Transcendence and Life: Nietzsche on the “Death of God”

Abstract

The aim of this essay is to reflect on the implications of the thought of the death of God with a view to two related themes. The first has to do with the a-teleological interpretation of Being and the world as a result of the collapse of the transcendent realm which heretofore had given a meaning to life. The death of God implies that no finality can be ascribed to either the world or human action. The investigation of this theme necessitates examining one of Nietzsche’s central doctrines, the Eternal Recurrence of the Same. It has long been considered to be the most puzzling idea in Nietzsche’s corpus, to which he himself offered no thorough explanation but simply referred to it obliquely as his “most abysmal thought.” The second theme to be discussed is the nature and the task of thinking after the death of God and its relation to suffering. The a-teoleological interpretation of life implies that reason and the good no longer guarantee one another, and that thinking cannot justify suffering in the name of the greater good. The relationship between life and suffering must be re-evaluated and so too must the value of suffering. The point that Nietzsche makes is double; the transformation that he calls for is not only to affirm suffering rather than eliminate it, but to affirm that thinking is suffering.

Keywords

• Nietzsche; Death of God; Eternal Recurrence of the Same; Transcendence

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