This article explores and critically assesses the metaxological account of a philosophy of God professed by William Desmond. Postmodern reflection on the philosophy of God has a tendency to focus on the 'signs' of God and urges for a passive acceptance of these signs. Desmond argues, contrary to this tendency, for a mindful togetherness of philosophical activity and religious passivity. After exploring Desmond's thought on this topic, I move to assess his 'metaxological yes' to God as the agapeic origin from (...) an existential point of view. Initially it seems that his 'yes' is somewhat strained as it burdens itself with an excessive task of having faith into something that is beyond determination. I illustrate this insight by referring to Friedrich Nietzsche’s 'Thus Spoke Zarathustra.' Nietzsche's existential 'No' toward transcendence is a consequence of a mindful confrontation with the excesses as play. (shrink)

Nietzsche suggests that even individuals who take themselves to bear an affirmative attitude toward life would be horrified by the thought of eternal recurrence (roughly, the idea that our lives will repeat endlessly in exactly the same fashion). But why? Why is it supposed to be more difficult to affirm recurring lives than to affirm a non-recurring, singular life? I argue that standard interpretations of eternal recurrence are unable to answer this question. I offer a new interpretation of eternal recurrence, (...) which attributes its difficulty to the conditional nature of ordinary affirmation. Affirmation is conditional when it depends on the possibility of excising objectionable elements from the object of affirmation. What Nietzsche means to reveal, with eternal recurrence, is that even the most apparently affirmative individuals often manifest only a conditional affirmation of life, a form of affirmation that conceals a tacit negation. Eternal recurrence brings this hidden negation to light, thereby encouraging us to move toward an unconditionally affirmative stance. I conclude by reflecting on why Nietzsche takes the distinction between conditional and unconditional affirmation to be such an important philosophical idea. I argue that those who devote themselves to challenging, long-term goals will face psychological pressures that tend to deform unconditional affirmation into conditional affirmation. (shrink)

Thomas Hurka has argued that Nietzsche’s positive ethical views can be formulated as a version of perfectionism that posits an objective conception of the good as the maximization of power and assigns to all agents the same goal of maximizing the perfection of the best. I show that Hurka’s case for both parts of this interpretation fails on textual grounds and that the kind of theory he proposes is in conflict with Nietzsche’s general approach to morality. The alternative reading for (...) which I argue defends a form of perfectionism as the value perspective of a ‘noble type’ that may emerge in the wake of a revaluation of all values. The basis of this perfectionism is an individual’s projection of an ideal of life to which she ascribes intrinsic value and in terms of which the value of other things is assessed. Justifying this reading requires drawing a distinction between life-denying ideals – forms of the ‘ascetic ideal’ – and life-affirming ‘counterideals’. It also requires recognizing that the perfection of the noble type is expressed in an individual ideal that cannot be shared with others, as opposed to a common ideal of human perfection. (shrink)

This paper identifies and offers commentary upon a previously un-remarked consonance between Nietzsche and Weil when it comes to the idea of a universal love of the world. The discussion focuses on five features of the Nietzschean account of affirmation, which are as follows: that the possibility of affirmation has the form of a fundamental question at the heart of human life, which has an all-or-nothing character ; that genuine affirmation is rare, difficult or traumatic in an existentially revealing way, (...) primarily because affirmation means facing up to the lack of finality in the world, and in particular the problem of meaningless suffering, which means that affirmation is tied up with a fundamental revaluation. The first half of the paper outlines the parallels between Nietzschean affirmation and Weilian ‘consent to necessity’ in relation to the first three of these, which are also the most general. The second half of the paper explores the fourth and fifth, so as to suggest a way of reading the underlying similarity between these two projects: both are attempts to rediscover the possibility of an all-embracing affirmation of reality in the absence of any existential teleology, and when eschatology has been presumed to be impossible. In other words, both Nietzsche and Weil are compelled to find a way of achieving a transfigured perspective on ‘the whole’ in the absence of any transformation of ‘the whole’. (shrink)

ABSTRACTIn this article I argue that we should understand Nietzsche’s doctrine of eternal recurrence as the ideal of life affirmation opposed to philosophical pessimism, the view that life is not worth living. I first articulate Nietzsche’s psychological account of pessimism as a vengeful focus on the past and an aversion to time understood as transience. I then consider the question of why a person with the opposite psychological orientation – a creative relation to the future and an endorsement of time (...) – would will the eternal recurrence of all things. My answer appeals to Nietzsche’s notions of will to power and the redemption of the past from its senselessness. The interpretation of eternal recurrence that emerges from this approach takes Nietzsche’s vision of a great, world-redeeming individual to be integral to his doctrine of eternal recurrence. This is just one way in which it differs from common interpretations of eternal recurrence as a cosmological theory or thought experiment. (shrink)

The relationship between Epicurus and Nietzsche is an increasingly popular research topic. There are a number of publications that attempt to detail the nature of this relationship by investigating specific aspects of their writings that interrelate. Such research is valuable because it reveals an otherwise hidden dynamic to Nietzsche studies, however, all previous discourse on Epicurus and Nietzsche are limited because they fail to recognise both thinkers as philosophers of immanence. This thesis proposes that ‘immanence’ is the central concept that (...) allows the influence of Epicurus upon Nietzsche’s thought to be revealed most appropriately. Furthermore, it proposes to account for the development of ‘immanence’ within the works of Epicurus and Nietzsche in order to disclose the nature of immanence itself. By following Nietzsche’s genealogical method, this thesis will demonstrate that Epicurean immanence emerged through the conceptualisation of all existence within the cosmos and nature. Moreover, immanence developed as an atomistic response to the transcendent philosophies of Socrates and Aristotle which opposed Democritean materialism. Nietzsche recognised that the increasing popularity of Platonism in late antiquity led to the event of Christianity, which dominated Western thought until its success eventually destroyed the conditions that maintained it. Nietzsche predicted that in the light of Christianity’s demise, mankind would be plunged into a state of crisis and unparalleled nihilism. In response, he proposed that the body and spirit must be reunited in an act of overcoming, and those capable of that act would ‘inherit the earth’. Immanence for Nietzsche is this unifying act and inheritance, and he demonstrates that redemptive doctrines such as Epicurus’ ataraxia, modelled on nihilism, must be rejected and overcome by a philosophy modelled on ‘cheerfulness’. It is in this respect that his philosophy from The Gay Science onwards can be recognised as a discourse on immanence. (shrink)

Prior to the third essay of his Genealogy of Morality, Nietzsche affixes a fragment from Thus Spoke Zarathustra. The purpose of the fragment seems explicit in the Genealogy’s preface where Nietzsche tells us that the essay is a commentary on an aphorism. However, the relationship of the fragment to the third essay is unclear. In response, several commentators have offered a solution: namely, to disregard the fragment from Zarathustra and to read the first section of the third essay as the (...) object of Nietzsche’s commentary. Since this reading, the puzzle concerning Nietzsche’s aphorism has been considered solved. In this thesis, I make a case for why we should revive this debate, why we should restore the most natural reading of the preface, which makes the fragment from Zarathustra the aphorism Nietzsche refers to there, and how we can make sense of its connection to the third essay. (shrink)

In this thesis, I use the work of Friedrich Nietzsche to offer a detailed account of existential sin. I show that existential sin as a form of self-understanding is deeply embedded in the Christian theological tradition, and that Nietzsche’s account of existential sin should be understood as part of this same tradition. In my reading of On the Genealogy of Morality I show that we need to place sin in close relation to bad conscience, guilt and the genealogical method itself. (...) However, despite being grounded in Christian thought and dependent upon the figure of the Christian God in its origin and emergence, I follow Nietzsche in positing that existential sin continues to exist after the death of God. It is by considering sin as not only a form of self-understanding, but also as a cultural memory, that we can make sense of this claim. For Nietzsche existential sin is at its root a mistaken understanding of human nature that has taken hold of us through Christianity. However, I argue that we need to consider existential sin as a socio-historical answer to the ontological problem of meaningless suffering. Existential sin responds to a fundamental experience of the human condition. With this in mind, in the final chapter of the thesis I examine possible avenues of redemption from post-Christian sin. What options are open to the person suffering from post-Christian sin-consciousness if she cannot turn to religious narratives? I argue that Nietzsche’s redemptive method of genealogy is not sufficient, and that life-affirmation is too demanding. However, a weaker version of life-affirmation in which meaningless suffering is affirmed as necessary, but not desired, does provide a promising alternative answer to the problem of meaningless suffering. (shrink)