Nietzsche: Nihilism, Superman, and Eternal Return
Nihilism
According to Nietzsche, the term that defines the history of European culture, or Western culture, is nihilism. As understood by Nietzsche, the history of the West is the story of a decline. This decline has resulted in the will to nothingness. Nihilism is based on the Christian-moral interpretation of the world, which is not only the Church but throughout the culture: in philosophy, politics, etc. Identifying the true Christian God in just another world where the truth lies, logic is implicit in his denial of God, which confirms that the existence of God is to affirm the existence of truth. Enlightenment rationalism opened the door to the denial of God’s death. The new identification as modern science is indeed a step in the decline since the life-denying God is a vital affirmation of science. Nihilism is a necessary move because nihilism is the logic of our values and our ideals because we must experience nihilism to understand what the real value of these securities is. Decadent nihilism opens up a world of possibilities in the creation of new values if you are able to accept it and overcome it.
The Superman
In Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Nietzsche presents the Persian prophet as a spokesman for the death of God and a prophet of the superman and the eternal return. Zarathustra chooses it because it created morale and because its doctrine considers the truth as the supreme virtue. As a result, it should be him, the first to admit his error. Superman is not announcing a single individual, but a new type of human, beyond the human being as has been until now. He is “the man of the future”, a symbol that expresses a key idea: man is something that must be overcome.
Humans must leave the human will to transcend himself and lead the superman. The most complete and radical moral autonomy would be the ideal by Zarathustra. Superman as regards the meaning of the earth, ocean, lightning, insanity, etc., above all, if a score deserves the superman is the “child”. And when Zarathustra explains the three metamorphoses of the spirit, the camel, a lion, the lion into a child, the child made to correspond with the Superman advertising. The child is innocent and forgotten, is a wheel that turns on itself, a first movement. The boy, who moves instinctively without recognizing hazards, regardless of the consequences for the child’s life is something new and exciting.
The Eternal Return
To Nietzsche, the idea of eternal return is the basic conception of Thus Spoke Zarathustra and involves the most fundamental of his thought. What is at stake is the problem of time and failing to break the time nor the will, is the loneliest affliction of the will. But time is voracious and all succumbed to it. Overcoming the voracity of time passing through the perpetuation of this. The will to power continuously requires overcoming of self, the human bridge to the Superman, the Superman is the creator of the values of affirmation of life, but time is circular, as everything is repeated continuously, Superman is back again the life-denying man. Nietzsche understands that this eternal return is the ultimate affirmation of life. Superman is good for himself and the acetic maximum life challenge is to repeat his life forever.