Nietzsche and Christianity meet Hegel

Sauwelios · November 6, 2006, 4:45pm

“Definition of Protestantism: the partial paralysis of Christianityâ€”and of reason…”
[AC 10.]

Nietzsche encourages the complete paralysis of Christianity, whereas Christianity encourages the complete paralysis of reason.

detrop · November 6, 2006, 5:16pm

Jakob rolls five on six sided dye…

Penalty to morale, failed save throw…

Nine hit points lost…

Jakob · November 6, 2006, 6:13pm

Finally you provide an argument. I am happy to admit defeat.
If I understand you correctly, Nietzsche means that one should be more severe to a liberal protestant (like Spinoza) than towards catholics, because he is more aware of the fact that he is lying when he calls nature God.
If this is what he means, I have misunderstood him, and in that case I think he is wrong. You have proven to me I am not a Nietzschean.
Here’s how I see it:
The man of knowlegde understands that God, if he exists, can not be different from nature, and understands that faith is not unnatural, because increasing knowledge is increasing trust in the natural course of existence and increasing delight therein. The catholic thinks God is supernatural, and that he, being natural, is ungodly. Pretending to have faith in something he does not trust at all because he sees the world around him as directly opposed a doctrine of virgins giving birth and people ressurrecting from death, he is a hypocrit. The catholic is more of a hypocrit than the protestant, the protestant more than the liberal protestant. Hence all the idolatry of images in catholicism - Powerful means are needed to convince oneself of truths one instinctively knows to be lies. The protestant has no need for images, because he is less of a hypocrit.

Sauwelios · November 6, 2006, 6:26pm

Calling nature God is completely anti-Christian - and anti-Judaist, for that matter. Judeo-Christianity calls anti-nature God (the “beyond”, the nothing). I would never call Spinoza a Protestant.

If this is what he means, I have misunderstood him, and in that case I think he is wrong. You have proven to me I am not a Nietzschean.
Here’s how I see it:
The man of knowlegde understands that God, if he exists, can not be different from nature, and understands that faith is not unnatural, because increasing knowledge is increasing trust in the natural course of existence and increasing delight therein. The catholic thinks God is supernatural, and that he, being natural, is ungodly. Pretending to have faith in something he does not trust at all because he sees the world around him as directly opposed a doctrine of virgins giving birth and people ressurrecting from death, he is a hypocrit. The catholic is more of a hypocrit than the protestant, the protestant more than the liberal protestant.

I agree with everything you say here, save for the last sentence. The Catholic is less of a hypocrit etc., because he is less knowledgable about nature - less scientific. It is less hypocritic to unwittingly proclaim falsehoods than to do so wittingly. Hypocricy is feigned ignorance, not actual ignorance. The Catholic is more naive, more innocent; Adam before the Fall is the perfect Christian, because he has no knowledge of nature.

Jakob · November 11, 2006, 11:39am

Sauwelios:

Jakob:

Finally you provide an argument. I am happy to admit defeat.
If I understand you correctly, Nietzsche means that one should be more severe to a liberal protestant (like Spinoza) than towards catholics, because he is more aware of the fact that he is lying when he calls nature God.

Calling nature God is completely anti-Christian - and anti-Judaist, for that matter. Judeo-Christianity calls anti-nature God (the “beyond”, the nothing). I would never call Spinoza a Protestant.

If this is what he means, I have misunderstood him, and in that case I think he is wrong. You have proven to me I am not a Nietzschean.
Here’s how I see it:
The man of knowlegde understands that God, if he exists, can not be different from nature, and understands that faith is not unnatural, because increasing knowledge is increasing trust in the natural course of existence and increasing delight therein. The catholic thinks God is supernatural, and that he, being natural, is ungodly. Pretending to have faith in something he does not trust at all because he sees the world around him as directly opposed a doctrine of virgins giving birth and people ressurrecting from death, he is a hypocrit. The catholic is more of a hypocrit than the protestant, the protestant more than the liberal protestant.

I agree with everything you say here, save for the last sentence. The Catholic is less of a hypocrit etc., because he is less knowledgable about nature - less scientific. It is less hypocritic to unwittingly proclaim falsehoods than to do so wittingly. Hypocricy is feigned ignorance, not actual ignorance. The Catholic is more naive, more innocent; Adam before the Fall is the perfect Christian, because he has no knowledge of nature.

You have a point. Where I differ wih you is that I do believe in ‘God’ - or rather, don’t believe in nihilistic science.
I am a Blakean rather than a Nietzschean. But just call me a Milikowskian. I believe in Genius as the origin of everything. Genius is by definition inexplicabe, untraceable to reason, to logic. Reason, logic and science are all products of genius.

Genius stands between necessity and power - ah, between will and power! Does it not?
But I venture that Genius is even more fundamental than will.

more_or_less · November 11, 2006, 7:08pm

Jakob:

Sauwelios:

Jakob:

Finally you provide an argument. I am happy to admit defeat.
If I understand you correctly, Nietzsche means that one should be more severe to a liberal protestant (like Spinoza) than towards catholics, because he is more aware of the fact that he is lying when he calls nature God.

Calling nature God is completely anti-Christian - and anti-Judaist, for that matter. Judeo-Christianity calls anti-nature God (the “beyond”, the nothing). I would never call Spinoza a Protestant.

If this is what he means, I have misunderstood him, and in that case I think he is wrong. You have proven to me I am not a Nietzschean.
Here’s how I see it:
The man of knowlegde understands that God, if he exists, can not be different from nature, and understands that faith is not unnatural, because increasing knowledge is increasing trust in the natural course of existence and increasing delight therein. The catholic thinks God is supernatural, and that he, being natural, is ungodly. Pretending to have faith in something he does not trust at all because he sees the world around him as directly opposed a doctrine of virgins giving birth and people ressurrecting from death, he is a hypocrit. The catholic is more of a hypocrit than the protestant, the protestant more than the liberal protestant.

I agree with everything you say here, save for the last sentence. The Catholic is less of a hypocrit etc., because he is less knowledgable about nature - less scientific. It is less hypocritic to unwittingly proclaim falsehoods than to do so wittingly. Hypocricy is feigned ignorance, not actual ignorance. The Catholic is more naive, more innocent; Adam before the Fall is the perfect Christian, because he has no knowledge of nature.

You have a point. Where I differ wih you is that I do believe in ‘God’ - or rather, don’t believe in nihilistic science.
I am a Blakean rather than a Nietzschean. But just call me a Milikowskian. I believe in Genius as the origin of everything. Genius is by definition inexplicabe, untraceable to reason, to logic. Reason, logic and science are all products of genius.

Genius stands between necessity and power - ah, between will and power! Does it not?
But I venture that Genius is even more fundamental than will.

You sound more Freudian or Jungian as a result.

If will is the Id then is genius the Ego or the Super Ego? Sounds like the latter, but I don’t get this “necessity”…

more_or_less · November 11, 2006, 7:12pm

Jakob:

more or less:

Jakob:

more or less:

Well you are correct in that dialectics precede Hegel, the point was that Hegel extrapolated to abstract concepts such as history or the nation-state.

So no, we need Hegel more now than ever.

In this case, though, it is sufficient to see that both Jesus and Nietzsche were exaggerating. They went too far with their convictions, resulting in negation of these convictions. That, at least, was my point. There is no need to forge a fusion of the two - one can simply be moderate and take from both what is healthy, sane - and reject the other half.

Given what we know of the “truth,” how is what you are suggesting not itself a synthesis? Or is that your point?

I wasn’t sure if it counted as a synthesis when I wrote it since it is more of a middle road without an actual fusion of nuclei. I tend to think in terms of was and clash, release of blind new energy when I think of synthesis, Perhaps that is too dramatic.

Jakob:

However I have a crazy suggestion to make, how do you know that Christianity is not a Greek conspiracy to overthrow [dialectically destroy] the Romans via the Jews?
The Christians in part being the synthesis of the Jewish and the Greek ethics…

I have never really thought through the fact that the Greeks were essential in the conception of Christianity. But of course they were.
—What Greek ethics do you see in Christianity?—

I’ve ‘learned’, so far, that Christianity was the antithesis to the classical world. But this brings back to mind the idea that Rome was an antithesis to Greece as well.
Rome has no Dionysos - The drunk Bacchus has nothing to do with the fluxgod - and there is a very distinct Dionysian quality to the effects of the Holy Ghost. But these aren’t the Greek ethics you talk of, I presume.

No, Rome is very nihilistic, and thus the point about Christianity.

What do you mean by nihilistic here? My understanding fo nihilism does not apply to Rome - nihilism as belief in nothing, thinking that there is no point to exsitence. Rome was built with great love for the world, and especially itself. It still is a monument to existence.

Also, the example of Jesus is one who actually resists human authority in the name of truth. In other words, Jesus is about democracy and the masses inherently, ie, the meek shall inherit… Very much a subtext about the polis/demos and against the notion of a Caesar/Republic with a very limited conception of the “citizen.”

I can see your point, but that subtext is, I think, not objectively present in the Bible. The New Testament makes no mention of politics at all - it simply scetches worldy affairs as unimportant. Of course it was an actual threat to the authority of the Caesar - so much that he had to become a Christian in the end.
What is significant to me is that the art of the Augustus period, when Christianity was no factor, is of the highest standard of Roman craft and aesthetic - closely resembling the classical Greek period, whereas in the Constantine period it had fallen to a degenerate state.

The mob of figures below are from Constantine period, the circles above are ripped from an arch from a much earlier period. The interest in art seems to have been almost entirely lost. My point is that I consider the factual Christian influence on Rome as degenerative - in terms of art at least. No wonder, with the emphasize on the afterlife. Id sooner call Rome under Constantine nihilistic than under Augustus.

Well then do you consider the influence of democracy in the form of Christianity destructive to Pax Romana? Is that a “decent”?

Jakob:

Also, I think the example of the Godhead and the Alpha/Omega is clearly an attempt to make a usable dialectic for combining the reality of the human, original sin, with the ideal of the human.

I think the gnostic Christian wrotings are by far the most useful to this dialectic. For one thing, they involve Mother Earth as opposed to the father in Heaven - a polarity absent in the final donctrine. I think the Bible has been mostly effective in securing the power of Caesar, who became the pope - as a representant of the Holy.

Jesus makes a nice thesis for the ubermensch antithesis. Neither example is workable in reality, neither is truly “human.”

With this difference that the Ubermensch is a goal, whereas Jesus is (supposedly) a historic figure.
Nietzsche is not very clear about the Ubermensch. Sometimes he is the robust Caesar type, sometimes he is the sensitive hermit who flees from the stenches of the mob.
Then again - Jesus is also different in every description of him.

You mean that Caeser crippled the Republic and adopted the rise of Christian power?

A Christian Empire is doomed to failure. Nietzsche would no doubt agree…

Jesus is very political and is inherently about the will to power as well, its just that his is based upon equality and not individualism.

Jakob · November 12, 2006, 1:36pm

Will is Id? I think you made an unwarranted assumption somewhere.

First you would have to ‘get’ the will to power. That would first mean not to equate it with a completely different concept and then call me a follower of the father of that concept.

Jakob · November 12, 2006, 1:43pm

Pardon? What is this tendency to utter latin words completely out of context?

Of course not you son of silly person, Jesus was Caesar.

I’m sure you will agree with me that you are wrong.

more_or_less · November 12, 2006, 7:31pm

Perhaps the word “if” is confusing for you.

I asked you to explain your meaning of necessity, I guess you cannot.

more_or_less · November 12, 2006, 7:33pm

So you don’t think Pax Romana has anything to do with the Caesars?

wtf?

I can see that all you can offer is sarcasm and empty claims at this point. I guess the dicussion is over.

Jakob · November 12, 2006, 8:36pm

more or less:

Jakob:

more or less:

Well then do you consider the influence of democracy in the form of Christianity destructive to Pax Romana? Is that a “decent”?

Pardon? What is this tendency to utter latin words completely out of context?

So you don’t think Pax Romana has anything to do with the Caesars? I simply don’t see why you would need this term in this discussion. Obviously Christianity was detrimental to the politcal stability in the empire. If that was your question, yes.

Jakob:

You mean that Caeser crippled the Republic and adopted the rise of Christian power?

Of course not you son of silly person, Jesus was Caesar.

wtf? ask Sauwelios

Jakob:

A Christian Empire is doomed to failure. Nietzsche would no doubt agree…I believe western man lives in a Christian empire that has lasted about 1700 years now. Now why would I get sarcastic?
Jesus is very political and is inherently about the will to power as well, its just that his is based upon equality and not individualism.

Jesus is inherently about the will to power? Yes, if one believes that all is will to power, everything is inherently ‘about’ the will to power.
I can see that all you can offer is sarcasm and empty claims at this point. I guess the dicussion is over.
what discussion?

Jakob · November 12, 2006, 10:15pm

Nietzsche was a man troubled with a too big brain for his heart. His heart was pure and nice, and his brain was savage monster of energy. His heart was forced to eat all the brain caught for it. Rabbits, Dogs, Camels, Elephants, his sister, his mother, his God, his creation and ultimately even his sanity. Oh my god nietzschnietzschnietzsche. You are so cool.

Sauwelios · November 13, 2006, 12:11am

Jesus Christ was probably Julius Caesar:

http://www.carotta.de/subseite/texte/jwc_e/contents.html

Jakob · December 27, 2014, 9:29pm

detrop:

I also want to say this, Jakob. I advocate secular ethics especially at this point in time. Any subdivisible group which separates itself from a social mass is an economic form of anarchy. Organized crime, for example, and the mafia.

The existence of such secular and as you call it, “tribal,” moral systems is that they cause conflicts with the natural tendency for capitalism to attempt to appropriate consumers into a predictable and regulated class. Anything which makes it more difficult for law enforcement to regulate the money system is a step toward its loss of power over economy.

Anarchy is the ideal state during the reformation of capitalism when it reaches its contradictory state; when the need to produce higher volume exceeds the resouces for such. A great swell in the working class will rise up like a wave…Mexicans with electric leaf-blowers will rally in the streets.

Social crisis creates secular ethics. They are neccesary evils in the dialectic.

Historyboy · December 28, 2014, 6:55am

Nietzsche was thinking too much. People can stop growing if thinking too much at an early age (21-). His height 171 cm. Reason why he was thinking too much was not that he was beaten (if one is hit in the head he starts thinking a lot) but being “polish among Germans”.

Jakob · September 28, 2018, 9:13pm

When people still read.

Much of what led up to self-valuing logic can be learned in there. It’s the best body of philosophy of the 20th century Id say.

Rough and bloody waters.