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On the Genealogy of Morals (1887) is a book about interpretation and the history of ethics which raises profoundly disquieting issues about the violence of both. This is the most sustained of Nietzsche’s later works and offers one of the fullest expressions of his characteristic concerns. The introduction places his ideas within the cultural context of his own time and stresses the relevance of his work for a contemporary audience…. More >>
On the Genealogy of Morals: A Polemic. By way of clarification and supplement to my last book Beyond Good and Evil
On the Genealogy of Morals: A Polemic. By way of clarification and supplement to my last book Beyond Good and Evil
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Tags: Beyond, book, clarification, Evil, Genealogy, Good, last, Morals, Polemic., supplementPosted 02 May 2010 in General
Nietzsche attempts to construct the origins of Christian morality using the scalpel of his pscyhological-historical method. Despite the many penetrating insights into human nature, in some areas he misses the mark totally. He claims that Christianity was the product of a Jewish conspiracy to enact revenge on Rome — that it was the fullfilement of the burning ressentiment of the Jewish slave-priests who in their impotence could not subjugate the masters by force and were therefore led to do so through a doctrine of love. Christ, as Nietzshe sees it, was the bait through which Rome was subjugated to a transfigured Judaism. While the theory, despite its obvious absurdity, sounds interesting, it follows from the psychological arguments that Nietzshce is building, and even more so from his premise that “God is our most enduring lie”. For once this accepted, as Nietzsche sees it, Christianity ipso facto becomes the product of human minds; hence he endeavors to find the materialistc origins of Christianity by way of a psychological-historical deconstruction of the human-all-too-human tendencies responsible for the inception of Europe’s dominant religion. Yet such a method can certainly back-fire — and in Nietzsche’s case it seems too. How so?
Nietzshche’s obsession with values that accompany strength, dominance and might may have mirrored his own decrepid physical condition. The German philosopher was forced to retire from his teaching post at the young age of 34 due to his deteriorating health. Some speculate that his condition was precipitated by an injury during military training in his youth which cut short any aspirations he may have had of becoming a soldier. Taking into considertation that much of his life following retirement was ridden with painfull fits of vomiting and unceasing migranes, does it require a radical leap to presume that a man so deprived of health would fanatically esteem strength and everything connected to an abundance of physicality? After all, which other philosopher wrote so eloquently about the greatness of the overman’s domineering power and the importance of the will-to-power? Yet Nietzsche was incensed by attempts to explain-away his ideas by explaining HOW and WHY they arose in himself. Irononically, this is the method he uses against Christian-morality; he presumes that an explanation is an explanation-away. As he writes in the WILL TO POWER: “Everywhere God is inserted…and the real origin of morality denied”. It appears that the blind spot of his genealogical anaylysis of Christian morality is himself, which can be equally genealogically-submerged if his method is adopted. This means that both Christian values and Nietzsche’s views can be explained away by exposing the circumstances that led to their emergence. Where then lies the truth, if all perspectives are levelled by the “consuming fires” of genealogical-subversion?
As I Muslim I side with the Christians (and all believers in Divine causality), in arguing that an explanation is NOT an explanation-away, and that at best it simply reveals the contextual bed underpinning the emergence of any phenomena, be it an idea or event — that and nothing more. As Ghazali, the medieval Islamic mystic writes: the materialist is like an ant which crawls on a sheet of paper, and seeing black letters spreading over it attributes the cause to the pen alone. Rating: 2 / 5
I gave this to my coworker and he couldn’t stop talking about how great it was! Rating: 5 / 5
My interest in philosophy itself has never been as great as my interest in “How One Becomes What One Is,” which is the topic covered in the little book at the back of this double selection. For those who find fault with Nietzsche because his philosophy does not conform to what they would like to believe, I would like to think that Nietzsche’s best answer is like his comment on Hamlet on page 246. “Certainty is what drives one insane. But one must be profound, an abyss, a philosopher to feel that way. We are all afraid of truth.” No doubt On the Genealogy of Morals is great philosophy, but no one would want to compare my life to the forms assumed by the ascetic ideal, even philosophers whose search for truth is the hard kernal at the center of the ascetic ideal. Outside of philosophy, there is no ascetic ideal. People want the moment, or eternal salvation, or they need to conform to doctrine that distinguishes them in a way that is not subject to the harm which the comedians of the ascetic ideal triumph over simply by having their own ideals, or laugh, whatever. Rating: 5 / 5
Undoubtedly Nietzsche’s most penetrating and philosophical work, the “Genealogy of Morals” is a shattering indictment of science, Judaeo-Christian morality and modern Western values such as liberalism, socialism and feminism. It identifies these phenomena with the reactive, self-preserving “ascetic ideal” – the oppressive “will to truth” – that aims to constrain and deny life. In opposition, Nietzsche propounds art and culture as a counteragent and champions the “Diyonisan tragic artist” who will affirm and celebrate life. – Also a pioneering text for poststructuralist critical-historical analysis, as represented by the likes of Deleuze and Foucault, and deconstruction, the maverick textual methodology of Jacques Derrida. Rating: 5 / 5
This anthology of Nietzsche’s writing is a marvelous work – Kaufmann’s translations make the philosopher’s unique style accessible and interesting to the English reader; it doesn’t resort to false formality or dry academic prose as is often the case in translation of such material, but rather sets things in lively and dynamic tones, much as Nietzsche’s own writing and tendency toward the dramatic was noted by his contemporaries.
Nietzsche’s father was a Lutheran minister, but he died five years after Nietzsche’s birth in 1844. Nietzsche was raised by his mother, grandmother and aunts; later in his life, his sister would become executor of his estate (after Nietzsche had become incapable of managing his own affairs) and reshape his philosophy and writings in her own idea – this becomes a running motif in later anthologies of Nietzsche; editors can quote and clip to fit their own agendas. In some ways, that is true of Kaufmann’s text here, but in much less inappropriate ways than others, particularly Nietzsche’s first editor, his sister.
Nietzsche was a star pupil from his earliest days at university in Bonn and Leipzig. His formal study was in classical philology, but his attentions turned in various directions quickly during his writing and professional life – he had an intense interest in drama and the arts, with Wagner’s music and Greek drama in principal interest. His first book was devoted to these topics – ‘The Birth of Tragedy’. It was not highly regarded at the time, but has since become much more appreciated as an anticipation of later developments in philosophy and aesthetics.
Nietzsche’s life after this period was a very choppy one – he left the university, claiming illness, and while this developed later to be a true situation, at the time is was probably academic politics and difficulties fitting in with the establishment he was trying to break. He had a formal falling-out with Wagner, even writing later a piece entitled ‘ Nietzsche contra Wagner’, finished just a few week prior to his going insane.
Kaufmann states in the introduction that Nietzsche’s real career took off after his active life was over; under his sister’s direction, many of the writings Nietzsche had managed to do and not get published, or which were published but forgotten, really took off in major directions. While his major works of Zarathustra, Ecce Homo, Will to Power and Genealogy of Morals were in various editions of disrepair (indeed, the Will to Power was never more complete than a series of notes), Nietzsche had a knack for language that made him very quotable, and his influence continued to grow well into the first half of the twentieth century, influencing art, philosophy, history, and politics in dramatic ways, if not always the ways in which Nietzsche envisioned.
For example, Nietzsche was not particularly impressed with the ‘typical’ German anti-semitism, which later erupted into the Nazi movement. He considered it rather bourgeois, and while he undoubted had his own issues with Jews (Nietzsche had issues with almost everyone, particularly any group, Christians included, who had a religious connection), the Nazi use of Nietzsche’s work owes more to Nietzsche’s sister’s influence than anyone else.
Kaufmann states that ‘Genealogy of Morals’ is perhaps the closest in form to English-speaking philosophical discourse. This is a discussion that involves philosophy, psychology and linguistic theory, looking at morality in three different essays. The first essay explores the idea of good and evil as good and bad; Nietzsche develops the idea of master and slave morality – the slave resists the ideas of the master, and thus values things that are less likely to gain power – Nietzsche sees Christianity as an example of slave morality.
The second essay looks at the issues of conscience and guilt, and how these spawned the invention of gods. The third essay concludes the work with a look at ascetic ideas, how these relate to aesthetic ideas, and where in Nietzsche’s opinion the great philosophers of the past have gone wrong.
Perhaps this later explains the second work in this collection, Ecce Homo. In this book (first published posthumously), Nietzsche analyses his own work piece by piece, as well as gives an overall assessment of his life. Nietzsche’s insights into his own writings in hindsight is fascinating to behold. For example, his idea of his work in the first piece of this collection, the Genealogy, is as follows:
‘Regarding expression, intention, and the art of suprise, the three inquiries which constitute this Genealogy are perhaps uncannier than anything else written so far. Dionysus is, as is known, also the god of darkness.’
Nietzsce is not easy reading, and this work is not the best for casual reading or the first-time reader of Nietzsche. However, for those who have already made some headway into understanding him, this is a good collection, for Kaufmann is one of the better translators and commentators. Kaufmann’s notes here are especially valuable. Rating: 5 / 5