors' of mankind" KSA vol. 12, p. 501). The Jews - as Nietzsche had indicated with the Eve myth - are not creative in contrast to the Aryan peoples, they are mere "intermediaries", merchants: "they invent nothing." Even their law is from the Codex of Manu - copied from an "absolutely Aryan creation" (Letter to Koselitz, 31 May 1888, cf. n. 31)...
Breeding a pure European race
"Imbibed and absorbed by Europe"
Nietzsche found surprising the fact that Christianity could have forced a Semitic religion upon the Indo-Germans (KSA vol. 9, pp. 21f). For this reason, he fought both Judaism and Christianity, and he created for himself a pagan, Indo-Germanic alternative with his new, Hellenic Dionysos and the Iranian Zarathustra...
The Christian was "only a Jew of a 'freer' confession of faith" - Christians and Jews were "related, racially related" (AC 44), and Christianity was a form of Judaism raised "yet one time" higher through negation (AC 27: "the small rebellious movement, which is baptised in the name of Jesus of Nazareth, is the Jewish instinct once more"). Nietzsche wrote:
Christianity is to be understood entirely in terms of the soil from which is grew - it is not a countermovement to the Jewish instinct; it is the successor itself, a further step in its [i.e., the Jewish instinct's] frightening logic. (AC 24)
Nietzsche's fight against the "denaturalization of natural values" (AC 25), his "transvaluation of all values" was directed against Jews and Christians. Because Nietzsche argued against both, Christian antiSemitism was especially offensive for him. The Jews, Nietzsche maintained, were nevertheless guilty: They had "made humanity into something so false that, still today, a Christian can feel antiSemitic without understanding himself as the last stage of Judaism". (AC 24) The Antichrist was Nietzsche's last word on Judaism which he himself intended to be published. It is precisely with respect to supposed or truly "positive" utterances on Jews and Judaism that this fact should never be forgotten.
A short essay (section 251) in Nietzsche's "Philosophy of the Future" - Beyond Good and Evil (1885/6) - belongs to the "positive" parts. Here, "the breeding of a new caste to rule over Europe", definitely a current "European problem", according to Nietzsche, is discussed. The breeding of this caste follows the "Greek model": the foreign elements are "imbibed" and either assimilated or "excreted" - thus does a "pure European race and culture come into being". With the Jews, however, Germany was going to have difficulty, for Germany had "amply enough Jews" (so wrote Nietzsche in 1885/6): "that the German stomach, the German blood, is having difficulty (and for a long time yet will continue to have difficulty) finishing even this quantity of 'Jews'." Other European countries had finished with the Jews "because of a more strenuous digestion"; in Germany, however, there were simply too many. Nietzsche demanded what all anti-Semites demanded at that time: "Allow no more Jews in! And, especially, close the gates to the east (including the one between Germany and Austria!"... For anti-Semitism itself, Nietzsche had complete understanding; he was simply - like "all careful and judicious people" - against the "dangerous extravagance" of this feeling, "especially against the tasteless and scandalous expression of this extravagant feeling". (By asking moderation in the expression of anti-Semitism, which he considers as principally justified, Nietzsche takes the same posltlon as the later Wagner and Wolzogen.) Nietzsche had a measured and tasteful manner of expressing this "feeling". And his solution to the problem was also mild: the Jews are to be bred in. They even desire it themselves, "to be in Europe, to be imbibed and absorbed". As for the "antiSemitic complainers", those who might hinder this gentle final solution with their radical words, Nietzsche wanted to have them expelled from the country. And then, he thought, one could - "with great care" and "with selectivity" - cross an intelligent Jewish woman with an "aristocratic officer from the Mark" (i.e., a Prussian aristocratic officer)... In this elevated, fine, tasteful, gentle anti-Semitism, a thematic communality between Wagner and Nietzsche reveals itself, one going deeper than any disagreement in other areas, whether personal, musical or religious.
How likely is it this data by prominent scholars I provided in good faith is going to be incorporated into the Nietzsche articles, considering Wikipedia's unbalanced, extreme pro-liberalistic, pro-Marxist atmosphere?!— Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.136.80.109 ( talk • contribs • WHOIS)
It is a matter of honor to me to be absolutely clean and unequivocal regarding anti-Semitism, namely opposed, as I am in my writings. Source: Friedrich Nietzsche's Collected Letters, Vol. V, #479 How come he's so contradicting?-- NoNo 02:32, 22 August 2006 (UTC)f
Now, if...the only politics calling itself Nietzschean turned out to be a Nazi one, then this is necessarily significant...One can't falsify just anything.
— Jacques Derrida, The Ear of the Other, ibid, p. 47
Let's get some things strait hair. Any racism that you detect in Nietzsche must be seen in historical context. Many white Europeans of that day(including those enlightenment fundamentalists) had racist view points of some kind. Where talking about white supremacy in its full 19th century force. Nietzsche is no worse then the average European of his day and perhaps better then many(he did advocate racial mixing apparently). Trying to put privilage on Nietzsche's influence on Nazism(and I don't deny its there) is a canard done by many enlightenment fans who continue to deny THEIR PRIMARY ROLE as people like Horkheimer, Adorhno and Baumant have shown. Nazism grew out of the view points of Herber Spencer and those other logical positivists who were endentured within enlightenment discourse. I shouldn't have to remind people of the many thinkers left and right who were pro-eugenics back in the early 20th century. Enlightenment rationality is what gives you your nazism. The problem with Nietzsche is that he was on some level a capture of those view points. You can clearly note some similarities with him and Herber Spencer for example. As for anti-semitism, look, you can say that some things he said in the late 1800s were politically incorrect as well as stereotypical by todays standards even in a complementory sense(he thought Jews did control the strings in europe for example and gave them credit), he was hardly anti-semetic. I would say the main substance of what he says against Jewish culture is true. They are the 1st to put a major slave moralistic culture on the map. He does not say that this is indemic to their race, he simply notes a historical role they have played and calls it out. Ultimately your charge against Freddy fails to take note of the pravailing white supremacist views of the day which were entreched in enlightenment thought and still are. He's no worse then many others. Wolverine
The Nietzsche article is very long. I think that we should follow the example of the Kierkegaard, Philosophy of Søren Kierkegaard, and Theology of Søren Kierkegaard articles and break out N's thought from the biographical article. the biographical article would consist of:
The Nietzsche's thought or Nietzsche's philosophy article could merge all of the assorted articles that we have now into one large article:
Does anyone support this? — goethean ॐ 18:06, 4 August 2006 (UTC)
I don't know how to archive a talk page, but it seems about time don't you think? - Bordello 15:32, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
To provide a more succint (by expanding the article *sigh*) and informative main article, especially as we need to seriously devolve it, I've followed the example of the Michel Foucault page in particular and set out a "Works" section of the article, including very brief summaries of major works by Nietzsche, linking to the main article on the subject and sprinkled with links to more detailed discussions. Because at the moment we have a long and informative biography and a hyper-contentious section on interpretations of Nietzsche, and nothing else. If this is done well we can trim the rest of the article into a form where it is more than a biography - currently it offers nothing to someone who wants an overview of Nietzsche's philosophy (which is why people come to the page). My contribution is little more than a rewrite of the Nietzsche entry in the Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy ( Wicks, Robert, "Friedrich Nietzsche", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2004 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = < http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2004/entries/nietzsche/> - the only reference in this article! ) and only covers the first two books. I'll leave a more rounded and complete rendition to my fellow editors and myself when I have more time and resources at hand. -- Marinus 01:50, 15 August 2006 (UTC)
I've finished the entires for his major works. I'm thinking of putting in (miniscule) comments on the other two books of 1888, and I'll definitely need to say a few words about the Nachlass. Comments are welcome. -- Marinus 03:46, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
This may surprise readers who became adults in the 1970s, but drugs such as chloral hydrate have harmful effects. It is very possible that Nietzsche's overuse of this substance led to his mental breakdown. As is the case with many drugs, their effect is trivialized. The destruction that they cause is usually attributed to another source. Lestrade 01:59, 15 August 2006 (UTC)Lestrade
Not all too surprising. Medical knowledge wasn't particularly great back then, and the understanding of effects of certain chemicals upon the body was still foundationally growing. Are there any scholarly sources that support this view? If so, it could be added to the article. Non-vandal 04:50, 16 August 2006 (UTC)
Another influence that "Schopenhauer as Educator" may have had on Nietzsche was in his decision to leave teaching. Schopenhauer had abandoned his academic career and spent the remainder of his life as an independent scholar. How delicious that must have seemed to Nietzsche, whose early The Birth of Tragedy had effectively ruined his philological career. Nietzsche developed several non-verifiable ailments, such as headaches and stomach disorders. These provided a public justification for his departure from professorial life after having stayed long enough to earn a small pension. Lestrade 12:26, 6 September 2006 (UTC)Lestrade
Poor vision would not have interfered with his teaching. Many successful teachers have poor vision. In the military, he had been injured by a horse. That injury naturally healed. Lestrade 12:59, 7 September 2006 (UTC)Lestrade
How could Freud say that Nietzsche had more knowledge of himself than anyone else? Could Freud compare Nietzsche's knowledge with Nietzsche's self and then make the judgement that they corresponded? How could Freud know what other people, past, present, and future, know about themselves? Freud's statement reflects very poorly on his intelligence. Lestrade 18:12, 6 September 2006 (UTC)Lestrade
Just wanted to know wether the IPA spelling is correct. I'm learning German and I think it should be pronounced otherwise, I may be wrong, though
Did Nietzsche comment much on Machiavelli? It would appear, if only on the surface, that the two thinkers have at least some common strains running through there works. 152.23.84.168 02:38, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
Obviously, these are far too many works to put on the main page. I have only tried to put together a representative list of books that should be considered for the bibliography of books about Nietzsche. Since these books come from my own library they are mostly paperbacks and later editions. All the dates and publishing information only reflect the editions I happened to buy. There are several schools of Nietzsche interpretation (e.g., Anglo-American, Continental, Postmodern and 'Straussian') that I respect and have tried to include books from all these schools. But perhaps some of the above works seem idiosyncratic and thus need to be explained. The Foucault book contains two very important essays on Nietzsche: "Nietzsche, Freud, Marx" and "Nietzsche, Genealogy and History" that have been very influential. The Gaultier book, written around 1900, is key to seeing the connection between 'Nietzschefied' Neo-Kantianism and postmodernism. The Steiner book might be of interest to those that want to find an 'occult' or spiritual meaning to Nietzsche's work. The Lampert book, Leo Strauss and Nietzsche, contains the important essay by Strauss, "Note on the Plan of Nietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil," and thus would serve both as an example of Strauss and also the 'decoding' of his method. At some point Volume III of my Heidegger books 'grew legs' and walked away; I would be grateful if someone would supply the correct information for Volume 3. I include MacIntyre on this list because Nietzsche's position is a possibility that MacIntyre, in his 'trilogy', wishes to foreclose. If his books need to be cut I think it would be best to drop Whose Justice first and only then After Virtue. I would hope that his Rival Versions makes anyones final list. There is an emerging anglo-american Kantian interpretation of Nietzsche (Green, Hill, Small, e.g.) and I do hope some of these books make the final cut. I think Stambaugh's dissertation on time a classic that is often overlooked. Hopefully it too will make the list. Rosen's book on Heidegger references Nietzsche throughout but most especially in the second half of that book. Well, I could probably write a little something on several more books that might not be obvious choices but that is enough for now. Apologies for spelling, typos, etc. Pomonomo2003 23:40, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
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Many scholars have questioned Nietzsche's complex stance toward Judaism and anti-Semitism, and thus his relationship with Nazism. Among contemporary scholars searching for the roots of fascism, this question has become central to their readings of Nietzsche and other Enlightenment-era philosophers, especially those alive during nineteenth-century Germany.
YirmiYahu Yovel, for example, argues that Nietzsche's attacks on ancient priestly Judaism were as fierce and uncompromising as his assault on anti-Semitism. [1] Yovel also wrote, that the anti-Semites accused Jews of having killed Christ, but Nietzsche accused Jews of having begotten Christ. [2] According to Yovel, Nietzsche depicted ancient Judaism as grounded in ressentiment and as responsible for the corruption of Europe through Christianity. [3] While Walter Kaufmann praised Nietzsche as opposed to all Nazi intents and acts, scholars such as Steven Aschheim have placed Nietzsche as "the most acute anti-Semite that ever was", [4] because, he continues, as an example in The Antichrist, Nietzsche illustrated Judaism's role in Europe's spiritual history, namely, as one engendering Christianity itself, making the Jews "the most fateful people of world history." [5] He then further suggests "Nietzsche became a crucial source" for a particular variety of anti-Semitism he refers to as "anti-Christian anti-Semitism" as was "designated by Uriel Tal" in contradistinction to a Christian anti-Semitism. [6]
Inquiries such as these, however, have been known for decades, although in a perhaps different light. That Nietzsche has been marked in the political sphere as one among (or at least claimed as a precursor to these movements) the anarchists, communists, feminists, libertarianists, socialists, nihilists, fascists, anti-Semites, Nazis, etc. is a prevalent reading in the history of scholarship, in large part due to the manner in which Nietzsche was presented and appropriated by the Nazis, and similarly for other political movements, as one of their philosophical inspirators. While the legitimacy of Walter Kaufmann's work is frequently questioned, his intense scholarship during the 1950s onward attempted to dispel such views and present Nietzsche's writings in their appropriate historical framework, going so far to show them as strongly against these particular views. Contemporary scholarship in both North America and Europe and across languages nevertheless continues to plumb the nature of these indications with some in agreement and others in disagreement on Nietzsche's very complex positions on these issues, leaving the matter an unsettled question.
Within the influences section of this page i was rather surprised to find Hume. I am completely unaware of any major influence Hume had on Nietzsche, i would much appreciate it if somebody could state how he influenced Nietzsche, to give a reason for his name being among Nietzsche's influences. I have also made the additions of Dostoevsky, Plato, David Strauss, and Darwin to that section. If anybody disagrees with these additions please say so. Thank you.-- Itafroma 11:48, 17 July 2006 (UTC)itafroma
I have to disagree about all three of the removed influences. I believe that it was David Strauss's 'Life of Jesus' that upon reading at a young age, Nietzsche made the decision to abandoned his faith and theological studies. Nietzsche has famously said about Dostoevsky that he was "the only psychologist from whom i had something to learn." He was very impressed by 'notes from underground' especially, and i would find it hard not to call Dostoevsky a philosophical writer atleast, and if a composer can be an influence i believe a writer can also. Comments about Darwin and Darwinists in Nietzsche's writings may be harsh but this is partly due, in my opinion, to Nietzsches staunch anglophobia, he certainly didn't agree with Darwin's theories absolutely, but his work on struggle and evolution influenced his own work on power (see 'Nietzsche's new Darwinism' by John Richardson). I don't quite understand the influence does not equal criticism comment, as if you mean criticism from Nietzsche, he has harshely criticised nearly all of the individuals on the influences list, most notably , Schopenhauer, Socrates, Spinoza, Wagner and Plato. In fact despite Nietzsche's admiration for Plato and Socrates their epistemology is almost the antithesis of his own.-- Itafroma 13:17, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
"But apart from Goethe and Schopenhauer-- and perhaps Burckhardt-- none of the men chosen by Andler seem as important to Nietzsche's thought as Heraclitus, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics, Spinoza, Kant, Hegel, Heine, Darwin, and Dostoevsky." (p. 306n)
"Even without the still more offensive explicitness of the censored passage-- which reads, "the word idiot"-- it seems plain that Nietzsche conceived of Jesus in the image of Dostoevsky's Idiot. This conception of the Redeemer is the clue both to Nietzsche's reverence for Jesus and to his critique: his whole attitude toward Jesus hinges upon the 'something' he 'learned' from Dostoevsky." (p. 340)
"While Nietzsche never mentions "The Idiot", he freely owns how deeply he was impressed by Dostoevsky after discovering him early in 1887-- and it was in the following year that the word "idiot" assumed a sudden significance in Nietzsche's writings." (p. 340n)
Non-Vandal, on what do you base your contention that the influences section is only for philosophers? — goethean ॐ 14:53, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Simple: we're talking about a philosopher. Sure, Nietzsche had widely divergent sources and effects, but we must limit ourselves to {{INFOBOX_PHILOSOPHER}} to what is most pertinent. If we don't, it will also become a huge mess. If there are other notable influences and those influenced N, then we can state them in the article. The rest are clearly laid out in the INFOBOX itself. Non-vandal 14:59, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Here is another very interesting link: "In every one of his protracted and volatile struggles with historical figures or symbols, with Wagner, Socrates, Goethe, Christ, Schopenhauer, and, I would suggest, Schiller, love and hate can scarcely be disentangled." — goethean ॐ 16:30, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
I just noticed the following note at Template:Infobox_Philosopher:
Based on this guideline, aristotle, dostoevsky and voltaire can be deleted immediately. hegel and socrates are mentioned, but not as influences. they are only compared to N in the main article. — goethean ॐ 17:16, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
The claim that Sigmund Freud gave Nietzsche the highest possible praise isn't verified, and it smacks of POV hyperbole. The writer cited Ernest Jones' scholarly biography, but not the actual page number. I've read Jones, and I don't recall that high praise, only Freud's denial that he owed anything to Nietzsche. Please supply the page number, or remove the claim. Also -- another famous person who claimed Nietzsche as an influence was L. Ron Hubbard, founder of the Church of Scientology. It's right in the frontspiece of his 1952 book, Scientology 8-8008. I added that fact a day ago, and now it's been erased. Why? Petrejo 05:30, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
Interesting qoute which I've posted in the NPOV discussion too,
It is a matter of honor to me to be absolutely clean and unequivocal regarding anti-Semitism, namely opposed, as I am in my writings. Source: Friedrich Nietzsche's Collected Letters, Vol. V, #479 -- NoNo 02:32, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
The opening paragraph already seems to me to broadcast a POV in many ways; among them: (1) the identification of Nietzsche abstractly as a moralist suggests a bourgeois morality while the writer is aware that Antichristianity is the core substance of Nietzsche's moral ideology. It seems like an early whitewash to hide Nietzsche's Antichristian position in the introduction; (2) the phrase, 'astonishingly productive' would suggest that Nietzsche was a prolific writer of great tomes, when in fact the quantity of his lifetime output was less than that of other contemporary philosophers; e.g. Kant, Fichte, Hegel, Schelling, Schopenhauer, Marx, and so on. By 'astonishing' the writer possibly means that Nietzsche's poesy was superb, but that's a subjective impression which, used so early in the article, tends to guide the reader toward a POV; and (3) the writer jumps from 1889 to the second half of the 20th century to portray Nietzsche's significance. This omits the importance of the first half of the 20th century, particularly in Germany, which is vital to an ongoing debate about Nietzsche. To deny that period would seem to take a side in that debate at the start.
I suggest that an NPOV opening paragraph would (a) be unashamed of Nietzsche's Antichristian morality; (b) remove any hint of flattery; and (c) admit Nietzsche's German fame in the first half of the 20th century. I made all three changes last night, and they were erased (nobody has yet said why). I've attempted this morning to add the changes slowly, one at a time, starting with (c). All three changes would help to balance the opening paragraph, in my view. Petrejo 15:00, 22 July 2006 (UTC)
I edited the opening paragraph, rearranging some wording in a way that I hope will make the meaning clearer. Some of the statements still contain POV, and I'm not too comfortable with the distinctly un-Nietzschean duality of "positive" and "negative", although I think the meaning is approximately accurate. As for the "broad and unusual philosophical themes" phrase, I think it may be better to recast the sentence entirely. What defines "unusual"? Certainly Nietzsche's thought can be quite striking; in particular, the notion of the eternal recurrence strikes me as quite odd. Now, this idea is not in fact odd at all - to anyone familiar with Eastern thought. Anyways, just a bit of imperfect clean-up. Matheson 09:00, 2 August 2006 (UTC)
Another edit on the opening paragraph. The phrase "inadequacy of dualistic thinking" is of course Nietzsche's own POV. I am new to this and remain somewhat uncertain of how NPOV is supposed to work. I'll look into it.
Also, N was always highly regarded among certain groups of early 20th-Century English and Parisian intellectuals; I've added this to the introduction. I couldn't find one particular citation, but I feel that his impact on the British and Parisian thinkers listed later should suffice. Again, I'm new here, so maybe verifiability is an issue in this instance. Matheson 09:55, 2 August 2006 (UTC)
The article says "Ultimately, however, Nietzsche claims that, unlike the overman, who embraces life, Jesus denied reality in favor of his 'kingdom of God'." Is it to be taken then that Nietzsche's opposition to Jesus of Nazareth as an approximate kind of Übermensch is not derived from Jesus' apparent elevation and glorification of a truly slavish slave-morality? Does this mean that Nietzsche's concept of slave-morality is subordinate to his concept of Übermensch--or to put it differently, is the Overman accountable to the master-morality in any way at all? (It certainly appears to me that the two are interdependent upon each other, but it still does not preclude one of those apparently nasty contradictions in Nietzsche's thought.) 71.76.135.102 15:15, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
Just in case anyone has seen it, I think the youtube videos [2] [3], which according to users' comments are from a 2001 movie, have been digitally made from still photographs taken by Hans Olde in May 1899. See de:Diskussion:Friedrich Nietzsche#Filmaufnahmen von Nietzsche?. I uploaded the images to Commons, perhaps you might like to use them somewhere. There is no meaning in the numbers, obviously 8/11 and 6/7 would belong together (and, if there really was a film, would show real movement in between).-- Chef aka Pangloss 13:26, 28 July 2006 (UTC) - PS: I am not sure if my translation "The ill Nietzsche" (for Olde's title Der kranke Nietzsche) is fitting; "krank" can also be translated as "sick". If "sick" is better here, please correct this.-- Chef aka Pangloss 16:53, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
It's good to see you are still here. As for Pangloss, I understand he voiced his personal opinion, but he's also making points about what others have said. And these points aren't "emotion". They're significant and need more discussion. There's no reason to be directly confrontational, just focus on content and things will develop where we all want them to be, I assume. Non-vandal 05:37, 12 August 2006 (UTC)
I have heard from somes sources, including about.com [6], that Nietzsche dropped the middle name Wilhelm from his name, but it doesn't seem to be mentioned in this article (I can't find it). Is it true and should it be mentioned? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sirveaux ( talk • contribs) 23:40, 29 July 2006 (UTC)
"According to at least one authority, the Slovenian scholar Anton Strle, Friedrich Nietzsche lost his faith around the time he was reading Leben Jesu." - Taken from the David Strauss article.
"* David Strauss was the famous author of 'the life of jesus'.Thois, Strauss's most notorious book, had a profound effect on the young Nietzsche and contributed greatly to his loss of faith when he was twenty years old (Hayman 1982, 62-63)" - Taken from a note on p32 in 'The Nietzsche Canon a Publication History and Bibliography' by William H Schaberg
Do any other users still object to any inclusion of Strauss in the influences section? Or atleast some text in the article stating a possible influence from Strauss. I was also considering adding Philipp Mainländer to the Influences section, any thoughts?-- Itafroma 11:04, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
After one semester and to the anger of his mother, he stopped his theological studies, and lost his faith. It has been suggested that this may have been partly due to his reading of David Strauss's life of jesus at the time, which had a profound effect on the young Nietzsche.
This is the text i have added to the youth section of the biography. I have tried to make it apparant that the evidence for Strauss's influence is inconclusive. But if anybody disagrees with the addition please say so, and why. I also think that Socrates deserves more text, and should be included in influences.-- Itafroma 14:57, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
...and lost his faith. citation needed It has been suggested that this may have been partly due to his reading of David Strauss's life of jesus at the time, which had a profound effect on the young Nietzsche. citation needed He chose to concentrate....
There is a bias in the above description in the article which trivializes Nietzsche's experience and ignores Nietzsche's own triumphant proclamations of god realization contained in these letters, in favor of the normalizing perspective that it is a breakdown as opposed to Nietzsche's own descriptions of his experience as a breakthrough. I find it quite offensive and disrespectful of Nietzsche to so blatantly ignore his own account of his experience and trivialize it with the word breakdown.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.138.137.6 ( talk • contribs • WHOIS) 10:15, 1 August 2006(UTC)
Presenting Nietzsche AS HE IS amounts to discussing and questioning the ingrained taboos of modernity--who has the courage for that? Apparently to refer to Nietzsche himself is inadmissible, and one must remain in the circle of the interpretations of modern liberal democratic and postmodernist distorters and scholars with an ethnic Judaic agenda (see Kevin B. MacDonald) like Walter Kaufmann, whose strained, cynical efforts to present a humanistic, super-democratized Nietzsche are notorious and laughable.
In case reference to Nietzsche himself is somehow 'unscholarly' (a quite strange position), I will refer to outside scholarly sources.
http://www.filosofia.it/pagine/argomenti/Losurdo/Losurdo_Santi.htm
The Journal of Nietzsche Studies, n. 27, (Spring 2004) Nietzsche, the aristocratic rebel.
Ernst Nolte, Three Faces of Fascism:
"The discovery of the Dionysian background of tragedy, the defense of genius against the masses, the insistence on the necessity of slavery, serve no other purpose than to explicate the elements of genuine culture: its background, relevance, and basis. They are developed along with the indictment of the enemies of culture: science and its logical (Socratic) optimism, mass emancipation and its shallow utilitarian outlook, revolution and it pernicious effects ... For if history amounts to nothing more than the petty and sterile calculation of the last 'squinting' men, who neither obey nor rule and desire to be neither poor nor rich, then the most mighty effort is required to force them back into the state of slavery which is their rightful place ... In fact, Nietzsche's whole thought represents the very antithesis of the Marxist conception, and the idea of destruction is the negative aspect of its core ... Nietzsche is not in any obvious sense the spiritual father of fascism; but he was the first to give voice to that spiritual focal point toward which all fascism must gravitate: the assault on practical and theoretical transcendence, for the sake of a 'more beautiful' from of 'life.' Nietzsche was not concerned with magnificent animality for its own sake, nor was destruction per se Hitler's goal. Their ultimate aim was a 'supreme culture' of the future ... Many decades in advance, Nietzsche provided the political radical anti-Marxism of fascism with its original spiritual image, an image of which even Hitler never quite showed himself the equal ... Nietzsche's thought is not an ideology of the bourgeoisie: on the one hand it is a deeply disturbed protest of the artistic temperament against the general world trend, on the other it is the violent reaction of the feudal element in bourgeois society at being threatened." (p. 441-45) "[Note 57] Nietzsche claimed that miscegenation was responsible for the triumph of democratic ideals (Werke, VIII, 245)." (p. 545)
Rudiger Safranski, Nietzsche: A Philosophical Biography:
"If happiness and freedom of the greatest possible number are given higher priority, Nietzsche claimed, the result is a democratic culture in which mass taste triumphs. The orientation of a democratic state to comprehensive welfare, human dignity, freedom, egalitarian justice, and protection of the weak impedes any prospects for development of great personalities. The 'bright lights' vanish from history and along with them any last vestige of meaning.
"In his quest to defend aesthetic significance in history, Nietzsche assailed democracy as far back as the early 1870s, even before his shrill attacks on the 'complete appeasement of the democratic herd animal' some years later. Nietzsche considered the ancient Greek slaveholder society the paragon of culture for the very reason that it disallowed concessions to the 'democratic herd animal.' He extolled antiquity for being honest enough not to have covered up the terrible foundation from which its blossom grew ... Just as people need brains and brawn, Nietzsche argued, society needs the hardworking hands of laborers for a privileged class, allowing that class 'to engender and fulfill a new world of needs' (The Greek State) ... More recent eras have glorified the world of work, but glorification is self-deception, because even the 'terminological fallacy' of the 'dignity of work' does not alter anything in the fundamental injustice of life, which metes out mechanical work to some and creative activity to the more highly gifted. Slave societies were brutally frank about their inequities, whereas our modern times feign contrition but are unwilling forgo exploitation in the service of culture. Thus, if art justifies our existence aesthetically, it does so on the foundation of 'cruelty' (The Greek State). ...
"Nietzsche feared that if knowledge and learning were to become available to the majority of people, a horrifying, culturally devastating uprising would ensue, because the 'barbaric slave class' would plan revenge 'not only for itself but for all generations' (BT, 18). For him, this awful revenge was a 'calamity slumbering in the womb of theoretical culture'.
"Nietzsche contended that the order of ancient or modern slaveholder societies could be preserved only if everyone accepted the basic tragic constitution of human life as a consequence 'of the natural cruelty of things' (BT, 18). The slaves put up with cruelty, which is one aspect of Dionysian wisdom, and the cultural elite is aware of this cruelty and seeks refuge behind the shield of art, which is its other aspect. ...
"Nietzsche could envision this higher stage of mankind...only as a culmination of culture in its 'peaks of rapture', which is to say in successful individuals and achievements. The will to power unleashes the dynamics of culmination, but it is also the will to power that forms a moral alliance on the side of the weak. This alliance works at cross purposes with the goal of culmination and ultimately, in Nietzsche's view, leads to widespread equalization and degeneration. As a modern version of the 'Christian theory of morality', this alliance forms the backbone of democracy and socialism. Nietzsche therefore adamantly opposed all such movements ... If we are content to regard this highly personal philosophy and these maneuvers of self-configuration with fascination and perhaps even admiration, but are not willing to abandon the idea of democracy and democratic justice, it is likely that Nietzsche would have accused us of feeble compromise, indecisiveness, and epitomizing the ominous 'blinking' of the 'last men'...
"In both Twilight of the Idols and The Antichrist, Nietzsche evaluated a book he had discovered in Turin, namely the Laws of Manu. This book was alleged to be a moral code of the caste system based on the Vedas. Nietzsche was captivated by the chilling consistency with which this corpus of laws divided society into mutually exclusive social milieus according to an ominous requirement of purity. He regarded the fact that members of the various castes could not interact with one another as a clever biopolitics of breeding that would prevent degeneration...
"In his last writings, notably in Twilight of the Idols, Nietzsche employed even more adamant moral and philosophical arguments to advocate anti-Judaism, and introduced on occasional hint of racial biology: 'Christianity, with its roots in Judaism and comprehensible only as a growth from this soil, represents the countermovement to any morality of breeding, of race, or privilege: it is the anti-Aryan religion par excellence' (TI 'Improvers of Mankind' 4)."
Prominent scholar Hubert Cancik, MONGOLS, SEMITES AND THE PURE-BRED GREEKS: Nietzsche's handling of the racial doctrines of his time:
Greece as Model
...Nietzsche thoroughly accepted the biological discourse of his contemporaries: history was supposed to be explained through the "mixing of blood", the "coupling" of heterogeneous elements, "extraction" (in a biological sense) and, finally, "collisions" and "waves" of "immigrants". The genesis of the Greeks in Greece, where they "became Greeks", is the point of his notes on the "original inhabitants". This point owes a debt to a particular biological (see "Nietzsche's Greeks, Jews and Europe" below) and political (see "A higher caste", below) theory of Nietzsche's.
"A higher caste"
Nietzsche's notes jump from the prehistoric "original inhabitants" to the historical period of Greece: from the conquerors came the rulers; from the original inhabitants came the slaves; from the battle of races came the battle of the "castes". Politics built itself upon the previous "racial history". Together, all of these components formed the Greek model that was supposed to mediate between antiquity and the European future. Immediately following upon his racial history of Greece, Nietzsche continued with these words:
If one considers the enormous number of slaves on the mainland, then Greeks were only to be found sporadically. A higher caste of the Idle, the statesman, etc. Their hostilities held them in physical and intellectual tension. They had to ground their superiority upon quality - that was their spell over the masses (UB 118, p. 206 = 5[199]).
Now then, there are "Greeks". The conquerors "had taken into their blood", consumed and digested the Semitic, Mongolian and Thracian components . Something new had come into existence. Yet the "wild energy" through which the conquerors had taken possession of the land and its inhabitants remained preserved up into the earlier perlod of antiquity - or so Nietzsche thought. It was, indeed essential in order to keep the "enormous number of slaves" suppressed. This same energy drove the Greeks both to rivalry with each other and to the highest cultural achievements: "The intellectual culture of Greece [was] an aberration of the tremendous political drive toward distinction" (UB 118, p. 118=5[179]). The highest achievements of culture were necessary; they were not some lovely but superficial decoration. They engendered the cohesion of the higher caste of the "idle" - the political class and the creators of culture: in the musical and the athletlc contests, aggression was channelled and sublimated (cf. e.g. the piece from December 1872 on: "Homer's Wettkampf": KSA vol. 1, pp. 783-92). Moreover, the supreme achievements of culture cast a spell over the "masses", who obviously had to care for each one of those belonging to the "Idle", whose rule, in this manner, was justified aesthetically. Consequently, Nietzsche believed that he had proven through historical methods that the wild power and energy belonging to a conquering people has to be "bred great" (groB gezuchtet), a cultivation process by which such achievements as those the Greeks once produced would also be brought forth in Europe in the future (UB 118, p. 116 and 114 = 5[185] and [188]). Neither peace, luxury, socialism, the ideal political state, welfare, nor short-term educational reform are preconditions for the engendering of genius - whether of a people or of an individual; rather, genius should arise from conditions "as malicious and ruthless" as those in nature itself: "Mistreat people - drive them to their limits" (UB 118, p. 112 = 5j 191] and [194]).
Nietzsche's considerations about race and caste as well as rule and culture for the Greeks were aimed at his present. "The Greeks", he thought, "believed in differences among the races". Nietzsche approvingly recalled Schopenhauer's opinion that slaves were a different species, and in addition, he cited the image of a winged animal in contrast to that of an unmoving shellfish (UB 118, p. 112 = 5[72] and [73]). In such a generalization as this one, the statement is incorrect, and in a more narrowly defined sense, it is racist... Accordingly, the following statements by Nietzsche are to be characterized as racist:
1. "The new problem: whether or not educating[!] a part of humanity to a higher race must come at the cost of the rest. Breeding . . ." (1881 KSA vol. 9, p. 577 12[10])
2. "We would as little choose 'early Christians' as Polish Jews to associate with us: not that one would need to have even a single [i.e., rational] objection to them.... Both of them simply do not smell good." (AC 46)
Nietzsche tested his racial teachings within the framework of classical studies. The aphoristic formulation that he gave to his "Notes" on the original population of Greece in September 1876 forms a connection to the racial teachings of his critical writings ("Die Pflugschar" 143 KSA vol. 8, p. 327; it is proved by the version of "Pflugschar" that the passages numbered 5[198] and [199] in KGW are not separated "tragments" but rather a unity). In his "Plowshare", Nietzsche excluded the Doric migration and avoided the word "caste" as well as such peculiarities as the tree and snake cult, or the Mongolian elements in the Odyssey or the Italians who had become Greeks. Purified of offensive, concrete, verifiable details, a more refined, polished, dashing aphorism emerged, one that suggested, in more pleasing language, the necessary connection of racial differences to the rule of "higher beings" -- thus "the idle, the political class, etc." are now called - and to cultural superiority.
NIETZSCHE'S GREEKS, JEWS AND EUROPE
Inheritance of acquired characteristics
...the "purity" of the race is also a positive, basic concept of biology for Nietzsche. Nietzsche constructed a little racial history of ancient Europe upon concepts he had borrowed from biology (GM 15 1887; note that Nietzsche had read Tocqueville - see his letter to Overbeck, 23 February 1887). "Blood mixing", skull shape and skin and hair color are the main terms of his anthropology. Nietzsche coupled the biological to social characteristics and to moral values: the blond-haired is better than the black-haired, and the short-skulled is worse than the long-skulled. Some fearless etymologies suggested by the erstwhile philologist make this chapter from the Genealogy of Morals into a prize exhibit of philo-Aryan prose (some examples: esthlos/"noble" to einai/"to be", malus/"bad" to melas/"black") because for Nietzsche, the long-skulled blond - the good, noble, pure conqueror - was the Aryan, of course: they were the master race in Europe. Nietzsche's little racial history of ancient Europe aimed at the present. In the social and political movements of the Democrats, the Anarchists and the Socialists of his time, he saw, namely, the instincts of the "pre-Aryan population" breaking through again. Nietzsche related these political programs explicitly to biology. He feared that "the conquering and master race - that of the Aryans - is also being defeated physiologically" (GM I 5). According to Nietzsche, the Jews had begun this slave revolt: they led the slaves - the mob, the herd - to this victory over the aristocracy. This victory meant "blood poisoning", "intoxication" - this pastor's son and classical philologist loved to adorn himself with medical jargon. Nietzsche identified the reason for the poisoning: "It [i.e., the victory] had mingled the races promiscuously" (GM I 9; for the mixture of races considered as an evil, cf. JGB 208, 200). The pre-Aryan population was thus in league with the Jews and against the Italians, the Greeks, the Celts, the Germans - and generally speaking, all Aryans everywhere ... In 1881, Nietzsche published a general draft of his racial ideas under the title "The becoming-pure of a race". What he had previously scattered about in notes concerning classical studies and in various other hints is here summarized in twenty-five lines of print covering five points: 1. The races are not originally pure but, at best, become pure in the course of history. 2. The crossing of races simultaneously means the crossing of cultures: crossing leads to "disharmony" in bodily form, in custom and in morality. 3. The process of purification occurs through "adapting, imbibing, [and] excreting" foreign elements. 4. The result of purification is a stronger and more beautiful organism. 5. The Greeks are "the model of a race and culture that had become pure"... The significance of this text for Nietzsche has been shown by W. Muller Lauter. The "model" for the breeding of a European ruling caste was the Greeks: "it is to be hoped that a pure European race and culture will also one day succeed [in coming into being]" (JGB 25, last sentence & Daybreak IV 272, last sentence). In such a race and culture - as the model prepared by Nietzsche has instructed us - the foreign elements (those bred in) will be imbibed for digestion or excretion...
...Spencer had transferred theorems from biological evolution to the historical process. He complained that a policy of social reform hindered "natural selection". For this reason, Nietzsche advised, one must "eliminate the continuance and effectiveness" of bad, sick and uneducated people (KSA vol. 9, p. 10 (1880); cf. ibid., pp. 27t., 454t). From Sir Francis Galton, one of the original founders of eugenics, he took over the formula of "hereditary genius", which Galton had used in his study of the families of criminals (letter to Strindberg, 8 December 1888.; cf. Ietter to Overbeck, 4 July 1888. Ct. Marie Louise Haase, "Friedrich Nietzsche hest I rancls Galton", Nietzsche-Studien, 18 1889: 633ff)...
Nietzsche's utterances about acquired character, the purity of races, the inheritance of characteristics, the degeneracy of halfbreeds (JCB 208 KSA vol. 5, pp. 138. Cf. JGB 200: "The man belonging to an epoch of dissolution which mixes up the races") and the cultivation of drives over long periods of time could - for this branch - suggest an unorthodox (Neo-)Lamarckianism...
In historical scholarship as well - and even in classical philology - racist teachings had penetrated. Within Nietzsche's racial teachings, Jews and Aryans had a special position. In his first monograph (1872), Nietzsche had already arrayed the "Aryan character" against the Semitic one, Prometheus against Eve, the creative man against the lying woman, the tragic wantonness in battle for higher culture against lascivious sin (The Birth of Tragedy 9; in German, the word Frevel/"wantonness" is masculine in gender; the word Sunde/"sin" is feminine). This argumentative structure is still present in The Antichrist (1888): against the philhellenic Hyperboreans and what Nietzsche called "Aryan humanity" stood denatured Judaism and Judaism "raised to the second power", Christianity (cf. GD The 'correctors' of mankind" KSA vol. 12, p. 501). The Jews - as Nietzsche had indicated with the Eve myth - are not creative in contrast to the Aryan peoples, they are mere "intermediaries", merchants: "they invent nothing." Even their law is from the Codex of Manu - copied from an "absolutely Aryan creation" (Letter to Koselitz, 31 May 1888, cf. n. 31)...
Breeding a pure European race
"Imbibed and absorbed by Europe"
Nietzsche found surprising the fact that Christianity could have forced a Semitic religion upon the Indo-Germans (KSA vol. 9, pp. 21f). For this reason, he fought both Judaism and Christianity, and he created for himself a pagan, Indo-Germanic alternative with his new, Hellenic Dionysos and the Iranian Zarathustra...
The Christian was "only a Jew of a 'freer' confession of faith" - Christians and Jews were "related, racially related" (AC 44), and Christianity was a form of Judaism raised "yet one time" higher through negation (AC 27: "the small rebellious movement, which is baptised in the name of Jesus of Nazareth, is the Jewish instinct once more"). Nietzsche wrote:
Christianity is to be understood entirely in terms of the soil from which is grew - it is not a countermovement to the Jewish instinct; it is the successor itself, a further step in its [i.e., the Jewish instinct's] frightening logic. (AC 24)
Nietzsche's fight against the "denaturalization of natural values" (AC 25), his "transvaluation of all values" was directed against Jews and Christians. Because Nietzsche argued against both, Christian antiSemitism was especially offensive for him. The Jews, Nietzsche maintained, were nevertheless guilty: They had "made humanity into something so false that, still today, a Christian can feel antiSemitic without understanding himself as the last stage of Judaism". (AC 24) The Antichrist was Nietzsche's last word on Judaism which he himself intended to be published. It is precisely with respect to supposed or truly "positive" utterances on Jews and Judaism that this fact should never be forgotten.
A short essay (section 251) in Nietzsche's "Philosophy of the Future" - Beyond Good and Evil (1885/6) - belongs to the "positive" parts. Here, "the breeding of a new caste to rule over Europe", definitely a current "European problem", according to Nietzsche, is discussed. The breeding of this caste follows the "Greek model": the foreign elements are "imbibed" and either assimilated or "excreted" - thus does a "pure European race and culture come into being". With the Jews, however, Germany was going to have difficulty, for Germany had "amply enough Jews" (so wrote Nietzsche in 1885/6): "that the German stomach, the German blood, is having difficulty (and for a long time yet will continue to have difficulty) finishing even this quantity of 'Jews'." Other European countries had finished with the Jews "because of a more strenuous digestion"; in Germany, however, there were simply too many. Nietzsche demanded what all anti-Semites demanded at that time: "Allow no more Jews in! And, especially, close the gates to the east (including the one between Germany and Austria!"... For anti-Semitism itself, Nietzsche had complete understanding; he was simply - like "all careful and judicious people" - against the "dangerous extravagance" of this feeling, "especially against the tasteless and scandalous expression of this extravagant feeling". (By asking moderation in the expression of anti-Semitism, which he considers as principally justified, Nietzsche takes the same posltlon as the later Wagner and Wolzogen.) Nietzsche had a measured and tasteful manner of expressing this "feeling". And his solution to the problem was also mild: the Jews are to be bred in. They even desire it themselves, "to be in Europe, to be imbibed and absorbed". As for the "antiSemitic complainers", those who might hinder this gentle final solution with their radical words, Nietzsche wanted to have them expelled from the country. And then, he thought, one could - "with great care" and "with selectivity" - cross an intelligent Jewish woman with an "aristocratic officer from the Mark" (i.e., a Prussian aristocratic officer)... In this elevated, fine, tasteful, gentle anti-Semitism, a thematic communality between Wagner and Nietzsche reveals itself, one going deeper than any disagreement in other areas, whether personal, musical or religious.
How likely is it this data by prominent scholars I provided in good faith is going to be incorporated into the Nietzsche articles, considering Wikipedia's unbalanced, extreme pro-liberalistic, pro-Marxist atmosphere?!— Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.136.80.109 ( talk • contribs • WHOIS)
It is a matter of honor to me to be absolutely clean and unequivocal regarding anti-Semitism, namely opposed, as I am in my writings. Source: Friedrich Nietzsche's Collected Letters, Vol. V, #479 How come he's so contradicting?-- NoNo 02:32, 22 August 2006 (UTC)f
Now, if...the only politics calling itself Nietzschean turned out to be a Nazi one, then this is necessarily significant...One can't falsify just anything.
— Jacques Derrida, The Ear of the Other, ibid, p. 47
Let's get some things strait hair. Any racism that you detect in Nietzsche must be seen in historical context. Many white Europeans of that day(including those enlightenment fundamentalists) had racist view points of some kind. Where talking about white supremacy in its full 19th century force. Nietzsche is no worse then the average European of his day and perhaps better then many(he did advocate racial mixing apparently). Trying to put privilage on Nietzsche's influence on Nazism(and I don't deny its there) is a canard done by many enlightenment fans who continue to deny THEIR PRIMARY ROLE as people like Horkheimer, Adorhno and Baumant have shown. Nazism grew out of the view points of Herber Spencer and those other logical positivists who were endentured within enlightenment discourse. I shouldn't have to remind people of the many thinkers left and right who were pro-eugenics back in the early 20th century. Enlightenment rationality is what gives you your nazism. The problem with Nietzsche is that he was on some level a capture of those view points. You can clearly note some similarities with him and Herber Spencer for example. As for anti-semitism, look, you can say that some things he said in the late 1800s were politically incorrect as well as stereotypical by todays standards even in a complementory sense(he thought Jews did control the strings in europe for example and gave them credit), he was hardly anti-semetic. I would say the main substance of what he says against Jewish culture is true. They are the 1st to put a major slave moralistic culture on the map. He does not say that this is indemic to their race, he simply notes a historical role they have played and calls it out. Ultimately your charge against Freddy fails to take note of the pravailing white supremacist views of the day which were entreched in enlightenment thought and still are. He's no worse then many others. Wolverine
The Nietzsche article is very long. I think that we should follow the example of the Kierkegaard, Philosophy of Søren Kierkegaard, and Theology of Søren Kierkegaard articles and break out N's thought from the biographical article. the biographical article would consist of:
The Nietzsche's thought or Nietzsche's philosophy article could merge all of the assorted articles that we have now into one large article:
Does anyone support this? — goethean ॐ 18:06, 4 August 2006 (UTC)
I don't know how to archive a talk page, but it seems about time don't you think? - Bordello 15:32, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
To provide a more succint (by expanding the article *sigh*) and informative main article, especially as we need to seriously devolve it, I've followed the example of the Michel Foucault page in particular and set out a "Works" section of the article, including very brief summaries of major works by Nietzsche, linking to the main article on the subject and sprinkled with links to more detailed discussions. Because at the moment we have a long and informative biography and a hyper-contentious section on interpretations of Nietzsche, and nothing else. If this is done well we can trim the rest of the article into a form where it is more than a biography - currently it offers nothing to someone who wants an overview of Nietzsche's philosophy (which is why people come to the page). My contribution is little more than a rewrite of the Nietzsche entry in the Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy ( Wicks, Robert, "Friedrich Nietzsche", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2004 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = < http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2004/entries/nietzsche/> - the only reference in this article! ) and only covers the first two books. I'll leave a more rounded and complete rendition to my fellow editors and myself when I have more time and resources at hand. -- Marinus 01:50, 15 August 2006 (UTC)
I've finished the entires for his major works. I'm thinking of putting in (miniscule) comments on the other two books of 1888, and I'll definitely need to say a few words about the Nachlass. Comments are welcome. -- Marinus 03:46, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
This may surprise readers who became adults in the 1970s, but drugs such as chloral hydrate have harmful effects. It is very possible that Nietzsche's overuse of this substance led to his mental breakdown. As is the case with many drugs, their effect is trivialized. The destruction that they cause is usually attributed to another source. Lestrade 01:59, 15 August 2006 (UTC)Lestrade
Not all too surprising. Medical knowledge wasn't particularly great back then, and the understanding of effects of certain chemicals upon the body was still foundationally growing. Are there any scholarly sources that support this view? If so, it could be added to the article. Non-vandal 04:50, 16 August 2006 (UTC)
Another influence that "Schopenhauer as Educator" may have had on Nietzsche was in his decision to leave teaching. Schopenhauer had abandoned his academic career and spent the remainder of his life as an independent scholar. How delicious that must have seemed to Nietzsche, whose early The Birth of Tragedy had effectively ruined his philological career. Nietzsche developed several non-verifiable ailments, such as headaches and stomach disorders. These provided a public justification for his departure from professorial life after having stayed long enough to earn a small pension. Lestrade 12:26, 6 September 2006 (UTC)Lestrade
Poor vision would not have interfered with his teaching. Many successful teachers have poor vision. In the military, he had been injured by a horse. That injury naturally healed. Lestrade 12:59, 7 September 2006 (UTC)Lestrade
How could Freud say that Nietzsche had more knowledge of himself than anyone else? Could Freud compare Nietzsche's knowledge with Nietzsche's self and then make the judgement that they corresponded? How could Freud know what other people, past, present, and future, know about themselves? Freud's statement reflects very poorly on his intelligence. Lestrade 18:12, 6 September 2006 (UTC)Lestrade
Just wanted to know wether the IPA spelling is correct. I'm learning German and I think it should be pronounced otherwise, I may be wrong, though
Did Nietzsche comment much on Machiavelli? It would appear, if only on the surface, that the two thinkers have at least some common strains running through there works. 152.23.84.168 02:38, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
Obviously, these are far too many works to put on the main page. I have only tried to put together a representative list of books that should be considered for the bibliography of books about Nietzsche. Since these books come from my own library they are mostly paperbacks and later editions. All the dates and publishing information only reflect the editions I happened to buy. There are several schools of Nietzsche interpretation (e.g., Anglo-American, Continental, Postmodern and 'Straussian') that I respect and have tried to include books from all these schools. But perhaps some of the above works seem idiosyncratic and thus need to be explained. The Foucault book contains two very important essays on Nietzsche: "Nietzsche, Freud, Marx" and "Nietzsche, Genealogy and History" that have been very influential. The Gaultier book, written around 1900, is key to seeing the connection between 'Nietzschefied' Neo-Kantianism and postmodernism. The Steiner book might be of interest to those that want to find an 'occult' or spiritual meaning to Nietzsche's work. The Lampert book, Leo Strauss and Nietzsche, contains the important essay by Strauss, "Note on the Plan of Nietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil," and thus would serve both as an example of Strauss and also the 'decoding' of his method. At some point Volume III of my Heidegger books 'grew legs' and walked away; I would be grateful if someone would supply the correct information for Volume 3. I include MacIntyre on this list because Nietzsche's position is a possibility that MacIntyre, in his 'trilogy', wishes to foreclose. If his books need to be cut I think it would be best to drop Whose Justice first and only then After Virtue. I would hope that his Rival Versions makes anyones final list. There is an emerging anglo-american Kantian interpretation of Nietzsche (Green, Hill, Small, e.g.) and I do hope some of these books make the final cut. I think Stambaugh's dissertation on time a classic that is often overlooked. Hopefully it too will make the list. Rosen's book on Heidegger references Nietzsche throughout but most especially in the second half of that book. Well, I could probably write a little something on several more books that might not be obvious choices but that is enough for now. Apologies for spelling, typos, etc. Pomonomo2003 23:40, 25 September 2006 (UTC)