JESUS OR NIETZSCHE VIBS Volume 259 Robert Ginsberg Founding Editor Leonidas Donskis Executive Editor Associate Editors G. John M. Abbarno Steven V. Hicks George Allan Richard T. Hull Gerhold K. Becker Michael Krausz Raymond Angelo Belliotti Olli Loukola Kenneth A. Bryson Mark Letteri C. Stephen Byrum Vincent L. Luizzi Robert A. Delfino Hugh P. McDonald Rem B. Edwards Adrianne McEvoy Malcolm D. Evans J.D. Mininger Roland Faber Peter A. Redpath Andrew Fitz-Gibbon Arleen L. F. Salles Francesc Forn i Argimon John R. Shook Daniel B. Gallagher Eddy Souffrant William C. Gay Tuija Takala Dane R. Gordon Emil Višňovský J. Everet Green Anne Waters Heta Aleksandra Gylling James R. Watson Matti Häyry John R. Welch Brian G. Henning Thomas Woods a volume in Ethical Theory and Practice ETP Olli Loukola, Editor JESUS OR NIETZSCHE How Should We Live Our Lives? Raymond Angelo Belliotti Amsterdam - New York, NY 2013 Cover photo: Dreamstime Cover Design: Studio Pollmann The paper on which this book is printed meets the requirements of “ISO 9706:1994, Information and documentation - Paper for documents - Requirements for permanence”. ISBN: 978-90-420-3658-1 E-Book ISBN: 978-94-012-0925-0 © Editions Rodopi B.V., Amsterdam - New York, NY 2013 Printed in the Netherlands For Marcia, Angelo, and Vittoria Supra lu majuri si 'nsigna lu minuri. (“We learn by standing on the shoulders of the wise.”) CONTENTS EDITORIAL FOREWORD BY OLLI LOUKOLA ix PREFACE xi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS xv LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS xvii INTRODUCTION 1 1. Introduction 1 2. Nietzsche’s Life 5 3. Problems of Interpretation in Nietzsche 7 4. My (Mis)Interpretation of Nietzsche 9 ONE Jesus: The Nature of Our World and Our Mission in It 13 1. Family Relations 13 2. Associating and Identifying with Undesirables 17 3. Unsettling Established Rituals 19 4. Interrogating Prevailing Norms of Just Distribution 20 5. Material Minimalism 31 6. Jesus and the Concept of Forgiveness 34 TWO Nietzsche: The Nature of Our World and Our Mission in It 51 1. Perspectivism 51 2. Genealogical Critiques 63 3. Crafting a Worthy Self 64 4. Values 65 5. Nietzsche’s Glad Tidings 66 6. Master and Slave Moralities 69 7. Going Beyond Good and Evil 80 8. Eternal Recurrence 84 9. Philosophy and Psychology 100 10. Style and Rhetoric 105 11. Tragic View of Life 110 12. Jesus and Nietzsche 114 viii JESUS OR NIETZSCHE THREE Fundamental Understandings of Human Beings: Unconditional Love and the Will to Power 115 1. The Power of Unconditional Love 115 2. The Paradoxes of Agapic Love 119 3. Parental Agape 123 4. The Will to Power 126 5. The Last Man and The Overman 131 6. Nietzsche on Jesus 136 7. Nietzsche on St. Paul and Christianity 141 8. Nietzsche’s Understanding of Jesus 143 9. Jesus and Engagement in this World 145 10. Daunting Normative Ideals 149 FOUR The Perfectionism of Jesus 151 1. Perfectionism and Unconditional Love 151 2. Extending Unconditional Love 154 3. Unconditional Love and Abstraction 158 4. A Summary of the Perfectionism of Jesus 159 5. The Ethic of Jesus and Contemporary Philosophy 161 6. Jesus’ Enduring Message 180 FIVE The Perfectionism of Nietzsche 181 1. Nietzsche’s Vision 181 2. Aristocratic Privilege 187 3. A Summary of the Perfectionism of Nietzsche 194 4. The Perfectionism of Nietzsche and Contemporary Philosophy 195 5. Jesus and Nietzsche: Toward a Synthesis 205 NOTES 211 BIBLIOGRAPHY 219 INDEX 225 ABOUT THE AUTHOR 231 EDITORIAL FOREWORD Ethical Theory and Practice (ETP) is a special series in the Value Inquiry Book Series, and it is dedicated to works which attempt to close the gap between ethical theory and practice. One of the goals of Jesus or Nietzsche: How should we live our lives? is to examine the tension between the ways we theorize our moral ideals and the practicalities of human life. Jesus and Nietzsche were both sincere followers of the original Socratic mission of moral philosophy, that is, how to live the good human life not only in some distant idealized future, but also within mundane human existence. It is surely here that Jesus and Nietzsche have made a lasting impact in the history of morality, and most certainly in everyday life. These two thinkers share an important starting point. They cast a critical eye on everyday circumstances, especially as they are regulated, dictated and controlled by established, traditional moral rules and beliefs. They both interrogate the point and purpose of this realm. They search for sense and purpose outside the conventional moralities of their day, and yearn to under- stand the role of moral reformation in pursuing the good human life. Yet their thinking reaches for the everlasting and transcendent. Religion has probably been the single most influential element in the history of Western moral thought after the Greek philosophers, and it has continuously sculpted our moral reasoning, judged our motives, and dictated our goals. As such it has tended to calcify into prejudiced dogmatism and blind following of the arbitrary commands of omnipotent beings and of systems of power, backed up by all-encompassing fears of punishment. In the light of such extremism, it is easy to sympathize with the Nietzschean project of dismantling these practices and institutions, and stripping them of their undeserved dominance in defining human autonomy and potentials. Nietzsche offers an alternative image of how we might direct our lives and fashion the persons we might become. In its reformative aspirations, Nietzsche’s project bears similarities to Jesus’s radical moral message. But the two part company: Nietzsche an- nounces the death of God, while Jesus supplies a forceful rejoinder. As Raymond Angelo Belliotti convincingly shows in this book, Jesus and Nietzsche are not merely historical icons or galvanizers of power-hungry institutions. Instead, they are inspiring visionaries whose works can inform our existential choices and energize our lives today. Olli Loukola, Editor Ethical Theory and Practice PREFACE Three stories explain the origins of this work. The First Story I was raised a Roman Catholic. I attended parochial school from kindergarten through eighth grade. During my religious training—and religion was always the focus of the first session of every school day—we spent considerable time on the parables of the New Testament. This was unsurprising in light of the moral lessons contained in those stories. The transmission of moral lessons was, of course, the raison d’être of parochial school. One day, when I was in fifth grade, we were ruminating over the Parable of the Laborers in the Vineyard. During recess, I sidled over to our teacher, a nun in the order of St. Joseph and enthusiastically offered my judgment, “Sister, I think that Jesus was wrong on this one.” The nun made no effort to conceal her shock. As Jesus could never be wrong, just who was I to call his teachings into question. A wiser student would have apologized for his impertinence, marched resolutely back to his seat, and cut his losses. Unfortunately, a ten-year-old boy with a big mouth and a curious, undisciplined mind rarely recognizes much less embraces prudent strategy. Predictably, I doubled down on what I took to be my wisdom. First, I outlined the reasons, expressed exquisitely and articulately in my judgment, why I thought that Jesus’ conclusions were erroneous. Second, I accepted the nun’s challenge, and provided an account of how Jesus could be wrong: given by Catholic theology that he was at once the son of God and a human being, he was susceptible to mistake when and only when his human side was in play. Thus, he could be wrong when enunciating a parable if and only if during the rendering his human fallibility clouded his typically flawless divine judgment. This, undoubtedly, must have occurred during his account of the Parable of the Laborers in the Vineyard. You must remember that this encounter occurred in the 1950s, when the Catholic Church was even less accommodating to quasi-heretical utterances than it is today. The nun acted swiftly; she convened a meeting which was attended by the parish priest, herself, my parents, and me. This unpleasant religious intervention had only one agenda item: a host of authority figures would confront an incorrigible youth and get his mind straight. As always, my parents privately counseled a pragmatic stance: Maybe you are on to something, but do not get kicked out of school; make whatever atonements you must and get on with your education; for goodness sake (that was not the phrase they used), do not turn stubborn on this matter. So I sat, listened, was unconvinced, but feigned contrition, and returned to the good graces of the parish. The Church was always a sucker for a sinner who had