Understanding Nietzsche’s Core Ideas
Nietzsche’s Philosophy: Key Concepts
Nihilism
One of the more complex ideas in Nietzsche’s thought, nihilism, has two aspects defined in terms of the will to power:
- Passive Nihilism: Characterized by pessimism, historicism, the desire to understand everything, the idea that everything is futile, a denial of life itself, illusory values of an absolute world, and so on. This nihilism arises when the will to power, the essence of life, diminishes or is exhausted. It stems from the interpretation of human existence and the world provided by Christian Europe and Plato. Passive nihilism believes in no value, assuming that any value is possible only if God exists, and God does not exist. It culminates in despair, inaction, and the renunciation of desire.
- Active Nihilism: A power of destruction arising from the growing power of the spirit. The old Platonic values are not simply abandoned but actively destroyed by the will to power. This forms the foundation upon which Nietzsche builds his new philosophy and morality, involving the death of God and the transmutation of all values, ultimately leading to the ideal of the Superman.
The Dionysian
Nietzsche contrasts two philosophically artistic concepts: the Apollonian and the Dionysian. He celebrates Dionysus as the embodiment of the will to live, enacting the irresistible force of life, and argues that this was the Greek ideal in the pre-Socratic period. Dionysus, the god of chaotic night, constantly strives to live, feel, and express outwardly the vital impulses of human life. He represents life in its dark, instinctual, irrational, and biological aspects. With the advent of Socrates and Plato, this Dionysian ideal was displaced by Apollo, who represents the pursuit of perfect life and art forms. Apollo is the god of light, clarity, and harmony, standing in opposition to the world of primal forces and instincts. He represents balance, measure, and rationality. Nietzsche asserts an eternal struggle between theoretical consideration (Apollo) and the tragic account of the world (Dionysus), exalting the tragic-Dionysian against what he considers the post-Platonic philosophical tradition.
Unnatural Morality
Nietzsche identifies the strength of life instincts and passions, represented by a healthy morality. However, he argues that the morality we are taught is unnatural. We have been instilled with a morality that opposes life instincts. This morality conceives of God as antithetical to life, making us decadent and weak. It is the morality preached by Platonism, which argues that true ideas exist in another life. Nietzsche calls this a slave morality, born of fear, lacking self-created values. It is a morality of resentment and passivity. In contrast, master morality, born of vitalism, is chivalrous, creative, establishes its own values, and is therefore active. The Superman embraces the death of God.
The Apparent World
Nietzsche argues that the senses never lie and that reason is an empty invention. Therefore, the underworld, the realm of space and time, is the only one that can exist. The “apparent” world that traditional philosophers discuss is not apparent, but true. The world is not a lie or invention, and the doubt philosophers have expressed about the correspondence between the factual and the real is unfounded, as they are the same. Nietzsche criticizes Plato for contrasting the sensible object with the absolute idea and Kant for distinguishing between phenomena and noumena. He criticizes metaphysics for inventing this rational world and Socrates and Plato for initiating centuries of nonexistent Platonic dualism.
Transmutation of Values
The unnatural moral force that has corrupted humanity with its lies must be unmasked by studying its origins, which Nietzsche traces to Christianity (“Platonism for the people”) as a diffuser of moral decadence and an escape from the harshness of life. He identifies the need to overturn these values, establishing a new hierarchy. European culture, having reached a state of decline, must be restored. The vitalist philosopher must free humanity from these fictitious values and restore the right to live and exist. The Superman, through active nihilism, will create new life-affirming values and usher in the master morality.
Innocence of Becoming
Nietzsche captures the innocence of becoming in concepts like the Superman and the eternal return. If the world is acknowledged as having no end or purpose, it is innocent and cannot be judged. From absolute despair emerges infinite joy and freedom from blind subservience. We become free to abolish the purpose of existence, achieving maximum freedom. In this sense, death is the greatest pleasure because it signifies a return to the origin of life, to be reborn and repeated countless times with every pain and every joy, as events and individuals recur in eternally recurring cycles. This is agonizing only for those who do not love life. Nietzsche expresses this by saying, “No guilt, no redemption accordingly, but innocence of becoming.”