FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE

Friedrich Nietzsche

Friedrich Nietzsche

Introduction

Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche was a German philosopher of the late 19th century, born in Rocken bei Lutzen Germany, October 15, 1844. At this point in his life he began to drink, go to parties, and lose control. This became too intense for him and his illness could not stand it. After a few months of this he left his wickedness, renounced his life, wandered to a corner and resumed his solitary seat he had held. Still he despised himself significantly. This paper discusses Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, his religoius life, why he did not belive in god, and the subjective truth.

Discussion

After thinking and developing his philosophies he wrote several essays, one of which is The Anti-Christ, based on his theories about the Catholic religion and God or the lack thereof. His mother had once said she saw, All of Christ's suffering, in his eyes. Friedrich felt to the contrary about religion and everything religious. Nietzsche wrote ...It has been almost the terror of terrors and out of that terror the contrary type has been willed, cultivated and attained: the domestic animal, the herd animal, the sick brute man---the Christian.

It is easily seen that Nietzsche was extremely against the Christian religion. He felt it manipulated and changed people and made them believe that they represented the highest intellectual values as sinful, misleading, full of temptation, while Nietzsche found them virtuous (Deleuze 2003 85). In contrast, he felt nature was a very positive aspect in a man's life.

Nietzsche felt strongly about everything he said, but there was nothing he loved more then the beauty of nature. He spent time in the mountains because he found it serene and comforting. He wrote, out in Nature (Ewald 2003 400). Nature was an escape. He found it so beautiful. It was a natural beauty unlike the common world around him. Since he was very lonely it made him feel at peace.

What made Nietzsche stand out from any other romantic is how he could see humans as either completely corrupt or utterly admirable, and each one he knew was correct though it seems an oxymoron. He also found the common people just as important if not more so than the upper class of the world. He valued nobility of the mind above all. Nietzsche said, to a great degree of nobility of the mind consists of good nature and lack of distrust, and thus contains exactly that which acquisitive and successful people so like to treat with superiority and scorn. In other words, people that acquire nobility of the mind are good natured and trusting people, which is exactly what people of a higher status look down upon (O'Flaherty Sellner Helm 2005 8104). So it can be interpreted that Nietzsche felt that if you went against anything from the Catholic religion to what society felt acceptable, you would be prosecuted by a higher power while he would commend you for it.

Despite all the hardships Nietzsche had to face in his life he was a ...